Dear Editor,
I have a healthy regard for social media and its many pluses. There is significant respect for what it makes possible. There is also guarded circling around because, like a striking snake, it can overpower and devour. The negatives overtake the many great positives, which says something about the dark side of social media, and it is why I distance myself as far as possible from it. I manage, notwithstanding the deficit. My fears are again coming to pass, from what is coming to light. At its bottom, social media is about who said what and did what when. None is spared; almost all on the button. Press the button, and its world of followers is never more alive. Dumb people mostly. Arrogant people usually. Lying and slandering people get a high from it. A survey was conducted awhile back in Uncle Sam country, and one finding was that over 60 percent of social media contributions was false or slanderous. Welcome to Guyana, where I believe that it is closer to 80-90 percent.
There is the thrilling and inspiring advantage of anonymity, which means no accountability. At least, that is the story in Guyana. The nation’s immaculate Cyber Crimes Unit housed in the even more impressive Guyana Police Force is rendered impotent, irrelevant, and insipid. It knows, but it doesn’t know. It should act, but it is restricted from acting, depending on the identities of the complainant and the perpetrator. In essence, social media in Guyana is a first-class ticket to denounce first, degrade second, and destroy last. That is, if there is anything left to convert to ashes. Here leading politicians are vilified. I regret that the world is this circular, this narrow in Guyana. There is no delight in ranking men of the day being dragged deeper into the sewer. Deeper because they were already there. What Guyanese should discern is how the past returns to infect the present. Incitements from high places were given to low people to take to social media and blastoff. They did. Now look how things boomeranged. Or, as it is said in Guyana, waan haan caan clap. Or duh fuh duh nah obeah. So there…
My problem is that when guardians of the law are named and embarrassed, then whither the reach of the long arm of the law. Yes, there will be a determined trekking to the realms of tribunes to make wrongs right, but the toothpaste cannot be put back into the tube. Continuing with the Colgate (or Pepsodent) illustration, social media was a tool and a chance for Guyanese to freshen their breath, to cleanse their language, and to guard against the nips and nags of cavities that can flare into explosive abscesses. Ouch, indeed! Especially when there is the constant treatment to an endless barrage of sweets. Yeah, there is the need for some serious brushing up in this country. A complete overhaul is definitely called for, in my book. This thing is bad, and Guyana is in a rotted and ramshackle place.
I am standing on the sidelines (several layers back for sanity), and the trickles that come to me are enough to send on the next plantain or gilbacka boat back to America. No! I am not trying to be Eddie Murphy. What I am attempting to convey in rock-bottom language, instead, is how the worst instincts and impulses inside are given the freest rein to insult and assault and stuff salt in eye and nose, and who knows where else. Guyanese used to be a disciplined set of people (Yessir, Nosir, Mr. President, Hon Minister, the Learned Member). Along came social media with vilified and vilifiers going at it toe-to-toe. Throw in that torrid pace bowling duo of politics and race, and it is Christmas and Thanksgiving daily, usually in that same order. One doesn’t have to go to Mongolia’s Ulaanbaatar to locate the remnants of the Golden Horde. It is right here with unchained viciousness, and unlimited bloodletting to prove.
Today, it is beyond doubt that most Guyanese have a point to prove, and they include anyone with one phone, or one computer, and one finger along with one brain cell, no matter how fractional that cell. In leaving I am pondering whether social media in Guyanese hands is a pandora’s box, or the head of the Gorgon. It has turned anyone in its vicinity to stone. Me, I am praying, and it is not for me. Like they say -God bless Guyana. He already did, didn’t he? What else do Guyanese want? A damn nanny to teach some sense, and respect for the good things in life? Like social media….
Sincerely,
GHK Lall
