Chowrangi

Sheikh Saadi has said,”Hur Kay bud bashud naykee na beenud”, when applied to the present affairs of nations it means that people expect others to behave as they do. People also like to criticize others, while their own affairs are on fire.

You don’t have to be a genius to read the signs. We have a growing middle class, being reared on a diet of radical consumerism and aggressive greed. Unlike industrializing western countries which had colonies from which to plunder resources and generate slave labor to feed this process, we have to colonize ourselves, our own nether parts.

We have begun to eat our own limbs. The greed that is being generated and marketed as a value interchangeable with nationalism can only sated by grabbing land, water and resources from the vulnerable. What we are witnessing is the most successful secessionist struggle ever waged in Independent Pakistan. It’s the secession of the middle and upper classes from the rest of the country. Its a vertical secession, not a lateral one. They are fighting for the right to merge with the elite of the world.

There are political parties who believe in every negative or positive tactic to grab the rule. Their political strategies are very questionable. Political workers in the struggles have been dealt with brutally, killed, beaten, imprisoned and under false charges. The minute a state starts using force upon its own people, the whole world shrinks and colors fade to become black and white.

We are living in times when to be ineffective is to support the status quo which no doubt suits some of us. And being effective comes at terrible price. I find it very hard to condemn people who are prepared to pay that price. It’s time for us to sit up and think.

Other posts by Commoner

• Iran Twisters - July 20th, 2008
• Our Premier - July 20th, 2008
• Blasts in Kohat - July 20th, 2008
• Again People Speak - July 19th, 2008
• FATA Unrest Expands - July 18th, 2008
• PTCL Crisis - July 18th, 2008
• 50 Killed in Herat, Karzai - July 18th, 2008
• Modicum of Support - July 17th, 2008
• Eating the Words - July 17th, 2008
• Hairline Situation - July 17th, 2008