A study into zero-tolerance policies within the existing political structure
There is an undercurrent of strife today within our already complex social structures. These discords are appearing on the ideas of a nationalistic morality. The populist Shahed Khan in his essay "On the topic of right and wrong" very convincingly lays out what is right and what is wrong. In these bare minimums of his brand of morality we are to find virtue. A wrong can be right if it is used for something Shahed has arbitrarily decided is good. Capital punishment is also the way forward. Death rates are climbing as capital punishment by crossfires becomes more acceptable.
In this context, the state's failure lies in adopting "zero tolerance" policies for things that should require some tolerance such as corruption, drugs, corruption in the healthcare sector, militancy, corruption in banking, gambling and corruption in development work.
Asif Azad in his seminal work on The Country's zero-tolerance levels titled "My soon-to-be seminal work on The Country's intolerance level" posited that the curve of our zero-tolerance is S-shaped. It stays flat for a while, begins to rise around election terms, falls very slowly later and then rises soon after as necessitated by changing circumstances.
But Azad's work is more of a political statement than anything else. It presupposes that zero tolerance is an actual indicator of something. That people in The Country actually care. Bare facts indicate otherwise.
Azad's work also warrants the question of whether this new lack of tolerance is retrospective in nature. It seems not to be as the S-shape illustrates.
The Country's zero-tolerance policy has also exposed foundational weaknesses in its political and even apolitical structures. People with the closest proximity to the powers that be are being caught in the dragnets of their own machinations.
This in itself is an act of lunacy. For a true Kleptocracy would never allow for such hindrances in its functioning. By boxing ourselves in zero-tolerance boxes, we are becoming intolerant, which is not the course we wanted.
For the state to reignite the fire of Kleptocracy, we need to be more tolerant, as the world demands. And less vague too. Tolerance is indeed the buzz word of the future and by future, I mean our future, because comparison to other states is our only excuse for failing in most things.
At this juncture, right before we grab that middle-income prize, the idea of morality, and of zero tolerance, must be rubbished immediately. And the narrative must be refocused on the benefits of a Kleptocracy: the new trains, the highways and the electricity.
Happy voters. Look at our shiny new toys.
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