What Does Geography Have To Do With Love .….

Many estimates suggest there are more Jamaicans living abroad than there are Jamaicans living at home. Two of the many jokes at our expense is that we can be found in every nook and cranny of the Globe and we generally tend to have several jobs.
As a Jamaican living in the diaspora I am particularly proud of those jabs even when they are directed pejoratively.

Instead of hang­ing my head in shame I glee­ful­ly embrace the fact that as Jamaicans we are unafraid to fol­low our dreams wher­ev­er they lead and we do what we must to pro­vide for our imme­di­ate and extend­ed fam­i­lies as well as lend a hand some­times to oth­ers we don’t even know.
One of the rea­sons I per­son­al­ly argued for a change of Government is that since 1972 Jamaica has been ruled large­ly by one polit­i­cal par­ty with the excep­tion of two breaks, one for eight years(8) and the oth­er for four(4).
Despite hav­ing con­trol of the coun­try for 32 of those forty four years the People’s National Party has not been able to place the Island on a foot­ing that would con­vince non-par­ti­san objec­tive observers that the coun­try was head­ed in the right direction.
On that basis it was impos­si­ble to see what that par­ty could poten­tial­ly offer that it had­n’t offered over the pre­vi­ous thir­ty two years.

I want to see Jamaicans run­ning back home to make larg­er con­tri­bu­tions to Jamaica instead of run­ning away from the Island.
Unfortunately the crime and cor­rup­tion which has char­ac­ter­ized Jamaica’s recent his­to­ry made it impos­si­ble for that to hap­pen in any sig­nif­i­cant way.
Since the Manley years which saw a dra­mat­ic eco­nom­ic and intel­lec­tu­al drain, Jamaicans have con­tin­ued to leave the Island in droves. Unlike the 1970’s when the man­u­fac­tur­ing sec­tor sim­ply uproot­ed their busi­ness­es and left, Jamaicans who emi­grat­ed between the sec­ond Manley for­ay in 88 left with hard­ly any mon­ey , they left with their edu­ca­tion and exper­tise. They sim­ply had no mon­ey to run with.

JAMAICANS IN DIASPORA IN NO HURRY TO RETURN HOME

No Country can be com­pet­i­tive if it con­tin­ue to lose it’s best and bright­est peo­ple to oth­er coun­tries. Unfortunately dur­ing the recent­ly con­clud­ed elec­tion cam­paign one PNP politi­cian bragged that under his par­ty’s lead­er­ship more Jamaicans were able to source Visas to leave the coun­try. You sim­ply can­not make these things up.
Having left the Island how­ev­er, Jamaicans liv­ing over­seas have been exem­plary in their com­mit­ment to the Island’s well-being.
Recent esti­mates sug­gest that the Diaspora send back in excess of $2 bil­lion each year. This is a major source of invest­ment and wealth for the island. It accounts for more than 13 per­cent of GDP. The Bank of Jamaica says retirees who move back home are a key fac­tor, esti­mat­ing that their pen­sions pro­vide 15 per­cent of the inflow of for­eign cur­ren­cy. (Yahoo News)

Most Major nations in the world have nation­als liv­ing in oth­er coun­tries all across the Globe. It is unclear whether these nation­als are as keen about send­ing back mon­ey to help sus­tain their rel­a­tives and friends liv­ing at home in their coun­tries of birth as Jamaicans do.
Jamaicans abroad send back in excess of $20 bil­lion dol­lars each decade. Yet one of the most astound­ing thing which has come out of that kind­ness and ded­i­ca­tion is a sense of enti­tle­ment and ungrate­ful­ness com­ing from far too many Jamaicans.
Lets face it Jamaica is not exact­ly a teem­ing caul­dron of eco­nom­ic activ­i­ty, the mon­ey the dias­po­ra send home is crit­i­cal to the Island’s eco­nom­ic life.
In fact Remittance is the Island’s sec­ond for­eign exchange earn­er, that is noth­ing to scoff at. Remove that 13 per­cent of the Gross Domestic Product and 15 per­cent of the net for­eign exchange inflow into the Island and the end result is finan­cial collapse.

I write this Article because there is a mis­guid­ed bunch of self-appoint­ed Nativists in Jamaica who sub­scribe to a idi­ot­ic phi­los­o­phy that in order for one to love Jamaica one has to live in Jamaica.
They nev­er con­sid­er the impact the over two bil­lion dol­lar sent back each year has on their lives when they pon­tif­i­cate about lov­ing country.
For the most part peo­ple in the dias­po­ra have a far more sig­nif­i­cant impact on Jamaica that those liv­ing at home.
Jamaicans liv­ing abroad does not, or hard­ly ben­e­fit from Police , schools, hos­pi­tals, fire-ser­vice, roads and bridges or any ser­vices the mon­ey they send back pro­vide. In oth­er words the dias­po­ra is large­ly made up of mak­ers not takers.

Unfortunately some who place them­selves in posi­tions to influ­ence oth­ers use that abil­i­ty to spread igno­rance. They per­pet­u­ate a nar­row parochial nar­ra­tive that peo­ple liv­ing abroad can­not love their coun­try. I nev­er quite under­stood what geog­ra­phy had to do with love.
According to (Merraim-Webster ) Love may be defined sim­ply as unselfish loy­al and benev­o­lent con­cern for the good of anoth­er: as ie : the father­ly con­cern of God for humankind.
There is noth­ing in this rather descrip­tive char­ac­ter­i­za­tion which remote­ly speaks to geog­ra­phy as a com­po­nent of love. It is against that back­ground that I am offend­ed at the notion Jamaicans liv­ing abroad have sworn alle­giance to oth­er coun­tries and as such they can­not love Jamaica.
Now I under­stood not every per­son who applied for visas were suc­cess­ful . I also know many peo­ple did not have rel­a­tives to peti­tion on their behalf. Then there are those who left and because of their behav­ior or bad luck they are sent back. None of that should cause those who nev­er left or want­ed to, to be bel­liger­ent , resent­ful, or even envi­ous of peo­ple who left so they may bet­ter their lives and that of their families.

Literally every polit­i­cal rep­re­sen­ta­tive and busi­ness leader in Jamaica own for­eign Visas, in some cas­es dual cit­i­zen­ship’s and green cards.
Lets dis­pense with the envi­ous bullshit.
There are many Jamaicans who has/​had the oppor­tu­ni­ty to leave and set­tle else­where but chose not to. That’s com­mend­able, those are per­son­al deci­sions which indi­vid­u­als make for them­selves . They do not speak to love of coun­try in any degree as it relates to the per­son­al deci­sions of oth­ers who made alter­na­tive choices.
Living in Jamaica may deter­mine one’s love for stay­ing at home but it does­n’t dis­prove some­one else’s love because they chose to leave home.
Many Jamaicans left and were sent back and yes many nev­er had the oppor­tu­ni­ty to leave.
Over the years this has cre­at­ed a sense of envy which has caused count­less Jamaicans who returned home their lives.
This mind­set was born of an intrin­sic envy which comes out of the mouths of even some of those who pur­port to teach the word of God.
Lets get this straight the emo­tion you feel is not love, it’s envy, there is a sig­nif­i­cant dif­fer­ence between those two emotions.
We should nev­er allow envy and bad mind­ed­ness to pass as patri­o­tism , it isn’t.

Many peo­ple liv­ing abroad are mak­ing and have made sig­nif­i­cant con­tri­bu­tions out­side mon­e­tary con­tri­bu­tions ‚which far exceeds what the self pro­claimed native patri­ots can only dream of.
There is a rea­son that some of those parochial thinkers can­not reach for the stars, their brains are too firm­ly plant­ed in the ground.
Get over your­selves and your envy.