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RAMBLE in the JUNGLE

Time for action

By Wanaku Verdzekov · · Global

Date note: Undated Facebook note, written between 2011 and 2014.

Tags: knowledge, consciousness, laissez-passer

Consciousness comes with knowledge.
Knowledge of self comes logically before
knowledge of the heavens.
Knowledge exercises brain muscles.
A body of knowledge about freedom of self
is knowledge worth getting acquainted with.
Here are 20 or so pages for your
inquisitive mind to peruse.

Be informed before action.
Informed action is deliberate and positively consequential.
Uninformed action is reckless, with negative consequences.

At the end of the day,
it is all about YOU.
The total count of a nation's GDP
should include your contribution.
Shouldn't it?
You tell me.


The Camerounese government, à la Ahidjo/Biya and CNU/CPDM, has always used this tool as a sword of Damocles hanging over the heads of citizens who do not toe the line of its dictatorial policies. If you lived through the period of laissez-passers in the Cameroons, you could compare it to the pass laws (a kind of internal passport system) of apartheid South Africa.

You see, if we cannot describe our situation clearly, in a language the rest of the world understands, our stories will be buried in the mud under the boots of the men with arms (gens d'armes). If a citizen does not speak, even God will not hear. "Knock, and the door will be opened." Don't knock, and it stays closed.

TribalMonk

— Wanaku Verdzekov

Reading & grammar

Reading level: Gr 8–10

Understand

  1. What is the difference between informed and uninformed action?
  2. What were laissez-passers, and what does the author compare them to?
  3. Why does the author say "if a citizen does not speak, even God will not hear"?

Grammar focus: antithesis. Antithesis puts opposite ideas side by side in parallel form: "Informed action is deliberate… Uninformed action is reckless…" The balance makes the contrast easy to remember.

Try it: Write two antithesis sentences about studying (for example, planned vs rushed revision).

Discuss: Is it better to act quickly on incomplete information, or to wait until you are fully informed? Argue with an example.