Lord, what is wrong with my village people?

Dear Father:

You know for a second there, I thought Ebola was the only big sickness we had in our village without cure, but now I realized that I have been wrong all this while- Ignorance is the most dangerous disease affecting us in this village-not even AIDS or Tuberculoses.

And come to think of it Father, our gullibility has become a barrel to change and this has affected our ability to adopt to the paradigm shift that is affecting the rest of our global village.

In short, we have become a village that believes in the spread of falsehoods and gossips . Nobody wants to know the truth anymore-everybody wants to be a tale bearer-bearers of false news. Credibility and trust left our village even before I was born.

My son, where are you going with this one today with your big, big book?

No, mehn Father, leave me let me kill these people with my big, big English. Since they have refused to learn, let me just confuse them more with my big, big book. They say if you can’t teach them just confuse them and that is exactly what I am doing by speaking these big, big book today because even if I were to speak simple English, they will still not understand anyway.

Anyway, son, the way you are speaking today means you are angry over something .

Yes, Father, surely I am angry because I have never seen any breed of people who believe in dooms like the people of this highly forested village. And the way they go about it is what is more disgusting!
You are too hash today son. Can you tell me what is going on?

Okay, Father. The other day the people in charge of educating our children came out and said that our educational system is in a mess and we need to fix it.

So the big man for the education system said one of the ways he thinks we can start is by first closing all the grade schools at the end of this month. This means that there will be no promotion, no government exam and everything the children have done so far since they reopened schools after the Ebola will be considered as study class.

The man said this was intended to put in place some measures-like supplying text books to all the schools and making sure all the schools met the minimum standards to adequately prepare the children.

The next day Father, I heard a lady telling me saying “oh do you know what the people want to close the schools for?” “No”, I replied. “Oh, they say Ebola is back!” “You can’t be serious,” I said. “It is true! One of my brothers called me today saying the people at the school his children attending told him to go for them because two of the students were diagnosed with Ebola.”

Before I could get through explaining to the woman about the reasons why the school authorities want to close schools, somebody else called and said “Oh, do you know that they get lots of Ebola patients at this hospital and that hospital and the people are hiding it?

As if that was not enough, another person came saying” the people have diagnosed three person with Ebola in Lofa,” the place the sickness first began last year. Before he could complete his statement, another person said the number has risen to 6.” And so the stories went on, and on with different versions.

And without checking the truth of what they are saying, the internet carboys had already started raising false alarms especially those in Uncle Sam’s village for reasons best known to themselves.

The spread the falsehoods till they have become a Falcao, they can’t listen-Even if you try to educate them, you would have to try harder because their minds have been programmed to only receive the first information, any other information is a waste of time and energy because it will not be processed.

That is how gullible and sick my people are and getting them to recover through a rehab program by explaining the real truth to them is difficult. They believe in lies and gossips to the point that patriotism is lost.

There is this example I always give people illustrating how my village people can carry news here. For example, if I were to send a message to my old folks in the village informing them that I have a tension or migraine headache by the time the news reaches my old folks in the village, it would be totally different . If possible some would say I am already dead. That is the kind of village I live in and the kind of people I have Father. They lie and spread falsehoods with confidence.

They are so prepared to argue for something they have no knowledge about-with vague points than to listen and learn the truth.

Simply put, they are more prepared to argue falsehoods and gossips than truth and facts. And don’t dare try correcting them, some may even jump on you beginning with insults.

But I pray that one day we can find a cure to this terrible virus. -Othello B. Garblah