EDITOR: Reflection on Hurricane Ivan and the trail of havoc left throughout the Caribbean, shows how destruction is easier and swifter to realize than construction.
Construction requires meticulous planning and mobilization of large amounts of resources. It involves the effective application of different bodies of knowledge including geological, engineering and architectural. {{more}}
Things must be done in a particular manner, in a particular sequence, at a particular point and time and evaluated and re-evaluated along the way. The end product will be qualitatively greater than the summation of the component parts and materials used in the process (sand, stone, cement, steel). It gives a sense of achievement to those involved in the process.
Destruction on the other hand, generally does not require meticulous planning or mobilization of large amounts of resources. It does not require the possession or the application of bodies of knowledge. Destruction does not require a draft on paper and things do not have to follow any particular sequence.
In the same way it is easier in this country for some persons to say destructive things about others since it takes less energy to be destructive than to be constructive. Individuals do not have to know you or know about you to say the most demeaning things about you. They only have to perceive that you have a perspective that is different to the one they hold.
Character assassination has become the order of the day. Instead of updating and augmenting their knowledge pool, through the profound study of relevant materials, they continue to wallow in their sea of misinformation and misconstrued ideas. Some believe that their access to the airwaves provides them with an automatic endowment of knowledge about everything and anything.
It is imperative that as a people we move to change our present mind set. Let us use this period as a time of reflection, and emerge from it a more constructive people. Let us eliminate the tear down mentality, which appears to be so rampant among us.
It is the only way we can make the qualitative leap which is required to create the country we all aspire to, for ourselves and our children. The time is now!

Dr. Franklyn James