If I look at an object through pink lenses, what I see will naturally appear to be a pink object. Another person may look at the same object using gray lenses and what he will see will appear to him as a gray object. Indeed, each one of us looks through our own pair of colored glasses. We interpret things through a preconditioned mind which is often the result of our circumstances or upbringing. Thus we may all look at the same problem but still come up with very different conclusions.
Let’s take a story from Amartya Sen, a Noble Prize winner in Economics, to illustrate what I mean. The story involves a dispute among three children—Anne, Bob and Carla—as to who should receive a flute.
Anne claims that the flute should be hers on the ground that she is the only one of the three who knows how to play it (the others do not deny this), and that it would be quite unfair to deny the flute to the only one who can actually play it. If this is all you knew, the case for giving the flute to the first child would make sense.
But now it is Bob’s turn to speak out. And he defends his case for having the flute by pointing out that he is the only one among the three who is so poor that he has no toys of his own and the flute would give him something to play with (the other two concede that they are richer and well supplied with many toys). If you had heard only Bob and none of the others, the case for giving the flute to him would be in his favor.
Then Carla speaks up and points out that she has been working diligently for many months to buy the flute with her own labor (the others confirm this), and so she should have it. If Carla’s statement is all you have heard, you might be inclined to give the flute to her.
Theorists of different persuasions such as utilitarians, economic egalitarians or labor right proponents may each take the view that there is a straight-forward solution to the above problem. But almost certainly they would respectively see totally different resolutions to the problem. The utilitarians, whose philosophy is “use it, waste not,” would possibly vote in favor of Anne, the only one who can play the flute. On the other hand, the economic egalitarians, being driven by their concern to reducing the economic gaps of people, would possibly stand for Bob, the poorest among the siblings. As for the labor right proponents, they will obviously argue for a person’s right to the fruits of one’s labor. So Carla would be their natural choice. This is how a personal problem is turned into a political game—choosing sides and fighting for winning even if it means depriving others.
At the risk of being too simplistic, I would contend that there is a better way of handling the above problem, namely, the way a wise father would handle a situation among his children. First, he would not act like a politician who is more concerned about maintaining his public image or political office than anything else. Nor would he conduct himself like a judge in a court of law. His judgment cannot be based merely on the weight of evidences or convincing arguments; that is, he may not even get too concerned about who is more right. Rather he would always consider matters in the context of the grand scheme of things and take into account the interests of all his children while attempting to resolve their problems. Perhaps he would come up with creative ideas to satisfy all in some sense. Maybe he would have his children take turns to play with the flute; maybe he would consider buying some other things for Anne and Bob. Or possibly he would consider selling off the flute, adding some money, and purchasing something better that everyone could enjoy. In any case, a father would not brush aside any of the claims as unjustifiable. In addition to fairness, he would consider other non-material factors such as the happiness of the entire family, the long-term goals for each child, plus the need to be understanding and magnanimous among siblings.
Now let’s consider another example which has relevance to our present situation in Nagaland: the problem of unemployment. First of all, our Eastern Naga brethren are unable to get jobs because they have not been given adequate educational opportunities to prepare themselves and compete. Even those who are academically qualified are often denied employment because they lack political connections. These are injustices they face. So they have come to think that these problems can be resolved only through a system of job reservation for their communities. While this may narrow the numerical gap, it however does injustice to the jobs as it overlooks the issue of qualifications which are needed for the performance of the services. In a way, the proposal almost treats jobs like commodities which can be rationed out according to the number of people in each tribe. On the other hand, there are some individuals from so-called advanced tribes who strongly feel that they are unjustly deprived of job opportunities for no fault of their own because of our quota system. Their grievances are valid too. No wonder four student bodies recently protested against the government’s decision of reserving the 10 EAC posts for the Eastern Nagas. To be sure, the government’s intention was admirable. However, it failed to establish the legal grounds beforehand. At the same time, some of our student bodies have failed to consider the sad plight of our Eastern brethren.
Or what about the problem of conflicting claims of legitimacy by our various Naga national groups? Without a doubt, they all want the same thing—a better future for the Nagas. But in attempting to fight for the same, each party resorts to playing politics to strengthen its own party position. Some assume that sticking uncompromisingly to their own position is a virtue to be maintained at any cost. We fail to realize that psychologically we are all products of our past so we let too much of it to obstruct our present. For instance, some of us still believe that Indians only want to see the Nagas destroyed. We convince ourselves that they have some hidden policy which involves taking away all the resources of the Nagas and leaving us without a future. This is how we turn even our mere perceptions into our own realities. No wonder things get more complicated and thus harder to resolve (Justice would be a simple matter, says Plato, if men were simple).
The point I am trying to make is plainly this: Often a problem has many sides and each side may contain a facet of truth. If this is true, then every extreme may be seen as less than total truth. So in our attempt to resolve any problem, we must consider the possibility that we may be seeing only the things we want to see. This, of course, means that we must always have an open mind and, if possible, be ready with a magnanimous heart.
Let’s take a story from Amartya Sen, a Noble Prize winner in Economics, to illustrate what I mean. The story involves a dispute among three children—Anne, Bob and Carla—as to who should receive a flute.
Anne claims that the flute should be hers on the ground that she is the only one of the three who knows how to play it (the others do not deny this), and that it would be quite unfair to deny the flute to the only one who can actually play it. If this is all you knew, the case for giving the flute to the first child would make sense.
But now it is Bob’s turn to speak out. And he defends his case for having the flute by pointing out that he is the only one among the three who is so poor that he has no toys of his own and the flute would give him something to play with (the other two concede that they are richer and well supplied with many toys). If you had heard only Bob and none of the others, the case for giving the flute to him would be in his favor.
Then Carla speaks up and points out that she has been working diligently for many months to buy the flute with her own labor (the others confirm this), and so she should have it. If Carla’s statement is all you have heard, you might be inclined to give the flute to her.
Theorists of different persuasions such as utilitarians, economic egalitarians or labor right proponents may each take the view that there is a straight-forward solution to the above problem. But almost certainly they would respectively see totally different resolutions to the problem. The utilitarians, whose philosophy is “use it, waste not,” would possibly vote in favor of Anne, the only one who can play the flute. On the other hand, the economic egalitarians, being driven by their concern to reducing the economic gaps of people, would possibly stand for Bob, the poorest among the siblings. As for the labor right proponents, they will obviously argue for a person’s right to the fruits of one’s labor. So Carla would be their natural choice. This is how a personal problem is turned into a political game—choosing sides and fighting for winning even if it means depriving others.
At the risk of being too simplistic, I would contend that there is a better way of handling the above problem, namely, the way a wise father would handle a situation among his children. First, he would not act like a politician who is more concerned about maintaining his public image or political office than anything else. Nor would he conduct himself like a judge in a court of law. His judgment cannot be based merely on the weight of evidences or convincing arguments; that is, he may not even get too concerned about who is more right. Rather he would always consider matters in the context of the grand scheme of things and take into account the interests of all his children while attempting to resolve their problems. Perhaps he would come up with creative ideas to satisfy all in some sense. Maybe he would have his children take turns to play with the flute; maybe he would consider buying some other things for Anne and Bob. Or possibly he would consider selling off the flute, adding some money, and purchasing something better that everyone could enjoy. In any case, a father would not brush aside any of the claims as unjustifiable. In addition to fairness, he would consider other non-material factors such as the happiness of the entire family, the long-term goals for each child, plus the need to be understanding and magnanimous among siblings.
Now let’s consider another example which has relevance to our present situation in Nagaland: the problem of unemployment. First of all, our Eastern Naga brethren are unable to get jobs because they have not been given adequate educational opportunities to prepare themselves and compete. Even those who are academically qualified are often denied employment because they lack political connections. These are injustices they face. So they have come to think that these problems can be resolved only through a system of job reservation for their communities. While this may narrow the numerical gap, it however does injustice to the jobs as it overlooks the issue of qualifications which are needed for the performance of the services. In a way, the proposal almost treats jobs like commodities which can be rationed out according to the number of people in each tribe. On the other hand, there are some individuals from so-called advanced tribes who strongly feel that they are unjustly deprived of job opportunities for no fault of their own because of our quota system. Their grievances are valid too. No wonder four student bodies recently protested against the government’s decision of reserving the 10 EAC posts for the Eastern Nagas. To be sure, the government’s intention was admirable. However, it failed to establish the legal grounds beforehand. At the same time, some of our student bodies have failed to consider the sad plight of our Eastern brethren.
Or what about the problem of conflicting claims of legitimacy by our various Naga national groups? Without a doubt, they all want the same thing—a better future for the Nagas. But in attempting to fight for the same, each party resorts to playing politics to strengthen its own party position. Some assume that sticking uncompromisingly to their own position is a virtue to be maintained at any cost. We fail to realize that psychologically we are all products of our past so we let too much of it to obstruct our present. For instance, some of us still believe that Indians only want to see the Nagas destroyed. We convince ourselves that they have some hidden policy which involves taking away all the resources of the Nagas and leaving us without a future. This is how we turn even our mere perceptions into our own realities. No wonder things get more complicated and thus harder to resolve (Justice would be a simple matter, says Plato, if men were simple).
The point I am trying to make is plainly this: Often a problem has many sides and each side may contain a facet of truth. If this is true, then every extreme may be seen as less than total truth. So in our attempt to resolve any problem, we must consider the possibility that we may be seeing only the things we want to see. This, of course, means that we must always have an open mind and, if possible, be ready with a magnanimous heart.
