Learning the lessons of Respect: they’re freely available to view in The Gambia
It is impossible to overstate the importance of ‘on de way comin’ in the lexicon of Gambian cultural ways. There are various elements to take into account:
*on de way: could mean (a) I just started the car (b) I’m on the road but thanks to the Herbert Lumbago flyover also bein’ on de way comin’ I’m in the same place on the highway that I was quite some time ago (c) I’m coming but a difficult problem arose in Senegal so I’m coming from Thilogini not Brufut
*comin’: means only ‘I am on the case when it comes to arriving at some point’. The word plays no role beyond client reassurance: not only am I on the way, I am comin’ – which got to be better than bein’ on de way not knowin’ whether I comin’ or goin’ on account of one spliff too many.
*the follow-up question: (1) Where are you now? Not worth asking, as the answer will be ‘comin’ (2) How long will you be? Usually evokes ‘not long, I on de way comin’ now’ (3) You suggest a time scope by asking “An hour?” . You get, “Noooo”. Reassurance again, but (4) You ask, “Ten minutes?”, and slither down a snake to “I on de way comin'”. Another false dawn.
But it is the way of things in The Gambia, and I’m happier adapting to it than demanding (as a relative newcomer) that things should change. That said, I don’t think one should present the approach as in any way ideal: I merely feel that it is their modus vivendi – and if the country can thrive in the future as a haven for those in search of Laid Back Cool – it’s none of my business. I don’t indulge it to destruction, but I do respect it.
The average Western knee-jerk dogooder Democrat Hard Labour ideologue will doubtless see that opener as racist white supremacy Hate Writing to get a cheap laugh. Most of them are frantically busy 24/7 demanding action now on ending everything they despise – warmth, faith, irony, fun, tolerance and above all Respect. They vastly prefer their dystopian paradise in which there is NO TIME to waste, because conservative scum, religious bigots, bourgeois wankers, revisionist jokes and patronising Nazis are on the rampage everywhere and must be crushed, smashed, humiliated and (insert suitably genocidal verb here).
The Respect thing is celebrated by them via the tactic of spitting on anyone who questions their Weltanschauung. Spitting, sadly, plays at best a walk-on-crowd-member part in the Great Play of life.
I have learned, in the years preceding my upcoming Diamond Jubilee, that a “comfortable” person will never gain the respect of socially, mentally, physically, culturally, religiously, racially and educationally disadvantaged groups by dancing ever so go-lightly around the broken glass of their difficult existence.
One gets respect by giving it where it is warranted.
Not celebrating it, and – most important of all – not indulging it. Indulging undeserved demands for privilege is the ultimate cultural auto-blackmail.
And yes, BLM, I am talking about you…and LGBTQ, and Stone Age Islamists, and presstitutes, and everyone else engaged in the ruthless pursuit of unreality for their own ends.
I score well in Gambian integration, because life here is REAL, and because everything about it supports my long-held support for Radical Realism.
In this tiny yet astonishingly diverse Nation, one can be Real about silly aspects of religion, race and politics without the social tedium of tongue-biting. A person can write, sing, do comedy and belong without attracting the venom of hypocritical virtue-signallers. Let’s face it, if you have to use flags to signal your self-styled virtue, you’ve failed before you start: don’t say it, just do it.
Here, a key element that gives everyone permission to be open about what Western media call “sensitive” issues is the establishment of a personal behaviour pattern that shows respect without ever having to use the R word.
Bax – the night watchman at my apartment block – jokes with me all the time about skin colour because, like me, he finds it hilariously funny that white folks want to be darker while many black people want to be whiter. He chides me by saying “Yo never gonna catch me up” and I respond by saying, “I will if you spend some time moonbathing”. OK, it’s an ancient Dick Gregory joke, but it is timeless.
However, I couldn’t have that relationship without having listened intently to his wisdom, and he to mine, for some time now. That’s genuine mutual respect because it isn’t affected on either side.
Compare and contrast now the racial and religious mutual respect and tolerance of The Gambia with our scarey geopolitical mess.
The unelected American/EUNATO élite has no respect for the civilised traditions of Mother Russia, and so it is happy to exploit the brainless Nazism of Zelensckyyyesque Ukraine as a means of vicarious destruction. Therefore we have war.
The same Shallow Billionaire US State is now trying to convert its fear of massive debt and overdependence supply problems with rival China into some kind of Boy Scout mission to vapourise Evil. It has zero respect for what Beijing has achieved in transforming a Xenophobic mediaeval serfdom into a genuine rival to the Dollar hegemony. Therefore we have war.
The largely unelected upper ranks of the depraved European Union are hell bent on showing how Brexit has destroyed the UK economy – because without the UK cash cow, none of the Frankfurt numbers add up. The EU has no respect at all (in fact, it hates with a vengeance) the 400-year seafaring success of what was once the British Empire. There exists an enmity based largely on Franco-Bruxellian truculence about every last invented “rule” Britain is alleged to have broken. Therefore we have war.
Move on with me a little now to the consequences that stem from a lack of respect when it comes to the 7.9 billion of relatively ordinary folk like you and me who have to put up with all these narcissistic onanists.
Right now, it’s hard to tell any difference at all between the US Democrats and the Mediaeval Catholic Church. And it’s getting harder to see much difference between the Western MSM’s brainless repetition of ‘conspiracy theory disinformation’ today and the Nazi obsession with ‘Jewish artistic degeneracy’ in the late 1930s. What pulls those two historically distant connections together is A LACK OF RESPECT FOR THE COMMON SENSE OF SKILLED PROLES WHO PAY THEIR TAXES.
It’s actually worse than it was in Imperial Rome, when too much ignoring of the population’s needs, desires and beliefs resulted in rapid coordination of General Strikes during which all commerce and labour joined hands to walk off the set and tell the pervs at the top to go stick a starling up the anus.
Let’s just list some simple contemporary questions: How many Brits felt OK with Rishi Sunak ejaculating all over the fat little Ukrainian con-man Zelenskyy last week? How many EU citizens really believe that Vladimir Putin is another Hitler? Who if anyone at the moment wants war with China? How many human beings anywhere on planet Earth want a nuclear exchange in any shape or form? What percentage of Earthlings believe in there being any kind of climate emergency? How many mothers going forward will be willing to subject their children to covid jabs that are both unnecessary and dangerous? How many people across the world give a monkey’s chuff about LGBTQ, when most of them feel the indulgence of these people has gone far enough already?
None of that is good news for the Langley-to-Davos alliance of mendacity. Were free speech and trustworthy democracy to be restored, all of their idiocies would be rejected by a majority of electors.
But – as the 2020 POTUS electoral farce displayed to deadly perfection – they have no Respect for We the Electorate.
The only way left for the New Worlders to hide their obvious superiority complex is to pretend that there are two games in play, so they can distract us by switching the fear from one to the other as and when circumstances demand it.
That’s to say, scare us shitless with Covid et al fears and baseless vaccine/climate salvation capers; and the Empires of Evil who want to destroy the squeaky clean Stars & Stripes in favour of something as yet ill-defined.
Constant emergency, Permanent War and old Mr Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four
Emerging documents and recorded behaviours have, over the last five weeks, illustrated beyond any reasonable doubt that BOTH Viruvax distribution AND confected conflicts have all been run, funded and controlled totally by the Pentagon.But the insane pretence otherwise continues. So we the info-starved victims have become the 2023 equivalents of 1974 Kremlinologists.
Look back over the last week. Lots of unredacted Fauci information on the US medical front and Congressional enquiries/demands for investigation of the Pharma psychos. Hurrah! Hurrah! This is the Big Reckoning, the long-awaited fight-back….they’re on the retreat!
And then, controlled information releases about renewed shipments of weapons and GI grunts to Ukraine….swiftly followed by more troops, battleships and tactical nukes to the Pacific theatre with backing from Taiwan and Japan. OMG, the lunatics are still gunning for a unipolar world created by nuclear war! We’re doomed! They’ve won!
It’s not hard to discern what this is all about, is it? I mean c’mon, we’ve had three years of this BS. What will follow is lots of half-baked debate on troll-guided social Muskmedia which, when you add it all up, remains just Kremlinology about who’s out, who’s in, who’s up and who’s down. And the outcome will be a paralysing mélange of fear and confusion…..most of which will be hopelessly (and intentionally) inaccurate.
In that context, we should focus on calling out those incidents where the chronic lack of Respect for We the Taxpayers is disgracefully overt:
If you Respect your constituents, you won’t treat them like Lab rats in return for monied reward from heinous Pharmaceutical criminals
If you Respect your electorate, you won’t try to ram ludicrously minority socio-sexual belief systems down their throats
If you Respect your country’s values, you won’t sell them out to be part of a Hellfire Club set of degenerate ideas worthy of very few beyond the Marquis de Sade
If you Respect the national populous, you won’t (without asking them) expect them to live next door to obnoxious, unhygienic and incendiary anti-liberty immigrants who despise everything they hold dear
If you Respect We The People, you won’t ignore their democratically established wishes and tie them to the main propeller of the Eutanic just before it snaps in two and sinks to an icy grave.
And so to a brief conclusion. Odd as it might seem to many of you, the almost universal ability to show genuine respect across the racial, religious and social boundaries is at the heart of what makes The Gambia a cultural success – even if, as yet, it’s high imports level (and reliance on the Saudis and Chinese for infrastructural support) make for a very frail economy and massive overdependence on tourism. I’m sure the mild and tolerant form of Islam here has played a major role in this.
But equally, the political and bureaucratic élitism shows little or no respect for the ordinary People, and flouts its privilege far too often with 4WD gas guzzlers, sharp suits, fat bellies and all the usual material Big Bwana bling.
Nevertheless,
If you want to support the kind, come to Gambia
If you want to speak your mind, come to Gambia
If you’re a small mutualist business, come to Gambia
If you’re a respectful listener, come to Gambia
If you like inventive fusion music, come to Gambia
And when at last you’re no longer in a hurry to arrive,
be on de way comin’ to Gambia
The Slog 