The moral climate change: My take on Akwapim Poloo

I have been very sceptical about social evolution. I sincerely think while society may progress technologically, we simultaneously continue to sink so low in moral depravity. Technology enhances moral depravity.

Incidentally, the problem of the world is not necessarily a technological one, but rather moral - how best we allow morality to creatively engage with technology.

Since the secularization of morality in the 1960s, we have seen a downward trend in the moral aptitude of human beings. Through the instrumentality of modern science, we have significantly acquired technical skills.

We have become more skilful in dealing with the technical problems of the world. We have gone to the moon. We have gone deep under the sea etc. We appear to be conquering nature to a significant degree.

Unfortunately, the acquisition of technical skills has not corresponded with social skills. The more we advance technologically, the more we become individual qua individual.

As we sink deep into individualism, our capacity for social skills flattens. We lose our civil language. Social capital, a deeply nuanced subject, shrinks. What Ibn Khaldun calls the collapse of Assabiyya begins to signal the collapse of human civilization

In the end, we are faced with individuals being auto-nomos (constituting a law to themselves). An extreme form of libertarianism advocated by Jeremy Bentham and John Stuart Mill intensifies.

Individuals do as they please. They own their bodies - they do with it as they please. They remain unaccountable to anyone. They can walk naked in public, drink to their death, and even kill themselves as they see fit.

Social media has accelerated our individuality. We are now more interested in "likes" than the quality of what we write or post. As faceless, virtual beings, we can insult, attack, and malign against ideas that sound Christian.

It is in light of this that l understand the issue of Rosemond Brown (also known as Akwapim Poloo). I have not paid attention to her, since the few times she hit the headlines for controversial and wrong reasons.

This is also because I have not been interested in the movie industry since the late 1990s - when the media increasingly liberalised.

So, l hardly pay any attention to our so-called celebrities. And, of course, l do not even care to know them, as l hardly see any significant contribution from them in advancing human flourishing.

In our generation, it is now easy to condemn the church than celebrities who virtually do nothing but demonstrate opulence and sometimes sheer moral depravity.

Since the sentencing of Akwapim Poloo, l resisted writing about it, because it did not warrant my time and attention.

But l am compelled to wade into the discussion because of some individuals who are pontificating common sense.

There is one Prof, who is said to be a lawyer. Over the years, he has established himself as a formidable social commentator. He talks about virtually all social and political issues. But many times, l struggle to see any sense in his argument.

Unfortunately, he has a large following because his liberal views on moral issues sync with the young men and women in our generation. This Prof says he does not see anything wrong with what Akwapim Poloo showed on social media. Obviously, he had a relativistic view of nudity.

Ordinarily, l would not begrudge him if he were consistent with his relativistic proclivity. But, this same Prof says the judge was wrong in sentencing Akwapim Poloo.

This is where we see the faltering of a Prof whose sense of judgement is clouded by faltering logic.

How come he thinks his subjective view is better and should be treated as objective and yet a judge does not have an equal right - operating within the law - to sentence a crime?

When people become consummately partisan, they begin to lose the respect associated with academic achievement.

All the same, l understand the moral climate change. We live in a country where nudists would be hosted live on television to talk about their sexual escapades.

We live in a country where our young men and women hardly have any reasonable philosophy of life.

For example, on Thursday, April 16, 2021, I watched Paul Adom Okyere, a seasoned journalist, host some students from the University of Ghana to discuss social issues.

To my surprise, these university students had such a warped view of life that l was left nearly traumatized about the future of Ghana.

One of them said he plans to amass so much wealth that he could travel to England just to eat pizza. Another said, he is not in any form of conjugal relationship because he wants more money to get more women.

With university students speaking they way they did, l reluctantly understood why teenagers would murder for ritual purposes. However, if we live with young men with such contorted view of life, we should applaud the judge for seeking to protect public sensitivity and morality.

When we enter into the public sphere, we enter into an unwritten social contract with everyone and everything else.

That is why we are not allowed by our conscience - even if not dictated by explicit law - to do as we please in public.

Nevertheless, as we seek to privatise the public sphere, we must reflect on the following questions: When did sheer open nudity become a norm in Ghana? When did narcissistic tendencies become the normative part of public culture? When did cheap celebrities become role models?

We will always be divided on moral issues, but we will all equally face the consequences of moral depravity.

Based on this, I sincerely sympathise with the son of Akwapim Poloo, because he is a victim of a wayward mother. But the problem is deeper than just splashing with social media with nude pictures. Our generation continues to record high cases of premarital sex and children born out of wedlock.

In the wisdom of God, a biological male and a biological female are expected to marry and have children. So, two heterosexual parents are expected to nurture children to be socially responsible. Consequently, the inversion of the God-ordained type of family becomes the lot of the world.

Unfortunately, while single parenting - with all its challenges - is increasing, the extended family, formally a bulwark against deviance, is quickly eroding.

Alas! The family is almost gone. Children have become the victim of a world gone insane, a world spiralling out of its moral compass.

So, as we plead for Akwapim Poloo, let us, as a society, invest energy in restoring the dignity of marriage and human family. Let us also remember that the "Akwapim" attached to her nickname is an aporia of her behaviour. Because Akwapim was the heartland of Basel missionaries in the late nineteenth century, who introduced the Calvinistic work and moral ethic.

This contributed to making the Akwapim assume the fame as the most courteous in the country to the extent that, it is jokingly said if Akwapim person prefixes an insult with "Please". If Rosmond Brown is to merit the "Akwapim" nickname, then she must change her behaviour. This is similar to the advice Alexander the Great is said to have had for one of his coward generals, who was also called Alexander, "You either change your name or your attitude."

This also means that we should not excuse sin by pointing to another sin that went unpunished. Evil is evil whether it is punished or not. Those of us who hold onto the Christian faith should live an exemplary life for the world to learn. For, we are the light and salt of the world.

May God graciously forgive me my sins and use me to bring change to the world. May l not glory in my sin. May l not seek to make it look less sinful.

Satyagraha

Prempeh Charles (prempehgideon@yahoo.com), African University College of Communications, Accra