We Know What Jesus Didn’t Look Like… Don’t We?

(This article pinned to top for Easter. Scroll down for newer items.)

I Grew Up Thinking Jesus Was A Handsome White Guy With Blondish Hair

That’s the Jesus of my youth that you’re looking at. Remember that picture? It was everywhere – even secretly in some homes where images of Jesus and the cross were forbidden (“Too Catholic” said a certain lady relative, but she had a secret one, doan ya know!) Maybe it was tucked away in a bedroom cabinet, or behind a door but at one time that picture was as common in Barbados as flying fish and cou-cou.

Handsome white guy, blondish hair flowing over the shoulders, chiseled features and that oh-so-thin Hollywood nose. At 6 years old that picture almost made me ashamed that I didn’t look like HIM.

Especially with my too wide, too dark, too damned big nose… not to mention my hair.

Beat Your Wife In Barbados? You Are Protected From The Police If You Live In A Gated Community!

We Call For The Resignation Of The Commissioner Of The Royal Barbados Police Force

This story is so unbelievable that we thought we’d wait a few days for the dust to settle to see what really happened. We waited, and it is far worse than we ever thought possible.

It is a wonder that the international press hasn’t picked up on it. No doubt if CNN did a story, the Commissioner of The Royal Barbados Police Force wouldn’t be able to show his face at any international law enforcement conference for years without extreme embarrassment.

First, we had the absurd spectacle of armed, uniformed RBPF officers allowing themselves to be physically searched at Cricket World Cup by unemployed housewives posing as part-time security guards. (see BFP’s article More Idiocy As Armed Barbados Police Officers Allow Themselves To Be Searched By Security Volunteers At Cricket World Cup)

Now this…

A female resident of the gated community at Millennium Heights, St. Thomas, Barbados, called police about a man molesting and threatening her in a domestic situation.

Armed uniformed officers of the Royal Barbados Police Force attended at Millennium Heights in a marked police patrol vehicle and were refused entry by the private security guards.

Only after FOUR DAYS and repeated attempts to enter the community were the police able to respond to the domestic violence call!

Further, it appears that the police are regularly prevented from entering the Millennium Heights gated community to serve legal papers or to arrest wanted persons.

Senior police management is attempting to put the blame on security guards for our officers failing to respond to a victim of domestic violence for four days.

As with the Cricket World Cup security guards, the problem is NOT that uneducated, part-time security guards don’t know the law. The problem is that officers of the Royal Barbados Police Force obviously do not know the law and their authorities – or are not prepared to act like trained police officers with a sworn duty to uphold the law and respond to victims.

The police allowed the gated community at Millennium Heights to put itself above the law.

Folks, I’m no police officer, but I do have some previous military experience and I can tell you that this is a top-down leadership problem with the Royal Barbados Police Force.

We Call For The Resignation Of The Commissioner Of The Royal Barbados Police Force

Our police officers obviously lack the legal training and confidence in their own authority to be effective. They also obviously lack confidence that senior management will back their decisions in action. Any domestic violence call is potentially dangerous and it is unforgivable that a female victim should be denied police assistance because the officers lacked knowledge and confidence in their powers and authority.

It is unforgivable that the police officers left the scene the first time, let alone on subsequent days.

Someone must be held accountable, and that person is Commissioner Dottin of the Royal Barbados Police Force.

This Situation Did Not Happen In A Vacuum – We Have No Rule Of Law In Barbados

Senior Management of the Royal Barbados Police Force has an attitude problem – they are weak and believe that they serve political masters first, and the rule of law second. This has filtered down through the ranks to the point where patrol officers are unsure that they serve the rule of law first and foremost.

Patrol officers obviously tried to process the Millennium Heights domestic violence call politically – worrying about repercussions from the upper levels or political masters if they acted with the rule of law and victim safety as their first priority.

This is an unforgivable situation and is indicative of the culture of fear, confusion and indecision that permeates our police force. Senior police management and the political hierarchy have our good police officers cowering like powerless eunuchs.

Commissioner Dottin, your time has come.

posted by Robert

News Links

The Nation News: Gates Must Open!

The Nation News: ‘No Policy’ To Stop Police

Barbados Government Blog Publishes Threats Against Journalist David Ellis – “We must guard our nation against such reckless use and abuse of press power.”

Official Government BLP Blog also warns the Barbados media that they had better “project the positives aspects of Barbados society at all times” or else!

Today, the official blog of the governing Barbados Labour Party published an article warning that “democracy is in peril” because radio journalist David Ellis read an email from a listener on the air asking Barbados Tourism Minister Noel Lynch how it is that he managed to become a millionaire while in government.

Surprisingly – or upon second thought – not surprisingly, the largest newspaper on the island also published the threats against the Barbados media. See The Nation News BLP Column – Ellis’ Blunder

(See our article Attention Offshore Investors and Transparency International – Corruption Stories Being Hidden By Barbados Media & Government)

The BLP Blog calls Mr. Ellis’ email reading a “dastardly act” and warns that the situation is heading for a court of law. It also warns the Barbados media that they had better “project the positives aspects of Barbados society at all times” or else!

According to the BLP Blog, Mr. Ellis is a “political surrogate” of the DLP – whose leader David Thompson is an “educated derelict”.

It appears that the BLP are happy with the name calling, but most uncomfortable when simple factual questions are asked about, for instance, where the money went.

Yes, we can see the BLP’s strategy. Keep everything at a name-calling level and then they don’t have to answer a direct question about where the money went.

The article ends with a Mugabe-like caution that “the politics of Thompsonmania threatens (the stability of our society.)”

BLP Blog Reveals The Despotic Attitude Of The Owen Arthur Government

The Barbados Government is now engaged in giving a lesson to the print and broadcast media and every journalist in the country – stay in line or suffer the consequences of loss of employment and an expensive legal battle supervised in the courts by Chief Justice David Simmons – former Cabinet member and good drinking buddy of Prime Minister Owen Arthur.

It is high time that the rest of world learned about the sad state of democracy in Barbados.

Here is the article from the BLP Blog. As you read it, imagine that you are a journalist with a mortgage and a family…

Ellis’ Blunder

Nothing in the world can take the place of persistence. Talent will not: nothing in more common than unsuccessful men of talent. Genius will not: unrewarded genius is almost a proverb. Education will not: the world is full of educated derelicts. Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent.

Calvin Coolidge

There can be no doubt that that dastardly act by David Ellis, which took place in the studio of StarCom Network on the Sunday’s programme of Brass Tacks will find its rightful place in the law court, thus making the matter subjudice. Paddy will not interfere with the due process of law.

The Rt. Excellent Errol Barrow once admonished poor people to stay clear of the law courts for fear that they maybe abused by the system. We have come a long way since then and poor people have been engaging the services of the courts with much success. We wish Minister Noel Lynch well as he seeks to defend himself from the abuse of a very powerful but irresponsible medium.

The incident raises serious questions about the real role of the press in developing societies like ours. The press, both print and electronic, is a very critical partner in building and shaping a wholesome society. Every word spoken, every picture shown, impacts upon the lives of people and because of its powerful influence in shaping those mindsets there must be as a natural course of their responsibility seek to project the positives aspects of our society at all times.

In every society where the press has taking on a political agenda and where it has used its overwhelming power to negatively influence public opinion those societies became disruptive, democracy came under threat and the lives of their people were thrown into total anarchy. We must guard our nation against such reckless use and abuse of press power. When the citizens of any country has to seek legal recourse from a media that has become malicious, politically motivated and disrespectful to the basic human rights of its people then our democracy is in peril.

When the late Sir Grantley Adams laid the foundation for free education, which was later completed by the late Rt. Excellent Errol Barrow, never in their wildest dreams did they contemplate that the beneficiaries of that great social revolution would today be the subjects of ridicule by a politically lost DLP. There is no doubt that last Sunday’s fiasco had its origin in the DLP’s butcher stall at George Street and that Ellis was only the political surrogate.

The DLP has been for some time engaged in a politics of innuendo in which charges of corruption is continuously leveled but never backed up by a thread of evidence. It should be clear to all that after all the millions of dollars of investment in our social capital any success shown by our people is attacked by this new DLP lead by a man who best fits Calvin Coolidge example of an “educated derelict”.

The question for Barbadians is this. How do you treat to an opposition party that wants to lead this country in a competitively regional and global arena where the accumulation of wealth and financial resources of our people is critical to developing new enterprises and expanding our pool of entrepreneurs? The success of our people has been the bedrock of our society. Today the politics of Thompsonmania threatens that stability.

It is sad when the party that Barrow built can now find itself in a state where its lack of vision and foresight now causes it to see itself and its members suspiciously.

… read the original at the BLP Blog (link here)

May God Bless The Folks At WordPress.com

One of our readers asked about some Google advertisements that sometimes appear on Barbados Free Press. We’ve never seen one, but we are told that they occasionally appear almost at random.

We understand that the advertisements are put there by the hosts of our blog at WordPress.Com. We have no control over the adverts, nor do we receive the advertising revenue.

They are the price of having a free and anonymous blogging service from WordPress.

As most of you know, I am not a religious man but I say “May God Bless the folks at WordPress” because without them and their free, anonymous service, Barbadians would have no place on the internet to discuss the government without fear of reprisal.

In fact, without the internet and WordPress.com, we would have no place at all to discuss the government in a public forum without fear.

Even as I am writing this, the government’s BLP Blog has posted a warning to the Barbados media that they had better “project the positives aspects of Barbados society at all times” or else!

(see BFP’s article Barbados Government Blog Publishes Threats Against Journalist David Ellis)

Once again, may God Bless the folks at WordPress.com

Robert

A reminder that if we can start a blog, you can too!

The learning curve is about 10 minutes and WordPress.com has dozens of templates to easily get you started. By the end of this year or maybe sooner, over a million folks will have their blogs hosted for free at WordPress.com. You can remain anonymous or not, your choice.

WordPress.com and other such providers have done so much to empower people and democracy. In the not to distant future folks like Matt and his friends at WordPress will be viewed as the heros that they are.

Start your own blog today by clicking on the wordpress.com logo at the top or here.