Corruption everywhere!
Congratulations to Mr. Wahid for his article (October 7th) 'The toll collectors are here', which explained to us how corruption actually works and how it can get such a grip on our society.
It is immensely sad and very worrying. How does one break the power of such a system - because system it is - in which the powers of evil get firmly entrenched in the structures of society in such a way that many despair of ever breaking its power?
However, I also feel sorry for those trapped in the system. They are just those who want to make a living, have a network of friends and something to do each day which gets them out of the house! And, of course, it is not only the poor. Some of these guys are graduates!
I remember when my previous school was attacked by a corrupt property company. The thugs that had been installed in a room there were frequently visited by smart young graduates from the company who came to support them. When I asked one of them why a business came against a school in a mob, broke down the wall and beat up 3 young guards who later went to the hospital and had a total of 17 stitches put into their heads and necks, he replied, "We don't beat people up, we kill them!"
Some of them visited the school - it was the Eid holidays and I was sleeping on the floor of my office to make their lives as hard as possible. They arrived in nice, white punjabis on smart motorbikes. They said they were coming for a meeting and I told them that, if they were coming for a prayer meeting, they were most welcome! They roared off again. I felt great compassion for them. How do young men who want the good things of life, avoid falling into the hands of such corrupt businesses?
How much moral teaching do we give young people in all our religions on what they should do when they get a job and, in some cases, they are immediately approached by colleagues who inform them how the 'system' works in that job and how extra money can be made 'on the side'? That even happens in a lot of schools in which new pupils are informed how the cheating system works there and so have to choose whether to please their new friends or upset them!
Moral education involves explaining how the truth, justice and wisdom that we find in them is APPLIED in the real world and how each of us can learn how to survive as a moral person, walking uphill into the sun rather than downhill to the devil, taking our society with us.
In every country, young people need help in the actual skills of how to survive as good people in a naughty world. Is everyone just expecting someone else to be doing this? The evidence is that moral education, of the kind needed, has slipped through the gaps.
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