Editor in Chief: Moh. Reza Huwaida Thursday, March 28th, 2024

The Kabul Style

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The Kabul Style

I was sitting in one of the restaurants and busy in eating my meal. At the same time, a light chat was also in progress with my companions. After some time, two men came and sat at the table next to us. They both looked heavy and well-built and had style as if they wanted to intimidate or bully others. This was felt not only by us but also by some other people who were sitting on different tables. They had a quick glance at them and after this; they could not conceal the feeling of dislike to their style. Anyhow, they called the waiter in a way that was expected of them and ordered their meal. After sometime, they started talking and their voices were the loudest in the hall. One was telling the other about an incident. Due to his loud voice, I found myself listening to them. His narrative was full of bombastic words and descriptions like, ‘I told him, I will tear you into two parts and will eliminate your whole family. For this he started shaking, hahaha and could not utter anymore word. And then I went to his brother and I grabbed him from his collar and dragged him to some place. He started begging to me, hahaha and he looked very strange in this condition’. His partner was also adding fuel to his fiery sentiments, ‘Oh really, you did this! I can’t believe that! How did you do that?’ and soon the next started swearing in the name of God and the Holy Book. Later on, I felt sorry for my action of listening to others and resumed my conversation with my fellows.

In a society where ignorant and ill-mannered people rule, such scenes can be witnessed on every corner. Such behaviors are at the same time the psychological and social complication and symptoms of other social ailment or disorder. This shows that our society is full of people who not only believe in boasting but they have also got a strong hold on the nerves of all the members of society and the way they think and act, influence the other members of the society. At the same time, it also shows a reality that these people have silenced the voices of those who could have acted and behaved the otherwise. According to a law of physics, vacuum can never exist and it will always be filled by something. In a society, where a gap of educated, civilized and good people is formed, it is soon filled by those who were mentioned in the lines above.

It doesn't mean that our society has got emptied of those who can set good standards for others but this situation has happened by the preference of benefits and personal gains on universal habits and qualities. We all believe in good and universal values and feel glad when we see them being practiced in the society. At the same time, it is also our earnest desire to put share in the promotion and propagation of these values. But following and promoting these values remain easy until they don’t clash with our wishes and desires. At times, we come along with a situation when we have to choose from either the universal good values or our gains and benefits. In such circumstances, we confront a great confusion and the resultant frustration. Our ethics, our moral set of values, and our religious guidelines encourage us to stand firm with the good values or let’s call ‘the truth and goodness’ but we see that, in this way, we will face loss and our gains and aims will not be achieved. This important and crucial stage decides not only the future character and effectiveness of the person but also sets the tone of the society.

A few days earlier, a man confronted a similar situation. He worked in an office where he had to meet numerous kind of customers and people of different mentalities. In our society, where we have given promotion to the tradition of fighting and arguing in order to snatch the rights of others, one confronts a number of unpleasant people and situations on regular intervals. He also confronted some people who were not ready to accept their mistake and had raised a hell in his office by their shouting and misbehaviors. They were demanding money which never belonged to them. All the efforts to mediate and bring out a good solution had proved meaningless. The man was left with only two solutions; either to pay the money and retire from his right or be ready to fight with them. He thought for some time and then, silently gave away the money. After a few days, some of his friends came to know about it and they were very angry at him and one of them was seen shouting, ‘Why did not you tell this to me. I could have come there with my armed men and could have given them a good beating and they would have never dared to come to your office in future’. But the man spoke softly, ‘My friend, thank you for this. I knew that you were stronger than them and we could have easily done that but I was never willing to put my share in this culture of violence and power-exhibition just to save a few thousand Afghanis. I feel sorry that I had to retreat from my right but I feared that there would be fires from both the sides and there would definitely be deaths and injuries and those few thousand Afghanis were not worth it.’

There may be many other reasons for the promotion of this bullying culture. People, who have money or strong political and social links, are usually not afraid of any kind of legal punishment or imprisonment because they are sure that their money or political attachments can save them from any such punishment. Just like the second story described above, a bullying style may make you snatch the rights of others and earn you some temporary benefits. And most importantly, it is the only way that an ignorant should adopt but this style only gets stronger when everyone considers this acceptable. There is no wonder when this inappropriate style is adopted by those who are not in position to adopt a better style but it is very sad when the same is adopted by those who not only know to deal the situation in more gentle or polite way but who can also act as the role model for the rest of the society.

There is a saying that ‘world has not been harmed by the shouting of bad people but by the silence of the good.’ In this regard, we need to have a strong belief in the power of the good; in the power of politeness, gentleness and very refined behaviors, no matter how much we lose or gain. When this belief would be firm in our mind, we would be able to witness the same in the eyes and thoughts of others and then it would be visible in every social setup of the society. Otherwise, we will have to live with whatever we have!

(Muhammad Rasool Shah works as Academic Coordinator at Barakat Int’l School, Kabul. He can be reached at muhammadrasoolshah@gmail.com).

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