Cherish our sons and empower them with self-worth

FRIDAY, JANUARY 25: On Wednesday night, my wife and I drove into town at 9:30pm to catch a movie.

We got there late and had to return home. As I walked in the door my BlackBerry went off and after looking at the text, I dropped my phone and ran to my son’s door to make sure he was alive. I am sure this action was repeated by many, if not every parent of a young Bermudian male.

A double murder? We have somehow become immune to the news of single murders.

My fellow Bermudians, I implore on you to leave partisan politics out of this equation. Neither political party can stop this self-inflicted genocide.

I look at the senseless comments on blogs, and I ask, why are our people so insensitive to the victims’ families?

If time and time again, people on the blogs call these young men animals, what do you eventually think they will see themselves, and their next potential victims, as? You bloggers are no more than a cyber-crowd cheering on gladiators to maim and/or kill each other.

Through you, these young men feel they finally have become celebrities or are on their way to becoming celebrities, as they read your remarks after a murder. You are as much a part of the problem as the people pulling the trigger.

Without going too far, I will say that it is foolhardy to expect or demand the police to “kick in every door” to find weapons. As a soldier, I can assure you that this is a pipe dream. It is easier for us, as a people, to find the young men who need self-value.

Over the last five years, 70 per cent of the murders have taken place within a two mile radius of where I grew up as a child.

Some 70 per cent of the victims are either relatives or people whose relatives I know. Yet I have no words of comfort for them as I feel I am only using the words I used for the previous family. I can only give them an emotion filled hug as they prepare to bury a son. I see the anguish, even on the faces of my cousins — the Augustus family — as they give service after service.

As a parent of three sons, I have spent agonizing days and nights wondering how I can save my sons from becoming a statistic? Do I lock them in their rooms? Do I ship them abroad? Do I arm them to protect themselves?

The bottom line is, like you, I have no answers to the 1,000 questions that every parent has. My only answer is that like you, I will hug my boys more, I will love my boys more, I will talk with my boys more, I will cherish my boys more.

Not even those involved in this gun culture fully understand the whirlwind they are in.

There are no slogans I can offer you today. I can only tell you to love all of our sons.

When you see or hear of a young man wavering from the right path, reach out to him and talk to him. Most of these young men only wish to feel that they are a part of our society.

We seem to have collectively fallen into the trap of caring more about getting people to move here to work and live for 10 years, than we care about those who have lived here all their lives.

I am not discounting the need for international business, yet I am reinforcing the need for attention to be spent on indigenous brothers.

No investment or business plan in Bermuda is going to work unless we have peace and safety.

More importantly, our young Bermudians must know they must stop the mayhem and become part of the progress.

They are the ultimate stakeholders of Bermuda. The more we forget this part of the equation, the more they will remind us how quickly they will tear it apart.

No prison officer can, nor should, show our sons the guidance and discipline that must start from home. Spend time with our sons, love them and cherish them. Empower them with self-worth and positive initiative.

That is where we start. Anything less than that, is where we will end.

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