Dear Editor,
I have read with great interest several letters in the press (by Dr Joyce Jonas, Mr Leon James Suseran, Mr Roshan Khan) concerning the continuing proliferation of noise pollution caused by speakers playing music at high decibel levels, and the immunity of the perpetrators from the law.
During October 2007, the occupant of a house near to me in Herstelling, East Bank Demerara, upgraded his audio system with several hi-powered components, namely 2 additional power amplifiers and 4 eighteen-inch metal cone bass speakers. From thenceforth, my family and the other neighbours, comprising octogenarians, toddlers, schoolchildren, and adults have suffered severe bombardment.
Attached is an excerpt from a list detailing the dates and hours when this bass menace was playing. The songs are confined to Indian remixes, chutney and Jamaican dancehall. The pounding bass riffs in these songs, with tempos ranging from 85 to 120 clicks per metronomic measurement, amplified to extreme levels have been terrorizing us residents.
On three separate occasions, I pleaded with the individual for relief from this sonic mayhem, and on the last occasion, some two months ago, the perpetrator asserted most colourfully that spewing this sonic bass was his constitutional birthright. Armed with the knowledge of the damage being wreaked on the collective psyche of my family, the perpetrator strikes in the morning before I leave for work, and when I get home in the evenings. The noise continues until after 7 pm or whichever hour suits the whim and fancy of the perpetrator.
Some Sundays, the music commences at 6.30 am. Reading to my toddler is a virtual impossibility. Watching television and reading requires yogic powers of concentration. Sleeping on Sunday, the rest day, is impossible. Cogito ergo sum banefully bashed. And on it still continues.
Complaints via phone calls to the Providence Police Station have been answered with the evergreen excuse of the unavailability of transportation, and on those occasions when the police did show up, the sonic mayhem continued after they left. Neighbours have passively resigned themselves to this nuisance, fearing retaliation from the perpetrator.
This hopelessness and resignation is reinforced by the knowledge that a civil suit would only add to the prodigious list of some 23,000 case jackets waiting to see the light of day, and the fact that representation might cost in excess of six figures.
After much introspection, several alternative solutions to my family’s particular plight have surfaced, in keeping within the fight-flight paradigm: Firstly, walking over and rending to bits the offending audio equipment. Secondly, investing my life savings in constructing a bigger, more powerful treble squealer to reply to the opposing bass, with one song repeated continuously for 12 hours on end – a methodology reminiscent of the nuclear arms race era. This would entail drastic budgetary revisions reducing food consumption to meet the resultant increased electricity use.
Thirdly, penning petitions to our legislators to mandate that every Saturday between 12.01 pm and 12.01 am Sunday be designated open season for bass binges. This would contribute significantly to acclimatizing the bass disaccustomed and the upcoming generation to the New Bass Order.
The hosting of biannual Bass Blowout Festivals inviting competing outfits from the Caribbean and further afield would provide an impetus to the sagging tourist industry, and foster acceptance of the Bass Inclined in a plural society.
The fact that the protection and preservation of civil rights seems to be an adornment of only the connected, well-heeled few will significantly alleviate the suspicions of the foreign refugee status reviewers in my flight from sonic mayhem.
Whilst I procrastinate on which methodology to pursue, gracious gratitude are extended to you the keepers of the fourth estate for publicizing this case of sonic sadism.
Yours faithfully,
Naseer Jabar
