I am scared…again

May 1991. My first memory of fear is that of me as a 5 year old sitting next to Maa in my childhood home. It was raining heavily and as typical of monsoon, there was lightening accompanied by a shuddering thunderstorm. That night, however, there was also a sense of discomfort and fear in the air. I didn’t understand much. But I did understand something very bad has happened and from this point on, the safety of all of us is at risk.

It was the night after the assassination of Rajiv Gandhi, the then Prime Minister of India. What followed was a decade of communal warfare, terrorism, division and political instability in my country whose remains are still being used as fuel to ignite the communal divide in my country.

Tonight, 29 years later and 8000 miles apart here in New York City, the same fear returned. Only this time, I am dealing with it alone. At around 6 PM this evening, I received an email from the building staff

Lobby doors locked

Due to current situation and NYC curfew, the lobby doors will be locked at 10PM tonight for safety reasons.

The morning I first heard the news of George Floyd’s unfortunate death, I sent a distressed text to a friend wondering how, even in the face of a global pandemic, people are yielding to their worst self. His response was usual — Stay away from the news. But what do you do when the news make its way to your doorsteps? Lock the lobby doors?

Entitlement and injustice is what caused the fall of the mighty Roman Empire by a handful of Visigoths, who were asking for nothing more than a peaceful co-existence. Alaric’s multiple pleas to Honorius went unheeded. Not only did Honorius refused to “negotiate with the barbarians”, he beheaded his own regent Stilicho who was trying to bring an agreement to the table. Instigated by repeated insults and betrayals, Alaric, who once served a soldier in the Roman army, marched upon the city of Rome and unleashed a mayhem not seen in it’s 700 years of existence.

It seems much the same today. Centuries of pleadings to be treated as a fellow human were trampled under the foot. Until one day, a brutality committed in broad daylight was captured and published, as an evidence of the criminal injustice (as if one was needed) That image of a white cop choking a poor black man under his knee symbolized everything that is wrong with America. A “developed” society that failed to ensure equal opportunity and safety to all its citizens.

A mass unrest followed and the whole community came out on the streets to demand justice but much like the Sack of Rome, the protest is not limited to demands for justice anymore. Downtowns are burned down, stores are plundered, people are wounded and the likes of me, have become spectators to the destruction of everything that stood as a symbol of our fulfilled life.

It is this mayhem that brings back the fear of my 5 year old self. I am scared again because I have witnessed such outpouring of hatred that divided my own country into two distinct sections. A country where taking a third stance is not an option anymore. Where no one questions the deteriorating infrastructure and shrinking economy anymore. Where the only thing that matters is to win an argument over the other half and blame them for all the woes.

I am scared because 7 years ago, I moved to America with a Hope that I will never have to experience such division and hatred again but today, it doesn’t look very different from the land I left behind.

Rage causes a chain reaction that damages everything that comes its way, not only for today but for ages to come. Even when it’s justified as an outlet for centuries of suffering, it does not help the cause. Only aggravate it further.

For Alaric the sack of Rome was an admission of defeat, a catastrophic failure. Everything he had hoped for, had fought for over the course of a decade and a half, went up in flames with the capital of the ancient world. Imperial office, a legitimate place for himself and his followers inside the empire, these were now forever out of reach. He might seize what he wanted, as he had seized Rome, but he would never be given it by right. The sack of Rome solved nothing and when the looting was over Alaric’s men still had nowhere to live and fewer future prospects than ever before — Michael Kulikowski, Rome’s Gothic Wars