by Colin Hyde

I haven’t yet had the opportunity to look at ALL those invasive questions our MOE put to our students, the most concerning of which probed their young minds about gender issues and the extent of their sex obsession. A couple of the questions that were put out there also looked at dark issues. Remember we had an occult group that was targeting our young people some time back.

Some “adages” are half-truths, and some are the purest pearls. If you have time to waste (I know you don’t) you can think up all the not fully baked stuff you’ve heard over the years, but here it’s all about, ehm bizniz, so, we’re going with a stitch in time saves nine, and an ounce of prevention betta than a whole pound of cure. One stitch in time would have been to block that US presidential hopeful who retired to sell Viagra. Maybe, maybe it isn’t a bad thing, restoring vitality to old men, to save them from the scorn of veteran women who are out for revenge, but whatever virtue there was made ugly by advertisers who hawked their pill from morning till night on American television.

Decades ago PM Said told us about the dangers of television, and now there’s an even badder influence on the block: the handheld electronic device and the one that is placed on the lap. Daily our youth are being bombarded with sex, gender issues, and violence on the television and via the Google engine on their electronic devices.

I’m not sure of the age group that participated in the survey, if they were children (5-12) or youth (13-18), and I’m not sure it’s a bad idea to find out what’s going on inside their minds. Hmm, even an ostrich with its head in the sand knows that the innocence of our young ones has been punctured, and the only question is quantity, how deeply they are immersed in the bedroom and closet activities. Ah, the power of sex, it does, yes, draw human beings like moths to a flame. My, if our most sober people, our pastors, don’t stand a chance, how can the young energetic ones resist?

I told my dad, a voracious reader in his day, that he wouldn’t have consumed half the books he had if television was around when he was young. Eureka, I just learned something. Have you ever wondered at the simplnis coming out of American media and many of their modern artists? It’s television! Those people don’t read nearly enough.

But let’s not be distracted from this sex lure. Can you imagine how many children would be having children in this world with televisions and laptops if there were no readily available contraceptives? Prior to the army of 10,000, adults encouraged full engagement in sports, pushed a heavy dose of chores, and applied strict supervision over all activities where boys met girls, to keep young people in check.

What was God thinking when He doled out so many hormones? On first take, it looks like the only thing on His mind was procreation, the continuation of His prized species. I said, first take.

Ah, you remember those school days when teacher did random testing and you, who didn’t do your home study as usual, made yourself as small as you could and prayed she didn’t use you for her sample? Well, ehm, I would have passed on this bit coming up, if it wasn’t such a good reminder of the powerful forces our young ones are up against.

Mark Denison, in CovenantEyes, at the website covenanteyes.com, could be a fibber, but he said, in the story “Pastors and Porn: Why We Struggle and the Help We Need”, that as a senior pastor he struggled for 31 years with porn and sex addiction. Denison cited a 2016 Barna report, The Porn Phenomenon, which “found that 57% of pastors and 64% of youth pastors admit they have struggled with porn, either currently or in the past…[and that] around 21% of youth pastors and 5% of pastors claim they are currently addicted to porn – they’re living in constant fear of discovery.”

One of the things parents have to be extremely concerned about is old predators who are posing as youth on social media to get in on the lives of their young daughters, and gay predators who are scouting young males to find those who might be having some confusion. I said I haven’t looked at all the questions yet, only a few, and that I definitely wasn’t for the identification. That’s because we absolutely don’t want old predators and old gay predators in on the thoughts of our young people.

Jamaica taking the lead, again

Euronews said Jamaica’s broadcasting regulator had “banned music and TV broadcasts deemed to glorify or promote criminal activity, violence, drug use, scamming and weapons”, and the Jamaican government explained that the move is to curtail music that “could give the wrong impression that criminality is an accepted feature of Jamaican culture and society.” I like the Jamaican government.

Some Jamaican artists are critical, at odds with their government for moving to stomp down violent lyrics. They say the move “cuts populations affected by heightened gun violence out of the conversation…will do little to stop crime”, that “art imitates life” and their art is about “what is happening in Jamaica for real.”

I absolutely don’t buy art “imitating life” as a defense. From the website, uh.edu, I like Plato in the Republic who says, about art imitating life, that some “poets and other artists represent the gods in inappropriate ways” and that “art”…”can undermine the stability of even the best humans by making us feel sad, depressed, and sorrowful about life itself.”

The progressive human being imitates things that are good, and stomps down things that are bad. Glorifying violence, which is what we do in these songs the Jamaican government has targeted, is not neutral. Once upon a time cigarette makers put a lot of swag behind smoking, and it became the thing for all of us. If your report on violence glorifies it, which is what many of these songs do, you are adding fuel to the problem.

The television people bring the same argument of these songsters. We are only showing reality, they say. So, is everything that is real, good to show? Is it art to show someone picking their nose or making wind at the dinner table? Is it art to leave the bathroom door open when the girl isn’t going to use the shower? Is it art to sing lyrics that cheapen women or glorify violence?

Congrats to Jamaica for taking the lead. Many of these artists have wholesome songs. They should confine themselves to that. There are some lessons we need to heed, and one is, if you don’t have something good to say, and you need to say it, go and speak to the wind.

When you wear a mask it is for your sister and brother

I’ve got a special mask, one that works to protect both me and my neighbor, and I wear that whenever I enter very crowded areas or a business place that is air conditioned. It’s a gift, and I’m grateful for it. Bully, I don’t enter very exposed areas often.

All the warnings out there are that Covid-19 isn’t through with us, and that we’ll be hit with some nasty flu viruses soon. I hate a sticky nose and an eechi throat. No, we can’t have forgotten already what it was like when cases of Covid-19 were increasing daily, and the terrible impact it had on our economy. It makes sense that we keep our nose and mouth covered when we are out in public. When you wear a mask it is not for you, it’s for your sister and brother. If you love people, wear a mask when among them. Please, keep your germs to yuself.