Against The Stream ~ WHAT, NOT WHO
WHEREVER THERE ARE
PEOPLE, THERE are problems of various kinds. Some
problems are logistical, such as the matter of producing
food and other basics necessary for survival, and
which, though they can be streamlined, can never be
completely eliminated. It is not this kind of problem
that I am concerned with here, but with those that
are—by using a little wisdom or common-sense—avoidable.
Do you like to suffer? You will say "No!"
of course. But there is a little bit of sado-masochism
in most of us, else why would we pay to watch horror-movies
that scare us and even cause delayed-reaction nightmares?
Or why are champion boxers paid millions for a few
rounds in the ring, during which they bash each other
to bloody pulp, if not for the entertainment and satisfaction
of those who delightedly watch and applaud their violence?
Something inside us does like suffering, if not our
own, then in others. Strange, isn’t it?
Each person sees the world from his own
unique viewpoint, and there is nothing unusual about
this. Problems arise, however, when we think that
the world must be exactly as we perceive it to be,
not thinking that others might see it differently,
according to their particular viewpoints. Clinging
to one’s viewpoint, unwilling to look at things
from others’ viewpoints, leads to intolerance,
bigotry, fanaticism, and all kinds of tensions, conflicts,
and problems, small and great.
We live now in a world where cultures and
religions touch and overlap each other on all sides,
unlike in former centuries when nations had little
commerce or contact with each other, and little was
known or understood—but much misunderstood —about
the cultures and religions of others. Now, looking
back, we can clearly see the trouble and misery that
has been directly caused by the idea of ‘the
Chosen and the Damned’ throughout history. Is
it not time that we updated our way of looking at
things? We are, after all, now in the 21st Century
(using the arbitrary Christian dating-system that
the whole world has got stuck with).
Isn’t it sad that, while the world’s
wisdom—and there is no shortage of it, really—should
be freely available to anyone who can think and read,
in any bookstore or library (even in newspapers and
magazines!), many people should be as happy in their
ignorance as ‘pigs in muck’, or content
to live like ‘frogs in a well’, thinking
that their own narrow way of looking at things is
the totality of life?! It would be alright to let
them remain so, if they were content to allow others
to differ, but they continually try to drag others
down into their darkness with them. This cannot/should
not go unopposed. The world needs more light instead
of more darkness.
We can—i.e., it is possible—look
at things from others’ viewpoints without necessarily
agreeing with or endorsing them. And if we can do
so, we will become greatly enriched thereby. The more
sides we are able to look at a thing from, the clearer
the picture we will get of it; try it, right now,
and see: Without moving from where you are as you
read this, look at any object near you: a TV, refrigerator,
car, or even a person. Your view of it, your perception
of it, is only as a two-dimensional object, like you
see on a TV screen.
Can you drive a two-dimensional car, sit
on a two-dimensional chair, eat a two-dimensional
meal, or embrace a two-dimensional person? If you
go to buy a car, you would not take just one look
at it, from a particular angle, and then buy it, would
you? You would walk all around it, look beneath it,
get inside, inspect everything, and probably test-drive
it first. In the same way, it would help us—and
the world—if we looked at others’ points-of-view
objectively. We need not like them, or agree with
them, but we can agree to differ, without wanting
to destroy. The unwillingness to do this displays
a deep-seated insecurity about one’s own viewpoint,
and reduces us, often, to intolerant bigots and fanatics,
whose war-cry is: "I am right, and you are wrong!",
whether on a personal level, or on an increasingly
large-scale level such as "my family", "my
tribe", "my nation", "my race",
"my religion", and so on. Have we not personalized
everything, and made things like ‘good’
and ‘bad’, ‘right’ and ‘wrong’
into persons? Watch yourself the next time you have
an argument with someone: Do you think that "He
is right, and I am wrong"? If we thought like
that, there would be no basis for argument, would
there? Arguments arise and go on because each person
considers himself to be right and others wrong. Is
there anything we can do about this? Certainly there
is. Try to see that:
WHAT
MATTERS IS WHAT IS RIGHT,
NOT
WHO IS RIGHT.
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