Ronald Thwaites | About relationships ...

It is the texture of relationships which makes human life valuable to others and pleasurable, even joyous, to oneself. The sly, Anansi virus upon us now, has the prospect either of further debasing our transactional, class-based behaviour towards each other or impelling us to brilliant standards of self-respect and mutual regard. Which will it be?

Our choice is stark. For those living in the after-glow of the Easter remembrance, the ideal is living like the universal God /Human whose reckless love – erotic, filial and agape-ic all together – sacrificed all – even mortal life, to give rise to abundant – even eternal life for us all. Alternatively, as John Dominic Crossan puts it, “the supreme value of the American (read Jamaican) imagination is individualism ... based on economics and property”. After all, that’s just why we try to run things now.

Which road will we take after this time of purgatory? Which ethic will be the new foundation of national policy, of politics, economics and social relations? The 6-feet social distancing separates us bodily now. How will we choose to live, fully humanely, soul to soul, hereafter?

The epic period of Jamaican history, for me, is the time after Emancipation when, cast out reluctantly from the brutal-but-secure slave environment; pursued and encumbered with every resentment, disability and legal oppression – the inspiring grace of freedom caused people to cohere around land, family, school, church and community, to fashion a new way of life.

No need to romanticise the era, but it was heaven compared to what came before and, in many important respects, superior to what we have fractured and bastardised life to be like nowadays.

Two stories induced these thoughts. In the traffic line behind the souped-up ‘deportee’, modified to emit loud farts, a fast-food box and cup were flung into the middle of the road. Unwisely as it turned out, I drew alongside the sweet-boy and his girl, “Cho man, you can’t do that”, I said with a polite frown through the window. “Who you a talk to?” the guy responded. Then she recognised me. “Oh, a you! Dutty, teefin palitishan (sic). A you fi pick it up”! Mercifully for me, the light turned green and, with peals of scornful laughter, the couple sped away followed by the sound and smell that they think established their superiority.

Where did we learn that? What does that conduct say about civic relationships? Is it OK? How and when do you begin to correct such behaviour?

CURRENT TALE

Then there is the current tale of the 43 Jamaican seamen denied entry into the country of their citizenship. After all the explanations and excuses have been heard, the fundamental outrage of refusing a citizen from entering his own State remains of primary concern. That basal relationship should never be an issue. It is still not resolved.

Contrast what is still happening to Jamaicans at sea or stranded elsewhere, effectively rendered stateless, to the alacrity shown when Donald Trump threatens to deny us visas if we even but delay his regular delivery of Jamaican deportees. Tell me, too, that it is untrue that a private airplane with a favourite son’s family has been quietly landed recently while all others languish. What is the texture of fairness and compassion in the relationship between citizen and government that these instances bespeak?

What kind of people are we fashioning ourselves to be during and after the pandemic? Understandably, we are hearing a lot about the epidemiological aspects of our predicament. But, long after the virus has been caged, the social reconstruction will remain a challenge. Every utterance, each decision, every stimulus of influence and leadership needs to point towards an ethos, not of ‘bhuttoism’, arbitrariness and opportunism, but of humane values, equitable treatment and fresh collaboration.

The conservative, well-informed International Monetary Fund is predicting almost 6% negative growth in our already-sputtering and desperately unequal economy for this year. To withstand this, and probably more, let alone to reverse it, will require changed and renewed relationships at all levels. The new creation will take more than the right money.

Why not start now?

Ronald Thwaites is member of parliament for Kingston Central. Email feedback to columns@gleanerjm.com.