THE Dagombas have a saying that when diarrhoea roams a household for long, its mission is simply to attack the head of the household.
The meaning of this axiom is that when leaders fail to deal adequately with impending danger, they end up getting consumed by these dangers.
The culture of insults has been with us for long. Various political, religious and institutional leaders have been at the receiving end of these verbal blows and we have, as a common people, failed to raise eyebrows.
Today our president, the number one statesman of our land, has become the target.
In fact, many big shots of this country have at one point or the other indulged in this habit of using intemperate language and all we have done is look on as if these people were untouchable.
We have heard top politicians attack the personality, intelligence and academic qualifications of their counterparts in a very trenchant and sarcastic manner.
When it favours a section, they justify it, whiles those who feel affected condemn it. And depending on one’s political disposition, an insult could be seen as fitting or the opposite.
In all these our inaction as a nation of people with shared values of decency has helped institutionalise this culture to the extent that today, the youth even feel alright to use such bad language against elders, so far as they are clad in partisan smocks.
The most regrettable aspect of this insulting trade is that people even get rewarded for it. People become sole proprietors of insults because apparently there is a reward scheme, which is mostly political power or public post.
It appears the more one uses invectives to ridicule and demoralise his or her opponents, the more he is worshipped by his party fellows. It is therefore not surprising that when a party assumes the reins of government, some of the positions are reserved for those who did the dirty job during campaign.
No wonder serial callers, who use intemperate language on radio against their opponents, now have a bargaining chip. The result of all these is that people who do not deserve public office, rather get into these positions and eventually stall progress because, apparently, they lack the expertise and temperament required to run such offices.
The Executive Director of Youth Icons Ghana, Nana Yaw Osei-Darkwa certainly hit the point right when he stated that those who lack ideas and composure are those who reduce national discourse to the trading of invectives. So you can imagine what happens when we put our destiny into the hands of these people.
It is even more disturbing to hear some politicians force Ghanaians to accept that the use of intemperate language could be justified when one is simply doing it for retribution purposes.
I find it very difficult to come to terms with this analogy, simply because two wrongs never make a right. Whether your insult followed another insult or it was the first, the bottom line is that it is an insult.
The fact that you went to steal because somebody also stole from you does not make your act of stealing moral or legal. I therefore cannot fathom why top political leaders allow themselves to be dragged along into the gutter only to defend themselves by saying they had been provoked.
Have our leaders not got scruples? Why should they simply act in uncivilised manners just because they were provoked? It is just like saying that one has respect for womanhood and yet when somebody insults your mother, you also insult that person’s mother. How then do you prove your respect for womanhood?
One thing that remains clear is that, insults though can be cutting and spiting, does not pose real danger to human life. As far as I know, when it rains it does not wash off the spots of the leopard. Similarly insults do not physically injure a person, except for his emotions and perceived reputation.
Therefore, a principled and civil person does not necessarily lose his composure just because he or she has been insulted.
What even baffles me more is the absence of a regulatory mechanism to check the use of abusive language in the media. It appears all we do to tackle these unfortunate incidents is by public condemnation.
All one hears is this or that institution urging people to avoid insults. So, we are now appealing to people’s moral conscience to act well. Even the top echelon of our political leadership is always ‘urging’. When would they be directing and instructing. They have our mandate to bring change, so they should stop acting like toothless bulldogs.
What about the National Media Commission. Of what use is its existence if it cannot instil professionalism into the Ghanaian media industry.
Apart from allowing people to use intemperate language in their newspapers and broadcast networks, media companies further rubs more salt into injuries as they repeat these insults.
Although bringing an issue to light could prompt some discussion, it must also be stated that insulting characters could be relegated and given the coldness they deserve by not even giving them avenues to speak in the media.
In fact, Metro TV deserves commendation for deciding not to read out intemperate language in newspapers during the review of newspaper stories on its Good Morning Ghana show.
Now it is clear, we can simply not rely on politicians to bring sanity, because, apart from they being the ones who stoke the fire, many of them have simply lost the independent mind that is needed to think and talk rightly and progressively.
So the mantle now rests on civil society. And if civil society players also become allies with politicians, then who becomes the independent judge to breathe an air of sanity into this country?
God help our nation.
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