IN a letter to the Antigua Observer yesterday Mary John cited Jamaica’s violent dancehall music as the reason for violent behaviour of the youths in Antigua.

In her effort to get the attention of Antigua’s Minister of National Security Errol Cort and the Minister of Education Jacqui Quinn-Leandro, she hit out heavily against the genre.

“Dancehall is not our cultural music. Why is it most predominant? Why is the government allowing another country’s cultural music, which is such a terrible influence on society to totally take over?” she questioned in her letter which was posted on www.antiguaobserver.com.

In her letter John also made reference to an article that was printed a few years ago in The Daily Observer entitled “Something in the music,” where it is said that the public continues to weigh in on a recent statement by Cort, who said government would move to ban artists whose lyrics promote violence from performing in that country.

That article had gotten some responses which included two promoters and other persons calling into the talk shows and on government to follow through on the threat.

Among the violence cited by John in her letter to the editor are two school stabbings in two days and a huge fight at a comprehensive school.

She claimed that most of the students are walking around with iPods and that 90 per cent of them are listening dancehall music.

“How can the students prepare their minds for learning, listening to this noise which promotes violence and is filled with such lewd and nasty lyrics?” she quried. “There is no doubt in my mind that dancehall music is a huge contributing factor to the violent and agressive behaviour of our youth in Antigua.”