BECAUSE our opinions in the culture of interpreting information are guided by the organisations we have come to recognise in various areas as authorities on this or that, we tend to rationalise their pronouncements, believing them to be guidelines grounded on solid information, researched and beyond reproach. 

By all means, it is expected that those organisations must ensure a prudence in what they dispense; casual statements on important topics become irresponsible, and attract and develop a life energy of their own.
When the president pardoned women prisoners last June, it was considered by ‘John Public’ a normal courtesy extended to the general low-offence, ‘human’ prison population; and we believe in the redemption of the soul, thus the requirement of probation reports and in some cases mental evaluations.
At the time, the Guyana Human Rights Association (GHRA) issued a statement that harks back to another era. What it said, in essence, was that “Women have no place in prison”, a position supported by arguments that cannot be justified in the real world in which we live.
I did not read the article when it was published back then; I brushed it aside.
A colleague later sent me a copy by email; again, the burden of work and meeting normal mundane deadlines kept me distracted, though it did nudge corners of my mind to just read it.
Then on Saturday, September 10, I happened to read Freddie’s column, which was titled, ‘Longevity in office breeds a possessive mentality.’
In that column, the head of the GHRA, Mike Mc Cormack, came up among others whose timeline record does not justify their being there today. This sparked that familiar echo of the muse taunting, “I did tell yuh to read the GHRA release, eh?” So, I did.

ADJUST AND EVOLVE
Turns out the problem is not longevity in office, as Freddie claimed, but performance; the ability to evolve and adjust to the ‘Tradewinds of our time’, and shelve ideals no longer applicable.
According to the GHRA release, “90% of women are in prison for three offences: petty theft, drug trafficking and murder, all related to disordered relationships with men.”
Well, not even women will agree with this; it’s absurd, and demonstrates isolated views, and, should I say, heterosexual male bashing, and malicious stereotyping.
FACT: In Georgetown, the four most notorious ‘Drug Yards’ existing today can be found in Bourda, Lacytown and Werk-en-Rust; and they’re all run by women.
I know of a situation back in the early 1980s when ‘ganja’ was pressed and packaged for trafficking. I knew the mules; these were women who were in control; no male enslavement. Rather, the males were recipients of handouts and not the managers.
Gender, race, social status,and religion are no longer criteria that can compete in today’s world for exemption from accountability for common criminal and deviant criminal acts committed.
FACT: The last woman hung in this country in 1950 for the ritual murder of the child, ‘Lillawatie’ was not a male-tormented woman. Nor were the female SS warders of the concentration camps who were condemned and hung at the Post-WWII Nuremburg trials.

NO ONE FORMULA
Murder is not a crime, the cause of which fits into one formula; there are female serial killers and psychopaths, thus a blanket statement is dishonest and misguiding.
The crime of spousal and family murders for economic benefits goes both ways; male and female, with young and not so young offenders. Case studies of this nature can be extracted from our media publications, both print and electronic, with outcome data from the courts.
The article also highlighted that prisons were created to protect society from dangerous men. Not so! Prisons were developed as a feature of the touted age of western enlightenment against a backdrop of holding dungeons, where the swift, savage machinery of torture were stored, and public methods of hanging, impaling, burning alive and stretching on the rack followed.
Females were also imprisoned for prostitution, sorcery and witchcraft, which latter crime amounted to the use of herbal, mind-altering and lethal concoctions to poison and neutralise their victims.
As such, this release into the public domain served not to enlighten, or to be factual or objective.

GENDER ISSUE
The gender contentions in Guyana are driven by two ancient and distinct systems, namely: Patriarchal and matriarchal. Both systems apply rules for gender positions that produce disadvantages.
With the patriarchal system, women are generally overlooked in the disbursement of family legacies; that priviledge invariably belongs to the sons. The matriarchal, on the other hand, places the mother at the apex, hence the origin of the term, “Mammy gone, family done.” Here, scarce incomes go to daughters mostly. These cultural norms apply to gender interactions differently, but do overlap. But with the criminal-minded, elements can be drawn from criminal expressions [in this case with females] from both systems. And as such cases stand before us in the courts, women are brought to the fore as the masterminds, with some male addict the clumsy and hungry assassin.
Hence, the subliminal message sent by this release is that if female criminals are too fragile to pay for their crimes, which men are in some way responsible for, then where do they belong: As the good housewives with the babies and the picket fence?
That scenario, however, with its harsh economics and rights reforms, most 20th Century women cannot even conceptualise. But this does impinge, through defamation, on the rights of men. Should the GHRA require a research contractor, at a reasonable stipend, I’m open.
That release does question the knowledge, scope and construct of an organisation much needed in any nation today; it’s difficult to rationalise what inspired such a narrative.
Scientifically, it’s not yet been proven that gender determines the nature of any criminal, with the human behaviour evidence existing. Thank God law enforcement by experience has a more realistic understanding!