Betrayal is where trust was
Remember the movie Spotlight? This movie was based on true story of how an American daily, The Boston Globe, in 2002 probed into and unravelled the massive child sexual abuse scandal in Boston archdiocese. What originally appeared to be a few isolated cases of molestation revealed an undeniable pattern of sexual abuse and cover-up in many dioceses all over the United States
People, in general, and some nations, in particular, in every point in time have taken up the responsibility of executing an absolutely essential societal trait that is to deliberately opine about everyone and everything.
“Look at her dupatta. What is the use of wearing a see-through chiffon cloth when her hair is still visible?”
“The way he is offering his prayer makes me doubt its acceptance by God. Zuhar and Asar are to be offered separately because these are two different prayers. Zuhrain can only be offered during Hajj.”
“Our youth is wretched. Look how girls from respectable families are sitting beside boys. Being physical is not at all a big deal for this generation.”
These and many other comments and taunts are being hurled at people by the leftover society since forever. Lessons of virtuousness and chastity are being taught to masses by clerics and priests since the inception of religion. The question is how well these injunctions have been preserved in the hearts and conducts of preachers themselves.
Remember the movie Spotlight? This movie was based on true story of how an American daily, The Boston Globe, in 2002 probed into and unravelled the massive child sexual abuse scandal in Boston archdiocese. What originally appeared to be a few isolated cases of molestation revealed an undeniable pattern of sexual abuse and cover-up in many dioceses all over the United States. The investigation, when furthered by the newspaper’s investigative journalist unit, revealed that the priests and other members of the Catholic Church clergy have been carrying out the abominable ‘ritual’ of sexually abusing children since several decades and the actual number of perpetrators reached into the thousands. This alone was sufficient to create a crisis for the Church, yet it encouraged several victims to come forward with their share of stories.
Despite anything to the contrary, such incidents are reported to date where exploitation of children and youth is carried out by members of that very faction which is responsible for shaping up the mindset of its ardent followers.
The news of an Indian woman cutting off a Hindu guru’s penis after he allegedly tried to rape her at her house in south Kerala was published in various South Asian newspapers on 20 May 2017. The girl in her early twenties claimed that Hari Swami had been assaulting her for several years as her parents trusted him blindly and, therefore, used to invite him frequently to perform religious ceremonies.
Yet another incident was reported in Badin back in 2014 when a local mosque’s imam reportedly gang-raped his 12-year-old student along with three accomplices in a seminary room in the mosque. The victim was later strangled by them to keep the hideous crime out of sight.
The American students who went to churches to seek guidance, the parents of the Indian girl who continued to live under the same roof where their daughter was being subjected to assault by the man they hadimpetuously trusted, and the preadolescent girl who visited the mosque to receive religious education were all given the toughest and harshest lesson of their lives: it becomes easy to conduct immoral and grossly offensive acts under the pretentious ambit of religion as it is the safest label that can be used to fulfil vested interests. After all, betrayal is where trust was.
Refuge is by and large sought with cassocks, saffron-coloured robes, green turbans, black burqas and long beards, and the reason for this generality is obvious: symbolism acts as the ultimate concealment. The use of graphical abstractions, artefacts, archetypes and other symbols to represent religious ideology and its concepts has made it convenient for propagators to sweep their trash under the carpet. No matter how much we deny it, books are judged by their covers, and humans by their attires. An average acolyte of Islam, to illustrate, has limited, if not good, knowledge of the ideology he follows. He, therefore, knows what growing a tuft of hair on lower part of face means, and he very well realises what hijab means, or should mean, to a Muslim woman. Consequently, he venerates those who take up these identities with utmost deference, esteem and obedience. He blindfolds himself with the perception that these ambassadors of his religion can never let down him and his religion. Withal, how is he supposed to react and what is he supposed to do on witnessing such incidents where preservers of faith become stealers of its subjects’ honour and violators of its injunctions?
Every idea, according to Hegel, is pre-destined and, therefore, divine. What can be determined is the extent to which is revealed. “When philosophy,” says Hegel, “paints its grey in grey, then has a shape of life grown old. By philosopher’s grey in grey it cannot be rejuvenated but only understood. The owl of Minerva spreads its wings only with the falling of dusk”. His idea of development of thesis, anti-thesis and eventual synthesis of yet another idea by amalgamation of salient features of the former two is what sets the pattern of human history. Rigidity and orthodoxy result in nothing but cases where fear is developed in the hearts of followers that forbids them from questioning the fundamentals of ideology as well as its commandments. This idea, or the thesis of today’s age, prohibits commoners from pointing fingers at the preachers who, in actuality, are not fulfilling their duties the way they were supposed to.
Burqa, for instance, is used by Muslim women to hide their identities from strangers. But when this very piece of cloth is used to avoid being identified by anyone while one is on her way to a hotel to have sex with a total stranger, a highly perplexed paradox is established.
When the premier representative of the Saudi government of Hijaz shakes hands with a woman, and simultaneously bars women living on the land he is ruling from driving to save them from “euphoric orgasm”, it is also paradoxical.
Why is the ruling class allowed to enjoy this prerogative and masses made to acquiesce with the former’s policies? If one thing is valid, or has been made legitimate, for rulers then why can it not be validated for the ruled? The answer to these questions are repeated but the only logical argument to defend this illogical methodology, and that is to develop fear of religion in the hearts of subjects because this is the most effective card that can be encashed whenever desired and within no time. Like Voltaire aptly opined: “Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities.”
