Letter of the Day - Problems as scapegoat

THE EDITOR, Sir:

I MAKE reference to your "Letter of the Day" in Friday's edition of The Gleaner. I am having a really good laugh! What a comedic letter! Treece Catlin has spoken why she has left Jamaica after 22 years. She claims she left for her sons' well-being yet in the same letter she clearly states that both she and her sons were surrounded by loving people, as she states "I do not think I will have the same friendships here as I did there." She says her husband has hope, but she does not. Yet she says she has "not given up on Jamaica yet".

What this dear lady has done is (a) broken up her family on account of her fears (b) taken her sons away from their father who could provide stable male support for them. I empathise with her based on the fact that she is not Jamaican, but surely how can the country be all that bad when she has experienced love and close family and friends here? With this I cannot empathise.

Horrible, violent people are everywhere; Jamaican people are experiencing horrific times. We are 39 years old compared with America's 225 years of independence and many who were in the USA back then (1776) are not around to see what that country has developed into today.

Point is, the family is a crucial part of the reformation of our island and Ms. Catlin has clearly put another setback in our moving forward by virtue of splitting her family as she proudly states "leaving behind my husband", essentially breaking her marriage contract. Is there something else Ms. Catlin is not telling us and using Jamaica's problems as a scapegoat?

May we not feed each other our fears and lack of faith - thereby sowing the very seeds that will put us under. Let us remind ourselves everyday that our National Anthem has provided us with the perfect words of prayer for our problems; our fathers of Independence had foresight. However if we do not have the faith to repeat those words then clearly we will be consumed with fear which is the fuel to all the ills we experience.

I am, etc.

TOTLYN OLIVER

c/o 1 Arthur Wint Drive

Kingston 5

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