“Being poor or even living in Laventille does not cause one to engage in crime or any other behaviour, but they make certain lines of conduct easier or more difficult. When poverty or unemployment is treated within the context of strong families and an active socialising church, crime and vandalism …
Read More »Daly Bread: Angels driving in their limousine; Shadow, flooding and citizen humanity
The thing about liming long is that you have a first-hand memory of plenty things. I saw ‘Shadow’, in a tent, in his first year of performing. I think it was Port Services club but what I am sure about is that I left repeating: “Kitchie boy, water in yuh …
Read More »Media Monitor: Maraj and Maharaj tell why we jamming the criminals but we still in a jam
“Why should people be sacrificed so as to allow others, wrongdoers, to prosper? That is what we are being called upon to do, colleagues, […] What we are being called upon to do by a small clique of people in the country is to support wrongdoing, pretend not to know …
Read More »And God liberated woman: Afryea finds genesis of today’s gender struggle in Holy Bible
In the King James Version of the Holy Bible, Job 42:12-15 reads as follows: So the Lord blessed the latter end of Job more than his beginning. […] He had also seven sons and three daughters, and he called the name of the first Jemima, and the name of the …
Read More »Super G Meets Don Quixote: CoP lives up to his bloody boasts; but to what end?
As much as we may wish it to be otherwise, Gary Griffith is not the answer to our prayers but the symptom of our problems. In our greatest moment of fear, we have manifested and brought him to life as protection against the very forces we have created. Like Phoenix, …
Read More »Dear Editor: Self-motivation and high IQ—not prayers or parents—are key to academic excellence
“[…] It is clear that the successful children did not need to be told to study hard but did so without cajoling and certainly without boofing. “So, contrary to claims that anyone can be a top SEA or CSEC or CAPE student—which is logically impossible anyway—the attributes of a minimum …
Read More »Dear Editor: Do tougher measures work? TTPS should not be judge, jury and executioner
“The heart of criminal law is the degree of protection afforded to the accused… The Police cannot be judge, jury and executioner. “[…] It is seductive in its logical simplicity but the idea that criminals are persuaded by ill treatment, stiff sentences or police killings is a middle-class delusion. It …
Read More »Gibbons’ new calypso drama: Voices from the ghetto to sing de chorus?
What, I asked myself, might a Part IV of “Sing de Chorus” look and sound like if the dramatist decided to write one? What quality material would he have to draw on? Would any such production be what a recent Express story about an upcoming concert called “an ode to …
Read More »“Talk less, empathise more and rough up less”; advice for CoP Gary Griffith
“[CoP] Gary Griffith’s penchant for engaging mouth before putting brain in gear will erode the goodwill we all have in store for him. He must understand that thinking more, talking less, empathising more and roughing up less, will help overall to soothe a nation in crisis and pain.” In the …
Read More »Dear Editor: “A sublime yet subtle poet […] who defied conformation”; Ode to Shadow
“He was a sublime yet subtle poet who danced to his own drum, who wove bass lines—allegedly from Hell, but so transportive as to refute that assertion—that underpinned, pulsed through and propelled each call that he made to his beloved people.” The following Letter to the Editor on the passing …
Read More »Media Monitor: “Disgrantle” resident and “prioritarise-ing” minister star in messy flood coverage
The one thing that disaster should never be is haha funny. Regrettably, nobody bothered to tell TV6. Or sister OCM station i95.5fm. On yesterday’s 7pm TV news, there was this guy from Greenvale fuming about the inadequacy of the $15,000 grant that Government has offered certified victims of last weekend’s …
Read More »Casting the longest Shadow: how the Bassman from Les Coteaux shook up calypso
As the homage continues, your pores raise as the senses are met with the incomprehensible but instantly recognisable “Ah be a ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya wha-wha-wha.” Who else but Winston Bailey could open a tune with his own blend of words and letters as a melody, to float upon the one he has …
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