Our education system and social brought up have taught us one thing “We are the best, we are the only people who are RIGHT, everyone else is wrong and we should try our best to put others on the Right Path”.
Teaching this phenomenon to the children and youth is becoming one of the root causes of many issues we are entangled in today. Most of us think in each matter that we are the only one who is right and in fact the best while all other people who are not alike are fools and on the wrong path. With this, we close the windows of our minds and face difficulty in engaging in dialogue in a civilized manner. We are not ready to listen to others because we have already decided that they are wrong and they only purpose of listening to them becomes not understanding their point of view, their perspective but to make a counter-argument which can prove them wrong. No matter, how much evidence is piled up, we have already made up our mind – we are RIGHT and they are wrong!
Often after posting anything on social media with which most people disagree, I feel like either I have put my hand either in a beehive feel surrounded by furious people with guns who are ready to attack me. I don’t see any tolerance or space in this society for people who are not following the norm of society but are different! Here different means being WRONG!
With this ideology integrated, mostly people in our country consider it their basic duty and right to judge others, and then to police them. This judgment and policing ranges from personal matters to public matters, from persons to institutions e.g. it is becoming increasingly common for the TV channels to do search operations either for couples dating, people not fasting, or people involved in prostitution. Such kind of TV programs is a reflection of our social attitude of “Judging and Policing the Morals of others”. Everyone feels themselves as the guard of the morals of the society, to punish others and teach them.
Because we have internalized idea of teaching others the right path so at the moment we think someone is “wrong” or in “trouble” we immediately start giving them suggestions; just have a look on any discussion and most of the comments will be about “you should do this, you should do that, you should not think like this, you should not critique, you should be patient,… etc etc”. Giving suggestions has become our habit though we know that mostly those suggestions are not entertained and when our suggestions are not entertained by others we become furious “See! You were supposed to be in this trouble because you didn’t follow my suggestion”
I think this principle of “self-righteous” has hindered our ability to engage in constructive dialogue with people with whom we disagree, and as I said most people construct their arguments not to convey their point of view but to put others down. Facing harsh realities make people uncomfortable, they feel like losing the argument, and then try to cover up their loss in an argument with abusive language. I agree with the saying that when someone starts shouting and using abusive language during an argumentation it means they already feel they have lost the argument and to satisfy their ego they try to put down others by using abusive language.
Another reason for this attitude can be traced to the fact that we teach “debate” to children instead of “dialogue”- and the principal of debate is “In any argument, one is a winner and the other is a loser”. We need to promote dialogue as a way of communication because the dialogue is based on the principle of “both of us have parts of the answer to the question; no one is completely wrong, and no one is completely right”. We also need to learn as a society that, different means different, different does not mean WRONG
