INTELLECTUAL CORRUPTION

Corruption gets a breath when we have the option to choose from right & wrong for a petty gain and you opt for the latter one. In general corruption is used as a synonym for bribe and extortion. But it's not money  alone the expense of which costs us, but also the bargaining, stealing and selling of attitudes, beliefs and conviction can prove to be lethal for the destruction of the overall society.

The only happening place in Pakistan is the TV. I start surfing from 0-100 channels and all are filled with sad stories of people, dramatic short movies, and stormy talk shows. I get truly awed by the observable fact that we all spend our days in multiple environments namely office, university, friends and family but nowhere are things so paced up like in the TV. It's like a trailer of the movie too shitty to watch. News are the trailer, country-affairs are the movie.

I am one of the pioneers in news watching lazy bums in this country. When my fellows were cramming their study material to pass the exams, traveling across the northern cities, dating their first loves, I was watching TV news. How exciting. I specifically remember the previous sequence of the guests sitting in the current affairs programs. The government rhino/wolf or some similar sort always sat next to the TV anchor and the opposition leaders were queued according to their party sizes and were boo-ed upon all along the show by the anchor. I can recall Imran Khan was a pitiful dude sitting at the last end waiting for his only minute in the show.

Times have changed. The news channels have gone through following phases.

1.   Vent out phase: since we got the MIC for the first time we were so excited that we kept on ranting the  same issues over n over without focus on any particular matter

2.    Media Under Attack Phase: One fine day Hamid Mir got a real beating inside the studio, ever since he's pissed and now has turned his guns against his guests who were his 'Rooster Fighters' earlier.

3.    Breaking News Race: The competition got stiffer and the market space kept becoming narrower. The media marketers introduced a new service; breaking the news first! With the very slogan that 'we are the ones telling you exclusively before anyone' repeating endlessly we were hypnotized.

4.    Anchors' Musical Chair: Then we observed anchors shifting channels frequently, from one to another. Dr. Shahid Masood is the champion in this saga.

During this course, we the audience kept learning a very unique form of corruption; Intellectual Corruption. With total absence from political public gatherings, and showing no interests in participating as a political societal individuals, the people of this country had only TV to learn from that there is something happening which impact their lives. Some of us were too dumb to take advantage out of this and started acting as self-appointed representatives of some channels in breaking news to our peers. Much to no one's surprise, the others became more n more dependent over the channels & sub-channels. How lazy.

We have seen people building their careers in solo TV shows proposing theories of their own and then rising back as 'analysts'. Where in this world could it be so easy?

Amazingly, there's no single agenda present in any show. Since it's an hour long duty 5 days a week, out of which 20 minutes are dedicated to dancing Ali Zafar selling Sasta Packages here and there.

So what we find today is, every opinion that runs across the TV channels is the basic source of our beliefs. If the media says that there were 200 people in a particular gathering, we believe it. And then some other channel jumps in saying they were not 200 but 2000. Left wondering, we play ini-mini-mina-mo quoting disputed figures in our intellectual sparring here and there with our peers. Due to incomplete, contradicting and unstable news which we are addicted to spread, we have ourselves become liars of the highest degree. All of us have our positions with no stronger grounds than the rest. Now as such allegations might offend anyone and cause to 'huh?' and move on, a sample dialogue hereunder is presented (hope it sounds familiar):

[In a smoking session after lunch at office]

  

Mr. Alert:	Did you get the news of PNS Mehran Attack?
Mr. Profound:	Yea, it's a real dent on our morale. I think Navy is in the line of fire these days. I think it was US and Israel.
Mr. Links:	Leave it bhai, there have been evidences that it's India & Israel behind it.
Mr. Intuition:	How many insurgents were they?
Mr. Alert:	Some say 6, others 8 and some even say they were 12.
Mr. Profound:	What? Aren't we yet confirmed about the numbers still? We're sinking. Nobody can save us. Traitors are taking away the game.
Mr. Intuition:	I think they are Talibans.
Mr. Links:	Arey I know what it's about. But can't just tell you all about it.

(what the crap!)

Mr. Profound:	There's nothing that's left away from the media eye. What is it you know different that we, the TV watchers, don't know?
Mr. Links:	I know people in Army.

(crap again!)

Mr. Alert:

This country needs to read my blogs which offer turnkey solutions to saving countries like ours.

Now what I can decipher from such non-conclusive discussions is the inability of our people to stick to an argument at a time, their lack of commitment to fortifying it by complimentary premises. We are so engulfed in proving ourselves to be intellectuals that we would just say anything about anyone to prove we're well in touch, moving in right circles and connecting the dots in the most efficient manner.

Our confused children watch us debating all confused, with switching from one argument to another with irrelevant premises. Youngsters could only make the meaning out of such headless discussions that someone is a hero and the other is the villain. Then the children label the people with right and left wings. Facebook activists create pages, post obscene comments and campaign for the ideas they heard in the debate at their backyard yesterday. Vola! The people of this country are only as much political!

Such hypocrisy and intellectual bankruptcy has caused everyone to finally have gone into a state of living without the most valuable gift we call 'faith'. Now we do not believe in anyone and in no principles of genuine change. We have forgotten that there's one mechanism of nature as well. Not everything is scripted by the puppet players.

Good Old Days

Retried General Pervez Musharraf was a breath of fresh air in 1999 when we all got sick of listening to same old repeated mantra by the then 'seasoned' politicians, namely Nawaz Sharif & Benazir Bhutto. Musharraf was someone who all of a sudden showed up as a man who made sense, spoke with logic and a growling confidence (which was by virtue of the uniform but still). Available media for learning the affairs of the country were PTV, BBC Urdu radio and newspapers Jang & Dawn. With such limited means of information, we were serving the two great leaders of this country as a tennis ball with each throwing towards the other playing for an endless loop of deuce.

Musharraf, despite all for whatever he is praised, worshiped and regarded in this country especially for the magnificent gain of national honor and pride by submitting to US threats after 9/11, was perhaps a man who fancied a free media in his life. But as the song goes, " Be careful what you wish for, you just might get it all." Mr. Musharraf asked a bit too much for himself.

An open mind is not a slave mind. As the people who were asleep and less conscious were provided a voice, they cluelessly started questioning. Some were staunch supporters of the then government while the rest saw the picture differently and so opposed in whichever capacity possible. From high end bureaucratic parties to low end chowk-talks people felt immense pleasure in speaking out the ideas, thoughts and the philosophy of enlightened moderation. So, the Unique Selling Proposition (USP) was the Extremists VS Moderates.

Pakistanis discovered a new lifestyle; using cell phones. Oh we loved Musharraf for that. There was also another 'first time' item in our newly shaped lives; Shaukat Aziz. A minister who was well dressed, smart in speaking. Having stayed in his halo effect that he had worked for World Bank before parachuting into the political arena, we were in romance with his offerings: mobile phones & cars. We all 'knew confidently' that he was the man this country ever craved for!

The tried and tested universal laws of economics did not apply to Pakistan because we did not know them. Convenience. Earlier, any failing economies saw heavy trends of investment in the stock exchanges of the country and real estate. But it was the major indicator of our Economic Growth because US Dollar was stable enough to maintain on a certain level.

And then the bubble busted. And hell, there was no alarm beforehand - we always like to believe that we'll be 'informed' that a shit is about to happen.

I don't want to get into the sweet memories of emergency rule, sacking of chief justice of Pakistan & a series of brutal operations against the Bugtis and the Jamia Hafsa. Since it was all in the best interest of the country we aren't entitled to opine. The legendary role of dispute resolution played by today's Army Chief Pervez Kyani (wow, another Pervez - I wonder how we would react if our next President has a name like Mir Jafar) between the Hero and the Bandita (alleged by the same hero) turned out to be of pivotal significance.

The economic growth was factual, proven, acknowledged and adopted by the world, was too fundamental and long lasting. But a completely useless point is, that almost the same people were in power at that time also. How could I miss the thriving, the brave, the courageous, the upright, the noble Electronic Media. Today, where I see all the leaves dispersed in air, the stem of Media stands strong. Anchors became leaders. Audience became hostage.

Those times were good. Who can deny it? Obviously no one.

MBA - Why? Who?

Listening to evergreen 'Nothing else matters' I was struck by a series of questions pounding over my subconscious for some time. Being enrolled as a businees student in one of the good reputed universities, I often have these questions echoing in my head while I walk through the university ramp. Raising up the volume bar, here I think a little aloud.

Q.1: Purpose of doing MBA?
To land with a good job in a good company.

Q.2: Normal psyche of an MBA pursuant?
To cast some halo effect over the employer may be, that he is hiring a candidate who has got his intelligence and knowledge certified by those which are in the business of certifying people after a few tests and trials. Most of the premise above focusses on the employer-employee understanding at the time of interview and qualifying it.

Q3: Needs of the business market?
There never have been enough companies to employ the total population of any geography or the globe. There always has been unemployment because of certain variables. The market needs more starters, now more than ever. Is today's MBA up for it? No, he is busy searching jobs in newspapers.

Q4: Is there room in the business market?
- Product produced and demand difference. Employer's bazaar always need people of commitment and diligent individuals. Theories from books dont survive the transition of the bag from classroom to car parking.


Alternate answers to the questions above are although welcome, yet nothing would change the world much. But it's good to vent out, I guess.