GUEST COLUMN – Fete in context

I READ with interest the purported comments of the Honourable Minister of Education Mr Ronald Jones in the Saturday Sun of July 24 with respect to the back to school fete. We can respectfully agree to disagree on his comments. I am one of the annual attendees of this event and would consider myself one of the first to sign up. I am proud of my school and I am proud of my uniform. For one night I have the opportunity to don my khaki, place my school epaulettes on my shoulder and wait for the goosebumps of pride to soak through my pores. It is an event where I can rekindle old friendships and friendly rivalries. For one night I am transported back to 1.2 or 2.2 or 3.4 and so on. Over the years we have gone our separate ways but that night we meet again and the friendships reappear as if there was no juncture. Although others may alter or disrespect their uniform as he alleges, I would not recommend that he paint all with one brush unless he was there.In addition for 364 days we can be friends, but for that one night I am Kolij and if you are Lodge, the “friendly” taunting and sledging are rejuvenated.I also noted the reference to the “nun” costume and allegedly making a mockery of the Catholic Church. I do not share that opinion. I don’t believe that one “nun” outfit can make a mockery of the Catholic Church. I believe that the Catholic Church does not need any help in this area and does quite fine on its own in making a mockery of themselves. I will not mislead you and imply that there were not any lewd, crude or severely altered uniforms on display. However, it was not the preponderance that the National Enquirer or wrestling match scriptwriter wannabes would have you believe. They say a picture is worth a thousand words. If he had an issue with the back-to-school fete, then a viewing of the Pork Lime “Guh Down” on YouTube would probably render him unable to utter any one of those thousand words.This event should not be taken out of context, nor should it be sensationalised or politicised to unnecessary or irrational proportions. It is simply an event put on by group of fun-loving individuals for the enjoyment of people. Fortunately we live in a society where he and others have the democratic right not to attend for what I would opine to be a misguided sense of the tenet of the event, while I opt to exercise my democratic right to brave the showers and large crowd to attend.We agree that society is in decline. However, the ills of society do not start with this one event with the “pillars of society” attempting to rekindle their youth. It begins with an archaic court system with slow-turning wheels of justice; archaic juvenile penal system; lack of opportunity for youth through inadequate sporting facilities or sporting programmes: inadequate or non-existent mentoring programmes for troubled youth; inadequate or non-existent apprenticeship programmes for youth, among many others.I have seen too many talented youths in our society succumb to the “block” way of life. If he took the opportunity to speak with some of these “pillars of society” he would see that in more than a few instances in their lives they came to a fork in the road where they had a decision to make. The paths they chose and those taken by their friends determined where they ended up today in society.We all need to work together to create obstacles to the more attractive, short-term path, which usually is a dead end with no way out. We need to make the harder, less attractive, long-term path more enticing in order to increase the numbers of our “pillars of society” and decrease the population of our incarcerated youth.I have rarely bought or read newspapers for over five years. If the report were not on the cover of the newspaper, I would never have bought the Saturday newspapers. Do you think it was coincidence that the pictures shown of the event in the newspaper, which he was apparently commenting on, was not representative of 95 per cent of the attendees?What will his comments be next week when pictures of Kadooment Day are published? I assure you that they will be worse than [the comments about] the back to school fete. Should we ban this as well? I invite him or other naysayers to attend with an open mind before casting aspersion based on a report in a newspaper. My uniform is pressed and waiting for next year.