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Leave Usain alone!
August 31, 2016
Listen nuh, I'm good with Usain Bolt. Yeah! Wah you say? The man proved his greatness where it mattered - on the track. He has achieved legendary status through consistent excellence in his chosen field and he has established his place in history by way of his outstanding public performances. He has trained hard, prepared well, and executed with aplomb. His many accolades have been well earned.
So, I don't know about you, but no little insidious Internet manufactured suss or attention-seeking attempts at creating scandal is going to succeed in diminishing my admiration for this great athlete. No iyah, I'm not so gullible. No amount of sensational stories about real or imagined activities that are none of my business is going to sidetrack me from my determination to honour the man for his great accomplishments.
Libelous accounts
Over the past days since the Olympics, I've seen glimpses of some outrageously salacious and probably libelous accounts of things that have supposedly been done by Usain. I say glimpses because I quickly delete or steadfastly ignore most after seeing the headlines. I refuse to consume unpleasantness. I'm just not interested in smut and scandal.
Most of the transparently suspicious stories are usually backed up by seemingly doctored photographs and emanate from the plethora of fly-by-night online news networks that are easily spotted by the shoddy and childish work of the so-called writers. But even some of the more reliable and trustworthy news sources also get caught up in the mix-up, as they often seem duty-bound to at least do a printed story about the online pseudo-story - so they [even inadvertently], help in spreading the suss!
And even if some of the wonderfully wicked and wild tales are true, so what? That should really be of no concern to me or you. Enough of the hypocritical respectability politics. Hear wah mi a seh nuh man, an' mi a go say it inna plain simple, ordinary Jamaican. Some a unuh fi just gwey an' low di man! Unuh is not his spouse, his parents or his chosen counsellor. Why everybody turn moral arbiter? The athlete never applied for missionary work. He didn't join the priesthood. As far as I know, he signed no contracts which necessitate that he becomes an exemplar of modesty and chastity.
Admirable thing
I know I'm weird. But I'm remembering my high school days when, as we walked in our two lines to go upstairs to the general science lab, the boys would do the seemingly gentlemanly and admirable thing of allowing the girls to go up first while we waited below. But, the truth was, we didn't just put them up in front because we wanted to honour them. No! Naughty boys we were, we did it mainly so we could sneak a peek up their skirts.
Well, I feel like is same so this society behave. We just love elevate people so we can be in a position fi look up inna dem private and personal business. Yeah, is like we become a society of vigilante voyeurs who spend too much time literally a look up under people! Either that, or we jump on the bandwagon of praise even while we simultaneous try to dig up some dirt that we can throw on their moment of glory. Yeah man, as a star light up, we imagine, make or magnify a reason to rub off some of them shine.
Mr Bolt, you came to run. And you have ran like no man in Jamaica or the world has ever ran. We rate yuh like wow! And is nothing but unadulterated big up wi a gi yu. Yeah. No reprimands are required, no sermons are necessary. Mi done talk!
