Garth Rattray | Rescue our youth, save our society

Recently, a video recording of a schoolboy being brutally assaulted by two other similarly aged schoolboys was doing the usual rounds on social media. The video was very disturbing, but even more disturbing was another video featuring a young woman warning all and sundry not to be fooled by some of the children who wear school uniforms.

She commented that she was from an underprivileged community, and she explained how the dons use the youths as their soldiers (I’m paraphrasing). She related that the school-aged youths, whom we might see wearing school uniforms, are sometimes the ones making ‘duppies’, a colloquial term for killing people. She lamented that the good citizens, living in those communities, have to pretend to admire and accept the gunmen and gun-toting boys, or else!

Her tale was chilling and betrayed her chagrin with leaders who fail to realise the danger posed by youngsters who are recruited into gangs. They strive for recognition and the respect of their peers by killing as many people as they can. Her words painted a dark picture of the dangerous underbelly of our society.

While listening keenly to her tale and admonition I recalled a terrifying experience that a patient of mine had many years ago. He was driving several workers home late at night. They were working on a construction project. Some were in the cab of the pick-up with him, and the others were seated in the open back of the vehicle. They could not believe their eyes when they noticed a small group of boys, perhaps in their early teens, standing idly at the corner of Maxfield Avenue and Spanish Town Road.

Each of the youngsters held an assault rifle in his hand. The boys watched as the pick-up turned the corner and made its way up Maxfield Avenue, but then the driver overhead one of the boys say to the others, “Come mek wi test out di rifle dem.” The driver got low and floored the pick-up. The boys fired several shots at them, but thank God, they all missed. He never looked at youths the same way since that fateful night.

BLAME SOCIETY

I grew up hearing my father saying that he blames parents for the wrongs that their children do. Generally, he was correct, but I go even farther, I blame society for the wrongs that children do. It is bad enough that society ignores the underprivileged, and even blames them for their horrible situation in life. It is terrible that successive leaders and governments know full well that violence-prone communities have certain things in common like, the lack of father-figures in the homes, aggression and violence rampant in the tenement yards and surrounding community, poor amenities, deficient infrastructure, unmet basic needs, undereducation, poor work skills, abject poverty, angry, idle and jobless youths, dependence on someone (sometimes politicians and sometimes dons) for survival, and the influence or perhaps governance of criminal gangs.

Despite this crucial knowledge, generation after generation of disenfranchised Jamaican youths go down the same path of violence, self-destruction and wreaking havoc on the wider society. There is some intervention at the community level, but it lacks sufficient manpower, penetration, consistency, and robust financing. Instead, the security forces are increased, and our prisons become more overcrowded day by day. Spending more time, effort and money at the community level will preserve many lives, improve investment, and save even more time, effort and money on security. It’s sensible that we pay now to save a lot more in the long run.

BOON FOR THEM

The individuals and groups that survive by or benefit from violence know that recruiting youths is a boon for them. The brains and personalities of youths are not fully developed until they are about 25 years old. Adolescence is said to begin at 10 year old, but it does not end at 19 years old as was previously thought; it goes up to 24 year old. The average soldier is about 25 years old; however, in several ‘small wars’, child soldiers are about 18 years old.

Youths are attractive recruits for criminals and criminal gangs because children and adolescents are malleable, easy to indoctrinate, possess underdeveloped or misshapen morals, tend to feel invulnerable, are poor at assessing risks, and cannot appreciate the full scope and ramifications of the wrongs or atrocities that they commit. They are also less costly to maintain. In other words, they are easily weaponised, and disposable.

Additionally, some of the marginalised children and adolescents who grow up with the pain and misery of broken homes, abject poverty, a violent environment, all kinds of abuse, the possibility of facing starvation repeatedly, being uneducated or undereducated, and are unskilled or jobless, easily gravitate towards groups that offer leadership, acceptance, friendship, a family structure (no matter how bizarre), and the use of tools (firearms) that represent status, ranking, power, and the ability to unleash horror at will. In other words, vulnerable youths may become tools shaped by death and destruction that use tools to cause more death and destruction. Violence and death become a perpetual motion machine performing a vicious cycle.

The situation is made worse when underprivileged and suffering adolescents see others in society with prestige vehicles, nice clothes, shopping continually, appearing prosperous, happy and carefree while they exist, trapped in an interminable nightmare of misery and stress.

Jamaica can change; but, it will take bold leadership to ensure that we focus our efforts and resources on our disenfranchised communities.

Garth A. Rattray is a medical doctor with a family practice. Send feedback to columns@gleanerjm.com and garthrattray@gmail.com.