The Voice Of The Jamaican Ghetto: Incarcerated but not Silenced

by Adidja Palmer

hated black people so much that their hatred influenced the rules that black people had to live by. They banned gatherings and any talk of Black Power. Yes, you could not even have any books in your possession about Black Power, Malcolm X or any black freedom fighter in Jamaica. Sounds like elements of Apartheid but it was our black Prime Minister that did it and not a white regime. Not only did Hugh Shearer ban those books, but he also prevented the great author and lecturer Sir Walter Rodney from landing in Jamaica. Yes, the same Walter Rodney who wrote books like; ‘Grounding with my Brothers’, and ‘How Europe Underdeveloped Africa’. The ban was also carried out in High Schools and students could not wear pins indicating their support for the Universal Negro Improvement Association (UNIA) or any other similar black group. Black people got in trouble in schools in Jamaica for loving the Black Child. Things got so bad in response to Shearer’s and the government’s treatment of Walter Rodney that there were riots; properties destroyed, buses destroyed and strikes everywhere. A declassified US telegram that was reporting to Washington on the

These days of unrest after Walter Rodney’s ban became known as the Rodney riots. This was on the heels of the Coral Gardens Massacre where Rastafarians were rounded up like animals and killed trying to stand up for their faith. When Coral Gardens happened, Remember Bustamante (our National Hero) ordered that all Rastafarians should be shot on sight. Then Senator Shearer (before he was Prime Minister) asked that they be brought in “dead or alive.” Later on, as Prime Minister this black man Shearer instructed the police to “shoot first and ask questions later.” Another National Hero, Norman Manley also said, “These people – and I am glad that it is only a small number of them – are the wicked enemies of our country. I ask you all to report any unusual or suspicious movements you may see pertaining to the Rastafarians.” So there you have it, a man who banned black books in our black country is the man whose face is on the largest bill, the $5000 bill!!! In fact all these men who have spoken publicly in derogatory terms about black people without apology, have been honoured with being on the Jamaican currency at one point or the other – you condemned me but you have no issue honouring these people with probably the highest recognition an individual can attain in his country. Therefore if you bestow such an honour on black haters, why do you wonder who taught Jamaicans to hate their own skin – take a look in the mirror leaders! To this

day there has been no public apology to the Rastafarian movement for what these men did. The first two heroes you see when you walk into Jamaica’s National Heroes Park are the cousins Manley and Bustamante, who had very little good to say about black people. Norman Manley once prosecuted Marcus Garvey. So, yeah, Kartel has now revealed to the masses, there has been no love for the Black Child. Instead of blaming me, take a look at the facts. I have said it, let the chips fall where they may.

A case that is much appreciated by Kartel is the 1966 case of Miranda vs. Arizona. The issue of a citizen’s right to remain silent and to have a lawyer present when being questioned was brought to the forefront because of an unfortunate experience endured by Ernesto Miranda who was tricked into giving a confession without his lawyer present. Since Miranda won that case, the US now has Miranda rights where the police are required to immediately advise an individual of their rights when making an arrest. This is important because Miranda did confess to a crime but was freed because the US court felt his human rights were more important than a conviction. Another case appreciated by Kartel is the case of Texas vs. Johnson. Gregory Johnson, an American, decided to burn the American flag in protest against President Ronald Reagan and big companies in America. Ruling in Johnson’s favour, Judge William Brennan stated that “the government may not prohibit the expression of an idea simply because Society finds the idea offensive or disagreeable.” Based on Kartel's experiences, I find it utterly funny when a learned judge makes that declaration, because in Jamaica it is the opposite. The government will prohibit any idea or expression it finds offensive or disagreeable because, well, because it can. We are government, you are poor people and we tell you what to do. If you don’t like it, we arrest you – it is that simple.

We learnt a lot from this ‘Days of our Lies’ fiasco as we were informed that a good lawyer in Jamaica gets paid an average of $250 USD an hour or $20,000 JMD per

I hear that judges don’t listen to my songs. Correction, I hear judges don’t admit to listening to my songs because I am just too lewd.

Yes, the majority of Jamaican youths grew up in poverty or rather, destitution. Do you really know what destitution in a Jamaican household is? It is five people in one room, sometimes no light, no running water, not even toilet. I hate to be graphic but I want you to understand – diarrhea, period, cancer, baby diapers; your bathroom is a scandal bag, your back yard is the gully that stores those bags of refuse. Your dinner, if you are lucky to have dinner, is what uptown people serve their dogs. Children go to school barefoot, without lunch money, school books or bus fare. Old people with diabetes or high blood pressure simply bear the pain because there is no money for medication. Wounds turn to sores, sores turn to infections, infections turn to amputation, all because somebody could not afford a bottle of mercury comb that’s poverty Jamaican style

ghetto youths are? Imagine for some reason, a youth gets a good education and meets a young lady from uptown – do you have any idea what it feels like for him, knowing she will never marry him because the family will never accept her nuptials with a youth from the ghetto? Can you imagine three youths working in a supermarket and something goes missing from the storeroom. One youth is from Norbrook, the other Havendale and the third one come from West Kingston. Who is the suspected thief? It’s always the youth from the West. Let me give you one specific example that I know of. This youth was a good youth, high school educated, with a few CXCs. He coached preparatory school football, was president of a youth club and an active member of his church – but his crime – still a ghetto youth. He happened to work as a security guard at night to supplement his coaching income. Unfortunately for him, he never understood Babylon’s system of justice. His friend who owned a BMW dropped him to work one day. The owners/managers were so outraged by the vehicle he arrived in, that they reprimanded him, telling him to watch the kind of company he was keeping. To them, no law abiding citizen in that neighbourhood should be driving such a car. They did not care that the friend’s sister was a registered nurse in

New York earning a large pay cheque and had sent money back home to buy the vehicle. A few days later, a property that he was guarding got robbed by armed men. Miraculously the youth survived and went home counting his blessings, scared and shaken. He was awoken the next morning with guns in his face, roughed up and his home searched by senior members of the security company and the police. Why? There was no evidence to suggest any wrong doing. His supervisors said he acted courageously but that was not good enough – he was a ghetto youth with a rich friend – that’s the reputation that preceded him. He was forced to leave his job and eventually migrated. 23 years later, he is now in Canada doing well but he is still shaken at the thought that he endured such injustice just because he was a ghetto youth. 23 years later, the same owners of that company are lauded as business leaders and these are the very people that say that Dancehall is slackness. Wouldn't you consider this type of behaviour to be slackness? Go figure.

When we are charged with non–violent crimes like the use of indecent language, possession of a stick of herb, breaching the Noise Abatement Act or even some minor traffic offence, can you give us the opportunity to pay our debt to society while still earning a living? Perhaps, you could give us house arrest with a strong curfew, where we can go to work, make a living, feed our families and still pay back society. Maybe you can let us out Monday to Friday so we can still work, take our youths to school, help them with their homework, and teach them

how to take care of the house while we are gone. If you must incarcerate us, incarcerate us on the weekend. I read that Food for the Poor sometimes pays for prisoners to be freed where those prisoners are too poor to pay their own fines. Sometimes these fines are in the hundreds or low thousands, but ghetto people are too poor to pay for their freedom even when the courts grant it. Instead of waiting on Food for the Poor, couldn’t we teach those youths a skill? Have them earn some money then work for their freedom so they can go home to their families, now equipped with a skill.

watched in amazement on TV where police pressured a handcart man for selling fruits and vegetables in the wrong place. Illegal vending, illegal taxi driving, operating this or that without a license (in Society’s terms) is translated in the ghetto as – “mi nah stop hustle fi di paper” – a phrase I keep repeating in the song. I also try to explain in the song that sometimes ghetto youths are trying to say to Your Honour – “mi waan food pon mi plate like any odda man.” When I have a car and my youth is hungry, I might ‘run a roast’ in the night as a taxi driver to see if I can make a little money to buy something so when the children wake up there is breakfast. Society please tell me, which is morally worse – letting the youths go hungry in the morning or try to see if I can run two trips before you catch me? If you catch me, I am a criminal – so what’s my choice, bad father or criminal? News flash: some ghetto youths would rather go jail than see their child hungry. Society, please understand the choices we are faced with in the ghetto when you are drafting your laws to punish us.

There are other times that a man might ave ah bredrin who can get a case of beer on consignment. If it is summer time and the new school term is approaching, do I get a case on consignment, go to Sumfest and make some sales or tell the children that Daddy is upholding Babylon’s law at all costs so no back to school money and no school September since I don’t have a vendor’s license? Or when my conductor’s license expires, do I allow National Water Commission (NWC) to cut off the water and allow my daughter to stay sick with a 101 degree temperature, or do I try to conduct on a bus without the ID in order to hustle some money so I can take her to the doctor or buy two children’s Cafenol and then renew my license? If she has a fever and I don’t have the fluids to keep her hydrated, she could die Your Honour. So what should I do Mr. Judge? Should I risk you convicting me or have my baby girl suffer – you tell me.

terminated for no legal cause or our intellectual property rights get violated because the Big Man takes advantage of us and justice is out of our price range. Tell me how can we as small business owners ever get justice with the current cost of legal advice? We have already established the range of what a top notch lawyer charges – up to $4,000 USD for a single day’s work. Yes, I have documented proof – $350,000 JMD for a single day’s work. Let me explain something to those of us who like to think, “a big company can’t crush me because I have my lawyer”. Learn this reality. Big companies usually have a big law firm that they work with and a lot of judges are their former partners or classmates. These companies will show up to court with Junior Counsel and two other members of the firm – so that’s about $100,000 per hour that Mr. Big Stuff is paying out of his petty cash account. Then, that big law firm hires another lawyer who they “instruct” for about another $50,000 per hour. Hopefully, you have your calculator because this is how it actually works. You may think that the worst thing is that your one lawyer going up against this powerful group of attorneys but that is the least of it. Why is this point important? Because when you go to the court with your one lawyer against this company,

parish where we can file a complaint, pay something reasonable and still keep our service until the matter is resolved, so our children can live comfortably while the matter is being investigated. Build it please; we have many educated young people on the Gaza who would love to work there. Build it please; we don’t want our people to be accused of stealing service. Build it please, so we as Jamaicans can live in more humane conditions with a little less oppression. Thank you Judge, Thank you Minister, Thank you Society...I now ‘rest’ the ghetto youth’s case in your hands and await your response. Ghetto court adjourned!

Yes, in the song, I singled out the Broadcasting Commission because they are the biggest threat to my ability to put food in my children’s mouths but there is so much more skulduggery that goes on in Jamaica that I could spend every moment of everyday for the next 10 years writing letters and it still would not be enough time to write to the varied and numerous government agencies that keep up sheggery. Babylon, you have so many double standards; your policies are classist – sometimes racist – in their foundation, you perpetuate injustice on ghetto people with a brutal and heavy handed and you are corrupt. To put it in a Jamaican way, the powers that be in Jamaica are nasty, dutty and evil and kip up bay almshouse pon poor people. It doesn’t make sense for us to sugar coat the thing and put it lightly, let the truth be known.

I apologize if I am too impassioned here, but my blood boils when I think about these things. Imagine a country with so much poverty, suffering, unemployment, crime, homeless kids, destruction of our environment, and the best Babylon can do is single out dancehall music and try to make it seem like it is the sole cause of Jamaica’s problems. What about the financial sector? What about the health sector? What about the education system, national security, social welfare? All those things are copasetic and it’s just dancehall that is an issue? How dare you come with such lies and deception to the people! And to make matters worse, you not only do it locally but you do it internationally as well. It is as if it is not enough for you to spread this propaganda across the island so you fight us regionally and internationally, causing a situation where your own citizens can’t even get a visa to perform in a neighbouring Caribbean island and earn foreign currency. This money that we earn overseas is brought to the island and spent in the economy to better the lives of Jamaicans. If that is not wickedness then what is? You think I don’t know that gun tunes and sex tunes are not the reason you all don’t like Vybz Kartel? Now, this is the reason right here; you banned me the moment I became extremely popular

because I am not afraid of speaking the truth about what I see being ...

not smart enough to see right through you. You see, it’s perplexing, that you don’t even know what Dancehall is yet you want to set the rules. You’ve never spoken to the chicken man to have him tell you what Dancehall means to him. You’ve never ask the hairdresser how many of her clients did their hair on the weekend because they were attending some Dancehall event. Did you stop the Japanese that you saw at the airport coming down with a sick amount of yen to spend pon wi dance dem and ask them why they are coming to Jamaica? Do you know about Front Line, House of Leo or Four Roads street dance where police invaded the dance like they just landed in enemy territory? Have you ever stood up in a corner dancing with your girl only to see Operation Ardent arrive on the scene telling all men in merina, suede shoes and dark glasses to go up in the truck and everybody else to go home fast? Have you ever paid your money, walked into a dance, bought a round of Guinness and police come bruck di selector needle? Remember they used to raid Front Line on Red Hills Road in the 80s when Exodus was playing on a Tuesday night. Then they pressured Super D out by Harbour View on Sundays, Lees in St. Thomas, Bodyguard in Clarendon and Dancehall everywhere else. So please, do not make it seem as if all of a sudden Vybz Kartel’s music is the reason you have decided to raid dancehall. If it was so, why did Buju Banton sing “Operation Ardent” in the 1990s? Just to clarify, it is not always in the...

Consider this people. If the government was sincere about promoting morality in our music, they would take just one of the Income Tax bills that they assign to a single Dancehall artiste and build a venue for Dancehall setting the rule that no one under 18 can enter the building! This would be extremely profitable for the government and allow us to promote our events without fear of being shut down, but this has not happened because it is not a moral war it is a financial war. Dem nuh want ghetto youth to have house and car.

“atrocity”

Carnival so that young girls less than 10 years old can gyrate in a contest! I consider that sick and I think that Kiddies’ Carnival or even putting the term Kid and Carnival in the same sentence should have been outlawed. However, I want to make it very clear, if this whining is being done by adults they should be allowed to get on as bad as they want because they are big people and nobody should be able to stop consenting men and women from doing what they want to do together as long as it is within the confines of the law. All I am saying, the same rules for uptown people’s music should apply to ghetto people’s music too.

idolized in movies. When Jamaica Broadcasting Corporation (JBC) was still the only channel, people used to wait up on Monday nights to watch Karate movies and Bruce Lee was as big a hit as the song “Everybody Was Kong Fu Fighting”. In Jamaica, we host nude weddings on Valentine's Day at a popular hotel and the world knows about it. Most pharmacies and some book stores have a wide assortment of pornographic magazines – local, international and even in Spanish. So how come with all the pornography with raw sex on the TV, dirty magazines in book stores where kids shop for their school books, war movies, the karate flicks and nude weddings, the only moral concern in Jamaica is my song Romping Shop, causing an emergency ban on all songs with the word ‘daggering’? It is not a moral war it is a financial war, dem nuh want ghetto youth fi have house and car.