Commentary

What were they thinking?

YOU KNOW, I think I am beginning to figure out just what is wrong with us here in Jamaica, why there is so much crime and so many strange occurrences. Over the past few weeks I have been noting with much interest some types of behaviour being displayed by the citizens of this country of ours, and I have come to the basic conclusion that we have all gone mad.

Now, you're all probably saying that I am the one who has lost it and not the people of this country, including some of you reading this, but bear with me while I share with you some examples that led me to my conclusion.

I was in a meeting the other day discussing stories being earmarked for publication when a story being filed by a correspondent came up for discussion.

A man and his common-law wife in St. Catherine were involved in a dispute and knives were brought into action. The man was stabbed in the neck and began bleeding badly. So what does he do? He takes the knife, stabs the woman 17 times, and even though she was obviously dead by then, he fetches a hammer from his toolbox and beats her brains out.

Weakened by the wound to his neck, he would later collapse and was subsequently taken to hospital.

Now, was that any rational way to settle a dispute with someone you share your life with? If that was the case, each of us would all have more than a hundred partners during the course of our lives. What I don't understand is that after he stabbed her 17 times, didn't he believe he got the message across that he doesn't like being stabbed in the neck? Did he really have to drive his point home with the hammer?

Then there was this woman on television a couple of weeks ago, talking about her predicament in the wake of the passage of Hurricane Dennis. I don't remember if she was from St. Thomas or St. Andrew, but I do recall that she gave the television crew what was to me the quote of that week.

Fix the river?

This woman and others live either along or near a river course, and using her own words, whenever it rains her place of business and home get flooded. She then suggests that Government needs to fix the river. Fix the river?!

What, are PJ and the PNP now God?!

What she and her community members need to do is move. I just don't get why we think the way we do, why we think Government needs to do everything for us, including thinking. This woman lives in a river course, what does she expect to happen when it rains? Does she truly believe the river is going to change course just because her shop is there?

Last, but certainly not least, when Dennis was threatening the island, I was on my way to work; after all somebody has to keep you guys abreast of what's going on during a storm, when it came to my attention that when most people were battening down and bracing for the worst, there were people setting up stalls in the middle of New Kingston and along Oxford Road.

The stalls were laden with cigarettes, oranges, beer, stout and sweets. My question is: what were these people thinking, or were they incapable of thought? Did they believe that Hurricane Dennis was the name of a flight coming into the island laden with people craving beer and cigarettes, Australians perhaps?

What I am even more curious about is what would have happened if the island took a direct hit, would these vendors have blamed Government for whatever misfortune befell them, or would they lay the blame squarely at the feet of their moment of madness.

Now you see what I'm talking about. The big question now is whether there is a cure for our now very apparent mental ills.