On the passing of Desmond Seales, Editor in Chief of Cayman Net News.
I try not to speak ill of the dead, not out of superstition, but because it's no challenge, like shooting fish in a barrel - in Desmond's case that would be a puffer fish surrounded by piranha.I try and avoid instant canonization of the deceased too - which avoidance in Desmond's case is also like shooting said fish in said barrel; saint he wasn't.
Many a eulogy begins with John Donne's words, No man is an island entire of itself but I think Desmond came to believe he was the embodiment of the Island - something that explains how he came to quarrel, one-by-one, with other self-styled 'big fish' sharing the same conceit.
Cayman probably shaped Desmond more than vice versa. He came to reflect the quirks, contrariness and sometimes garbled logic characteristic of the Cayman Islands, for example how he treated people.
The smiling, welcoming face at the door, which turns away (and turns to thunder) to cuss a servant for being too slow, too noisy, too some-ting, then turns back, smiling radiantly in an instant.Or how he couldn't be wrong about anything even when he obviously was.
The man in smoldering clothes denying he was struck by lightning because he was wearing a tin hat in a thunderstorm. "That hat saved me. Imagine what would have happened if I hadn't been wearing it when that thunderbolt hit".
Cayman Net News had the authentic tang of Cayman culture, being the same gumbo of contradictions. It mixed high moral tone, inspired comment, blunt commonsense and devil-may-care jibes at the powerful with monumental pettiness, political toadying, self-aggrandizement, and random mumbo jumbo. Sometimes all in the same article. Fascinating.
If there wasn't enough news for the day Net News wasn't above 'finding' some or if the news wasn't lively enough, augmenting it.
Eventually he overplayed his hand. Crucial, and fairly recent, events that lead to there being less news and less influence for Desmond were
- outing of his own journalistic source of private government documents, (Charles Clifford) for personal reasons.
- alleged comments (which he denied making) about criminal contacts and police corruption that lead to the fiasco of Operation Tempura - the scale of the fiasco not being of his making.
- publication of letters (of very dubious origin) in Net News about the judiciary that triggered another investigation
These events made Desmond appear, at best, a journalistic Jonah and at worst Byronic including in the sense of being "mad, bad and dangerous to know."
Desmond was much more about politics than news over the last decade but I don't think he was ever really on a side in terms of party politics. He was more like a floating voter, prepared to take a chance on change but also prepared to take his vote elsewhere if electoral promises were broken.
Whatever his faults and failures he was consistent in calling for a better quality of politics and politicians, he believed both had to improve and advance if the Cayman Islands was to enjoy a happy future. This is from an editorial in May 2007.
Effective political leaders should serve in a transformational role, where they are able to outline a vision for the country and instill confidence through their works to transcend personal goals and ambitions for the collective good of the country. This transformational leadership has typically been lacking in the Cayman Islands, leaving the country searching for directionAmen to that.
Bury Desmond's faults with him but let that agitation for better politics be his legacy.
What should his epitaph be? .. sticking to Donne, but paraphrasing him
"...never send to know for whom the press rolls; It rolls for thee"
With fitting irony Desmond becomes headline news in all the local media ... it's what he would have wanted.
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