Because by their very nature, most
African societies, Nigeria included are communal ones, we sometimes bury individualism
and at large the individual. We are made to believe that in each of our own
respective communities we must all think and function alike. Never mind the
fact that we live in communities that are very often neighbours to people who
are very different. Despite this and with its varying religions and
ethnicities, Nigeria as a whole still suffers from communalism. We expect our
children to inherit our religion, cultural beliefs and sometimes our politics
(God, I remember getting the stink eye, because my brother and I didn’t like a
Northern president – not as a person, but as a president and no not the present
one!). While there’s nothing wrong in wanting for your child what you think is good for them, the
problem comes when children “rebel” and we overreact.
Because we are in so many ways forced to
think alike, little signs of differences are immediately shut down. In the
short run, this exposes our herd mentality, in the long run however this may
have an impact on the self-esteem of the person made to feel wrong for being
different. Sometimes, if not often, these “differences” that are quick to be
shut down can be quite… how do I say this, stupid. A friend of mine recently
told me of how when we were kids he use to get beat by a religious teacher for
being left-handed. Today this sounds silly. Heck, even back then it was silly,
you just didn’t dare say it before you too got whipped. This whole left-handed
thing is seen as a cultural misnomer in Nigeria. God forbid you give someone
something with your left hand and end up receiving a lecture on cultural ethics,
even if you were holding something with your right hand (I got an earful for
that, including being asked what tribe I was). It isn’t the fact that some
people find this to be wrong, it is the way in which they go about trying to
correct it like one has all of the sudden become a pariah and will burn in
hell, because they can’t write with their right-hand.
Showing interest in another person’s way
of life can also be a problem. A Muslim friend of mine told me how everybody
around her (friends and family included) freaked out while when in Secondary
School she decided to take CRS (Christian
Religious Studies) to fill out her number of required courses. She was
purely taking it out of interest and not as a means of conversion, she was
quite comfortable in her beliefs, but everyone else was worried. More worrying
was how she will be perceived if she left the herd so to speak. Well my friend
took CRS and is still very much Muslim today. I had a similar situation,
although I’d be the first to point out I’m not the most religious of types.
When I was 18 I took an interest in reading the Bible, simply because it was a
new and intriguing to me, I had read parts of it before in Secondary School.
When someone in my family saw me reading it, I got a warning that I may very
well be disowned if I was found reading it again. This despite the fact that I
got the Bible from another Muslim household who were quite aware the book was
being read in their house and are still very much Muslim last I checked and I
haven’t gotten any more religious. I haven’t read the Bible since nor did the
warning get me to read the Quran even more at the time.
My point is- even though I agree people
should feel concern, because they are people and people do irrational things
–we are killing individualism at the cost of a form of communalism that doesn’t
help us as a society in the long run. What happens when you need someone to
help you understand Christian customs when no one from your religion is allowed
to take an interest in how the others live or interact? We all seem welcoming
to people who take an interest in our way of life, but not when someone takes
an interest in another’s.
The feeling of guilt that comes with being the
pariah is another problem in itself. The more you coerce people to conform, the
more problems you are going to have in future, because we end up having people
we are neither here nor there. Repressive societies in my opinion hinder
growth. Even when it comes to things like sexuality *gasps*… oh yes, am going
there. While I’ve never really been a fan of the in-your-face show of
homosexuality you see in almost every TV show now- simply because I don’t need
a show to tell me there are gay people who have seemingly normal lives –I’ve
always respected the rights of the individual in private. Whatever you do in
your home, it’s YOUR home… providing you don’t kill someone and bury them in
the backyard, because that someone probably belongs to someone else emotionally
and otherwise (that’s a police investigation for when the police decide to be
competent).
I understand the cultural complexities of our society and why
things like gay rights and /or marriage are a cultural no-no, I do. But the
truth of the matter is even if I understand these things as do many others, we
surely can’t expect everyone to be in line with what we think is right. For
starters, your very existence and the way you choose to live your life is wrong
to someone else… even if you do it in a community. Think about that!
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