Will the real PASSIONATE Jamaican youth please stand up??

Photo from
Facebook Youth Stand UP campaign

Passion cannot be turned off. You either have it or you don't. So says one of my coworkers. A lot of our so-called youth leaders' actions are indicating a lack of serious, sustained passion for any meaningful development in our young people.

I often wish to see even a glimpse of old-time Jamaica, not because I have a nostalgic Achilles' heel, but because I'd love to see the kind of fire and passion that drove a nation full of enslaved chattels to fight - to their last breath - for a cause they believed in. I'd love to do an autopsy on Jamaica's freedom revolution - find out what killed it, when it died and why.

True, we've come a long way and there may no longer be a need for drastic, revolutionary action the likes of which our forefathers displayed, but still, I don't think enough of our people - enough of our youth - realise that we're not there yet! We have not yet attained the pinnacles of human success for which our forefathers fought! Honestly, with our high illiteracy, unemployment and disempowerment rates, we have not even scratched the surface of where our country and society ought to be, or wants to be.

It's like the Gleaner's acting opinion editor, Andre Wright, said in his letter last week - we're not angry enough. We've become so passive and receptive of whatever the Government and corporate sector dish out to us that we're all sailing to high tide in a handbasket, whistling Bob Marley tunes along the way ... And when we do get angry, it's about issues that are ephemeral and temporary.

It's high time for us to WAKE UP and TAKE ACTION. And our young leaders ought to be charting this course. Unfortunately, as we have seen, they're too busy repeating - with alarming accuracy - the mistakes of their predecessors.

To this day, I don't know (and I would love to know) what the outcome of their private meeting with the ministry of youth's parliamentary secretary was. The media was not allowed in the meeting (a move I would love an explanation for), and none of these young leaders have come forward to disclose anything except that the meeting was 'cordial' - how informatively vague!

It's ironic, because they went into that meeting to represent the interests of this nation's youth. Failing to communicate the outcomes of this meeting with the very people they went in there to represent raises more than a few questions and eyebrows ... it calls method and motive into question.

I'm not saying that ALL our nation's young leaders are at fault. However, I can only speak about what I have seen and experienced. Transparency is necessary in leadership, and, balanced by a rational, level head, there MUST be that essential element of PASSION.

Now, will the real PASSIONATE Jamaican youth please stand up??