A culture named ‘Insensitivity’

Selecting a suitable topic took me two hours. Sketching the idea took another fifteen agonizing minutes. Waiting for my brain to present something worth writing about felt like an eternity. Picking topics regarding insensitivity seems too sensitive to display in the hall of shame, a hall where it’s simpler to find muses forced to pose. If we talk about Asia collectively, issues about the transgender community, people with skin colour or shape considered too odd to survive, give rise to internalized taboos even the liberals surrender before.

I was scrolling through social media when I stumbled upon multiple videos about transgender activists from Pakistan and India. It’s devastating to state that both mentioned being terrified due to ‘that one night’ that gave them nightmares and wounds that break stitches every time a fellow human hurls abuse. Do they wonder about the uncountable dusks of insomnia that a soul concealed with flesh and eye bags must have suffered from before they proceed to harass? The word they’re familiar with runs the culture of insensitivity.

‘Khusra’ makes my skin crawl as I type it down. I might edit it out of this article. However, as I mentioned, picking topics regarding insensitivity seems too sensitive to display in the hall of shame.

This word reminds me of men who display femininity in their body language and are rather harshly given the tag. Why? I ask, is only an alpha male accepted and the rest degraded? Anything feminine raises a pink flag.

Pink – a colour associated with fragility and submissiveness, and something a man must not have to protect his manliness. Colours remind me of the skin tones our culture seems to shun. To give you an example, ‘dark’ is associated with evil, like the legendary Boxer Mohammad Ali once said, “Why are the angels white and the devil black?” If we despise darkness so much, why is the morning set to get us out of our comfort? Why is the night set to help us retreat to our cocoons?

We aren’t the founders of this practice. Our ancestors played a significant role in creating myths that ended up enslaving millions from a race other than white. I still consider myself a slave to the culture of insensitivity, as I have caught myself multiple times falling prey to its claws and calling my peers terms created solely to question the creator and eventually becoming a devoted sinner.

He paints the way he wills. Why do we try to steal the canvas and sketch an image to belittle? Asia’s obsession with a waist thin enough to show the outline of one’s lungs would forever remain beyond my understanding. Children as young as age nine have shown signs of mania over unrealistic standards of all kinds. Many of these standards and taboos transferred from the previous generation to the new one become fuel to the usage of insensitive remarks passed on to everything that breathes. What can one say when even a high-profile celebrity considers harassment the culture of a specific city?

A leash seems to have tied itself around our necks in the age of technology. We tend to lose our minds and chase our tails when untied. To remain sane and survive the smartphone virus, we must sit face down with our backs slouched as if worshiping the false god of tech. How convenient were the photo albums when all that pasted in them were the good memories and the bright smiles? One could hear the contagious laughs instead of the petrifying screams loud enough to tear apart the eardrums and give nightmares to the coming generations. I’m talking about the obsession with recording scenes and posting them online; the videos the phone addicts record to gain followers, starring a victim screaming their lungs out for help but eventually giving up in front of the people who portray the art of insensitivity. They deserve a ‘round of applause’ for the splendid acting of being brain dead, showing off their blood drained heart with pride. I wonder how many of us were reminded of our law student being stabbed by her classmate in front of a crowd, or of the Indian girl who simply wanted to see the church but was burnt alive as a punishment. Wondering what the crowd did? It proceeded to record.

You might lose count of the number of times I’ve mentioned the word ‘insensitive’. I’d keep in mind to use ‘cool’ as its synonym next time.

Let’s not allow the next generation to become a victim to practices formed ages ago. Let’s not evolve into our ancestors with myths in their left hand and judgments in the right, giving birth to a firm foundation with bricks of a culture named insensitivity.