Are we free?

Unfortunately, in the third world countries the concept of freedom very much is defined as how 'bold' one can be in the face of the 'western nations' and how these countries don't like to be dictated by the other countries. Pakistan is no exception to this, as we here the political parties shouting slogans everyday to give the ordinary people a false sense of freedom. The fact though is that the ordinary person is not even free to think, now, if you can't even think free how can one act free. In this report published by the Daily Times we get a clear picture of the ground reality. Although the reports subject is minorities nevertheless it gives as a broader understanding as to how free we are. The system that has been around us was primarily developed to benefit the religious groups, army and the big wigs of the main political parties, because it is in their interest to raise a generation that has a distorted view of the world and the issues in the Pakistan. Although the whole report is available on the Daily Times website and also at watandost.blogspot.com/, here are few important highlights:

According to the report, textbooks have often served as a tool in the hands of successive governments, for propagating their biased outlook towards history, politics and religion in order to shape a certain national identity. Authoritarian governments and the “ gatekeepers of ideology” have always ensured the deliverance of carefully sifted contents to the students in order to mould them in favor of a reactionary system. The outcome, the report said, was that the system had produced a generation that was prejudiced and intolerant.

The report referred to the textbook statements, which eliminate the claims of any community other than Muslims over the country. The report points out that the lack of different viewpoints in textbooks leads to contempt and hatred for other communities.
Highlighting the disparities in textbooks and curriculum of the government and privately managed schools, the report criticizes the role of state sponsored textbooks for discouraging critical thinking through books which emphasize more on religion, civic obedience and the duty of the individual to the state.

It says that the intervention of the state in the educational process had distorted historical facts and had encouraged students to be non-critical, submissive to authority and to treat education as a process of selective memorization. The report said that educating students on these lines could make students only see a world that was limited to Pakistan and Muslim countries. “There is no reference to human unity, human rights and individual freedom in these textbooks”, the report said, adding the outcome manifests itself in the form of violence and intolerance prevalent in the Pakistani society.

The bottom line is that the process of real freedom will not begin from the borders of the country but from within each citizen of the country by freeing our thoughts from being indoctrinated by a select few as to what we should think and do. Although we do not like to admit it, we are living in a communist style govt. country where the freedom is only in the air we breathe.
We still have to be freed!