An all African Christian enlightenment band set up in the small town precinct at lunch time. You have to know that this is a very compact space and does not compare with the usual expansive high street pedestrian-only shopping areas found in larger urban areas. Also, it is place where people live in maisonettes above some of the shops.
So, there was this band and several large speakers. The decibels were seriously awful, the sound levels hurt. The singing was abysmal, unusually so, it was not what I would have heard elsewhere from African singers.
Apart from a very few young people, who, probably already have damaged hearing from loud noises constantly flowing at full blast through their MP3 players into their ears and the experiences of night club sound abuse, the band was making a good job of keeping people away. Like us, people were skirting around the centre, or rushing past the noise. The few local shopkeepers there are in the precinct will not have been at all happy with their trade being disrupted.
I think enlightenment is a multi-way, personal process. Inflicting injurious levels of auditory pain on people is not a particularly useful step to guide anyone to voluntary enlightenment.
RANDOM THOUGHTS 
Couldn’t agree more. Reminds me of the advice to my grandfather on his ordination – how not to communicate with people!
That phrase ‘how not to communicate with people’ is one I have used often, both very seriously and sometimes with humour. The bottom line remains the same for both. And yes, it is a saying that would have been useful to communicate today. Because of the extreme noise levels, it was impossible to communicate anything….at least not in a polite two-way communicative fashion!
If I know anything of the matter, it may well be that they will go home deploring how indifferent present society is to their message … :no:
With any luck they will work it out one day. Different cultures, quieter diplomacy, and all that.
Exactly so! :yes:
It struck us that there was some role reversal going on with us the heathens being pounded!
It still wouldn’t change my views on the possible pathways to positive communication in today’s societies.
Listening and courtesy never come amiss.
Oh dear, seems like they need to turn the volume down if they wish to be heard 🙄
Spot on :yes:
Never a truer word or two said, Marika. I wonder if they were enlightened enough to see (let alone hear) what they were doing. Dubious I would say.