Distinctions are a necessary evil. They exist. So, they might as well be understood. From an idealistic point of view, it is better to live in a society free from alienating labels of distinction. But such an option doesn’t exist; for distinctions and discriminations ripple in lived realities.
The best we can do, when a situation cannot be wished away, is to understand it aright. This is true both for the majority community and for the minorities. It is crucial for the latter. What makes a situation harmful is not only its hostility, but one’s inability to understand the given situation for what it is, and how it may be handled advantageously.
Equality is an ideal. All ideals are taken for granted. So, we don’t bother to reckon the war-zones and morasses of equality. The majority-minority interface is necessarily one of inherent inequality.
The very fact that equality of treatment has to be enshrined in the constitutions of the world—including our own—means that it is not a state to be taken for granted, but an ideal to which a society needs to aspire and progress. Inequality is the natural order. Everybody relishes inequality when it is to one’s own advantage. In this respect, all individuals and communities are identical.
The most empowering thing for minorities all over the world to realise is that inequality is not as great problem as it is assumed to be. Equality is, no doubt, a desirable ideal, hugely valuable in itself. But it is not an imperative either for existence or for excellence. On the contrary, inequality, given the right outlook, can be a greater catalyst for excellence than equality. It is also possible to sink under the burden of inequality, if we do not know how to cope creatively with it. Inequality is inherent in the relationship between the minorities and the mainstream. It cannot be otherwise. It never was, nor will it ever be.
Consider this. It is argued with much conviction that there can be no Hindu terrorism, whereas Islamic terrorism is deemed a plausible category. Of course, we also say now and then that ‘terror has no religion’. What escapes the notice of all is that the operative outlook is shaped by a mindset—perfectly understandable—of inequality.
The fact is that all religious communities are compacted of individuals and all individuals are capable of violence under similar circumstances.
Consider this too. If a member of a majority community commits a crime, it is an individual act. But if the member of a minority community does the same, it becomes a slur on the community as a whole. Certain Christian groups convert; and not all conversations are above board. I am a Christian priest. I have always had the cloud of proselytisation over my head. I never resented this, even though it was a far cry from the truth; for I understood why. When it comes to a minority community, the offence of one will seem the offence of all.
Why should this be taken note of, without getting overly aggrieved by it? It is, seen aright, a blessing in disguise. It is good for minority communities to exercise greater vigilance regarding the ethical and cultural stature of its members, which is possible only if they pay attention to the development of a community as a whole, which is hardly the case today. The vice of a member, or of a few members, would seem the essential characteristic of a whole community.
The entire community suffers. The general sense of outrage in respect of offenses attributable to members of minority communities will be far in excess of what corresponding acts by members of a majority community would evoke. The principle needs to be understood clearly. A majority community, all over the world, is perceived as an aggregate of discrete individuals. Minority communities are inevitably perceived as organic entities. Every individual, in effect, represents the community as a whole, even if he is not a practising member of that community.
This too can be a blessing rather than a curse, provided minority communities bother to develop—spiritually, culturally, intellectually—its members so that they become wholesome embodiments of their strengths rather than weaknesses. If a member of a majority community is noble, he is only a noble individual. But if a member of a minority community is noble, his nobility lends a glow to the community as a whole.
Hannah Arendt, in The Origins of Totalitarianism (1979) points out that the persecution of Jews in Germany was preceded by their spiritual decay as a community. This made it far easier for the Nazis to direct the avalanche of hatred towards them. Difficult times are, truth to tell, invitations to spiritually and culturally rejuvenate oneself. The blessing of the Old Testament, wrote Francis Bacon, was prosperity. The blessing of the New Testament is adversity. The worst calamity is not that hard times descend on a community, but that its advent coincides with its spiritual and ethical disarray.
It is good that testing times come. Character is not what you are in your comfort zones, but what you prove yourself to be when the going gets tough. That is when escapism becomes alluring. Rather than face the challenges of the present, and grow through them, individuals and communities feel tempted to escape into a golden past, or withdraw into fortified ghettos, which aggravates the burden of victimhood and pegs them down to disabilities, real and imaginary.
The right thing to do is to equip oneself to strike out into the future, learning from the mistakes of the past. It doesn’t help to be in denial: there are mistakes to be corrected. It is no use blaming others. In the end, individuals, communities and nations perish under their own weaknesses, and not due to external pressures and calamities.
Valson Thampu
Former principal of St Stephen’s College, New Delhi
Email: vthampu@gmail.com