source: Jamaica Observer

published: 19 November 2023

Image Credit: Jimmy Chan at www.Pexels.com

When my father was born the Nazi party was already in charge of Germany. It was a political movement that preached racial superiority, intolerance, and open violence towards minorities.

During the lifetime of my cousin, who is only five years older than I, blacks in the United States could not legally vote. That right only became guaranteed after the passing of the Civil Rights Act in 1964.

In my lifetime, blacks in South Africa were not allowed to vote, participate in political representation, or move freely across their own country. That only ended when I was an adult in 1993 with the end of apartheid, and I am a middle-aged man.

The point I am trying to make is that equality and justice are relatively new realities, comparatively speaking, about 60 years old in mass application and in total application about 30 years — the market being when the South Africa apartheid Government was removed. That was the world's last rogue State.

So this is really recent when you consider that man has occupied this planet in our present form for about 12,000 years.

True justice is new, and more importantly, fragile. It is very dependent on the judiciary to be fair, logical and genuine.

In recent times there have been calls by political leaders, to include Prime Minister Andrew Holness and Senator Saphire Longmore, to resume capital punishment. This is significantly motivated by the recent violence against children.

The justice system knows that it is not perfect — none is. That's just life. No system is perfect.

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