Ralph Gonsalves was the much-needed diamond in the rough at the recent Caricom crime symposium. Quite frankly, I am glad that extended media coverage had been awarded to his contribution and not Prime Minister of Barbados Mia Mottley, who had nothing to offer but her usual vapid rhetoric.
For those who could not be bothered to tune in—and I certainly can’t fault anyone for not wanting to waste their time on empty promises—here’s a summary of Mottley’s contribution on the first day: we learned that back in 2018, the prime ministers of Barbados and Trinidad and Tobago met to discuss a crime-fighting plan. One of the “strategies” put forward was having customs and police officers throughout the region become familiar with each other. A team-building exercise was the supposed solution to crime. Thankfully, they never followed through.
Mottley de facto admitted that she has zero confidence in her own idea and knows that it’s impractical when she then went on to suggest a rotation of judges throughout the Caribbean, so as to avoid corruption in the court of law due to familiarity. Isn’t it ironic that familiarity among customs officers would bring fruitful results, but familiarity among judges would have the opposite effect?
It’s hard to take Mottley seriously unless you’re living in Barbados or liberal la-la land. But the Prime Minister of St Vincent and the Grenadines had some very noteworthy things to say, and if there’s anyone we should be listening to—at least on the issue of crime—it’s Ralph Gonsalves.
After an evening of listening to politicians recite everything the “social scientists” have been telling us for over half a decade, it was refreshing to see Gonsalves go against the grain and refute these claims.
The first is that poverty does not lead to crime. If that were the case, as Gonsalves pointed out, we would have had more crime in the 1930s, 1940s and 1950s. Motor vehicles almost exclusively belonged to the upper class. Even the poorest of families today have a sedan to get them around. Televisions were at one point the luxury of the rich; they are today the pastime of the poor.
It is the increasing desire for material consumption that leads to crime. The fast-paced turnover that selling drugs and gang life provide cannot be replaced by an eight-to-four. We know this from Edward Banfield’s classic study which was published around the same time “social scientists” started selling us their theories.
Unhappy people do not kill other people; they kill themselves. It’s a harsh statement that garnered an uncomfortable chuckle. But it’s what needed to be said. Gonsalves hit the nail on the head when he said no one in a court of law has ever testified that their poor upbringing or unhappiness forced them into a life of crime. Such shaky reasoning has always been prescribed by academics who make a career out of defending criminals and trivialising their victims.
It’s why Gonsalves’ calling for the death penalty was met with criticism. One such critic is Express columnist Orin Gordon, who recently opined that Gonsalves is wrong about the death penalty. What exactly is he wrong about? He never really told us.
Like most people who are against the death penalty, Gordon has no argument beyond it being “barbaric”. He gives a detailed description of an inmate’s final moments on death row. Would Orin Gordon feel equally saddened if he were to read a detailed play-by-play of the victim’s last moments?
Indeed, no one has the right to take someone’s life. But moral equivalency has no place in retributive justice. If that were the case, then the police would have no right to seize a car at gunpoint from a criminal who seized a car at gunpoint.
The death penalty may not deter crime but what it does is deter criminals from committing future crimes—simply because they are no longer alive to be repeat offenders.
On the topic of the death penalty, the only question is: does it cost us less to execute or house, feed and clothe an inmate for the rest of his life?
Adam Smith once said that mercy unto the guilty is cruelty unto the innocent. Bleeding hearts have spent the last 50 years showing compassion toward criminals. We’ve made teenage thugs appear to be helpless victims by calling them “at-risk youths”. We’ve given murderers second chances at life when in reality, we’ve only given them a second, third and fourth chance to commit murders.
Are we really surprised that crime is out of control when a bunch of intellectual morons can convince us that criminals have no control over their actions and that the rest of society is to blame?
Gonsalves is right. We are all responsible for our actions—criminals, too.
