Trade unionist slams bad parenting
BLENHEIM, Hanover — A senior trade unionist has blasted parents who he claimed have neglected their duties, thereby contributing to the country’s crime problem.
“Ladies and gentlemen, listen to me good. You can’t have it both ways. You can’t get up every day and quarrel, ‘Oh, look at Jamaica. Look how people ah dead over the crime.’ How you think crime starts? The number one cause of crime in Jamaica is bad parenting,” assistant general secretary of the Bustamante Industrial Trade Union (BITU) Colin Virgo said to a round of applause from guests at a civic ceremony in Blenheim, Hanover, last Friday marking the 139th anniversary of the birth of Jamaica’s first prime minister and National Hero Sir Alexander Bustamante.
“Everybody ah cuss police — the commissioner, the superintendent. You cuss [Minister of National Security Dr] Horace Chang, you cuss [Prime Minister] Andrew Holness. Every damn thing is Andrew, Andrew, Andrew,” he thundered. “Although I did not study this at university, I am not an idiot. This is not academics, this is common sense. The parents them who raise their children properly, dem nuh have dem pickney out deh as cruff and criminals.”
His comments were met with “True sir, true, true!” from the audience.
Virgo drew on Proverbs 22:6 in the Bible to shore up his point that it is important to discipline children from an early age, reciting the words from memory: “Train up a child in the way he should go: and when he is old, he will not depart from it.”
He wistfully spoke about how things used to be when students worried about the punishment parents would mete out to them if the school called with news that they had misbehaved. He drew a sharp contrast to how things are today.
“The mere fact seh you mek di school haffi call dem, you don’t even business about what punishment the school is going to give, you used to fret about what yuh parents ah go do you. Now you have teachers afraid for their personal safety to go to school because children cannot be disciplined,” he said.
“I wonder if we realise what we are doing to our country. So, if you can’t discipline pickney, then how you ah go discipline big man? And, if you don’t grow the children the right way… then how you going to control dem later?”
To much applause, he launched a broadside against parents who instigate attacks against teachers when contacted about their children’s bad behaviour; as well as what he perceives as the negative impact of cellular phones that provide unfettered access to content that is not always wholesome.
“You see dat thing called phone? Is like we need to go back to the days of banger,” stated Virgo to an outburst of laughter at his use of the street name for the less technologically advanced mobile phone.
He also took a swipe at some youngsters’ seeming embrace of the idea, pushed in some sections of popular music, that it is admirable to be “back of the class and fully dunce”.
“It is not a good thing to be dunce. It is not something to boast about. It is not something to be proud of. Jamaica has some of the brightest people in the world. So, unnu stop this damn rubbish ’bout fully dunce. All of us are bright. All of us are talented at something. Find what your talent is and use it to the best of your ability,” urged Virgo.
He stressed the importance of a concerted effort, by the society as whole, to keep the nation’s children on the right path. Too many youngsters, he said, have chosen quick money over making an honest living through hard work.
He gave the example of a hotel being constructed near Falmouth in Trelawny where a contractor had a hard time finding workers after reaching out to six communities.
“Everywhere that he went and spoke to any group of young men that he ran into… literally all of the young men said to him every time he stopped and talked to them, ‘Bwoy, daddy, mi nuh too deh pon dat right now. Ah straight chappings’,” relayed Virgo.
“Ladies and gentlemen, if we as parents, if we as uncle and aunt and cousins and brothers and sisters don’t take charge of those under our care right now, the country is doomed,” he warned.
Guest speaker at the function, state minister in the Ministry of Culture, Gender, Entertainment and Sport Alando Terrelonge, had words of encouragement for the young people present, noting that like Bustamante they, too, can be a hero.
“Busta’s spirit also says to every boy and girl here in Jamaica that whether you are from the rural district of Blenheim, whether you are from the cities of Kingston or Montego Bay, your rise to fame, your rise to the status of hero depends not just on how you view yourself but how you view your fellow man,” he said, calling them kings and queens with the potential to lead.
“Your commitment to the development and the empowerment of others and the empowerment and development of your nation must start with that in mind — that you are destined to be great, not for yourself but for the greatness of others and your country,” said Terrelonge.