Jamaican Till I Die!

Jamaicans are very selective when it comes to corruption, crime, criminals, and victim outrage. We love to pretend that we are outrage about corruption but for the most part we are not. Jamaica as a society normalized various aspect of corruption and crime, it is seen as an opportunity and all depends on who is the perpetrator, who is benefiting and who is the victim. I once wrote that I had to cut down all the fruit trees in my yard because I was tired of coming home finding people in my yard and up my trees. Based on the response I got from some, one would think I went into the yard of the people who were in my yard and cut down their food trees depriving them of a meal. I became the criminal for cutting down my own tree and they, the invaders of my yard became the victims. We give cute names to crimes we love Scamma and Choppa, and worship community dons, warlords, and Scammers because they are seen as providers for the ghettos. The people respect the fact that they came from nothin...

I often wonder what would be required for a person to feel Happy and Content. I know what makes one person happy and content, may not make another person happy and content. We might all live in the same country or on the same street or even in the same house, but we all have different life experiences, or we can interpret the same life experiences differently. For the most part our society conditioned us to believe that access to a continuous stream of increasing wealth and material goods is what is needed for a person to be happy and content. Children are being conditioned to equate material things with love. For example, some might think that they are loved, if their parents buy them the new iPhone and without it life is not worth living.   What I realized is that this conditioning is often the main source of our misery and unhappiness. No matter how much increasing wealth and material goods we accumulate. It is never enough and adds more complexity to our lives. The fear of...