KINGSTON, Jamaica — Entertainer George Nooks has said that there is a connection between today’s popular music and the surge in violence currently playing out in schools across the island.

Speaking with Observer Online at a Mother’s Day show held on Sunday, Nooks shared that musicians and the types of song lyrics they produce are a contributing factor to the country’s growing violence problem.

Nooks noted that while entertainers were not solely to be blamed for the problem, he stressed that they were culpable.

“It does, it does have a connection, we not blaming it like hundred per cent [on musicians] because if the mothers and fathers was partaking in taking care of their kids probably, they wouldn’t drift away as far,” added Nooks.

Nooks reasoned that part of the problem was that entertainers profited from songs with content that may have a destructive effect.

Stopping short of labelling the content of popular songs as ‘murder music’, he used the occasion to encourage the nation’s entertainers to produce some more positive songs.

“I would ask them for more positive music… I mean, I guess that’s what bringing in money to them and such forth but sometimes you haffi just stick to the goodness,” added Nooks.

Most recently, Education Minister Fayval Williams while speaking during the sectoral debate stated that she believed there was a correlation between lewd music and the uptick in school violence.

Increasingly, there have been calls from certain segments of the society to ban entertainers whose lyrics glorify murder and violence, similar to the campaign which led to the signing of the Reggae Compassionate Act.