EDITORIAL

“It is a living vibration, rooted deep within my Caribbean belly
Lyrics to make a politician [cringe], or turn a woman’s body into jelly…”
– David Rudder –Calypso Music [2011]

With the Crop Over season already well in train, one can very well understand the timing of the call by the Honourable Minister of Information and Broadcasting, Ms Lucille Moe, for songwriters and artistes to be mindful of the content of their offerings.

According to the Minister, “I would like to see a sense of responsibility prevail in our choices of what we broadcast [and] put in the public domain…”

While Barbadians generally would scarcely gainsay such a call, the constitutional identity of its source and the contemporary existence of laws and regulations on what may be broadcast publicly serve to make it a far more ominous call than it was perhaps intended to be.

And this is not to mention that it runs counter to the historical context of such performances and the emergent popularity locally of the so-called “bashment soca”; a variety of the art form that appears to thrive on the repetitive and figurative violent destruction of the female derriere or “bumper” as it is commonly referred to in that genre.

It is by now notorious that any governing administration and its members are traditional fodder for the calypsonian’s lyrics employing the constitutional guarantee of freedom of expression. While the Trinidadians “Chalkdust”, (Dr Hollis Liverpool) “Sugar Aloes” (Michael Osuna), “Watchman” (Wayne Hayde) and “Cro Cro” (Weston Rawlins) are salient latter-day examples of this art form; locally, “Gabby” (Anthony Carter), “Serenader” (Elenza Brewster), and several others have not been reluctant at times to comment critically on governmental policy in their presentations.

The relative fewness of libel suits in this context bears cogent witness to either a healthy respect for the law of defamation or to a cultural indifference to or an embracing of such commentary as an integral part of the culture.

Perhaps mindful of this reality, the Minister skilfully sought to dispel the implication of any notion that her call was a plea for calypsonians to go easy on the governing administration of which she forms part. Rather, she appealed to them to consider the protection of a vulnerable group by reminding them that their music influenced the thoughts, actions, and behaviours of the youth.

We are not aware of the age of the Minister and it would be churlish of us to seek to determine this, but if we assume correctly that she grew up in the era of Sparrow and Kitchener and their thinly veiled offerings of the details of their sexual prowess and ribald adventures on Carnival day, we are of the view that she should appreciate the comparative tameness of the local efforts in that regard.

Moreover, when we encourage or do not deter the participation of the youth in every aspect of the festival, it seems a bit rich for us to be worrying now about the likely negative effects of a few lyrics upon them.

In any event, the standards of a national festival created for adults cannot and ought not to be governed by what only is deemed acceptable for impressionable youth. To follow this to its logical end, the youth should rather be restricted from exposure to the more sordid aspects of the festival. And these, as we know, are not to be found in the calypso tent or in public broadcasts of lyrical offerings only.