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Mohammad Farooq

~ Thoughts provoker, feelings evoker

Mohammad Farooq

Tag Archives: Society

Privilege is abusive

31 Wednesday Jul 2019

Posted by Mohammad Farooq in Life, Opinion, Society

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Tags

Discrimination, Downtrodden, Entitlement, Immunity, Life, Privilege, Racism, Reality, Society, Superiority complex

Privilege tends to dent our psyche, gives us a notion of superiority and makes us a slave to its desires. However, there is a tendency to forget with it comes responsibility which isn’t mostly exercised, since it seeps into our minds and contributes to throwing our weight around. The drill of privilege becomes a daily ritual which can’t be shaken off because it empowers people and gives them unprecedented influence.

Interestingly, privilege in majority cases tends to be abused and misused to make a point, much like the aristocracy of the old days which gave them immunity to go unfettered and unchecked. It may buy you influence, sway, social standing and ability to throw tantrums, however, it doesn’t provide you respect if it isn’t responsibly exercised. It allows moronic tendencies to hold sway and allows such individuals to get away with a lot of crap without being held accountable.

Blighted by our proud sense of privilege, we tend to get blind-sighted by our actions and in the quest for power and influence let it drive us towards mistreating others who aren’t part of that fold. Ironically, that is how society has functioned since time immemorial, irrespective of the rise in awareness of equality there is a superiority complex that still allows it to thrive.

What does privilege provide? It grants us access to the echelons of society, shoves us into the mainstream and allows to intermingle at a level par of the status reserved only for the privileged. It is like the old order, who believed they were ordained by God to rule by birth and that is the mentality still afflicting our privileged class.

It is a worldwide phenomenon, but in third world countries the notion of privilege is beginning to be questioned and its nauseousness is irritating those who are rising through the ranks and challenging the status quo. For the status quo, amongst which the privileged class constitutes a majority feel threatened by those who they believe are inferior and are snatching to what they believe is rightfully theirs.

Consequently, it leads to insecurities, egotistical behaviour and thrusting of one’s influence to subjugate those who are victims of the abuse of privilege to forward their agenda’s. It is to show them their place and make them realize that they don’t belong amongst those privileged classes. The efforts to enter the privileged class circle by those not born into it leads to resistance and quashing their attempts for gaining access to it.

To hinder the progress of those trying to rise to the ranks of the privileged are demonized, discriminated and mistreated for who they are. Privilege is symbolic, it provides patronage and unlocks the door to unprecedented power and influence. This imbalance permits those privileged enough to knock out those aspirants and show them who is the boss. In every realm of life, we let this superiority complex clout our actions and thoughts which contributes to incessant hatred for the downtrodden and those below us.

Privilege is like a concoction, an addiction that has ensnared the elite, the powerful and their counterparts to exercise undue power and influence. This addiction in its very notion is toxic, distasteful as it sounds but this is a reality which cannot be ignored. It continues to thrive despite the rising awareness amongst those who are fighting to gain their rightful share in society.

The communion of those privileged and those below them is practically impossible. The interests and values clash, but those willing to bend and act like them tend to somehow gain access but they are never recognized as one of them. Those granted entries remain outcasts and tend to be disowned in many cases. In medieval times, it was common for those rising through the ranks to somehow arrange marriage in the nobility to gain legitimacy and recognition.

Earning a legitimacy license in the ranks of the privileged is a hard task so to speak, considering their biases. It is futile and any attempts to dissuade the privileged from throwing their weight around has been an abysmal failure. Clinging onto the hope that equality will thrive in this divided world is an exercise for the foolhardy and good luck to them!

 

 

 

 

Why does Manto arouse antagonism amongst the intelligentsia?

14 Friday Jun 2019

Posted by Mohammad Farooq in Biography, History, Literature, Psychological Issues, Saadat Hassan Manto, Society, Tributes

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Cinema, Dr Ayesha Jalal, Faiz Ahmed Faiz, History, Hypocrisy, Literature, Media, Nandita Das, Nuzhat Manto, Partition, Saadat Hassan Manto, Sarmad Khoosat, Short story writer, Society, Urdu literature

There are writers who run amok, and their stingy criticism is deployed to devastating effect which shames societal practices and exposes the dim realities of life we so much try to avoid. Manto is amongst those rare breeds of writers, whose stories evoke and stigmatize societal hypocrisies, lays bare the truth and makes it evidently difficult to absorb.

A column published in a leading weekly magazine in March, the writer said, “Exquisite short stories are mixed in with works that are at best hurried and slapdash, at worst incomprehensible.” He goes onto add, “Most of this is, no doubt, a result of the life that Manto lived: a life marred by poverty, alcoholism and mental illness.”

The columnist is a much-respected psychiatrist who has also done an exegesis on the famous Urdu short-story writer entitled “The Touch of Madness: Manto as a Psychiatric Case Study.” The writer seems to have stumbled upon Manto as an exhibit of mental psychosis and eccentricity for his research purposes and stamped his opinion about him being mentally ill.

He further stated: “In and of itself, this is of no moment. After all, an artiste is free to create and propagate his or her work any way he likes. But the continuing attention on Manto has had the result of perhaps diverting attention away from a number of other gifted writers some of whom were his contemporaries and some who came later. Writers like Upendranath Ashk, Krishan Chander and even the great Munshi Premchand. In addition, later writers like the exquisitely subdued Ghulam Abbas and Muhammad Hasan Askari have not received the kind of attention or accolades that have accrued to Manto.”

Interestingly, much to my consternation, a column about Manto and Faiz’s connection had an apparent disconnect to it, why would the contributor raise questions over his alcoholism and then express his apparent jealousy as to why he seems to be center of attraction and be so much in the mainstream? As per my observation, the interest Manto has garnered since his post-centenary celebrations is largely a consequence of his fanbase which has grown organically and keeps on increasing.

Is Manto to be blamed for the aforementioned literary luminaries not getting the accolades or attention reserved for Urdu’s greatest short story writer? Has anyone stopped people from exploring the writings of Krishan Chander, Munshi Premchand or Upendranath Ashk and researching about them? No one has cajoled people into reading Manto since his works aren’t for everyone to read, he is still ostracized by many and retains that aura of controversy that plagued him when he was alive and continues unabated to this day.

Manto’s repertoire and skills were unparalleled as a writer, his intellectual arrogance a well-known fact. He made more friends than enemies during his lifetime and never minced words. The spectre of Manto’s presence bears an overlying reality for his critics; they tend to fear him even six decades after his demise.

The movies made in Pakistan and India by Sarmad Khoosat and Nandita Das respectively were due to their love for Manto, the theatre plays, translations and other research are a consequence of his writings evoking the human sensibility. His popularity isn’t a result of marketing machinations or outpouring of investment but largely because of Manto’s loyal fanbase which has ensured that his legacy and works live on.

According to Mujahid Eshai, who has translated several works of Manto in two volumes published by Sang-e-Meel told, “The writer does not quote an example of such works. Again, no reference to any of Manto’s essays and Letters to Uncle Sam has been provided. The writer seems to have been impressed by Khoosat’s travesty of Manto’s life as reflected in the so-called biopic”.

Manto’s daughter Nuzhat Manto refuting his father was mentally ill-explained, “After his migration from Bombay (now Mumbai) in January 1948, the opportunities available for writers were limited. In the aftermath of partition, Lahore’s film industry was in shambles and had been ravaged by the exit of leading Hindu and other investors, which deprived many writers of earning a livelihood.”

She elaborated, “The conditions in a newly-formed state were minuscule, my father didn’t write for many months after his arrival which he mentioned in one of his write-ups. Also, his outright refusal to be associated with any movement, whether the progressive writers or others landed him in trouble with his fellow peers”.

“It is pertinent to note; my father wrote openly about his chronic alcoholism and his nephew’s sketch Uncle Manto shares the ignominy of those struggles and how it distressed the family. Court cases, his avenue to earn a livelihood shrunk as his peers boycotted him out of spite and growing societal opposition to those short stories on partition which drew the ire from all segments of society,” adds Ms. Nuzhat.

“To this day, the profound hatred continues. However, my father irrespective of all his flaws and intellectual arrogance, was not mentally ill. He himself requested his nephew Hamid Jalal to have him taken to the mental asylum for rehabilitation and get cured of his alcoholism,” she said.

Unfortunately, most of the focus on Manto has been surrounded around his penmanship of what transpired during partition were masterpieces. Ironically, his satirical pieces like Hindustan ko Leaderon Sai Bachao, Shaheed Saaz, Dekh Kabeera Roya, Upar Neechay aur Darmayan, Mootri, Mujhay Shakayat Hai, Letters to Uncle Sam and many other eminent works remain unexplored.

The writer has termed Manto’s stories at best ‘hurried and slapdash’. This is irreverently an indication that he hasn’t explored the iconic Urdu short story writer works in full and is at best a halfhearted attempt to malign Manto’s reputation. Irrespective, such efforts have not stopped people from reading his works or neither will it deter them now much to the dismay of his critics and those jealous of him.

In a session at the Lahore Literature Festival (LLF) in February, eminent historian and his niece Dr Ayesha Jalal said Manto was a social critic and a walking spectator to history. She stated the reason for Manto being a constant source of irritation was due to him writing about things which one isn’t “supposed to write or talk about”.

Manto remains a paradox sixty-four years after his death. Moral policing in a society polarized by opinions and influence will continue unabated and in case of Manto, such regressive measures will only elevate his status further considering that his works have reached as far as Croatia, in whose language his stories were translated in 2016.

“People call me black penned, but I don’t write on the blackboard with black chalk; I use white chalk so that the blackness of the board becomes even more evident,” said Manto in a lecture at Jogeshwari College, Bombay in the mid-1940s.

 

 

 

 

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Me

Mohammad Farooq

Mohammad Farooq

Busines Journalist and ex-Senior Sub-Editor at Profit by Pakistan Today. Bylines in Dawn, Livemint India, Huffington Post, Express Tribune, MIT Techreview Pakistan,IGN Pakistan, . Interested in Technology affairs, history buff and Part qualified accountant.

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A lot has been going on…

  • My Angelic Grandmother December 14, 2021
  • A man for all seasons: Shahid Jalal August 19, 2020
  • The Merchants of Death June 18, 2020
  • The renaissance of reading books again September 25, 2019
  • Privilege is abusive July 31, 2019

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