Nationalism, Religion and Politics — Touch-me-not!

by Pratik

Across the world and over many millennia, human kind may have evolved in many ways in terms of their intellect, physiology and progression. But a few elements of our psyche remain largely the same and are very much evident in the society of today. Few topics evoke as much of a response as much as religion, patriotism and politics (coincidentally in the same order of intensity).

When it comes to religion, we’ve an endless list of examples right from the influence of the church in medieval Europe to the Crusades. An obvious example is right here in our country with its multitude of co-existing religions with everything from the Babri Masjid demolition, the Gujarat Riots, the 1993 Mumbai blasts and so on. Outside India, we have ‘Radical Islamic Terror’ fuelled by the perennial tensions between the West and the Middle East. Nationalism includes the rise of right wing governments the world over is in itself a proof of modern nationalist wherein people feel more threatened by globalisation. Trump and Rednecks, ‘anti-national’ being asked to go to Pakistan, Brexit, rising protectionist measures being taken across the world by various countries. Politics, in a way go hand in hand with religion and nationalism with political parties often having their agenda based on the each.

So why are people so sensitive about this trio? I believe that it’s primarily because they feel that an attack on any of the above is an attack on their identity. We humans have always been social beings and gain pride and comfort in ourselves and get a boost in self-esteem by comparing ourselves to others and getting validated that we are better than the other. We thereby get a sense of belonging and prestige by the way the trio fulfils our sociocultural needs. On a more historical note, nations and cultures across the globe have always been under attack by external forces –be it India from the Mughals, Ghaznis and the British or say a South Korea from a Japan or China — resulting in people being fiercely protective of their identities so as to build comfort and conviction that they won’t be attacked again.

A more cynical answer to the same question is that people don’t have their own identity to associate with and cling onto either of the three to give themselves something they can associate themselves to which would in turn provide them with some sort of validation thereby fulfilling the needs of their ego and self-esteem. This is very evident in modern day India where sheer overpopulation has led to hundreds of millions of people doing small jobs or being completely unemployed. Their daily lives build up a sense of continuous frustration and a gaping sense of purpose which lead to them associating with the trio. Think about the previous line again and try applying it to various strata of modern Indian society. Even well-educated folks aren’t immune to these and proves that education alone cannot erase social stigmas and beliefs which exist in our society.

Of course it’s not all gloom and doom that the trio bring with them. Religion should ideally give a person a path to meaning and better lives; nationalism erases boundaries of caste, race etc across a set of people thereby unifying them for a purpose; political believes lead to a debate of views and put in place various checks in laws and governance.

Unlike what a lot of media houses and journalists especially in India believe, I do not think that our country has become any more intolerant to other (minority) religions, nations and political beliefs than any time earlier. What has happened however is the advent of social media giving everyone a platform to put across their bottled-up thoughts without any need of a second thought or even a fear of punishment. I personally hate the mindless me-better-than-you threads and comments when it comes to sports teams especially football clubs. And of course there is something called ‘The Recency Affect’ and ‘Survivorship Bias’ both of which are self-explanatory concepts.

While I have tried putting forth relatively simple explanations and facts of the question I have put forth, the issue is definitely more complicated and requires a far greater depth of understanding free of prejudice and bias.

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