Can the moral morass of any society run so deep?

Sep 30, 2018 Features / Columnists, Freddie Kissoon

One of the instincts that inhere in humans is the purposeful reaction to life’s glaring depravities. Humans are shocked to the core when a little child is raped, a doctor’s neglect causes a baby’s death, a law enforcement officer/judicial official takes a bribe, a restaurant attendant is ill treated by an uncouth millionaire, a policeman brutalizes an innocent driver, the coffee lady is treated by her boss as if she is a slave, a wild youth pushes aside a blind, old lady on the roadway, and the list goes on.
Once humans lose that natural instinct to revolt against life’s shocking misdeeds, then, civilization is in trouble. In countless polemics in these columns, I have outlined my complete numbness at the extent to which we have lost our collective soul in this country. It is impossible to imagine it if you come from an era where that soul was the epitome of empathy and spiritual generosity.
There is no specific date one can refer to as to when Guyanese lost their inherent capacity to understand what is injustice and human cruelty. But it no longer inheres in them. There must be at least a quantum of sentiments still alive in any society that could be invoked when blatant wrong-doing occurs.
What is taking place in this country is so unimaginable, unbelievable, and inconceivable that it calls into question whether the society is not dead. There are some people out there who lament the contract of Exxon oil investment as if Guyana will die tomorrow if the contract isn’t renewed, as if Guyana will not survive once Exxon starts pumping oil.
You read these people’s writings and there is the definite conclusion that the oil contract is so bad that it is the only vice that presently occupies Guyana and therefore it is the only thing to talk about.
You read what these people have to say on Exxon and you cannot escape their conclusion that you must get on board because nothing else negative, bad, unworthy is happening in Guyana.
True, the Exxon contract is far from being a virtuous transaction but should we make it the obsession that others have to the point of exclusion of so many other depravities. My emphasis is on the “exclusion of other depravities.”
If my memory serves me right, Guyana has been a traumatic place fighting for survival long before they found oil. What happened to those destructive things that we should be writing about? Fair enough – the oil contract necessitates debate and should be continuous but do we have a one dimensional mind that only Exxon is worth denouncing? Aren’t there other vices to denounce that are a vexation to the soul of this country? The answer is yes and these things are many.
One writer who pontificates often on the Exxon investment actually quotes from the law to prove that a policeman can stop your vehicle when requested. No one has responded to such a frightening opinion, which is more deleterious to the future of Guyana than the lopsided Exxon contract.
These are the questions we must discuss constantly. A society is bound to fail if a policeman without the relevant circumstances or the exigent context has the power to stop a vehicle. If what this writer says is in fact the law, then let’s downgrade the Exxon debate and champion changing that law which is far more dangerous that the profits Exxon will take out of Guyana.
There is no question in my mind the laws of a country should empower a policeman to stop a vehicle. But should the law allow him to do without conditions? So arbitrary police behaviour, according to this commentator, is enshrined into the law? If that is so, I want to discuss that more than the Exxon contract.
No human indignity moves the people of this country. I will end with the education system. I wrote that my daughter topped her class at UG in her second year and was given an award; the sum was G$845. In today’s Guyana, that is $4US. In today’s Guyana, a flash drive that students use cost much more. In today’s Guyana, any book that a UG student needs will cost more. It was better to award a plaque or a famous book but certainly not G$845.
The man who heads the organization that gave the money wrote a letter and justified the amount and even observed that parents gave praise for receiving that sum in the past. To date, in a country whose university must have produced dozens of thousands of students, no one has seen the obligation to discuss that paltry sum of G$845. What a dead country!

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