The Tribune

EDITOR, The Tribune.

We have now seen the House of Assembly sink to an all-time low. The Speaker sat perched on his li’l stool while a place that is supposed to house “honourable people”, see a member degrade and jokingly jam a thumb deep in the eyes of countless women, who already have been made to endure the inhumane misfortune of being physically, verbally, psychologically and mentally abused by men who think absolutely nothing of them.

Leslie Miller, and I intentionally left out the title “honourable” because he, himself has totally abandoned the title by his very behaviour of bragging how he beat a woman so much that he was tired, and could not hit her one more time. I was shocked that he in his demented mind, could hallucinate enough to believe what he was saying was funny. How sick! What was worse, his colleagues laughed. I wonder if the women in the Tall Pines Constituency are laughing too?

The utterances of Miller was sickening enough, but not half as sick as the behaviour of his colleagues. I saw MPs who could hardly compose themselves laughing uncontrollably over such an uncivilised joke. Picewell Forbes, who sat close by, was in his element, head back and mouth wide open as he enjoyed Miller’s story. All Androsian women who have suffered being beaten by men for whatever reason should make a special note of Forbes’ insensitivity.

I was appalled to see female MPs giggling so much that they seemed to be in a frenzy because of Miller’s account of a fellow female being mistreated and abused. How could any female in the House or outside find anything that Miller said so humorous? All females in the Bahamas who were ever abused should now see for themselves that the PLP have no regard for women. Not one female PLP MP stood up in the female’s defence.

Domestic violence in the Bahamas is real and thousands of women are made to suffer at the hands of cowards. Dr Sandra Dean Patterson, God bless her heart, who has worked tirelessly to bring attention and help find solutions to this “monster’ must be disheartened to see that the very people who she expects to take this serious, are joking about being perpetrators themselves and may be guilty themselves either by commission or omission. Dr Dean-Patterson must now see how hard it is for the PLP government to ever get serious about domestic violence and physical abuse of women.

I dare any female MP, their supporters and sympathisers to come up with any sensible explanation that would discount them from being in support of Miller’s total disrespect for women and their plight for abuse, a fight that is ongoing.

Any female member of parliament who found Leslie Millers “sick joke” amusing and not amazing are nothing more than just cheerleaders for an overzealous male chauvinist bigot. They have now shown that they could care less about the pain women experience while big strong men take advantage of them while imposing their strength to inflict pain to a point that they cannot lift a finger any more because of exhaustion.

Bahamians, especially female PLP supporters, must hang their heads in shame after Miller bragged that he was serious, because he doesn’t lie. Now we see the levels to which, we as a people, have sunk, our insensitivity has been swallow up by being PLP and having no heart. I dare all to say that we are not bordering on being uncivilised.

All of us should be ashamed of ourselves; we elected these jokers who have no regards for human life. We “burst out laughing” when women are beaten to a pulp. Female PLP MPs must hang their collective heads in shame. I dare any of you to explain your cold behaviour, especially since you are women too. You owe the Bahamian women who have struggled for so many years for equality much more. I know the women from the Women Suffogate Movement past, are spinning in their graves to see that their fight has been abandoned.

Finally, any man who hit women are nothing more than cowards, no matter what you call it. I am positive that men who hit women would die “a thousand deaths” if they even imagined another man beating their mother, sisters or daughters. These kinds of men, who talk loud, but say nothing, usually are different when confronted with adversity.

I pray that God in his wisdom, will bring some comfort to the women who are abused.

IVOINE W INGRAHAM

Nassau,

March 6, 2014.