ALL LIVES MATTER
The past couple of weeks have seen the issue of racial discrimination acquiring prominence, where, in some countries, may I say, this issue has reared its ugly head in most defining terms. Indeed, the happenings seem to be a grim reminder of a bygone era — something which we thought had been consigned to the annals of history and the scourge brought under control. Of course, the complete eradication thereof remains a pipe dream.
Before proceeding ahead a scene from the movie ”RACE” based on the life of Jesse Owens, the iconic athlete who facing all odds and overcoming innumerable obstacles, won four gold medals at the Berlin Olympic in 1936 is worth recalling . While he was welcomed back with a ticker-tape parade in New York, the humiliation began immediately thereafter. At the reception in his honour at the Walsdorf Astoria, he was instructed by the Janitor to take the service lift and not the normal guest lift which was reserved for whites. Even President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, in defiance of custom, neither congratulated him nor invited him to the White House– moving Jesse Owens to say — “Hitler did not snub me — it was FDR who snubbed me”. If a Country could do that to its National hero — imagine the plight of normal citizens who would face ignominy, disgrace and humiliation of the highest order as a part of their daily routine.
In another instance, going back in history about forty years, when I was still in my formative years, I vividly remember how Tony Greig’s comment on “making the Windies Grovel” galvanized the Caribbean pride and spurred a counter reaction of epochal proportions from the West Indies team . The swagger with which Viv Richards mercilessly plundered the English attack and the display of brute power by their battery of legendary paceman gave the English pride more than its fair share of pounding. Infact, so much so, that in the Final Test, in mock humiliation, Tony Greig crawled across the parched Oval outfield displaying unabashed atonement for his verbal indiscretion.
Well if you thought that a couple of decades later, the World would have moved on –you were wrong and we still seemed to be caught in a time — warp. Apparently, we have moved ahead but only in the manner but not the degree of discrimination which seems to be as ingrained in society as before.
Michael Holding’s recent powerful, emotive and intensely factual speech calling, infact demanding, an end to institutionalized racism is something that really gets ingrained in the mind. Faf du Plessis’s emphatic words ‘All Lives don’t matter. Until black lives matter” only added to the importance of the issue. While the whole world has been making symbolic gestures (“taking the knee” for instance) which by themselves carry their own significance, it is well-nigh time for collective humanity to deal with this disease, more proactively and determinedly. The need, specially, in view of the global outbreak of the Pandemic when the world faces a medical crisis of astronomical proportions is to prevent the situation from becoming more complex by adding another, dimension to the already intricate scenario.
Closer home, the Indian society has for long been governed by “Varna” wherein your birth determines your pecking order in the social hierarchy. The classification not based on any skill-sets gradually has given birth to a “caste” system leading to widespread discrimination and exploitation of the so-called lower castes at the hands of the upper castes. The extent to which we have become prey to this, is nowhere better reflected than in our political system wherein the selection of candidates, the composition of Governing Councils are based not on meritocracy but on win-ability in which the underlying caste composition of the electorate and the candidates ability to sway it on the basis of the his caste (“Jati”) becomes a dominant criteria. In all this merit, competence and sometimes integrity suffer at the altar of political expediency. Even the efforts of reformers and thinkers across the last couple of centuries have not resulted in the complete eradication of this menace.
Taking the discussion forward in the Indian context, Article 15 prohibits discrimination, both by the State and any citizen, on grounds of religion, race, caste, sex or place of birth or any of them. Further, with some amount of Constitutional sanction, the complex system of reservations and quotas, aimed at correcting historical injustices suffered by certain sections of society has symbolized the affirmative action of the polity to tackle caste-based discrimination. However, sadly while to some extent necessary and fruitful in the context in which they were conceived, they have in a manner of speaking, only served to widen the social divide. Moreover, over a period of time, the constant tinkering with quotas has only been motivated by political considerations and not any broader social goals. The fact that much more remains to be done in order to achieve the goal of social equality was tellingly highlighted in the vernacular movie “Article 15”, starring Ayushmann Khurrana, wherein the distance to be covered towards bridging the religious ,societal and economic gaps between various sections of the society (I hate to repeatedly use the word “caste”) was brought to the fore.
The above lengthy discourse. is meant to highlight, specially, in these trying times the need to rise above narrow, constricted, parochial concerns — to judge, as said earlier, people on the basis of their qualities, capabilities, qualifications and, of course, achievements. The background, lineage and ancestral moorings might provide, somewhat, a guide to the persons best occupational fit and vocational instincts — but no further and definitely not of his ranking in the social hierarchy. Appreciate Viv Richards rasping drives as well as Donald Bradman’s silken placements purely in cricketing terms and not associate it with the color of their skin or as Michael Holding says do credit Thomas Edison for inventing the light bulb but do also remember Lens Howard Larimer who invented the carbon filament which allows lights to continuously shine.
In a world where, thanks to large-scale globalization and vastly improved means of communication, there is ready, almost, instant access to information, the need is to martial our resources, and tinker our thought processes and churn our grey matter to get the mindset rid of this disease which has the potential to cause irreversible damage and untold misery, akin to any pandemic or natural disaster. It is here that edge of the box and not symbolic solutions would be required to force a collective change in the global mindset. As an example, just see the movie “Invictus” which tellingly portrays on screen Madiba Nelson Mandela’s efforts to use sport (the national Rugby team) to unite a country vastly divided and suffering from social tensions arising from decades of social discrimination — do remember the task is gigantic but the progress needs to be there — never mind the pace which can, expectantly , be excruciatingly slow.
All in all the need is to exploit the overreaching power of social media to trigger a mass movement aimed at rationalizing individuals’ mindsets to be a harbinger of rapid social change. The problem is acute and the disease malignant wherein attempting to treat it by merely symbolically will not be neither sufficient nor adequate.
