Success is Community-Based Initiatives with Violence Interruption Groups

Herbert Gayle

According to Doctor Gayle, the region has only one violence reduction success and that is through the concept of community policing. He is of the belief that hard-line policing is failing the region. It is best to focus on education for boys, empowerment for girls and community-based initiatives tied with violence interruption groups.

Dr. Herbert Gayle, Anthropologist of Social Violence

“Community based policing, you mean police officers who come and say good morning, who are part of your group, who come to your community meetings, who work with you, who understand your problems, who walk around and pretend they have two balls multiplied by two. Those are harsh words; you are not to say these things when you are on the street. In the quiet and the safety of the Bliss you can say community-based policing. When you get back outside, say suppression because that’s what we do in the region. We suppress, we suppress, we suppress. And everybody here who cooks on a Sunday, knows the power of a pressure cooker. The aim of government is to stay in power and if you murmur every day say me want dehn lock down dehn little bwai yah; we want dehn lock them down man and throw away the key. Somebody in government may be dumb enough to give you what you ask.”