The Editor,
As we celebrate our 170th Independence Day, I’d like to propose an “Independence Day Bill of Rights”!
ARTICLE I: You do not have the right to free food, free health-care or free housing.. Liberians are the most friendly and kind people in the world, and will gladly help anyone in need, but we are quickly growing weary of subsidizing a generation of welfare queens who achieve nothing more than the creation of another generation of welfare queens! (My free loading family back home please takes note)
ARTICLE II: You do not have the right to be free from harm or disaster. If you build your house on the beach (West Point), and sea comes and takes your house, it’s your responsibility to find somewhere to live. Common sense tells us that building your house near the sea is a dumb ass thing to do! But you are free to act dumb and stupid. Please do not expect taxpayers to pay for your stupidity and relocation!
ARTICLE III: During the presidential election, you do not have the right to free t-shirt and a free bag of pusawa rice unless you are voting for the ruling party (Unity Party). If Unity Party loses the presidential election, you can keep the t-shirt, but please return the bag of rice back to the government! It’s the government’s property!
ARTICLE IV: You do not have the right to physically harm other people. If you kidnap, rape, rob (armed robbery), or kill someone, don’t be surprised if the rest of us administer jungle justice to you! Why? Because we have no faith in the police keeping us safe. It’s better we kill you before you kill us! (if you rape, we will castrate you!). Because when you are caught by the police, you give them money, you will be free to come back and kill us!
ARTICLE V: You do not have the right to a job. All of us sure want you to have a job, and will gladly help you along in hard times, but we expect you to take advantage of self-employment, who-want-work jobs, and other the opportunities to make yourself useful for someone to pay you some money!
ARTICLE VI: Keep Monrovia beautiful or your butt will look like pepperoni pizza! Yes, if you are caught throwing trash on the street, you will be given 25 lashes on your bare butt in public! So you either learn to keep our capital city clean or you go back to wherever you came from, you heathen!
ARTICLE VII: You do not have the right to tell other people how much they should charge you for THEIR goods and service being sold to you in a peaceable voluntary transaction! If you cannot afford the prevailing taxi or bus fare, use your free transportation: Your own two feet! Or if cannot afford the prevailing price of rice, grow your own damn rice or eat eddoes or cassava! And if you cannot afford the market price of pepper, bitter ball, or okra grow your own garden!
ARTICLE VIII: You do not have the right to change our country’s history or heritage. This country was founded (colonized) by American freed slaves with the help of the American Colonization Society. And yes, the capital city was named after the James Monroe, the 5th President of the United States and a slave owner. If you are uncomfortable with the name “Monrovia”, go petition the Liberian people on your time and dime!
ARTICLE IX: If you want to teach your child your mother tongue (dialect), that’s fine. But do it do at your home! Please do not demand that the government use other people money to teach your child your mother tongue! I send my child to school to learn reading, writing and arithmetic and NOT to learn Lorma, my mother-in-law dialect!
ARTICLE X: If you’re a prostitute of legal age, it’s none of our business to tell you how you should earn your living! Prostitution is peaceful profession and should be made legal in Liberia!
Most prostitutes are women (or men) who happily chose prostitution as a means to survive as well as they can without violating other people’s rights! (Stealing, cheating, killing)..So why is prostitution illegal in Liberia? (Please, I am not talking about child prostitution!)
Prostitutes personally supply their customers with great service, and I can attest to that from my salad days at LU! Most of the hos I know do not steal from their customers; their customers pay them voluntarily. And their customers pay only with money belonging to these customers!
But contrast that with our political prostitutes (lawmakers) who routinely exercise their power to grab and spend other people’s money (tax dollars) as if the other people’s money were their own.
And if you dare tell them that they are stealing from you, they’ll yell at you: “Do you know I am?” or “screw you”!
So there you have it, my fellow citizens. I hope our esteemed lawmakers will have a robust debate and pass this “Independence Day Bill of Rights” into law. I think it’s time to allow common sense and prostitution to flourish in our country.
Happy Independence Day!
Martin Scott,
Atlanta, Georgia
[email protected]