Why is it that anyone who strives to fight the web of deceit, lies, injustice and suffering is bound to be labelled a cynical, bitter and irritating person?
Why, oh why, does the rich capitalist insists on eating all the good food himself, and is willing to grant nothing but crumbs to the hapless worker? Why do the wealthy, healthy pharmaceutical lords wish to close the doors of health and remedy on the sick and suffering poor?
Why do people sell out and trade their ideals for the glitter of fame and fortune? Why are people willing to lie, maim, kill and slaughter for gaining power and wealth when the end is the same for all — the powerful and the meek?
At one time or another, most of us have gotten stuck on these questions. Many of us probably moved on, concluding that that’s how the world works or that life is full of such dichotomies. But some people keep asking these questions throughout their lives, not only of themselves but also of others. These people are ‘unfortunate’ in the eyes of the world, as they torture themselves their entire lives and also ‘irritate’ the hell out of others at the same time, which obviously is their biggest ‘crime’.
In our world, anyone, who honestly strives to fight against the web of deceit, lies, injustice and suffering around him is bound to be — sooner or later — labelled as a cynical, bitter and irritating person.
He has, as his fate, to become the living example of Iqbal’s profound couplet:
Apnay bhi khafa mujh say hain baiganay bhi nakhush;
Main zehr-i-halahal ko kabhi keh na saka qand.
Although, there is also the famous line by Faiz:
Hum jo tareek rahoon mein maray gaey.
It’s far too romantic, even though it serves as a gratifying obituary for the tireless warrior — a sad yet idealistically brief portrayal of his life-long struggle. It is actually Iqbal’s couplet that accurately captures the acerbic and anything-but-romantic state that such a person finds him/herself in, day in and day out, virtually every single moment of his life.
It may be asked why is everybody wary of such a person. What leads to the bestowment of unkind epithets on him? Why is he such a source of annoyance not only to his enemies, but also to those whose interests he doesn’t apparently threaten? Why is he a difficult person not only in the eyes of complete strangers, but also to his friends and kin? To answer these questions, we’ll have to look in some detail at the human predicament and the world that we find ourselves in.
The human condition of being forced to live a life full of dichotomies is a complex and strange one. We are forced to live with the dichotomies of the rational and the irrational; the objective and the subjective; the future and the past; the good and the bad; the pure and the impure. But forced to live this life to what end? To attain what? Peace? Happiness? Glory? Or is it all about survival?
Is everybody really forced? Some people may be in it for power and glory, some for peace and happiness, some for ecstasy and pleasure, some, perhaps, even for survival. It’s also quite possible that for most people life is, at times, all of the above-mentioned things, and at others, not one of them.
At times, they continue their complex styles of existence with clear motives in mind. But even then, no matter how strong, clever and in-control they imagine themselves to be, they are really just like granules of odious grime drifting with the tide or rather falling due to gravity — falling towards their foreseen end, painfully watching the ground below from mid-air.
Everybody is aware that end it must in the same fashion for everyone — both the drifters and the ambitious — as has been the procedure for thousands of years. The only difference is the level of noise that the ends make. For the glorious, it’s a loud bang while for the rest, it’s a mere whimper — akin to the sound that is produced by an autumn leaf as it falls to the ground, along with countless other leaves.
Let’s focus on the level of noise. Is it important? Some people decide that noise, no matter how loud the bang, is hardly ever worth it. It is their intention to escape from, and ultimately silence, the crescendo of meaningless, empty noises, built up by both the directionless as well as the purposeful drifters. They want to put an end to all drifting, with supposed direction or without one at all. All noise and noise-producing effort, they decide, is ultimately futile.
Such people aspire to produce light. Light that sparks up the environment, compels the soul to rise from wretched depths and obliterates all dichotomies. But they have an underlying structural dichotomy — the mother of all dichotomies — to contend with, which always stands as an insurmountable hurdle in their way. How can a being that is born in the biggest black hole of darkness hope to produce light?
Perhaps, it can only be hoped to search for it, to escape from this seemingly inescapable black hole. So, it is the quest for light that is important, not light itself. Or perhaps the search is the light.
Anyhow, the quest is a difficult one. Three outcomes are likely for the person who sets out on this quest. One is that on being beaten time and time again, out of frustration, he gives up this search. He forever surrenders himself to the darkness of this black hole that now — after having spent a large portion of life on the quest for light and the purity of his effort almost becoming his light — seems even uglier to him. Thus, he becomes a cynic. He comes to believe that there is no such thing as light; there never was and there never ever will be.
The second outcome, that along with the third is of most consequence, is that out of great mental (and sometimes physical) agony, the once-pure searcher gives up his search. But this surrender is not as honest as that of our first defeated person. This person doesn’t admit that he has failed, but claims that the darkness of the black hole isn’t darkness at all. It is light! So he finds his light. He says that the black hole isn’t dark and fights against anyone who says otherwise. He sells his soul to the ‘dark side’. Thus, he comes to be a part of the hollow, haunting, all-powerful darkness.
The third outcome, the ‘victim’ of which is our ‘unfortunate hero’, is that the person continues his never-ending quest. He knows that he is destined to fail, but he doesn’t stop. He is a bit deranged to be quite honest. Or at least that is how it appears to those around him. His constant ‘sermons’ about light irritate everyone around him. Some people get angry because his constant oration about a brighter world reminds them of the darkness and worthlessness of their own existence. Also, some are too set in their ways and the call to search bothers them. For others — the wolves and the hyenas — who thrive in the darkness, the worry is that he might actually succeed in discovering what he seeks, and thus they come to hate him and his quest. He is their enemy as he plans on destroying their life-force.
So, in our world, our ‘unfortunate hero’ angers everybody. He is perceived as a menace and this is what he actually ends up becoming. Even those who don’t consider him to be their enemy carry a negative attitude towards him — furious at best, frightened at worst.
Apnay bhi khafa mujh say hain...
His children are unhappy with him because the scars that his perpetual battle leaves on him make him seem crude, mean and caustic to their little minds. His wife is annoyed because his honesty doesn’t lend itself well to escalation through the financial scale, that in turn costs the whole family to miss out on a bunch of luxuries.
His friends are not pleased as his character, spotless and shiny like pure light, reminds them of the compromises they have made. He is a living example that it’s not necessary to become the devil’s advocate; that it’s possible not to sell your ideals in exchange for materialistic and egoistic rewards.
His employers are furious because he threatens their comfortable existence. They are afraid that he will coerce others, through the honesty of his beliefs and actions, into being like him and overturn the illegitimate authority that they enjoy over others through economic strangulation and blackmail.
Now, just in case, this man is no saint. He tries to live the best life he can within his principles. He is not a hermit by choice; that he doesn’t socialize is because he hates the Faustian pact signings that are prevalent in the guise of parties and festivities. He is not a cynic; he wants to enjoy life. He can ignore and forgive little discrepancies, but what can be done when the world deems that it’s not enough. What to do when the world requires him to drink zehr-i-halahal, bitter poison, and then to call it sweet? This is where he draws the line.
No, he will not label darkness as light. No, he will not join in the nude dance of hypocrisies, lies and double standards for the sake of fitting in. “No,” he shouts out for all to hear, he will not become yet another cog in the shallow and dirty scheme of things. He keeps his soul intact, while beckoning others to do the same.
He will not sit quietly at the doings of blood-thirsty capitalists, who live in their big palaces and aren’t even willing to grant half-decent lodgings to their workers. Going to his office on the bus everyday, he sees the working-class people lying, quarrelling and fighting, just to save the measly amount of bus fare. Yes, he won’t be all chirpy and cheerful when he compares their heart-breaking existence with the care-free life of the loaded aristocrats travelling around in their chauffeur-driven cars.
Yes, he will get bitter when he sees the extravagance of the rich, and the wretchedness of the poor. Those disgusting, pitiable, dogs in the guise of human beings, who spend every day of their lives breaking their backs just to be able to eat a minimal amount of food at the end of the day, so that they could have enough energy for the next day to again suffer the same torturous routine.
Yes, he will be irritable, when those who were supposed to be his allies, sell out and succumb to the glitter of money, fame and power. And he will most definitely turn into an unappealing, bad-tempered ‘ogre’ when, on reprobation, the same people — the dishonest traitors who sold their souls — display the nerve to accuse him of selling out and try to smear his luminous character with the same contaminated black ink of hypocrisy that they have chosen to dab themselves with as part of the deal.
What is our world like? What does it have for an honest person to be cheerful about? We find ourselves facing imperialist and religious fanatics, both hell-bent on obliterating any semblance of peace, happiness and dignity in our lives; the threat of nuclear holocaust; economic terrorism of capitalist globalization; an international political and economic system in which the richest, most powerful country in the world, driven by the interests of its elite class, wages political and economic wars all across the globe, yet still doesn’t feed millions of its own people; a system which produces such ‘learned’ intellectuals and economists who claim that there is no alternative to this inhumane world in which there is such great disparity of wealth; a system in which every year, 11 million children die due to lack of food and millions other die of curable diseases due to lack of medicines, directly attributable to the insatiable greed of pharmaceutical companies. In short, a system in which the rich and powerful live like kings and the poor and defenceless are forced to live as dogs.
No, such a person cannot live amicably in this world. Yes, he is bitter, yes, he is difficult and yes, he is as annoying as can be. But let there be no doubt that the little light that there is in this world, the little civilization that we see around us, the little humanity that prevails, it is the result of the ‘acerbic’ struggle of those countless, nameless people who refused to be agreeable at the cost of their principles; who refused to be happy when millions around them were unhappy; who suffered the brunt of the oppressors right till the moment they departed from this unkind world:
Why is it that anyone who strives to fight the web of deceit, lies, injustice and suffering is bound to be labelled a cynical, bitter and irritating person? 
