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AFTER a very long time, I recently lost control and let anger dictate my actions; all because of the political views of a friend. Obviously, the net outcome thereafter, having regained composure, was regret, followed by a realisation that did it really matter who was the next prime minister of Pakistan.
Blinded libertarians will insist that yes it does. Why? Because of their view that every person has a right to live as he chooses as long as he respects the equal rights of others; and because of the popular narrative that libertarianism seems to have very effectively been sold to all of us. The idea that approximately 10 million voters, of which the majority are poor and illiterate, voting in their ‘selfish’ interest, which interest could be as simple as selling their vote for a few thousand bucks or as difficult as a promise of timely disposal of garbage in their area, will magically add up to the best outcome, every time, for Pakistan as a whole.
Like the very rational and highly informed economic man whose selfish interest is the force behind efficient markets, libertarianism rests on the belief that humans are rational, calculating and selfish. One could dispute the belief. For if we were rational or calculating we would not trade long-term interests for short-term ones, or be motivated purely by our emotions, with hatred being the dominant one. As with economics, it is often forgotten that at some level all humans, including the wisest amongst us, have the tendency to behave like absolute idiots.
Bad actors at the very top seriously affect the behaviour of all others.
When polarisation achieves the heights it has achieved in modern times, courtesy social and electronic media powered by modern technology, truth, rationality and mannerism get kicked out, or rather stand obliterated.
There was a time that journalism took pride in reporting news objectively and accurately; but as of now one is not sure if we have any real journalists left in Pakistan. Biases and prejudices are starkly evident, and fake news is the in thing, all of which is not helpful in allaying political tensions; bad actors at the very top seriously affect the behaviour of all others, so much so that political hooliganism is now the norm rather than a taboo. And all that in the name of freedom.
We as a nation definitely need to move on beyond self-seeking interests, and urgently need a better philosophy for what freedom actually means. For some of us, it definitely does not mean spewing hatred on prime time day after day; for the record when hatred becomes news, everyone invariably, including politicians, will follow the script. If I were to hatch a conspiracy, it would be about how the enemies of Pakistan made all of us forget that we are all, irrespective of our views, political or otherwise, first and foremost, citizens of Pakistan.
And no, citizenship is not about simply getting an NIC from Nadra or being able to vote in an election. Essentially, citizenship is all about adhering to the laws, the traditions, the culture and the norms of the society you live in.
Don’t worry, we are not plunging into a discourse on honesty, helping others, community service and picking up the garbage, in fact not littering, everywhere you go, and all in all making Pakistan a better place to live in.
We all already know that we have survived and evolved into a great nation through cooperating with each other, reciprocating good deeds, observing acceptable social behaviour; or in the words of the Quaid, through unity, faith and discipline.
So what went wrong? Well we Pakistanis, like most humans, are humans. Tit for tat is a natural state for us; meaning we do unto others exactly what they do unto us. If we get good we reciprocate with good, albeit if we get bad, we get crazy and return the favour in spades. A personal theory is that at some point, a bad actor for his selfish motive threw the first stone, and thereafter all hell broke loose.
In order to reverse this sorry state of affairs, we need to place our faith in the power of one; it is debatable whether the one vote really matters, but for sure each and every Pakistani matters individually for continuing our journey towards becoming the greatest nation on the planet!
Good manners, compassion and concern for others are contagious; good begets good. If you allow for the possibility that one’s good actions will motivate the other person to carry good behaviour to a third person, we have a chain, which can potentially reverse this mess we find ourselves in. So deliberately chuck your political views and your ego out the window, force a smile on your lips and unilaterally declare, with family and friends, a truce.
The writer is a chartered accountant based in Islamabad.
Published in Dawn, August 8th, 2018
