Tall Pine MP Leslie Miller's campaign to redeem himself following remarks he made in the House of Assembly earlier this year about brutalizing a former girlfriend were woefully unsuccessful.
Any pretense that he was a changed man in light of those sexist and misogynistic remarks were shattered last week as Miller discussed proposed constitutional changes granting women full equality.
To say that Tall Pines MP Leslie Miller is representative of a bygone unenlightened era is an understatement. His remarks reported in The Nassau Guardian were pre-modern, uninformed about the realities of the 21st century and stunningly unintelligent.
"If my sister marries a foreigner, I expect for that foreigner to take her home to his country and support her," he said.
"What they bringing him here for? Don't come to my country and take a job from one of my Bahamian brothers."
In equally poor measure, Miller referenced remarks he said a constituent made about FNM Deputy Leader Loretta Butler-Turner. The disparaging remarks referred to a certain physical aspect of Butler-Turner. Recall that during the last election Miller made a crude joke about Butler-Turner.
All of these comments by Miller should be placed in the context of his now infamous House remarks. They are in the same stream of thought and anachronistic thinking which made him believe that he could speak openly in Parliament about beating a woman, which he found quite funny at the time, playing to his colleagues and to his public persona.
As reported in this journal: "'That's like beating your wife or your girlfriend every time you go home. You just beat her for looking at her. I love ya. Boom, boom, boom. I had a girlfriend like that.
"'When I didn't beat her she used to tell me I ain't love her no more 'cause I don't hit her. But seriously I had one like that. I had one. She used to tell me,' he insisted as other members murmured and chuckled.
"House Speaker Dr. Kendal Major injected, 'We know that you're joking with that.'
"However, Miller said he was 'serious with that'.
"'I tell her I get tired, man,' he continued, laughing. 'My hands hurting a little bit... give me a break.'
"After a comment from a sitting member inquiring whether he was joking, he reiterated, 'I am telling you the truth. One thing I don't do is lie.'"

Xenophobe
Now Miller has doubled-down on his sexism and misogyny. Strikingly, he managed to sound like a sexist and a xenophobe in one breathe.
"If my sister marries a foreigner, I expect for that foreigner to take her home to his country and support her."
One can imagine a cartoon of a man grabbing a woman by her hair dragging her into a cave, with the words "Home, Sweet Home" in a frame on the cave wall, as the man roars and brags, while beating his chest, "If she doesn't do what I say, I'll beat her. I is man."
What Miller is saying is that women should do exactly what a man wants. It is the man who has the agency and the will, while women are to be passive. Miller seems to believe that women should shut up and do what the man says, with as little choice as possible.
The fact that women and men are both breadwinners in most of the West and increasingly in other parts of the world today seems irrelevant to Miller. He lives in a world which no longer exists, just like most sexists and misogynists, upset that the era of men subjugating women is fast slipping away.
Miller also seems woefully out of touch with the reality of the modern Bahamas where the primary breadwinners in most families are women. Today scores of Bahamian wives and partners are providing more income for their families than are their male counterparts.
The clearly insular Miller also seems to ignore the reality of globalization, a significant feature of which is the movement of human capital. Today, educated and professional modern couples are deciding together where they want to live and raise a family.
Millions of men around the world have moved to their wives' home countries, for a variety of reasons, including the fact that it is the woman who may have a higher paying job or that her home country may afford a family a better quality of life.
Should these men pack up and return to their home countries? Of course, that would be absurd, as absurd as Miller's ranting.
There are many Bahamian men who have moved to their wives' country. Would Miller have them all pack up and return home?
Moreover, there are many fine men who relocated to The Bahamas after marrying Bahamian women. They have contributed significantly to the country in their professions ranging from medicine to the foreign service, and they have been generous in their community service. Should these men also pack up and leave?

Befuddling
What makes Miller's comments even more, to put it politely, befuddling, is that in The Bahamas overwhelmingly more women are attaining tertiary degrees. This is true at COB as it is at tertiary institutions overseas.
A report by the Inter-American Development Bank dramatizes a critical developmental challenge, which Miller's unenlightened thinking will not help.
As reported in The Tribune: "Almost two-thirds of college and university-educated Bahamians have moved abroad to seek jobs in developed countries, costing this nation a sum equivalent to 4.4 percent of annual gross domestic product (GDP).
"The so-called 'brain drain' was highlighted in a newly released Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) report, which noted that 61 percent of tertiary-educated Bahamians had left this nation for jobs in Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Development (OECD) member countries.
"The study, 'Is there a Caribbean Sclerosis', which attempts to determine why economic growth in The Bahamas and five other regional nations has been stagnating, effectively suggests this nation is losing its 'best and brightest' minds to other economies.
"This, in turn, has major implications for the productivity, innovation and creativity of Bahamian firms and the wider economy, all areas where it is suggested this nation is not as competitive as it might be.
"The IDB report's authors, Inder Ruprah, Karl Melgarejo, and Ricardo Sierra, summed it up thus: 'The Caribbean countries have lost more than 70 percent of their labor force with more than 12 years of schooling through emigration.'"
This brain-drain which is making the country less competitive and helping to stagnate the economy is made up mostly of women. There is much that needs to be done to attract these women to return home to offer their talents and expertise.
One such measure is the proposed constitutional change. Bahamian women will be able to automatically pass on their citizenship to their children as is the standard practice in the vast majority of countries.
Bahamian women living overseas, thinking of returning home, would not want the added hassle of a potentially drawn-out and cumbersome process to pass on citizenship to their children born overseas.
Bahamian women at home and abroad must largely be appalled by the thinking of Leslie Miller, who jokes about beating women and who seems to think that a woman is a mere appendage to a man, with little to say about where she should live and help to raise her family.
The Tribune story continued: "The IDB study gives no explanation as to why 61 percent of Bahamian tertiary graduates head abroad, although the likely reasons include the fact many of them stay overseas when their college degrees are completed; the narrowness of the Bahamian economy and opportunities at home; and a lack of information about openings in The Bahamas.
"Still, the findings have worrying implications for The Bahamas, as they indicate an entire generation of entrepreneurs and top-level managers may be heading abroad, never to return. And with Baha Mar set to create 5,000 extra jobs, and other major investment projects coming on stream, this nation needs all the top-quality labor it can get."
Leslie Miller and those of a similar view may live in the past as much as they wish, and keep their heads and minds buried in the sands of yesteryear. In so doing, they will not only retard progress for women. Their views may also help to keep the country back in terms of economic growth, innovation, entrepreneurship and the fuller emancipation of women.
o frontporchguardian@gmail.com, www.bahamapundit.com.

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