Daddy! Daddy!! You look worried, please eat your food. Is everything okay, Daddy? I asked. Yeah, yeah I am fine. I am only shocked by what I saw when I was returning from work. What did you see daddy? Tell me, I pleaded. Hmm, I saw Adwoa, the next door neighbor, dressed with half of her bosom outside, the trousers she wore is such that the furors of her buttocks was out, with beads, and a terrible scaring make-up. Oh but that’s nothing really, we call that dress “show me your bosom” I said smiling. Shut up! Shut up!! Mummy yelled. But why are you shouting at me, mummy. Don’t we even see old women dressing in seductive manner? Am I to be blamed? Am I to be blamed for this societal stigma that has brought about this moral decadence in our society? I added.
Oh what is happening in this generation, our time was not like this. We had a childhood unlike you people who had your childhoods taken away from you” She also said. “But Mummy, you took my childhood away so don’t blame me. You didn’t let me go out to play. I replied.
She then said, “Your time is not like ours when everybody cared about everybody’s child.” She spoke a bit more on how even next-door neighbors can no longer be trusted and ended by saying,”…and morality is practically gone.” As I stood in front of the bathroom mirror that evening, only one question was on my mind; so who took morality away?
It’s really interesting how the youth of this generation is blamed for moral decadence on every front. Don’t get me wrong, we deserve a share of the blame, but it also means that somebody somewhere did not bring somebody up properly. No offence. Somebody did not tell her baby that she ought to treasure chastity. Somebody didn’t tell his boy that he had to work hard to enjoy life; no fast cash and pleasure.
Somebody was so concentrated on preaching prosperity (which is good) but refused to add the part about living right; living chaste. Yet they blame us? So someone once thought, “Wow, showing a bit of skin a little above my knees makes me look better.” Then another thought, “why don’t I bring that hemline a bit higher?” it all happened bit by bit and today, members of the female homo sapiens species gallivant naked but for pieces of clothing covering their private parts, back to the days of Adam and Eve, yet we proudly say we’re developed.
Many nations today suffer critical illness of corruption, fraud, miss-appropriation among others couple with kidnapping, robbery cultism, drug abuse, abuse of sex and sexuality, human trafficking, indecent dressing among the youths, and the most rampart and current problem of insecurity (terrorism). Decadence in personality traits leads to decline in peace and stability as well as national development.
In the past, the Ghanaian youth most attain the age twenty-five even after marriage before another can see his or her nakedness nevertheless that was the story before civilization. But, what do we see now, Culture and traditions which help to reduce immorality are been subsides by western attitude due to ‘civilization’.
If only the caring mother can inform the child that the way you look directly affects the way you think, feel, and act. When you dress down, you sit down—the couch potato trend. Manners break down, you begin to feel down, and you’re not as effective as you should be.
If only the manager of the firm can inform the youth that continually relaxed dress leads to relaxed manners, relaxed morals and relaxed productivity and leads to a decrease in company loyalty and increase in tardiness.
If only the religious leader, class teacher or the leaders of the society can tell the youth that the kind and mode of dressing can entice and arouse the opposite sex for sex and other related sexual behaviors irrespective of whatever opinion they have about it.
Then my motherland will be the best place to be in the next few years. If not for anything, revisiting the dress code of our forefathers is important.
Written by
Emmanuel Quabena Sarkodie
