Towards a better civil society

I was motivated to write this piece because of what I see as an increasingly high level of hypocrisy pervading our society. Before the October 7, 2002 elections, I held the view that whichever of the two main political parties (UNC and PNM) wins, Trinidad and Tobago will come out of it as the loser, and I have seen nothing as yet to change that perception.

My opinion was based, without favour, on the stupid and unproductive tit-for-tat racial politics of both parties, and most significant, a divided civil society that encourages and perpetuates the nonsense that has now entered a new phase, identified as the “blaming game” that has also entered the media call-in talk shows where objectivity and impartiality are scarce. We need political parties but what we need are democratic parties with a transparent vision and nation-building policies that can offer a united people’s government which will serve the interest of every class, creed and race in our society.

Civil society has not as yet faced the reality that both parties have worn the corruption boots while in Government and one is just as guilty as the other of political racism. Being subtle about it does not change the policy, and the danger of political racism is that it also serves as a cover for the people who practice class discrimination to remain unobserved. The performance of the Government and the opposition beg the question: Is party supremacy more important to the nation than genuine national unity.

I am not in a position to say we have terrorists in our land but I do know that we have too many people in this troubled rainbow country who have lost their sense of reason. When will these two parties and their supporters realise that nothing substantial in the interest of TT can be achieved without bringing the nation together as one in unity. I pity the poor and less privileged who innocently play an active part in perpetuating self-centered politics that is not in their best interest. Politically correct slogans can be meaningless if the will to make them a reality is not there. Are we in “a time for healing” or have we passed that stage?

Politicians cannot escape blame for the state of the nation today but my sense of reality tells me that the main culprit is our divided civil society, who just don’t get it. The society is helpless as a result of partisan politics that makes it incapable of supervising its servants who have assumed the role of masters. Because of its obsession with politics of division, society is unable to be true to itself and get to the root of problems and analyse them without bias, instead of viewing them merely from the service.

For example, every time there is a reason to start another debate about the madness on our roads, numerous suggestions come up such as: teaching defensive driving and issuing certificates. It is not that our drivers cannot drive or read road signs, the problem is more in our carefree lifestyle. The madness is in the heads of drivers who are “Trinis to the bone” (who abuse defensive drivers) manifesting the nation’s culture of indiscipline and lawlessness - maintained by the lack of law enforcement that has much more to do with our political culture than meets the eye.

We have litter laws but Mr and Mrs “Trini to the bone” who observe that the garbage truck did not pick up their garbage will solve that problem by putting it into their car and drive into some other residential area and dump it. They do it because lawlessness are in their bones. Adults complain about the lack of discipline among our young people without accepting responsibility for the problem. First of all, we must not put all the blame on parents. Civil society as a whole must share the blame for creating the social environment in which the parent and child lives. For example, while some of the less-privileged but responsible parents are trying to keep their children on the road of moral and spiritual values, they face the enormous task of protecting them from the impact of negative influences pervading society. The truth of the matter is that the adults have shown them the way and continue to do so. So what should we expect? If we are to solve a problem, we must first know all about it, especially its beginning. We have to go back into the past and study the nature of the relationship between parent and child as it existed at that time.

If we clinically examine the past, seeking hard facts, we will discover that mothers were the main pillars of “spiritual and moral values” in a society that shared those values and were conducive to proper upbringing of the nation’s children at that time. A time when, in the absence of the parent, the teacher, neighbour and even total strangers acted as the long arm of parental love and discipline. We must then investigate “when” and “why” those values began to fall apart. From my perspective, the trail will most likely lead to the beginning of the social revolution known as the “Women’s Liberation Movement” that had an unavoidable impact on traditional family values and customs (the class and status of the women in society who started and led the revolution is another story.)

As a result, the number of working women in TT began to rise, creating the need for child care facilities - especially among the less fortunate - that did not exist, leaving many children unsupervised on a daily basis. The movement energised the career woman and gave new life and meaning to “single parent” that added to the problem of child neglect. While the women’s movement may have started the ball of child neglect rolling, the momentum was taken up by modernisation in the name of progress. Television became the most sought after “babysitter” that had a foreign accent.

Modernisation and the new adult way of life impacted in many ways on the behaviour of our youth population. As our nation moved rapidly towards a connection with the modern world, adult society became obsessed with materialism that took us beyond the neglect of our children into a new culture underlined with contradictions, double standards, immorality, violence, sex and promiscuity to which they (the youth) were exposed via cable television, video games, bogus role models and trips abroad.

Related to the neglect of the nation’s children is the education system that has always been void of a level playing field, and that is putting it mildly. As far back as 1982, a former Government Teachers College Principal, Elodie Bissessar, told graduates at a ceremony that the present emphasis on quantity education without the corresponding qualitative value merely emasculated the system and hindered productivity, and that the mad rush for paper qualification depersonalised education, leaving little room for the personal development of the child.

She said the education system is too obsessed with examinations and the child today is bombarded with competition and his/her concept of success and getting ahead is directly opposed to “co-operation” since he/she must always strive to be better than the other child. She went on to say that in the haste to provide quantity education, the society had destroyed one of the purposes of education which is “to allow the child to live and live with people”.

The politicising of the education system is another problem. However, space will not permit me to bring to the fore the numerous ills adult society has inflicted upon youths of our nation. The bottom line however is that we as a people must be realistic and work towards uniting our divided population to gain the strength to resolve all our problems that threaten the nation’s future — Prayer gives all our problems hope but not solutions. To find a solution we need affirmative action.