OPINION: Ideological correctness is a deadbeat form of existence

Last Updated on Wednesday, 18 September 2024, 22:21 by Writer

By Dr Randy Persaud, Professor Emeritus, American University, Washington D.C.

Some folks live all their lives singing the same old songs, reciting the same old mantras, telling the same old stories. No worries there, because continuity is central to one’s sense of direction, purpose, of self. But while we may understand the cultural coordinates of our groundings, the same cannot be said for those who cling to old, washed-up ideologies that have long exhausted their original meanings, that have long gone past the structural and temporal circumstances of their emergence. We must say it and say it loudly – gobbledygook has no place in productive discourse. And even more emphatically, ideology can never be a substitute for reason.

I feel for some of the ‘comrades’ who pour their hearts out in the letter sections of the newspapers, and on the social media platforms. But as much as we must all appreciate that you feel strongly and care deeply, we must also tell you bluntly, that ideological correctness is a deadbeat form of existence.

No one doubts that unimaginable injuries were delivered through colonialism and imperialism. And while a few might think that there is no colonial overhang, the vast majority of those who concern themselves with power on a global scale, know that there is a real North-South gap in the world. But even so, why must GHK Lall write a near dystopian and nihilistic sentence like, “I have made myself clear repeatedly. There is zero interest in replacing British colonialism with American imperialism” (GHK Lall, Stabroek News, 10/17/2024). Is that what we have going on here?

Let me offer a response that is rational, rather than ideological. There is a standard definition of imperialism that will indeed meet the criteria entertained by Lall. In this case, and as the Marxist scholar Bill Warren once noted, imperialism in the Third World is based on exploitation of the labor and natural resources by capitalist multinationals who work closely with their governments.

The concept imperialist exploitation carries two meanings. The first is ideological, and refers to any foreign investment by a multinational corporation in the Third World. Put differently, all investments are by definition exploitative, and ipso facto, imperialist. The second component is more emotive. In this case, exploitation conjures up past historical abuses associated with conquest and subordination of native peoples, slave labor, indentured servitude, and other forms of coercive extraction such as the corvee.

GHK Lall uses the language of imperialism in both senses, namely, ideologically and emotively. It must be noted that he prefers the latter, something that is easily verifiable by the emotional guilt-trip he consistently pulls on the nation in his columns and letters.

If you take a more rational approach to our political economy, you ought to focus on two things. The first is about the creation of wealth. Who is creating the vast bulk of national and individual wealth in Guyana. You know the answer – it is ExxonMobil & Partners who have invested billions of dollars in the oil & gas sector. The second focus should be on jobs. Here again, it is the investments of ExxonMobil and Partners that have laid the basis for thousands of high-paying jobs in Guyana. Note that these jobs are across the entire economy. A construction porter today earns in one day what his father took one week to make when he was the same age as the son. A mason today makes over $400,000 monthly (working six days a week). Some make a little more; some a little less. A supervisor at a home for one house (not commercial site) earns $17,000-$20,000 daily.

While the employment in the housing boom is a product of PPP government policy, the wage rate is intimately tied in to the general economy propelled by oil. To boot, the current financial independence also means we have greater ‘economic sovereignty’. The troubling decades of the IMF are gone.

The data is so overwhelming that it will be an act of redundancy to just keep pouring out more and more. What does warrant further attention is the philosophical backwardness of folks who have themselves never produced any jobs, but who earn a living thrashing those who do. I do not care what label you stick on ExxonMobil and the other hydrocarbon investors. Frankly dude, I don’t give a damn.

If Lall wants evidence for my claims, I share the LinkedIn list of jobs in Guyana.

Take a look at the jobs, but more importantly take a look at how ideology cripples the mind.

Dr. Randy Persaud is Adviser, Office of the President.