Colin Wilson, the British author, quipped, “The average man is a conformist, accepting miseries and disasters with the stoicism of a cow standing in the rain.” I refuse to be a cow! While most would complain, I would challenge; while most would criticise the status quo, I would create a new one. I believe in using knowledge to create a better world where everyone has access to food, water, shelter, clothing and, perhaps most elusive of all, justice. I therefore possess an unrelenting intellectual curiosity to explore why institutions fail and an undying determination to fix them and support the downtrodden.
As my passion for understanding and aiding the underprivileged has grown, I have sought out greater interaction with those living below the poverty line. San Jog, a non-profit organisation that is affiliated with the European Union, provides legal aid to those youths who cannot afford it.
When I visited jail cells with San Jog staff, I interacted with youths possessing remarkable talent. Most of them were held for false charges; many had been victims of sexual abuse. Their common demise was that they were unable to afford lawyers to defend themselves. Seeing their plight, I desired to alleviate their misery and committed myself to making these children’s lives as fortunate as I possibly could under the circumstances.
I remember leading them in acting workshops. Even though these boys were without homes and families, internally disturbed and externally displaced, through acting they could achieve a certain kind of metamorphosis; they could be whoever they wanted to be.
One of the boys had broken legs, but could play Superman, the man of steel, and fly on stage. All of them could escape into this temporary imaginative realm where the world existed to love them, where they could keep their childhood intact for as long as possible and they, the children of misfortune, had the means to defend themselves.
The San Jog experience remains etched in my conscience and serves as a powerful driving force to improve economic policies in the developing world. Those children deserve to have the world they frequently dream of but which continues to elude them. Why had a democratic system failed to provide justice?
Since then, even though I quite vehemently oppose dictatorship, I have been interested in intellectual criticisms of democracy. Contemporary political scientists such as Yale Professor Robert Alan Dahl have attempted to address the criticism – much of which stems from the precedent set by Plato’s “The Republic” – that has haunted democratic systems.
I have seen the failings of military rule and parliamentary democracy in my country and am eager to learn more about the merits of various political systems.
SAIHAAM AHMED KHAN
Lahore
