Indiscipline, impatience and insensitivity

THE EDITOR, Madam: JAMAICA, UNFORTUNATELY, is overrun with indiscipline, impatience and insensitivity. The latter can be seen on our nation’s streets, on a daily basis: with taxi drivers speeding past long lines of non-moving vehicles at traffic lights; with taxi and bus drivers doing all kinds of insensitive, careless and dangerous manoeuvres, while speeding; with windscreen cleaners wiping windscreens at traffic lights without prior approval from the drivers of those vehicles; with street vendors selling in spaces and places they’re not authorised to sell; with music blaring from loudspeakers way past the time stipulated by the law; with male pedestrians carelessly crossing streets with an “I couldn’t care less that your car is headed straight towards me” kind of attitude written on their faces; with motorists nonchalantly throwing cups, bags, etc., out of their car windows and on to the streets, while driving; and with motorists recklessly, blatantly and arrogantly breaking red lights.

And, of course, in addition to the aforementioned list of stressors, Jamaica’s greatest threat to achieving Vision 2030 is the crime monster and, in particular, the high murder rate.

180-DEGREE PARADIGM SHIFT

If the Vision 2030 Jamaica National Development Plan is to be achieved – namely, “Jamaica being the place of choice to live, work, raise families and do business” – is to be realised, then a 180-degree paradigm shift will have to be made, because if the status quo continues, Jamaica will be the place of choice to flee from, to not work in, and to not raise families and do business in.

Indiscipline, impatience and insensitivity must be replaced with discipline, patience and sensitivity, at all levels of Jamaican society, starting with a strong media campaign, using billboards, ads, etc., along with implementing effective laws, and enforcing those laws, effectively.