Rights vs Responsibility...

Someone once told me that 'personal responsibility' lies at the heart of every wrong in our society and that until we as a people understood that concept and embraced it we would always find it difficult to undo the negatives that plagues us simply because they all shared the common bed of personal choice in the moment, and not only did I absolutely agree, I have been quoting him on that ever since.

Last night I decided to go to in St. James for something to eat and was having trouble getting into a parking space because of a woman and her young child who were standing in the road waiting for transportation. Despite the fact that she was aware that she was causing an obstruction and was affecting my attempts to park, she remained where she was defiant of my needs and ignored the problem she was causing. Not wanting to run her or her child over I had no choice but to drive away and park further up the road much to my consternation. Walking back to my intended destination all I was thinking of was telling her off like - “Well done, great job, teach him to be unmannerly and disrespectful to others, because surely all we need is another obstructionist in society” when the thinking part of my brain over-rid that thought and painted pictures for me of a scene in the middle of Western Main Road complete with extremes that included her pulling out a gun or a knife from her bag and attacking me, or of some unseen friend joining in and beating the crap out of me over what was really a clash of our two cultures over who had more 'rights.' I walked on in silence releasing my anger to the night air, cognizant of the fact that many bad situations start this way.

In discussing with many people the issue of the plannass attack on Gregory Wight by Shane Aleong/Gopeesingh, the conversation always returns to the cutlass being introduced to the situation  as the turning point of their opinion. Had he (Shane) spun around instead and 'cuffed' Gregory Wight down many agree that he (Gregory) would have looked for that based on his behavior. In a case of monkey knowing which tree to climb, many also surmise that, had it been a different type or size of person he (Gregory) would never have behaved the way he did and that he may have underestimated the impact of his actions and words to escalate the situation and that is a good point to note.  Others still point to the 'dutch courage' impact of thinking oneself 'right' being overtaken by the cutlass and asked, what if Gregory had been armed? The law places no responsibility on someone about to be attacked to wait to actually be attacked with a visibly menacing deadly weapon and had Gregory Wight pulled out a firearm and shot young Mr. Aleong/Gopeesingh dead it further makes the point I tried to make in my previous article, and that is we all have a responsibility to learn to live better in these times or risk losing life or limb over unnecessary trivialities.

My favorite book as a child was 'To Kill a Mockingbird' which perhaps explains my Atticus Finch tendencies and my need to always fight for the underdog. That said, I remain resolute in my position that Shane Aleong/Gopeesingh was ridiculously wrong in his response and that he should be made to answer for that, but I remain just as resolute that Gregory Wight, the very person whom I quoted above as having taught me the power of personal responsibility is no less culpable here, and, as the more mature and demonstrably sensible person he ought to have known better and quit after he made his point. Instead he animatedly goaded and harangued young Aleong/Gopeesingh for more than forty seconds as is clear to see in the video which led to the escalation, and, up to that point, Gregory Wight was behaving like a bully and he ought to be ashamed. This may well end up being judged on the merits of who was more wrong, but don't be fooled  for a second that either party was right.