Our African Caribbean community
I am just writing a small article about the violence and killing which is happening in our African Caribbean community. I am known as Stevie B. I work as an electrical engineer, and as a hobby I DJ on a radio station called Roots fm 95.4 fm. Over the pass few years there has been a lot of negative things happening in our community concerning our youngsters. They are dying everyday ie; shootings, stabbings, drugs.
It is sad to see how many of our children are dying so young and so unnecessarily. I feel a lot of the problem stems from home. We as parents are not taking enough responsibility. I can remember as a youngster I was raised within a community where everyone was my parent, my elders established a solid and consistent pattern of clear boundaries and expectations. Whenever I was on the streets I was representing my parents and if I did not do the right things my parents would know within 10 minutes and I would get a right lashing when I went home.
These days the majority of our children don’t even go shopping with their parents because they feel it is not cool and that it’s belittling. As a child I had no choice. We have lost all the foundations and lessons that our parents taught us.
We are living within a new founded society where children are having children, the youngsters of today have a lack of respect for their elders and have no respect for themselves. They are not willing to listen to their parents or guardians or their relatives, and most of all they think they know it all.
The older male role model should stand up and take more responsibility for how our youngsters are brought up. Starting with cutting out all the slackness in the music which is being played on the radio and the night clubs. And the music videos which portray violence and sex, because a lot of our children believe that is how the real word is and are going out on the street and copying the rubbish they see on the TV.
We need to go back to basics where the whole family will sit round a table every Sunday to have their rice & peas and chicken and talk about what they have been doing at school or college and knew that the plates had to be washed up after dinner and not had to be told to.
We need to take more interest in our kids education. Checking up on their attendance at school and most of all take more time checking on their homework – Sitting down and helping them.
I don’t agree with parents who just shout out to their children have you done your homework when they are just walking out the door to go school. We should all take time to look at their books and make sure that it done (it doesn’t take five minutes to do that).
As for mobile phones how can a child of primary school age have a phone. All that does is to put that child in a vulnerable position for him or her to be mugged .we are giving our children too many thing at such a young age ie mobile phone / Playstation / computers /mp3 players. They should be rewarded with these things if they are achieving at school or college but a lot of them are not and are still able to have those things
I am so proud of my children because they are not materialistic. My daughter Tania achieved (9 GCSE a stars) and is now going college to do 5 A levels. She has a mobile phone but is not allowed to receive calls after 9.30 pm. My children wash up the plates on a rotation system and have to wash their mum’s car every Saturday or Sunday depending on the weather.
It saddens me so much to see what is happening to our people we need to talk more to our children. There is a lot of negative people out there who are directing our children down the wrong road. They need to be stamped out.
All the killing, drugs and violence is affecting our black business . Because other nations are stereotyping us and thinking that all African Caribbean people can’t be trusted and are bad people to do business with. So in the long term it will affect the way we aspire in the future.
We will find ourselves not able to do business with any other nationalities because no-one will trust our people. That is the big picture.
So the beginning and end of this situation is that we all need to work together to give our children a better future and we need more positive male role models to play they part in our community
Single parents mum bringing up children on their own need dads to be more responsible. Just because there has been a break down in the relationship between the father and the mother it does not mean that responsibility as a father should be less, as long as the intentions is to the good of your child.
Mums should not stop fathers seeing their children because they don’t get on. As long as the father is taking interest in his child’s up bringing, they should always allow him access. Because in the long run it will have a major affect on the children, especially boys. The children are not to blame for the break up of relationships. And should not be used as pawns for mothers to get their own back
In my profession as an electrical engineer, I run my own company and I am fortunately in the position to offer opportunities to train young apprentices in the electrical industry. So if there are any interested parents or motivated youngsters (male or female) who would like to be an electrician, please call my office on 0208 845 4159 . The company is called Facelift Electrical Sevices and we have offices in Hayes.
My company belongs to the national inspection council for electrical installation contracts (NICEIC) which means we are a member of the industry’s biggest association of electrical contractors (which means I am good at my job!). We are always looking for more work, commercial and domestic properties and looking for contacts for maintenance contracts. We carry out periodic inspection reports on installations as well as supplying electrical installation certificates on completion of works. So feel free to call if you have any work to offer us. We supply a prompt and reliable service at reasonable rates.
That is all for today Stevie B (roots fm 95.4) do feel free to send your comments on any of the above. You can email me on mrplush@hotmail.co.uk