I have had too much

By M. L. Raina


Time was when being a dissident meant being someone who does not swallow myths and shibboleths wholesale. My gospel then was not Marx but a slim volume by the American philosopher Barry Denham whose book Man Against Myth I read with  religious zeal.

For me the time of dissidence is no more. I have reached a state of dissonance when everything sounds out of tune, out of rhythm for me.I have given up on hope, that overarching something that Ernst Bloch the  Marxist philosopher regarded as the mainstay of human endeavour.That hope is now overtaken by  the new mushroom cloud of despair hanging over all of us. A maverick East German poet Wolf Bierman,beset like me with the feelings of disconnectedness,wrote 'dreams that are still red/and not to be buried with our dead'. That was when he hoped that communism would survive. But when his hopes crumbled with the collapse of communism, he came out with: 'well, who preaches hope is a liar/ but he who kills hope/ is a pig/ and I do both and cry:/ please take what you need!/ too much would be unhealthy.'

But I have had too much already. Too much of the bullying by the working class who work at my home for money but would abide by their own union- ordained work practice (far from being the carriers of human liberation, as dewy-eyed Marxists believed, they continue to be parasites, the shirking, cheating malingerers who would think nothing of exploiting you just because you pay them a decent wage).

I have had too much of the contortionist Orwellianism of our politicians, our Singhs and Advanis, our Yechurys and Lalus. They would stoop to any level to give partisan covering to even terrible tragedies.The Maoist bandits who killed all those dozens yesterday couldn't have found better apologists than our self-anointed progressive intellectuals (the delphic oracle of the left Ms Roy once even called them Gandhians). Their refrain is: only landless Adivasis become Maoists. But we know Maoist think nothing of using Adivasis against the state,they even loot and plunder.

I have had too much of the bluster of our politicians lording it over our sports bodies,justifying the plunder of our fans as entertainment.the pity is no one sees the rot festering underneath the glitter, not the feuding leaders who unite only for pelf.

I have had too much of our Marxist ideologues buttressing rank casteists like Mulayam and Mayawati just because they are, to quote Yechury, 'secular'.
 
I have had too much of Modi- aiting by these false prophets of 'secularism'.

I have had too much of our secularists giving ideological support to Muslim communalism in Kashmir that parades itself as the voice of the people there.They even condone their philandering with Hafiz Saeeds and Imran Khans. Never heard a squeak from Tarigami against the Separatists?

In other words, I have had too much of myself believing all those lies and canards, hoping that some of them may perchance be true. But now, in Bierman's words, "I am sick...of all the political battles/ Tell me when will all this pain end?/ only when the new pain comes?".
 
May be I should adopt the Brechtian strategy and 'stay at ones post/ even if their fingers are at your throat/ you can help with your silence.'
Location: Panchkula, Haryana, India

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