Need for religious respect
WE ARE 23 years into democracy and we still have not experienced a working democracy with each other where the rubber meets the road.
What is one valid reason why we cannot come to grips with democracy? We are not realistic about our similarities and our differences concerning our intercultural practices, especially among the four distinct racial groups from the transition of apartheid to our present day rainbow nation.
What gives us away? When certain cultures express their celebrations during special days, then problems arise.
All religions have special days – that is a given. There has been hate speech, attitude problems and vitriolic language against Indians celebrating Diwali with firecrackers and everything else that goes with the festival of lights.
I think the manner certain groups are handling this is typical of human nature. They only react when symptoms show because they know pursuing the cause is a mission. I hope to surprise readers, because the cause is not what you may be thinking.
The reason is that we have no proper legislation governing respect for the different cultures and how the public has to respond when a crisis arises. Then, when crises arise, law and enforcement don’t know who to support when a complaint is made. We have a lot of work, because we must pursue our case to go for the big one: to go to government level and bring certain policies that protect the livelihood of all cultures. If we don’t legislate to some degree our expectations, we are worse off.
Let’s be objective: the recent chaos reflects that human rights have been contravened. Chaos didn’t just erupt between races – even a certain brand of Indians who knew their Hindu religion didn’t want the use of firecrackers to be overdone: they too had complaints. So apart from religious marginalisation, there are factions, and imagine the different modes of thinking?
What does this mean? As citizens we need to make a noble and worthy stand by first making up a convincing and persuasive case before taking it to the government. Let us be a thinking people. The best way is to find people of calibre from all the religions to uphold the innocent practices of any religions, so that government would see the unity and necessity of why they need to implement some sort of direction and guidance. PASTOR ROY NAIR
Via e-mail