Can victim mentality lead to Introspection?

In the last few days my homeland has seen unprecedented events and imagery we have not seen before. Before I comment on the events themselves I would start by commending Imran Khan for creating political interest in a historically electoral aloof nation and specially generation that gew up in ugly 90s politics. To his credit, whatever other good or bad he has done, in my view this will remain his prime achievement.

I didn’t grow up at time of Z. A. Bhutto so I don’t know if current level of popularity Khan enjoys is same as the level of ZAB but it is safe to say among his contemporaries, there is no one closer to him. The way families have showed up including children and elders organically is a sight in itself. Of all the amazing pictures however this picture to me defines existentially both the strength and weakness (with much touch of hypocrisy) fundamentally within PTI.

Strength of course is that IK’s fans are dedicated and have shown they have courage to support their leader. Another perspective however is that this reeks of their own hypocrisy. It shows they always knew who the real power brokers in this country were who had been abducting civil society activists, journalists, politicians and tribal men without any trials, at times tortured, threatened or forced exile. But PTI supporters were OK with this because it did not impact them personally. In fact it used same power brokers to come into power in the 1st place quite happily. Not just these, but despite going after corrupt elites being his single talking point of 20 years of struggle, PTI got the majority in parliament through dacoits of sugar mafia, land grabber mafia and ayyash nutjobs of British diaspora.

When that was the case in the first place, why does PTI and Khan fans pretend that what happened to them was something unexpected?

So will there be any introspection by PTI and it’s fans over things critics have been saying all along about it? The actions so far suggest otherwise.

Khan likes to give examples of UK a lot. In UK parliamentary system it’s pretty normal for PMs to get booted out when they no longer hold the majority. Pakistan is modeled on same system. It’s not a presidential system. Despite what he may claim what happened to him, whatever the motivations of the actors, it is part of Democratic process. Reason I’m skeptical of any introspection is because he tried to stop that through unconstitutional measures despite coming on live TV and committing in front of nation that he will let vote happen and accept the results. Instead he went on the route of victim mentality and when ur channeling ur whole politics with victim mentality, it hardly leaves any room for introspection.

Sure, we all would love for him to spill the beans on the real power brokers of this country, something which sections of civil society kept warning Khan about since years and he only got the taste of it from the other end of the stick. But more than that, PTI as an institution itself needs this introspection.

Do not make IK your scapegoat

“Shame on you, Mr. Khan“, read the title of an article of a popular English daily.

“TALIBAN Khan is back”, was the starting line of a piece by a member of editorial staff of another English daily. Yes with caps.

“So Imran Khan wants to negotiate with the people who kill little girls for their desire for education”, screamed (read: tweeted) some of Malala’s well wishers after the attack on her. Of course they were not using the incident to vent their anger and frustration for personal reasons. It is very reasonable to blame Imran Khan because obviously he has been advocating a ban on women education and ordering Taliban to attack little girls for years. Isn’t he? Never mind that he is the founder of one of the internationally recognized colleges of our country, located in a relatively small city.

Seriously!

You would think Imran Khan had personally shot the girl and put the picture of himself holding on his twitter account if you read some of the ‘opinions’ expressed.

Everyone loves to have a scapegoat i.e that one person who can be blamed for all the wrongs that happen to us because it helps us avoid figuring out the actual problem or to help avoid the real culprits. ‘Bomb attack in Pakistan?’ Blame India. ‘Bomb attack in India?’ Blame ISI. ‘Increase in sectarian violence?’ Blame Jews for spreading the hatred among the Muslim Ummah, which was living very happily otherwise. ‘Your children don’t listen to you?’ Blame Amreeka and maghribi rivayaat (whatever that is). Even Taliban use this ploy effectively and blame all of their motivations on operation of Lal Masjid. Similarly, the elites have found Khan as an easy scapegoat for all the wrongs that have plagued this country even though the guy has yet to hold any actual power. Khan is an easy prey because the only thing one has to worry about afterwards is the amount of hate mail one receives. And considering that many pseudo intellectuals think that amount of hate mail is directly proportional to their own IQ, it actually is a bonus. He is easy because blaming him will excuse them from speaking openly about the real culprits.

Or is it because Imran Khan openly speaks what he believes in instead of playing the game like PML-N which covertly makes alliances with extremist organizations for a couple of petty NA seats? Whose law minister has even participated in rallies of these organizations despite their links to Lashkar e Jhangvi which is responsible for sectarian violence from Punjab to Baluchistan? And yet ‘opinion makers’ of editorial pages only seem to find Imran Khan as a hypocrite. I must sue Oxford dictionary publishers and all my English teachers for feeding me the wrong definition of hypocrite all these years.

If a leader of a popular party can be called TALIBAN KHAN by a member of editorial staff in opinion pages may we also write ‘Shahbaz Sharif Jhangvi’?

To put it on record let me say I do not agree with Khan’s idea of negotiations with the Taliban. But is he the only one doing it? PPP information minister Mr. Kaira even went on to say government would support if Khan negotiates with Taliban. Apparently he also suggested Nawaz Sharif should negotiate with Baluch leaders. One wonders why have people voted for PPP then if every one else is supposed to do their job? So, why no article with the title ‘Shame on you Mr. Kaira’?

If it is about Imran Khan saying that there are different types of Taliban groups who need to be identified and separated, than one only needs to be looking at what Rehman Malik has been smoking for the last few days because that is exactly what he has been saying.

Lot of issue has been made (and rightly so) about Imran Khan’s statement in Talat Hussain’s interview where he showed reservation over big statements against Taliban over the safety of his workers in FATA. But one must ask whether any other politician even has made this little statement even? Even the parliament resolution did not mention Taliban by name. Why not write a piece ‘Shame on our whole Parliament’?

I would double dare any opinion maker to write an article titled ‘Shame-on-He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named’ over the killings of mere bystanders by political goons just because their leader was insulted by a member of another party?

Or is it because authors of elitist mindset feel guilty over keeping on voting for same parties again and again and their parties producing zero results?

Guilt is a very undesirable feeling to have. We do not wish to take any blame for ourselves or for those whom we helped in any sort of way. For that we tend to deflect our guilt on a scapegoat. Stop using Imran Khan’s name for personal fame or because you want to subdue your own guilt. Perhaps ‘Shame on us all’ should be the next appropriate title.