“Until the philosophy which holds one race superior and another inferior is finally and permanently discredited and abandoned, everywhere is war. And until there are no longer first-class and second-class citizens of any nation, until the colour of a man's skin is of no more significance than the colour of his eyes. And until the basic human rights are equally guaranteed to all without regard to race, there is war. And until that day, the dream of lasting peace, world citizenship, rule of international morality, will remain but a fleeting illusion to be pursued, but never attained... now everywhere is war.”

I was driving home today and heard on the radio that May 11, 2021, marks the 40th anniversary of the death of music legend, Bob Marley.

The above quote is by Haile Selassie I and was done at his address to the United Nations in 1963. His speech was then popularized by Bob Marley in the song “War” and functions as a timely reminder of issues we still struggle with today, especially when you look at not only the civil rights movements such as #BLM, the #StopAsianHate or the #PeaceInPalestine, in addition to the issues of divisiveness and strife we deal with in our own families.

I live in a country where the National Motto that most of us were beaten as children to remember, “Out of Many One People”, is not yet a lived reality, but still an aspiration. We simply have not yet attained that perfect society where no hierarchies exist. I mean, if we are being honest, perfection does not really exist but it seems as if we do not even try to come as close to it as we can AT ALLLL. In Jamaica, we have ‘second class’ and ‘first class citizenship’, in other words, the country still struggles extensively with classism. Then there is racism wreaking havoc in the form of colourism, where the lighter one's complexion is, the more status one tends to have or can attain, and the darker one's complexion is, the harder one has to work to prove their worth — what Caribbean sociologists refer to as a colour-class correlation.

Socialization within our families, schools and communities is responsible for the general shaping of social constructs but these constructs do not need to rule us. In fact, once you internalise them and come to believe them, they can have more power and influence over you than any of the hard sciences. As counter-intuitive as it may seem, social constructs can be more powerful and impactful on one's lived experiences than scientific reality.

Burying our head in the sand does not take away the fact that the society we find ourselves in has a variety of imperfections, way too many to count and that does way more harm than good. The fact that we ignore these issues causes greater issues for the generations to come. The problems need to be faced head-on, especially if we plan to achieve a society that is based on the principle that all people are equal and deserve equal rights and opportunities and has no amount or level of racism or classism will make our national motto a reality.

Please take an educated listen: