I was traveling from Port Harcourt to Bayelsa state yesterday afternoon, we go to a police check point and it was the Federal Sars men that stopped us. While they were doing their lawful duty of searching the vehicle and the passengers in it, a girl that was sitting behind me made a comment and the officer that was conducting the search heard her loud and clear. She said '' You people are just wasting our time, if it were the bad boys terrorizing the region you people won't stop them''. The Sars man got angry and asked the girl to come down from the vehicle, the girl came down and she was taken into their custody for further questioning about her comment. The officer asked the driver to carry the rest of the passenger and continue with the journey. Some passengers pleaded with the officer to let the girl go but they refused, they said the girl must show them evidence where she saw them not stopping bad boys. They accused the girl of working with bad boys. The girl was detained while we continued with our journey.
The girl wouldn't have found herself in that situation if she had kept quiet without saying a word.
we should learn how to control our tongue at all time. Don't say unguided words when in public place.
Don't say anything when your opinion is not sought after in a public place because you don't know who is who.
I feel like sharing this so that we can avoid some unnecessary problems in our lives.
I believe that everyone suffers with it at times, and that with practice, we can all improve. This is especially crucial in today's environment, since social media and the internet allow our thoughts to be magnified effortlessly. One careless statement may be repeated and disseminated far and wide, with unexpected repercussions we could never have anticipated. So the lack of face-to-face connection also removes some of the social indicators that would typically help us be more conscious of how our words are perceived, because it is easier to mistake a person's voice or purpose when conversing via text rather than in person. So assuming the girl controlled her tongue, she wouldn't have found herself in that situation.