If you talk to your grandparents, the will tell you that we are much better off today then they were back in their days. Many of us however, politely disagree because we are more restless, more complaining than ever. The reason for this is very instructive. Back then we had to band together as a people; today we strive to prosper as individuals, so we fail to see the bigger picture. There are implications for this.

As individuals the gaps and excesses of wealth are growing but we must keep the focus on the very small differences between us. Leaders must emphasize this. We can not afford the consequences of having restless followers. Let us look at an illustration of this. The Jews and Palestinians are the same “people” occupying the same land. They are very successful people where ever they go but in their homeland there can be no peace. A very small aspect of their religious and historical development has them restless, very restless. In fact they are fighting forever over very small differences that do not make sense to most of us here.

Why the restlessness?

We continue to ignore most of what is common to us as a people or a nation and focus on the very small matters and differences. Ninety –nine percent of what makes us Dominican is ignored for the less than one percent that make us different.

We thrive on differences naturally! Human beings are all the same except for 0.01% of the genetic code that makes us different; black or white, tall or short. We focus keenly on those differences. We fail to see the bigger picture.

People, nations, the world celebrate differences! That is what we learn easily; that is what we are taught systematically. We can only blame our leaders for this. What is the sense of what we want to do? Maybe we have wrong issues in mind. Politicians thought the people would come together once the elections were over. They underestimated how organized the divisions created in the people were. Even the special appointments afterwards made no difference to the mood of the people.

Dominica Stage College students did not recognize the first Minister of Dominica, Patrick John, as he stood in a political Science class recently. So what are we teaching? What have been learning?

We are taught that the system works better when have competition. War is the ultimate competition! In reality however, we rather have comfort zones. Certainly, these comfort zones need to be established in the right quarters. The ghetto kid, the single mom, the single dad, the failing small business, the boat-less fisherman, the struggling farmer, the bankrupted student cannot be left our. This important minority remains isolated, remains restless. The media love this. That is what they have been portraying because that is what sells, that is what we want to read. But it does not have to be this way. Think about it!

Source:This article was posted in The Tip! – A free publication published every Wednesday and distributed through-out Dominica.

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