{"id":2516,"date":"2019-07-03T21:49:50","date_gmt":"2019-07-03T21:49:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/westernmirror.com\/?p=2516"},"modified":"2019-07-03T21:49:53","modified_gmt":"2019-07-03T21:49:53","slug":"jamaica-the-paradise","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/westernmirror.com\/?p=2516","title":{"rendered":"Jamaica The Paradise"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Michael\nNattoo<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>It\u2019s\nbeen a while since we\u2019ve settled in and simply had a conversation, and it seems\nyou have the time now, so indulge me for a minute or two? Thanks. There\u2019s a\nquestion that\u2019s been on my mind \u2013 what does Jamaica mean to you? Does the word\n\u2018Paradise\u2019 still come to mind? Are we still a friendly people? That may not\nseem at all important to you right now, but I\u2019ll make a case for why it should\nbe. Truth is, I\u2019m too young to remember when Jamaica was \u2018paradise\u2019. And if I\u2019m\nto, against my better judgment, call it a paradise now, I\u2019d need to drastically\nredefine what a paradise is. Do you understand? I\u2019m sure others may share that\nsentiment too.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The point?\nIf we aren\u2019t who were, the path to forging a new identity to the benefit of all\nbecomes our only way forward. Any step forward not in service of that objective\nis a waste of energy and time, and will only see us ultimately being left with\nnothing as a result of not having any clue of who we are. Identities are\nimportant, not merely because they distinguish us, but because they define and\ndirect us.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>IS THIS\nWHO WE WERE?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Remember\nwhen we couldn\u2019t escape the perception of Jamaica being an island of Rastas all\nselling \u2018jelly\u2019 by the roadside? Let\u2019s not forget the signature \u2018Ya mon!\u2019 to go\nwith that \u2018Irie\u2019 image. Well, do you think that image remains now that we\u2019ve\nsince added \u2018Murder Capital of the Caribbean\u2019 to our name? How about that\nmultiple States of Emergency thing as well? That\u2019s not very paradise-like one\nbit. The obvious conclusion then, in light of all that rambling, is that we are\nin need of a new identity, desperately so. We are in need of one that reflects\nwho we truly are, just so that we can all march to the same beat, forever\nforward.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">We are what\nwe consistently do, so here\u2019s how our actions have been subconsciously shaping\nwho we are becoming \u2013 we no longer prioritize life as much as we do profits.\nYes, I know I sound like an overplayed tune with that declaration, but evidence\nof this is almost everywhere. Remember how we came to declare St. James\u2019 first\nState of Emergency? No? Well, crime came too close to our dollars \u2013 our tourism\ndollars to be specific. The impetus for that declaration was not primarily\nbecause of the over 300 people (locals mostly) we lost because of crime and\nviolence, but because had decisive action not been taken at that point, we\ncould have had a national crisis on our hands, effectively and permanently\ndamaging our relationship with Uncle Sam, and thereby damaging our precious\ncash flow. We couldn\u2019t have that now, could we? Fast forward to the State of\nEmergency being declared, and, sure enough, there came concerns about how we\nwould be perceived on the global scene. That\u2019s valid, but my position was that\nvalid concerns surrounding our global image were thrown out the window when we\nallowed crime to wreak the havoc that it did on our people. I could go on, but\nI imagine you\u2019ve already gotten the picture. Profits over people has become a\npart of who we are. I guess.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>WHAT\nWE\u2019VE DONE<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Here\u2019s the\nother thing we\u2019re doing \u2013 not caring enough about our tertiary education\ngraduates. Again, I sound like a broken record, but I don\u2019t care, to be honest.\nEach year, thousands of these tertiary level graduates are leaving these\ninstitutions, with ridiculous amounts of student debt, with not many options to\nsufficiently handle their new realities. Reasonable employment is not\nimmediately available, and so the alternative then becomes the increasingly\npopular call centre jobs. Complain about not wanting to work there, and you are\nforce fed with the one-shoe-fits-all response to being dissatisfied with\ngovernment employment options \u2013 START YOUR OWN BUSINESS. There\u2019s some merit to\nthat, but let\u2019s not ignore the existing hindrances to that process, despite\nattempts being made to solve them. Stuck between that rock and a hard place,\nour graduates turn their sights to either Canada, the US, or any other country\nthat will have them. Sometimes that works, and then at other times, it doesn\u2019t.\nShould we decide to stay here and \u2018tough it out\u2019, we are left to contend with\nthe reality that ultimately, innovation is not incentivized, neither is it\nsufficiently rewarded. Welp.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">There\u2019s\nmore to be said, but I think we\u2019ve rambled on long enough. This is who are\nbecoming. We are not yet there, which means there\u2019s a chance to change, but\nthat\u2019s the path we\u2019re on. We can change our future now, we can assume a new\nidentity, we can redefine our success, but we have to do it now. Jamaica is a\nbeautiful place, but until we fix what\u2019s wrong with it, it will remain a far\ncry from the paradise we, the younger generation, were told it was.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Michael Nattoo It\u2019s been a while since we\u2019ve settled in and simply had a conversation, and it seems you have the time now, so indulge me for a minute or two? Thanks. There\u2019s a question that\u2019s been on my mind \u2013 what does Jamaica mean to you? Does the word \u2018Paradise\u2019 still come to mind? [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2517,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7,10],"tags":[1371,21,233,67,31,30],"class_list":["post-2516","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-editorial","category-letters","tag-caribbean","tag-jamaica","tag-murders","tag-paradise","tag-st-james","tag-western-jamaica"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/westernmirror.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2516","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/westernmirror.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/westernmirror.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/westernmirror.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/westernmirror.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2516"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/westernmirror.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2516\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2518,"href":"https:\/\/westernmirror.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2516\/revisions\/2518"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/westernmirror.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/2517"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/westernmirror.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2516"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/westernmirror.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2516"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/westernmirror.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2516"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}