A psychology professor at San Diego State University, Jean Twenge has come out with a study claiming that young people of today are more fixated on money, fame and self-aggrandizement, rather than serving the society or the community. He terms it as largely incorrect the “popular views of the millennial generation, born in the 1980s and 1990s, as more caring, community-oriented and politically engaged than previous generations”. What is being brought out in the study about young people being fixated with money, image and fame is definitely true to a large extent including in our Naga context. However it is not only the young but society as a whole, which is facing a moral crisis. In economic parlance, our wants are unlimited but our means are limited. And therefore what we have is a situation where we are always looking at ways to fulfill our wants even by hook or by crook. Our young people may be also falling into this moral abyss. But who is teaching them to go after easy money? Perhaps the parents or the elders have not been the best of role models to teach our children right from wrong. And then the present generation will also pass on this vice to their children and it becomes a vicious cycle. So unless our present society makes the correction, we will continue to glorify wealth and self aggrandizement. And there is evidence all around to show that our Naga society is falling into the lure of easy money. Every day we read about extortion taking place. In the name of our national movement, scrupulous elements are seeking to extract from those who work hard to make a living. This is a sin against God. If we are fortunate enough to have a pair of hands and legs, why steal from others when we can also work, toil and eat from our own effort. The platform of the Church must be used to teach these lessons—about honesty, hard work and self reliance. Then the other new vice that was not very common in the past is ‘kidnapping for ransom’. Some of our misguided Naga people have been indulging in such criminal activities. The means may be different but the objective remains the same—extracting easy money from innocent people. This is another sin from which we must seek repentance.
Kidnapping like extortion has become a cottage industry in Nagaland to make fast and easy money. May be we need to find out our fixation with making a fast buck. One of them could be in the fact that we have a serious problem of attitude when it comes to work ethics. We yearn only to be masters, of hankering after easy schemes and eating up the seed money under various welfare programmes meant for self employment. This speaks volumes about the problem we face. Our attitude of self dependency is clearly manifested by the fact that we are unable to solve our own problems without outside help and this weakness is made worse by all sorts of charity being indulged by every tom, dick and harry. If we as a community cannot become more self reliant and empowered, we will simply not develop and so poverty and apathy will eventually come to us. Hard work and honesty never hurts. It can sustain and lead us forward. Our State politicians and Ministers while they condemn the so called ‘extortions’ from underground groups must also reflect whether what they are themselves indulging in amounts to extortion or not. We cannot only blame young people for the present moral crisis we face in our society. It is equally the failure of our parents and elders, who have passed on the present state of affairs to the younger generation. Perhaps more responsibility rests on the shoulders of the present generation of young people. If we can bring about a moral changeover, a reformation in our land then there is scope for hope. But if we let things as it is, the future can only be worse.
