Protest is a right; a must. But let there be temperateness and better sense

Sep 26, 2019 Letters

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DEAR EDITOR,

What unfolded last Thursday in and around the Pegasus should not be repeated in any form or to any degree. By any group in this country. Nothing else should have to be said.
Today, I am not interested in who is engaging in damage control; too late. I do not care who is pointing fingers at whom, or where the actual blame lies. Too pointless and keep the conversations at the same antagonistic intensity and in the same unconstructive place.
I embrace these postures because all there is to whatever public political (and media) post mortems ensue is maintenance of the endless cycles of low squabbling, lower instincts, and the lowest thinking that drags all of us still lower. There is not much depth left to go lower: ballooning sentiments and mindsets have exhausted what was there before. I sense a dangerous place.
Because what was stared last Thursday at the Pegasus in yard and room and table conveys the horrifying story of where we are as a society and as a people. We are far from either; arguably nowhere. Still, that was seen and had to be absorbed by adults and children; and across the political spectrum, the tribes, the nation.
If this is the best that we can present, then we might as well all be unseeing in blindness of to where we go. Not worth seeing. For in seeing, there would follow interpreting as to where we are and what could come next.
I humbly submit this, because if there is insistence of embarking upon and going down the road that is in-the-face, abundant in the partisan and physical and empty of the mental, then only menaces result. That road does not end, except in the harrowing places where such usually ends. Matters do not pause and stop but take on a life of their own; we have not the maturity nor the capacity to absorb the sharp blows. Such a life can be an uncontrolled one, an injurious one. Is this what is desired? I don’t think so. The better way must be followed.
I maintain that any opposition has every right to protest: vibrant, pressuring, searing, and eye-opening. But good sense should warn the local one that it does not have the depth, skill, stomach, and durability for protests of the nature displayed last Thursday. It is a short, quick step from cornering and crowding and shoving to the easy deterioration towards retaliating. Therefore, I strenuously urge thinking and rethinking of where events can rush in a heartbeat.
As an aside, in the United States, there has been great turmoil over the interrelated issues of racial policing, police brutality, Black Lives Matter, balance of force versus excessive force (Blue Lives Matter), self-defence, and the ubiquitous, sometimes inconceivable claims of ‘fear for personal safety.’ In terms of the latter, I think that that could have been easily and not unreasonably drummed up last Thursday. What could that have led to? And where would that have ended? Sober heads, and wiser calculations, must dominate. Remember: wiser calculations. Mobs have no minds; the predisposition to mayhem and violence are well-known all over, including here; and especially during political seasons.
I say this because if we have descended to the situation when the office of the head-of-state is trampled upon, through lack of respect and dignity due, then the state is headless. There is no controlling hand; a spectacle we become. If the claim is that government and president is illegal, then the argument could be made that so, too, is the opposition. Then the only people of standing would be the diplomatic corps; as we are all reduced to the level of refuges and illegal aliens. I take this further.
By the same thinking and token and postures so, too, is the flag and anthem. After all, these are the handiworks of one LFS Burnham, and he was a creature of rigging. Or does that not stand anymore?
Embracing the same yardstick, the much worshipped and trumpeted Constitution also must be without any sacred legal character, since it came out of the illegality of rigging. How can we, therefore, in good conscience refer to it? Rely on it? To do what: perpetuate illegality? From my perspective, this means that our entire existence is predicated on a string of illegalities.
Moreover, this reiterates that this supports the assertion that we are a people and land of whimsical, capricious men and no laws, since just about anything of substance -document, office, national emblems and virtues – possess the potential to be deemed illegal conveniently rather haphazardly, through fluid and inconsistent postures.
Protest is a right; a must. But let there be temperateness and better sense, all things considered.
Sincerely,
GHK Lall

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