9/22/2006 3:37:00 PM The people are the most effective opposition From gay rights to the hospital plan, your protests are far better than mine
Tom Vesey Sun columnist
Somebody asked me the other day what kind of perverse pleasure I get out of criticizing everything and everybody all the time, and do I intend to keep it up forever?
I can't deny that a flick through the back issues makes it clear that my complaining far outweighs my praising. I'm always going on about what's wrong with Bermuda and the self-serving nincompoops who run the place so badly.
You'll rarely find me honouring people who are actually doing things right, and you'll rarely find me actually doing anything myself.
I'm all talk and no action.
More and more, I'm starting to think that maybe I can stop carrying on like this.
Not because criticizing the Government makes me a bad person, but because ordinary Bermudian voters - people whose voices are far more important and powerful than my own - are speaking up themselves.
There was the march on Parliament after MPs rejected, without even debating, a proposal to outlaw discrimination against gays.
There are the ongoing protests over building luxury homes on the Southampton Princess Golf Course, and low-cost housing on the Loughlands estate in Paget.
And there is the angry outpouring over Government's plan to build a big new hospital in the middle of the Botanical Gardens.
These protests stand out in my mind not so much over the particular outrageous Government decisions in which (I must reluctantly admit) thoughtful people can have different opinions.
They stand out because of the public's insistence that the Government be fair and open and honest, follow the law, and involve them in the decision-making before decisions are actually made.
Governments desperately want to get respect from the people. They surround themselves with the trappings of power - big houses and cars, special privileges and tiles like "the honourable".
But they often forget that people desperately want to get respect from their Government.
This respect is undermined every time a Minister tells them to "get over it", or tells them that they don't need to see building plans filed with the planning department, or that their views are irrelevant or are somehow ill-informed.
Does this make them bad people?
Does this make them "negative"?
No, it makes them good citizens, and the stalwarts of democracy.
The truth is that there are already plenty of people standing in front of microphones talking about how wonderful everything is, and how well the place is run, and how happy everybody is ,or else, ought to be.
The whole Cabinet does this, all the time, backed up by all the Government MPs, not to mention the legions of "yes" men and women that all Governments attract and cultivate.
When ordinary citizens don't like what's going on - or what's not going on - they usually roll their eyes and say: "Well, what can we do?"
They often fear (with justification) that they will be pounced on quite savagely if they speak out. Their motives are challenged, their credentials assailed, their racial biases and allegiances questioned.
So they shut up.
They get tired of standing up publicly against authority, and of trying to organize support, which is especially difficult in a small place like Bermuda.
Or else people think the Opposition can handle their complaining for them: It's what they're paid to do.
But an Opposition is ignored for that very same reason - its criticism is devalued because it's so predictable. No matter how accurate, the criticism is always self-serving: The Opposition wants to make the Government look bad, and win the next election.
And of course, when the people are silent the Government happily assumes the public backs them, or at least doesn't care enough to cause much trouble.
Which is why the people are far more effective than Oppositions, or columnists, if only they can be persuaded to speak up.
And keep speaking up until Government hears the voice of the people, and starts to take it seriously.
Then maybe I won't feel the urge to criticize and complain so much.
The truth is, for all the columns that I write, I don't have very much to say.
Just that this country belongs to its people, and the Government should be open and honest, and do what the people want it to do.
Which ordinary citizens, when they speak out, can say with far more eloquence and power.
