right, wrong & social acceptance

we often find ourselves either saying or listening “is this right?” or  “is this wrong?” but i strongly believe that we should rather ask “is this socially accepted?”. social acceptance is a concept which solves lot’s of mysteries. it’s a term which tells you about something/anything more then it’s being right or wrong. social acceptance can make a right thing wrong and a wrong thing right in public perception. while one’s personal opinion doesn’t change according to social acceptance but course of action surely does.

let’s consider an example, we all have heard about heaven. since childhood we have been told about it. “if you do good deeds, you get to go to heaven” or, “if you do bad deeds, you get to go to hell”. and heaven is the place, where beautiful lasses “अप्सराएँ” dance for you while you get to drink “सोमरस”; virtually like a dance-bar. this definition of heaven is socially accepted. i suppose this is the reason of having so many dance-bar’s in the town. everyone wants to see and live heaven on earth as well.

while heaven is the place of complete bliss, delight and peace; the abode of god and the angels. the question comes to mind; what is hell? well, hell is pretty much like a place where you get rotten and chewed by the demons, weather and other creatures. it’s the place of dead, place of pain and turmoil, difficulty and suffering. even this definition of hell is pretty much socially accepted too.

eventually, it brings us to an important and realistic approach of human psychology & thinking : power of majority. it always were a very strong and influential concept, it still is and it will always be. when there are a million people, and one of them thinks of an act being right or wrong, the definition of right or wrong totally depends on social acceptance. one’s own soul’s thinking comes after the social acceptance, though it supersedes it sometime (very rarely).

please keep in mind that it’s not a statistical analysis. hitler plotted biggest massacre of his time but i wonder sometimes, could he have done it without support of people. truly, there were people who resisted or to be precisely opposed his action but mostly in their own minds. they knew very well, hitler‘s acts were simply socially accepted by than german or nazi population. they hated jews, there were several reasons behind it and most of them are still debatable.

ravan abducted sita because it was socially accepted in those days to win a woman, specially in lankan’s mindset. multiple wife was a commonly accepted and cherished concept. it’s true that mandodari, kumbhkaran & bibhisan did oppose ravan but they did it more likely because they thought it was wrong; it was their own personal view. after-all, even if you are a king, you can’t force a mob to fight for your doings, whether they are right or wrong, if they are not socially accepted.

it’s true that a good orator can force himself upon you, after-all the power of argument lies in the fact that if you argue rightly you can prove a wrong thing right as well as a right thing wrong. a word of caution : don’t confuse yourself between negotiation and argument. argument is really amazing thing. all wrong things which are socially acceptable by the people in today’s world are mostly due to right use of argument.

i wouldn’t say that social acceptance only comes in picture because people could be persuaded into it by a good orator with the power of speech, words & argument only. sometimes, it’s the power of  media, muscle, economic power or mere mutual profit with someone. take a look at america’s policies & actions, they are socially accepted because of all or one of those reasons.

they take down iraq for oil and justify it in the name of terror of bio-chemical weapons (which were never found there). while we can’t attack on p.o.k. (pakistan occupied kashmir) even when everyone knows we have been targeted by terrorist camps from there for decades now. china can occupy and control tibet while we can’t tell nepal to shut the f*** up anti-india-operations on his soil. (i credit it to the lack of an indian leader with balls, if we had one we wouldn’t get threatened and give in every now and than).

usa can keep a big stock of nuclear weapons while we can’t make any. usa doesn’t sign and follow any environment protection plan. usa has 5% of planet’s population and uses 25% of resources of planet earth &  it is one of the biggest  polluting countries in the world. no-one can say anything to it, it’s a super-power and it’s actions are justified by the effective use of tools of social acceptance.

one of the biggest example of it in hindu mythology is the story of pandav’s. none of them was a biological son of king pandu but they were known as his son’s and were socially accepted. to the suprise, yet, they found karn as a man of lower cast and untouchable. what an irony, bastards(pandav’s) considered another man inferior and not able to rule a kingdom as he was not a son of a king. strange, isn’t it?  , after-all they were themselves born out of wedlock.

their mother slept with another man and hindu mythology wrote some rules to call it legal and acceptable. amazing!! islam is not too different either : they allow multiple marriage and it’s socially accepted. they put their county below their religion. (i don’t call it on all but most of the muslims i met belong to this class.) what a shame? christianity is no different either to mend a wrong thing into right with the help of tools of social acceptance.

eventually, all sects do it, mend the laws or facts to make a wrong thing right or vice-versa for their own sake with the help of the tools of social acceptance. so here is a simple advice, don’t bother too much for right or wrong but you make sure to check if it’s socially accepted or not. still, if you have courage to fight for right and believe in yourself. stand up for it, after-all you always can change social-acceptance… don’t think so? keep reading…

gandhi & congress both asked for dominion status (home-rule). it was hugely accepted and supported by socials. bhagat singh & party found it wrong and asked for total independence (पूर्ण स्वराज). social acceptance came on bhagat’s side and gandhi & party were forced to follow it to get social acceptance on their side. they knew bhagat was taking lead and getting an important place in indian politics as a lead-leader. one of the biggest reasons gandhi didn’t save him, because gandhi always wanted to lead indian freedom struggle himself.

on a personal note, alcohol is socially not accepted back home but it’s not only socially accepted but also cherished in my friend-circle and educational-intellectual-comrades. so when someone back home asks me about alcohol consumption in my social circle, i often keep mum. after-all they think it’s wrong, while i don’t because in my social circle it’s socially accepted.

luckily the girls in my life understand that it’s acceptable in my social circuit while it’s taboo in their own. though, they try to keep a tab on it which i pretty much appreciate because deep-down i don’t also like alcohol always, it’s just that at-times it indulges me. hope you will understand it, after-all it’s not just a point of being right & wrong only. it’s about social acceptance as well.

post script : i am working on the second article on “the india of my dreams” series. i will answer the questions raised in the india of my dreams – I. still, if you want me to answer anything else about something or write on any specific topic : do let me know.. i sure will do it. even, this post also is written on request of a friend who wanted me to write on “social acceptance”.