A major headache is our two generations – one of which came of age in the era of social media and the other a little earlier around 9/11. The biggest problem of the generation coming of age in the social media era is that social media has replaced the book. They have not laid their hands on any book beyond their coursework. Whenever I meet a member of this generation and discuss reading and teaching, they always tell their favourite writer on Facebook. Then a slightly older is the generation that came of age around 9/11. This is the last generation that read any book except their textbook.
Unfortunately, this generation cannot go beyond fiction. Therefore, when it comes to book recommendations, it is forbidden to refer to any writer apart from a total of six novelists – Tolstoy, Marquez, Orhan Pamuk, Quratul Ain Hyder, Abdullah Hussain, and Shamsur Rahman Farooqui. This generation believes that the millions of books in libraries around the world are all fiction. So if they have read three local and three foreign bestselling novelists, then this is an extraordinary achievement. They think they don’t need to read anything else.
I am dismayed as there should be freedom of thought as well as freedom of expression. This generation also reads only fiction and the opinion is based on historical and academic topics. They read and hear such bizarre rumours on social media that will make you strike your heads.
Interestingly, they also have preferences based on the trends. For example, when novels were referenced in court decisions, the generation that came of age around 9/11 began competing on social media on who had read Mario Puzo more voraciously. They believe that since they can quote from the ‘Godfather’ novel than judges, they should be considered an “expert in law”.
After the tussle with the judiciary, former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif’s “Respect the vote” movement became popular on social media. So this generation came forward with the claim that the vote should be respected just like in America. Who would explain to them that if the vote was respected in America, would Donald Trump have come to power from the ballot box? Even today, Hillary Clinton claims that Donald Trump won by rigging. In fact, all American liberals say the vote was snatched by the Russians. And even Trump has termed Biden’s victory as the worst rigging.
Recently, I met one such “minor intellectual” who came to meet me. During our conversation, he mentioned the reference to respect the American vote. He said with full confidence that since the mother of democracy is Great Britain, and the vote is so respected many Pakistanis have been elected, the reference to the UK is more valid than the USA.
Not long ago, in Britain, the generals warned that if Jeremy Corbyn won the election, they would not accept the result. Since this was not published in any novel, these intellectuals were not aware of it. They were also unaware that a video of British soldiers stationed in Afghanistan went viral shooting at the picture of their opposition leader Corbyn.
After this story was over, the problem of PTM gained attention. Another phrase flew on the social media posts of these two generations. “We are making the mistake of repeating the history of 1971”. The new generation was actually speaking about the possibility of the country’s breakup. They think a country comes into existence from inside another country – a group rises up and declares a rebellion and then as a result of this “struggle”, a new state is created. I see an interesting contrast when a rebellious attitude is attributed to Ali Wazir and Mohsin Dawar but the new generation says “It’s all a lie.”
The second and most important thing is that which state in the world has been created by a rebel group alone? Is the division of Korea an achievement of a rebel group? Was Germany divided into two parts as a result of the struggle of a rebel group? Is East Timor a handiwork? Did Bosnia come into existence as a result of internal struggle? Did Israel become just because some Jews rebelled against Muslims? Were the 19 pieces of the Soviet Union the result of an internal coup? And was the tragedy of East Pakistan also the outcome of the rebellion of Bengalis? Our fiction-loving generation does not know that states are formed and broken as a result of the conspiracies of world powers.
East Timor comes into existence in the blink of an eye when the patronage of world powers was secured. Since patronage of world powers is not there, Kashmiris have been enslaved since time immemorial. Not even ten percent of Kashmiris are willing to live with India. The whole valley echoes with slogans of Pakistan Zindabad and hoisting of the green crescent flag is a common practice. But since the interests of the world powers are related to India, Kashmir is still under siege
Now, either the fiction-appeasing generation is ignorant of the fact that states are broken not by coups but by the global support of rebels. Is it acceptable that there was a regional or global power behind the PTM. It is either ignorance or a confirmation of the claim of the state institutions that there was another power behind PTM.
