NOT too long ago it took us a long time to catch up with news. We would hear or learn about events or happenings long after it had passed, but today it’s about instant news.
When anyone arrives at whatever scene these days, it’s about recording and ensuring that the whole world knows in record time and long before the media gets information about anything, the news is usually out.
In some cases that could be considered good and also bad as well. There are a lot of gruesome scenes being forwarded, sexual behaviour is rampant, intimate relations have become public. In fact, nothing happens in the dark anymore — and what is most interesting, there is no need to pay for reporting: it is all free and you get it in record time.
Also, everybody has an opinion, everybody has an idea of what should be done to this or that person and everybody knows who is doing what, or what should be the remedy or results of everything.
Wow, how things have changed. We know everybody’s business and we even know who is telling a lie or is bluffing, no matter who is issuing the release, because everybody always knows more about what is happening than even the people issuing the press releases.
We live in interesting times. Every other person is an amazing thinker or analyst. But despite all the ideas and opinions, everybody is talking, but still saying nothing. Every subject is discussed, but still no solutions. Everybody has the answers, but nobody is committing to meaningful change.
Sadly, there is no shortage of ideas or solutions but things remain the same. Every new headline is worth talking about, but we wait for the next big headline because views continue to change, and as we change, I wonder if it is for the better or for the worse, and if we truly care — or if it’s all about just knowing.
Another fact is that we know and see when things are going wrong or in the wrong direction, we know the risks, we know the outcome of bad planning or poor decisions, yet we sit back and say or do nothing.
We are contented to go with the flow or sit and wonder what’s next, or if disaster will be forthcoming, or who will clean-up the mess, or who should take blame.
Well, I might not enjoy admitting it, but if the truth will set you free as they say, I must say that I still cannot make sense of all the nonsense that’s happening in the name of news these days, so I, like everyone else, am sitting back and going with the flow.
But while sitting back and flowing with the flow I will also issue an early warning: ‘Tanti Tanto!’
Like the popular Jamaican song of way back in time, all I can say to Saint Lucia and all her sons and daughters today is ‘Take Warning!’