Orville Taylor | Loose tongues and politics

The pen is mightier than the sword, but the tongue is even more powerful because it has brought down empires, many a great man, and locally, has caused scores of politicians to fall from grace faster than the saliva that is generated from its activities.

Unlike the ears, eyes, nose, fingers, and skin, one has to expose a cavity from within the human body in order for the tongue to be exposed. In Spanish there is a proverb that goes “En bocas cerradas no entran moscas”. Translated: “Flies can’t enter mouths that are closed.” “There are biblical verses that speak to the use of the tongue. A very popular one is Proverbs 18: 21, which states, “Death and life are in the power of the tongue.” It is a different kind of argument and belief system regarding speaking things into being. However, words, when cast in the right or wrong direction, can have disastrous effects not only on the targets, but often on the speaker himself or herself.

One can find several things to have fundamental disagreements with the stewardship of P. J. Patterson, former prime minister of Jamaica. Yet, perhaps it is because his speech cadence was so slow that one almost needed a calendar to time him. Nonetheless, he was very careful about not making loose statements, not only those that were potentially actionable in a court of law, but most importantly, he understood the need to preserve a democracy by developing and fostering a culture of civility and thus peace. Do the search. He has been the least cantankerous party leader in the modern history of this country, across all political entities.

Children born after the late 1970s, and certainly during the 1980s, are pretty much young birds who have absolutely no idea as to what a storm is. For those of us who were in high school and university during that period, Jamaica was in a virtual, yet undeclared civil war. The level of hatred across political lines was palpable and scary.

DEVALUATION

There had been such a devaluation of life, based on some warped notion of political allegiance, that by the day and hour, many of us were in mortal fear of persons who hitherto had been our friends. For example, as I watched my community become divided into two political garrisons, each populated by young men with whom I shared my failed romance with football, I prayed that the nightmare of political tribalism and careless speech would end. Maybe because I was equally clumsy with my left or right foot, it was relatively easy to recognise that a spade was a spade.

We were not free, however, to call it so unless we were willing to give away our three points on home turf. It was just stupid to hate someone just because he was a Labourite or despite him for being a Comrade.

This is no drama, and never mind the fact that history is often written or interpreted by men who have estranged relationships with truth. It is firsthand information because I lived it.

By the mid-1980s, we had descended so deeply into a political abyss that it was ‘normal’ for someone to be attacked for wearing green, red, or orange. So dark were the garrison residents that one could not give my broke Brookist friends a one-dollar bill with Bustamante or my out-of-pocket Sherlock bredren a Norman Manley five-dollar bill.

It was so bad that a reputed entertainer, who later sang a disclaimer song about not stealing the ballot box, was mentioned among a group of my friends as being a good foil for King Yellowman. In one terse four-word sentence, his political allegiance was pointed out by one of the top ‘shotters’. Sacrilege.

FORCED SILENCE

Even today, 40 years later, I still feel the dread and forced silence and we accepted that the subject was closed like a coffin.

Some of these current younger politicians never saw first hand any of this. Which is why they are so careless in their speeches, even ignoring the legal consequences of making unsubstantiated statements, which might be ‘true’ in the court of public opinion or even in the real sense. However, being legally true is a different kettle of fish, whatever the background knowledge be.

Outside of the likelihood of legal action, Patterson, one of the best and oldest lawyers in our history and certainly one of the most astute politicians, fully comprehended the impact of certain kinds of speech, whether true or not. His leadership ushered in a period of political peace.

As an old owl, whom the young pecharies seem not to be learning from, he understands the almost perfect correlation between being anti-democratic and anti-media and ‘electile’ dysfunction. Indeed, misplaced tongues which have lashed in attacks against the press, invariably succeed in making their parties lose elections.

We remember the attack on the Gleaner Company, in 1979, the purge of the Jamaica Broadcasting Corporation in the early 1980s, and the recent ‘duppy’ stories as political leaders faced off against either the press itself or particular media houses.

Onslaughts against the press or even journalists, even if apparently justified, simply never work out politically. This pattern has held since 1944.

So my word to the young birds: inasmuch as speech is free, listen to the sage. As our own maxim goes, ‘Cock mouth [often] kill cock’, and we must use our tongues wisely and appropriately.

Dr Orville Taylor is senior lecturer at the Department of Sociology at The University of the West Indies, a radio talk-show host, and author of ‘Broken Promises, Hearts and Pockets’. Send feedback to columns@gleanerjm.com and tayloronblackline@hotmail.com.