DUTTY LABOUITES

It was many, many, many, many decades ago, while growing up in a predominantly PNP environment, that I first heard the term "Dutty Labourite". As it was explained to children then, Alexander Bustamente, leader of the Jamaica Labour Party was illiterate so those who supported his party were the uneducated people who worked mainly in the cane fields and as field work kept one dirty, they were loosely referred to as  "dutty labourites". In fact, in those olden days, the term was even used to encourage children to study hard, lest they end up being "dutty labourites!" 

I had though that term had been removed from the Jamaican vocabulary many decades ago, what with successive Ministers OF Education always boasting about their great achievements which had brought education to the darkest corners of the island. So I had (wrongly?) assumed that the few illiterates left could not make up the fairly large bulk of Jamaicans who describe themselves as JLP supporters!

Mr. Damion Crawford's glib use of the term recently therefore tells me a lot more about what happens behind closed doors at PNP meetings than even about Mr. Crawford himself. For Mr. Crawford would have been born somewhere in the 80's, long after that term ceased to be in common usage. Yet it flowed as naturally from his tongue as honey flows from honey comb!

This just serves to reinforce my belief that cultism is hazardous to the development of this fledgling nation!~