May be one of the reasons that I
have developed a fondness for little events with some sort of conclusions and
interpretation came from the “moral lessons” of school textbooks as well as
little story books for children? When I look back, I find that textbook
designers were wanted to achieve two objectives simultaneously, teaching the
language and morality. The reason that I brought up those moral stories is, in a way they have implanted in me from an earlier age that learning from wise men is a
wise act. Frankly, I am growing increasingly doubtful about this. Wherever, I see
more stress on the words of the wise men, I see more aggression and inhuman
behaviors.
If I dilute things out and do not
go for Marxists, Jihadist and Libertarians' gig names and choose the most
respected one like Plato, again I find the same issue. In the Book VII of the “Republic”
after telling (through Socrates) how a “Just City” should form and look like,
he then goes for how to implement it in an existing city. He proposes to kill
or banish everyone over ten years old and raise the children in the manner he
has outlined………. Now, if someone with a strong will gets inspired from Plato
and tries to make such a just city, the result will be a humanitarian catastrophe.
In fact, it has already happened many times but in different versions and under
different titles. Take all major revolutions; there were deliberate killings or
cleansing for creating “Just societies”. From French, Americans, Russian,
Germans, Chinese, Turks, Indian/Pakistanis, Iranian, Arabs, Latin Americans all
have tasted and practiced it in one or another form. Although these countries
have seen brief humanitarian crises during their revolutions/independence however,
afterwards they have moved to be better societies. In fact, these countries
celebrate those times as their most romantic times.
Contradicting myself, I also
consider them romantic times as those were times when people were standing for
what they were thinking as justice and the REASON that I consider them romantic
times is due to shrinking stands for justice and increasing stands on identities
in our times. If people in first and second decades of last century were
standing for economic and social justice…. today, a century later when the
whole globe turned into a “village” and “all nations” have signed on “Human
Rights” bill, it is no more justice or just societies that people stand for but
the identities.
Honor asks to ban/kill |
Freedom asks to ban/arrest |
Frankly, Seeing “Burqa” has become
a hot political issue is a Yuk moment for me. I should say, it is a yuk time in
the history. It is such downgrading even in radicalism that it is no more
society but it is the very personal issues, like head covering, beard, trousers
and hair styles that have become most important issues. It appears to me Tribal
values have overtaken both religious and secular values and have successfully
dragged contemporary people around the world from societal issues into personal
issues.