Are humans inherently flawed?

Jul 12, 2012 Features / Columnists, Freddie Kissoon

I entered the University of Guyana as a history major. In my first year, I met a Catholic nun, Professor Mary Noel Menezes. Her course for freshmen in history, “The Philosophy of History” was a fascination for me because if UG had a degree in philosophy I would have opted for it.
I came to love philosophy after working as an eighteen-year-old in the Michael Forde Bookstore where I stole some books in philosophy, a confession in later life which brought scorn from people like Ralph Ramkarran and Dr. Henry Jeffrey. As I am on the topic of book-stealing let me say I have no regrets.
I’m glad I stole them. They made me a better human being, and permanently influenced me to participate in the changing of the world for the better. Karl Marx once wrote; “The philosophers have interpreted the world, the point is to change it.” I can say those books have caused me to stay away from organizations and government that violate the rights of fellow human beings. I don’t know if one can say the same for Ralph Ramkarran and Dr. Henry Jeffrey. But I guess that is my opinion.
Sister Mary Noel Menezes was a powerful teacher of philosophy. She introduced us to materials that looked at the role of choice, free will and imagination in human existence. On those questions, I had already made up my mind. I was exposed to Jean Paul Sartre’s version of existentialism and the existentialist take on life is that we, by our own violation, make our decisions that decide our fate and destiny.
However, when you look at actual people in real life events and when you trace the course of history, you are perplexed (and perhaps tormented) that Sartre may be wrong and free will and choice may just be philosophical categories and nothing else. In other words, they don’t exist in human society.
I was forced to write this article here after reading the Stabroek News column of Dr. Henry Jeffrey of July 4. Before we get to the irritation I endured reading Jeffrey’s lamentation, let us rewind the tape to the first quarterly issue of 1994 of the PPP’s publication, “Thunder.” Here is what Jeffrey wrote; “At present, the Civic is made up of some thirty persons. The Civic does not have a separate forum but meets once a month or as is necessary.
“There is normally a formal agenda which can include all aspects of governance, questions of matters of major importance, motions to investigate any issue of national life. The Civic, then, is not a static handful of people but a growing institution with major access to power.”
The person who wrote those words stayed in the PPP Government for seventeen years. After a national blow up with President Jagdeo three years ago over the EPA prepared by the European Union, Jeffrey was asked to resign. Dr. Jeffrey wrote that he was offered the position of Ambassador to Suriname but after his request for additional resources were denied, he left the Cabinet.
Here are the words of Dr. Jeffrey on July 5, 2012. Interesting to note his caption; “Where liberal voices are muted, greater atrocities result.” Jeffrey wrote; “What these developments tell us (authoritarianism in the PPP and PNC) is that it matters not which party we belong to, we must urgently demand their reform.”
My question to Jeffrey is whether he demanded reform for the seventeen years that he was in the CIVIC sharing power with the PPP. What happened to the other thirty persons including Dr. Dale Bisnauth who like Jeffrey wanted to see reform in the present PPP?
My point is that human beings always seem to demand changes in governments that are dictatorial but only do so when they are out. Why didn’t they change their entities when they were inside these machines?
Often you hear a former Prime Minister advocating that his/her successor pursue an iconoclastic course on a matter of national importance. But they never ventured in those uncertain waters when they had the opportunity to do so.
When he was Chancellor of UG, Dr. Bertrand Ramcharran had dinner with me and the student leader Jason Benjamin. We told him as Chancellor, that he should not accept a party official, Dr. Prem Misir being Pro-Chancellor. He got annoyed and threatened to end the conversation.
Three years after he resigned, he wrote in his Stabroek News column that a party official should not be Pro-Chancellor of UG. Someone else has to do what Jeffrey and Ramcharran hadn’t the courage to. Where does that leave free will and choice?

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Are humans inherently flawed?

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