MORAL POLICING

MORAL POLICING: THE ILLEGITIMATE CHILD OF OUR IDENTITY CRISIS?
 

Across generations, Goans have grown above narrow-minded communal ideologies and embraced the socio-cultural diffusion as a spice to life. Living lifestyles apart from the rest of the nation with our festivals, celebrations and recreational habits; which sometimes cross traditional norms and ignite generation gap conflicts, we have been loved and hated.

A hardened fanatic appeared on the scenes last summer with plans to “save” our culture. For all you simpletons, the Ram Sena’s “saving” agenda includes destroying our solidarity and inter-religious harmony; fuelling the minds of the weak with his retarded stone-age ideology; employing our school dropouts and nurturing them into fanatics; stoning and stabbing and sucking out the life of those in love.

The identity crisis

The tourism ministry recently entertained the idea of inviting groups from Karnataka, Maharastra and Gujarat to participate in the carnival floats. Such a stupendous idea of making it a pan-Indian affair only brings us to doubt the loyalty of this Government. Whether it is Shigmo or Carnival; it is and should be a Goan cultural festival depicting the rural and urban lifestyles of our state.

Over the last decade, we have wrestled inner demons, questioning - to be or not to be- who we really are. Tourism coupled with the lack of ambition and employment in our youngsters has inspired a ‘slothful era’. Partying in Goa is metaphorically an umbrella term for ‘cheap booze, easy drugs and sex’. Our image outside the state is embarrassing –every woman is a whore and every man is a pimp. A professor in Tamil Nadu once warned the whole class that branding Goa as drunken village is blasphemous. He said and I quote, “They know how to drink, they are not like us who drink half a pint and fall on the roads.” How many Goans smuggle liquor across the border to frivolous characters who picture Goa with only bars and restaurants? Deserving or not, we have earned this tag simply because we have failed to respect ourselves

We are undecided if this global cultural influx good for our survival or whether it is ruining our heritage? But, that is for us –the Government – to evaluate. Encouraging ideas like ‘Ram Sena’ is an insult and degradation of our Police community. It shows that we don’t trust in our legitimate law keepers. We have a structured and authorized organization whose task is to enforce the law and protect the sentiments of the society. The honesty and loyalty of the Police community is a debatable issue, yet we do not need an extremist approach to settle our problems.

The wrong police

Sheltering these moral police would be like licensing a terror outfit to set up their academy. Today, they don’t prescribe to Valentine’s Day or dating, tomorrow they will create ruckus at our feasts and festivals. Soon, they will question Carnival and Shigmo celebrations. Later, they will storm bars and restaurants and beat up all the women who are drinking. They will terrorize beaches and parks and thrash all who hold hands. Terrorism is a word that is politically and emotionally charged. The UN defines it as a criminal act, to provoke a state of terror in the general public or to intimidate a population or compel a government to do or abstain from doing an act (concise). The Sena with its fundamentalist philosophy and notorious resume undoubtedly subscribes to this branding.

American professor of Psychiatry, Frederick Hacker termed such characters as crazy, criminal and crusading, whereas Viktor Vitiuk labels them as idealist, filibusters and lost souls. Whether it is his intolerable urge for action – surrogate sexual activity- or effort to affirm his self esteem or nurse a deeply hurt ego, his idea of self-worship profiles him to be criminally narcissistic and sick.

Terror is an organised system of intimidation. Under RAND Co-operation, an International Organisation that lists identifiable characteristics of terrorism, the perpetrators of violence often claim credit for their act. Sighting the above, it is foolish on our part to ignore; still worse - to help breed a school of maniacs, who have openly posed a threat to society. This might seem as an over-reaction to an issue that has fallen silent; but as long as the ant-hill exists, the serpent shall thrive.

Terrorism, under U.S. domestic law enforcement, has come to be identified with the ‘criminal mode of operation rather than the specific intent or motivation of the action’, thus clearly divorcing it from Ideology. U.S. Internal Security Act 1950, authorizes the state to penalize and detain anyone found engaging in acts - or even threatening and conspiring- violence. ‘Proscribed Organization’ is the British attempt at fighting militancy. The Indian Government needs to deliberate about updating and executing suspensions of anti-national outfits, like the Ram Sena. The idea of expanding the power of arrest for the Police is to enhance the pre-emptive element in combating terrorism. A competitive law will power the Police to act against suspects under surveillance.

Moral policing in itself is a manifestation of domestic or national terrorism and it has no place in an educated and highly diffused society like ours. Unstructured policing have no fixed principles or rational goals and they are driven entirely by emotion. One incident can lead to another and soon we will have gang wars, religious crusades and class uprisings, in the name of moral policing.

Uniting the good people

Trusting the Government with that task, we need to create a healthy citizen- police trust that will suppress anything that crosses the line and disturbs our identity. Then again, the line is too thin and undefined. Are the casinos helping us or ruining us? Are the mines employing us or suffocating us? It is time we leave our ‘sussegad balcaos’ and stand up for what we believe is acceptable and discard the rest. If we can resolve our identity crisis, then we can point fingers at the ‘fundamentalists’.

Finally, to all the ‘moral policemen’ out there - (after the Avengers, Spiderman and Batman) if you think we needed superhero; that is very noble of you, but, no thank you! We can take of our own. If you can’t see us holding hands, then don’t step foot on our sands!