BY YOLANDE GAYLE, STAFF REPORTER
JUST WHEN YOU thought it could not get worse... it does!
A story published in the Sunday Observer underscores just how stupid, insensitive and crass our youths are. And highlights one basic sentiment, if this is what our future looks like, we are dead in the water.
The story spoke of an incident in which students of Kingston College, the mighty (KC), were seen - and there is the picture to prove it, - with a flag bearing the Swastika symbol, at the recently concluded VMBS Boys' and Girls' Champs.
If you did not know, that symbol, because of its association with Nazi Germany and Hitler, has now come to represent the heights of evil in the world. The same symbol is still used by international Skinheads and certain sections of the American Klu Klux Klan.
And what do students of an alleged 'Ivy League' boys' school do? They put it in purple and white - their school colours - on a flag and proceeds to wave said flag at the pinnacle of high school athleticism - Champs.
To say that I am disgusted with that kind of behaviour is an understatement.
Something is seriously wrong when students are allowed to use what has now become the symbol of international hate, at a school event. Something is really, really wrong when they can justify it by saying that it is of African origin, and a Hindu good luck symbol.
Images of genocide
What it used to be is no longer of any significance because all of that has been overridden by what it now means.
The very sight of a Swastika conjures up images of genocide and some of the most atrocious acts of violence to ever be meted out to people. In this case the Jews.
What are these boys saying, really? Next year they will turn up with shackles and chains, claiming that they plan "to chain up" their rivals! No star, nutten cannot go so. What upsets me even more is that teachers, parents and officials from Intersecondary Schools Sports Association (ISSA) must have seen the flag. Yet, there is no mention of the offending article being removed.
Here I must say much respect to the principal of St. George's College, who got wind that his students planned to carry the same sort of flag to Champs, and threatened dire consequences for those who did.
But Mr. KC Principal Ivan Johnson, is quoted as saying, "I suspect they have no idea what it means, and we would be lucky if they understand who Hitler was."
I hope to GOD that he was misquoted, and the Observer reporter got it very wrong! However, I highly doubt that.
However, to all parents, prospective parents, teachers and old boys of KC read that statement again and tell me what you all get from it.
I translate it to mean, the students who are attending KC do not know about World War II, - which incidentally set the pace and developed many of the international policies, organisations (the United Nations) and standards by which we live today.
Evil men
They also do not know about Adolph Hitler, only one of the most evil men to have ever walked the face of the earth, who if his designs were realised would have made certain that any non-white and suspected non-white person be obliterated from the face of the earth!
And before anybody dare says to me, oh they learn it in European History, which is taught only in sixth form - there are some things, that as a student of any high school anywhere in the world, you must know! A working knowledge of World War II is one of them.
Anyway, there is just one question I ask and that is, will the students who by carrying a flag with the swastika on it, thus bringing their school and Champs into disrepute be punished?
