23/02/2019
THERE's MORE TO GHANA THAN SLAY QUEENS AND PIMPS
We can as a society choose to believe this narrative about our men and women or we can decide to look beyond this microcosm in our society.
Having the right perspective is vital when such revelations come to the fore. When I arrived in Ghana almost 9 years ago for the first time since I left in Jan '89 I notice a very disturbing pattern that our social fabric was adopting. These past 9 years has culminated in the explosive revelations of some character on social media called fatpu**sy.
Under normal circumstances I wouldn't comment on such salacious issues, but I feel compelled to do so because of the responsibility I have to this nation as a citizen. We all have that duty to speak up when we notice that our society is veering off the beaten path to proper development.
Personally, I'm not surprised by what's been written by a certain Ola Michaels only because I have seen this albeit in the early days of my return to Ghana from these so called A list celebrities and their entourages.
But that's not the focus of this post.
We can as a society choose to believe this narrative about our men and women or we can decide to look beyond this microcosm in our society which is the entertainment industry.
Ghana is made up of 30 million men, women and children. Our entertainment industry is just one of many micro communities which makes up the social fabric of our society. There are so many others which our flawed media industry ignores but we so desperately need to highlight if we truly wish for Ghana's prosperous development.
When I step out each day and get stuck in traffic I see young men and women who spend hours daily under our scorching sun trying to sell their wares so that they can put food on the table.
In the evenings I see young men and women taking out their tables to sell their eggs, Milo and indomie so that they can create a better life for their children. I see young girls carrying loads on their heads selling boflot, nkosua and meko or pure water and young men selling sweets and credit just so they can afford a safe place to lay their heads.
The young women and men who have learned a trade barbering, hairdressing and sewing. The many kiosks and containers dotted across our towns and cities will tell you that our youth want to work and are striving for a better life.
If we are going to use the men and women in our pseudo entertainment industry as a yardstick to determine the character of our young men and women, I believe we would be doing a disservice to the strength our youth have in spite of the limited support from our Government to support them.
Yes, there is a dark underworld in Ghana and many of our so called celebrities are complicit along with those who have created these prostitution markets; pimps, corrupt business men and politicians. It's found everywhere. The difference between Ghana and the rest of the world is that we have made this behaviour mainstream. We have bloggers, news papers, radio and TV stations giving platforms to these shady characters, they in a way romanticize this despicable behaviour.
Ghana's slay kings and Queens should not be elevated neither should their lifestyles be amplified by our media.
The ball is in the courts of our media houses. What are your editorial policies, who and what ideals are you promoting and projecting? GHOne made that difficult decision on one of their programs called the Late Aftenoon Show when some of us drew their attention to projecting people who lead questionable lives and are proud of it. They did very well to change their editorial policy. They now have a show that's informative, interesting and contributes to our social development. Ghana deserves better from the rest of our media houses and blogging communities.
