My son, the gunman
At the end of a bloody week (which has turned into a bloody weekend) there were two surprises:-
Murders are still down about 24% on 2005.
Four members of the Stone Crushers gang allegedly responsible for the horrific killings of five people in Norwood, St James have turned themselves in – after their leader was killed and a bounty put on their heads. I think wanted men turning themselves in is one of the most positive developments of the Lucius Thomas/Mark Shields era so far.
Two of the boys were accompanied to the police station by their parents. One had both his father and mother with him. So much for the idea that our most dog-hearted shottas are boys who are unwanted/abandoned/unloved…..
The traditional family
The Pope is in Valencia, Spain this weekend to participate in the 5th World Meeting on Families (the first was in 1981). The meeting of tens of thousands of people is intended to lobby for the rights of the Catholic family.
You can read the Charter of Rights for the Family here. It’s beautiful and inspiring, although there are some concepts in there that would certainly give our Minister of Finance a heart attack (like a family wage which would permit a man to support his wife and children, proper housing, good schools etc).
The whole event is a reminder that we Jamaicans should not blame slavery/poverty/ignorance too much for our existing family structure. Rich, long time Catholic countries like Spain, France and Italy are facing many of the same family problems as we are – single parents, divorce, lots of alienated young men – so much so that Pope John Paul II felt it was necessary to form this lobby group.
Unfortunately, in the future I don’t think that any one group or institution is going to emerge which will be able to hold families and communities together the way the Church used to do….oh, sorry, I forgot……we’ll always have the Almighty Dollar…….
Church family, school family, no family
The Gleaner, not known for its investigative journalism, published a story this week about the gang rape of a thirteen year old girl in the back of a van being driven by a Deacon of the Dayton Avenue Church of God. The rape happened in February 2006 and was videotaped by the participants – the videotape led to their arrest.
Here is list of adults who knew about the rape and declined to report the matter to the police:-
The Deacon
The Pastor of the Church (retired Appeal Court Judge, Martin Wright)
The mother of the 13 year old girl who was raped
An unknown number of church members
Please pray for all of them, and say a special prayer for the girl who has found out in this way that she has NO family and comes from NOWHERE…….
Corrected JULY 2009: Please see letter from Faith Innerarity below
It is libellious to state that one of the boys who was involved in the “gang rape” of the 13 year old girl is the grandson of the late Justice Martin Wright. He had no grandson involved in the incident. His grandson who goes by the same first name as one of the boys who was implicated in the incident, was a young child of about 4 or five years old at the time it occurred and does not live in Jamaica nor was in any way present or associated with what happened. The boy associated with the Dayton Avenue Church who was implicated in the case and who was subsequently freed by the court without charge, is the adopted grandson of another Church leader, and not connected at all to the late Justice Wright. That particualr youngman had captured the incident on tape (molestation -fondling e.t.c, of the girl, which although totally unacceptable was determined not to be rape – as was initially reported by the Gleaner – after close examination by the authorities). The matter of this erroneous reporting that the grandson of Justice Wright was involved in the incident was taken up with the offending media houses at the time and was withdrawn in subsequent news casts. You should also therefore expunge this error from your records. The matter will be brought to the attention of the daughter of the late Justice Wright, who is a Consultant Physician in the USA and whose son is being alluded to in your article as the ‘grandson’. Please ensure that immediate action is taken to remove this error from the article in the Section Family Focus. Before he died Justice Wright, a man of great integrity, was deeply hurt by this lie that had been perpetuated in the media. Now that he is deceased, his name should not continue to be tarnished in this regard. We need much more responsible journalism.
African-Caribbean family
Thanks to the rantings and ravings of Jean Marie LePen, the right wing racist leader of the National Front party in France, I’ve just realized why I need to enthusiastically support France in the World Cup final – there are 14 players from Africa and Caribbean in the 20 man French squad.
Zinedine Zidane (born France, Algerian parents)
Lilian Thuram (born Guadelupe)
Patrick Viera (born Senegal)
Claude Makelele (born Zaire)
Now if only I had remembered that before, I wouldn’t have been so upset when they sent Brazil home early…..
We’re all one family (for real !)
All humans alive on the planet right now are not only related but have a common ancestor. This has been figured out by a statistician with a supercomputer who reckons that our common great grandpa or grandma lived between 5,000 and 7,000 years ago…..
One love fe true.
“The Story of Mankind” (Hendrik Willem Van Loon)
“The Proper Study of Mankind : An Anthology of Essays” (Isaiah Berlin)
“Sly & the Family Stone – Greatest Hits [Epic]” (Sly & the Family Stone)
“Come On Get Happy!: The Very Best of the Partridge Family” (The Partridge Family)
“They’ Ain’t Making Jews Like Jesus Anymore” (Kinky Friedman)
“Can the Circle Be Unbroken?: Country Music’s First Family” (The Original Carter Family)
“The Ultimate Collection” (The Jackson 5)
[posted with ecto]
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Jamaica and the world 