Remove nationalist indoctrination from school syllabi

State schools teach the basics of political/ethnic prejudice in the process of teaching history. National pride is not something that can be TAUGHT. It’s something you grow into by yourself. When you try to TEACH national pride, what you end up teaching is prejudice.

National history of every country should explicitly start with the following: We’re NOT the greatest nation on Earth. We’re NOT the most righteous people on Earth. We’re not the most clever. We may be ahead in some areas, behind in others, but we’re just another group of people just like everybody else.

Avoid things like: Glorification of past, bloody battles: History books meant for young children depict Dutugemunu as a hero in the Elara-Dutugemunu war. The same treatment is given to a number of other less-than-righteous kings.

If memory serves me, a Grade nine school history book mentioned with barely concealed glee, two notable defeats of Portuguese/British at the hands of Sinhalese militia. It specifically mentions how a certain lake/marsh turned red with the blood of the foreign soldiers: hardly an educational fact.

Many other interactions with foreign races have been recorded in our school history books in neutral sounding language, but with a definite Sri Lankan slant. The school books have been partially sanitized of most of the wrongdoings committed by Sri Lankans.

As Bertrand Russell says, if every country taught their own imperfections and non-superiority to their young, they will be less likely to approve state aggression against other ethnicities or groups. But such a public is a disadvantage to a power-seeking regime.

Economy vs. Security

There needs to be two types of government monitors among citizens: those who monitor security without economic concerns and those who monitor economics without security concerns. Using security concerns to distract people away from economic failures is one of the oldest tricks in a politician’s repertoire, because economics and security represent the two most basic concerns: one is concerned with the gaining or production of value while the other is concerned with the prevention of their loss (by values, I mean lives and property).

If we were to appoint someone to evaluate this administration’s economic performance without letting himself be influenced by security issues, he will report that economic performance is unacceptable. It is important that not all concerned mount the mainstream media bandwagon. When an issue appears on front page headlines, we automatically assume it is of highest priority. If the coverage involves an incident, then it IS of highest priority as long as the event is in progress. However, as soon as the situation subsides, coverage MUST return to long term issues. If short term issues receive too much coverage, then by the time one is finished, another would have arrived to fill the headlines. This may be acceptable to mainstream media that depend on action-packed headlines for sales and ratings. But the non-mainstream and citizen journalists must keep covering the longer term issues. In fact, some can afford to concentrate SOLELY on “standing” issues while allowing mainstream media to cover sensational news

Unethical ordainment of children

More serious than unethical conversion is unethical ordainment. It is in the interest of both the religious and the secularists that ill-disciplined, dishonest and malevolent individuals do not make it to the ranks of monks and priests. Make it illegal for a parent or any adult to ordain a child as a priest/monk without his/her consent. It is disgraceful that certain parents find nothing wrong with the practice of ‘donating’ their children to the Order in the hopes of accumulating merit/blessings for themselves. Unfortunately yet predictably, these tend to be the same priests/monks who start behaving like regular individuals (and sometimes worse) when they become adult members of the clergy. They were never meant to be priests/monks; they may even harbor resentment over their fate. They are unable to lead the life of a priest; yet they cannot leave the Order without social stigma; even if they do, most of them are without the skills to survive outside their respective religious establishment.

Ordainment is a decision that carries life long consequences. A dependent under the age of 18 is in no position to give consent to it. Yet, the major religions prevailing in Sri Lanka require than the training of priests/monks start early. The minimum age for ANY form of ordainment should be 13. Between 13 and 16, the parents and the priests/monks must provide written assurances to authorities that the person to be ordained is fully willing and prepared and he must be interviewed separately by officials before legal permission is given. Ideally, religious laws should change to allow anyone to undergo priesthood training from any age between 13 to 18, and at age 18 decide whether to continue or not; and to be able to leave the establishment without any stigma. Ordainment of children against their will should be banned.

Government as an arbiter/representative

The failure of democracy in third world countries is largely attributed to the average third world citizen’s tendency to view the government as a caregiver, rather than an arbiter/representative. This is why communism is an Eastern phenomenon (most third world countries being concentrated in the eastern hemisphere).

It is not the government’s job to supply bread, water or housing. It is not the government’s job to take care of citizen’s needs. In a proper democracy that responsibility lies with each individual. The government is a third-party that comes into play when individual desires clash and an arbitrator is required. The law performs this function. The government can also be a hub for resources that are best pooled. National defense for example, is a common goal that is best vested in a single representative entity (rather than each citizen bearing arms).

When citizens become dependent on the government for needs other than this, tyranny arises. Fulfillment of needs is the bait through which tyranny takes hold. Tyranny and abuse of power can never arise in a nation where the majority of citizens understand the true purpose of government. The road to turning Sri Lanka into such a nation is a long one. We need to educate the public on the true mechanics of politics.

Separation of Church and State

The result of any mixture between religion and politics is EVIL. Sri Lankans who are aware of world history already know this. Christianity corrupted by political power took a thousand-year bite out of our civilization: the period spanning approximately 5 – 15th century AD are lost to humanity, the Dark Ages. The Church tortured and burned women as witches; it had the power to dictate what people learned and what they didn’t; to ban and burn books; to jail/execute writers and scientists; to send troops to other countries in the name of God.

Christianity was restored to the form originally designed by Christ, only through a massive internal struggle between Christians themselves: the Reformation. Christians have never forgotten this lesson. This is why in America, religion is forbidden from entering the government and is forbidden at the highest possible level: the Constitution. Religion may not be taught at school; public prayer or religious symbols within state buildings are not allowed. Most non-Christians find Americans’ apparent hostility toward their own religion puzzling. There is nothing puzzling when you see that the hostility is not toward religion, but toward mixing religion and politics. Muslims have yet to learn this lesson.

Buddhists tend to argue that, since Buddhism is a non-violent and tolerant system of beliefs, it cannot happen to Buddhism. They were proven wrong: on the subject of the ethnic conflict, political monks continue to be the most outspoken advocates of violence and intolerance. Astonishingly, some of them went beyond advocacy to direct demonstrations of violence.

There is ZERO correlation between the teachings of a religion and the degree of evil committed once it is mixed with politics. If “he that is without sin, cast the first stone” and “turn the other cheek” lead to the Witch Trials, it is no surprise that sermons of the Buddha too, were distorted to serve political ends. Buddhism in Sri Lanka has already been heavily corrupted by the politicized clergy, yet there is no sign that Sri Lankans are becoming wise to what Europeans learned centuries ago: ANY MIX OF POLITICS AND RELIGION IS EVIL.

Sri Lanka is a Buddhist COUNTRY. But it cannot be a Buddhist STATE. The difference seems subtle but is critical. Americans are far more Christian than Europeans or even their own neighboring Canadians. It is said that America is at once the most secular state and the most religious nation.

Amend the constitution to prohibit the government from favoring any religion or the parliament passing any law mentioning a specific religion. Make it clear that no religion is exempt from the Law: in any contest between the Law of the Country and the Law of a religion, the Law of the Country must prevail. In the eyes of the Law, only the Law is Holy. Religion must remain a private matter. Abolish all religion-related government departments and funding programs, with the exception of archeology projects dealing with preserving ancient Sri Lankan ruins (most of which happen to be from a Buddhist civilization). Sri Lankan cannot become a Buddhist state or a Christian state or an Islamic state or a Hindu state. It MUST be a secular state.

Prohibition of Liquor and Tobacco

Sri Lankans have yet to learn a lesson in Prohibition. That the sale and consumption of liquor/tobacco is legal in Sri Lanka is a great blessing: the industry is mostly in the hands of law-abiding citizens (in fact the tobacco and liquor industry leaders are exemplars of good business management). Habitual drinkers/smokers need not hide their habits and therefore are known to their friends and families, which makes it easier for them to receive help. Prices are not hugely inflated due to concealed production, trafficking or “protection”. There is no exponential addiction chain (as in drugs, where addicts finance their own addiction by becoming dealers themselves, pushing the drug to new, younger markets).

The effects of Prohibition are not hypothesis: America experienced it during the Prohibition Era. During that period, when the possession and production of liquor was banned in the US, the liquor industry looked just like the drug “industry” looks today. The huge surge of organized crime during that period–often dramatized today in “gangster” movies–was a direct result of the liquor ban. The very measure that was meant to reduce crime, gave birth to more of it.

The Law may prohibit CRIMES, but not VICES. Prohibition of a PERCEIVED necessity creates business for organized crime. For some, smoking is a necessary vice; for some drinking is a necessary vice; for the drug addict, his dose is absolutely necessary. The government has no right to pass MORAL judgment on its citizens, only LEGAL judgment. Caesar may not do God’s job. Drunk driving is a crime. Drinking is not. Pushing drugs is a crime. Taking them is not. Smoking in a poorly ventilated public place is a crime. Smoking is not. It is ludicrous for a government to pass laws to protect people from themselves: few entities harm people more than governments do.

The recent legislation against smoking in public is disturbing. It is a clear case of government stepping over lines of authority and may be an omen of more to come. As said before in this blog, politicians are the last group on earth who should be preaching morals, let alone enforcing them.

The government should repeal all alcohol/tobacco related regulations except the following: driving/performing risky operations under influence; sale to minors; smoking in a private establishments (e.g. restaurants) with no-smoking signs.

It would be good if even drugs can be legalized: prices will drop drastically, organized crime would lose business and the addiction chain would be broken; it will be easier to track and help addicts. Unfortunately, this is not a realistic option today. First, no one would accept this solution and second, no single country can do it in isolation. Drug trade is an international “industry” and any single country that were to legalize drugs would immediately become a hub of operations for the drug cartels in other countries. Drugs may be a problem too far gone to correct by deregulation.

Military Solutions and Final Solutions

There is no military solution to the ethnic problem. Military solutions are for military problems. An ethnic problem requires an ethnic solution. Sinhalese extremists turned a political problem into an ethnic problem. The LTTE turned the ethnic problem into a military problem. Now we have both. The ethnic problem is the existence of a Sinhalese majority and a Tamil minority in a single country and that they don’t seem to get along. The military problem is the existence of an illegal armed group using terrorist tactics under the aegis of fighting for minority rights. We need to solve both these problems.

The fact that most Sri Lankans are unaware of the greater political backdrop their country resides in, and that they’re unaware of the lessons of history, is evident from their acceptance of the term “Final Solution” — the notorious phrase used by the Nazis to mean the extermination of the Jews. Most educated westerners would run screaming if they were to hear the term “Final Solution” in connection to any ethnic issue. Yet it is the same phrase some Sri Lankan leaders are using to describe the mysterious silver bullet that is going to solve the ethnic problem once and for all.

What the solution is to the ethnic problem is not yet clear. But as for the military problem the solution is the disarmament of the LTTE, either voluntarily or by military engagement or by a combination of both. The rationalization of this solution comes from the principle of Uniform Application of the Law. An acquaintance of mine summed it up this way: “If you kill one person, you get to go to jail. If you kill a thousand, you get to go for peace talks”. But on the other hand, it is a fundamental right of a citizen to take up arms if his government fails in its obligation to protect him. This is why the ethnic solution is also necessary. So long as the government of Sri Lanka is failing in this duty, a disarmament of the LTTE will be a unilateral solution many will not accept.

Reforming the UNP

It’s better to reform an existing party than to establish a new one. The political reality is that a new right-wing democratic third party would never win a popular election in this country, perhaps not for decades to come. So which of the two main parties is the best candidate for reformation? Anybody who is a regular reader of this blog would know that my personal choice would be the most right-wing/capitalist party: the UNP.

Politician-wise, I don’t see a big difference between the UNP and the present incarnation of Sri Lanka’s political left: the UPFA. But policy-wise the UNP has demonstrated a higher level of resistance against socialism and various other extremist ideologies in recent years (with the blaring exception of the Premadasa administration).

Ten years ago I would not have endorsed this position; not only did two successive UNP administrations fail miserably to diffuse the then growing ethnic problem, the Premadasa administration strayed so far from democracy that I was at the time forced to support an opposition that embraced socialism — an ideology I oppose on moral grounds.

However the party seems to have made progress in recent years. If the party could go from political thuggery, suppression of free expression and the disregard of the Tamil minority, to what it demonstrated during the brief Ranil Wicremasinghe administration–a greater observance of property rights and other democratic norms and a willingness to compromise for the sake of reconciliation between Sinhalese and Tamils–then it seems logical to assume that it may be the best candidate for further metamorphosis.

The topic of United National Party reforms have been mentioned often in the media without much reference to WHAT the reforms are going to be and what they are aiming to achieve. In this regard, my position is set against the common assumption. It is true that the UNP is less successful in appealing to the more “local” voter segments than its competitor. It has been suggested that the UNP should become more nationalist and “cultural”. I believe the party leader even attempted this with references to ancient Sri Lankan kings during his last campaign’s speeches. But this is contrary to the essence of the UNP. The UNP should maintain and strengthen its identity as a right wing party with a Western/globalized outlook and democratic/capitalist ideals. Let the other side appeal to “our” or “local” values and resort to western-bashing. Both major parties must not represent the same end of the political/social spectrum. Lack of balanced political polarization can lead to totalitarianism.

Instead, the UNP must make reforms in the ways it reaches voters. Its platform should be primarily economic and it should make voters aware of this fact AND the reasons for it. A good early-twenty-first-century Sri Lankan political party will define the following platform priorities: the economy, peace, national defense and the maintenance of law, order and political freedoms, in that order. Preservation of culture, religion, language or anything along those lines should be left to civil organizations. Governments meddle in such affairs often with grave consequences. The following should be explained to voters (though I doubt any politician ever will): of all people, do not look to politicians for moral leadership. I have a problem when the same politicians who support brothels ban TV shows to preserve my “culture”. I have a problem when the same politicians who can’t balance their own budget preach economics and force me to practice thrift by forcibly placing a part of my earnings in a heavily inflation-eroded retirement fund (which they then dip into for financing government projects). Until the day good leaders arrive, politicians must be administrators at most.

Diaspora Naiveté

Calls for war are easy to make when the bombs are not going to fall on your own neighborhood. In the Sri Lankan ethnic conflict, both sides suffer from two forms of naiveté, each in its own way. Firstly, the paradox of the most distant factions on both sides being the most militant. Sinhalese extremists living in the relative safety and luxury of Colombo find it easy to call for war in the North. Tamil extremists living in London or Toronto are generally the most overt in their affection for the LTTE. Both are not just cases of being in an area where one is free to voice opinions. It is more a case of being disconnected from the reality one thinks one knows through verbal and written descriptions, photographs and video reports. Even those who visit a war-torn area for a few days and think “Ok, now I know what these people are actually going through” is still not fully aware. It is difficult for those in Colombo and London to grasp what it is like to live through a war day and night and not have anywhere else to go. Neither can I.

A section of the Sinhalese engage in classic nationalist chest thumping while a section of the Tamil Diaspora engages in classic romanticization of a distant conflict. But there is another form of naiveté: the naiveté of a new generation who is distanced from the conflict not by space, but by time. Many of the most vocal pro-Sinhalese, pro-war activists of the new generation were but toddlers in 1983. Some hadn’t even been born. They merely inherited the hatred from their elders, just as their Tamil counterparts inherited theirs from their elders. While the new generation Tamils can at least use discrimination as an excuse for their hatred, Sinhalese youth really have no such excuse to hate Tamils as an ethnic group (the crimes of the LTTE organization notwithstanding). We may very soon have to face the absurdity of two groups fighting for reasons that nobody living on either side remembers firsthand.

Money-Parties vs. Value-Parties

A political party whose platform consists of economics is far better than a party whose platform consists of “values”. In other words, of the two types of major parties found in most countries, the “money-party” is generally a safer bet than the “ideals” party. On the surface, the voter may feel that he should decide on the basis of who shows more concern for the things he value (be it national sovereignty, culture, religion, honesty etc.), rather than the one that promises more practical things. But the converse is true. Of all people, we should not look to politicians for values. For the Machiavellian mind, values are no more than devices. And as devices go, values can be far more potent than greed. The greatest atrocities in history have not been committed on the basis of practical necessities, but on the basis of values: on the basis of warped conceptions of what is right and wrong. The Holocaust, both World Wars, the Crusades, the Jihad, the Cold War–none of these were fought/carried out of material greed (though people like Adolph Hitler do occasionally appeal to economic reasons to catapult to power). I prefer the greedy politician over the ideological/charismatic one any day: material greed is a predictable element. Hunger for power is not. At humanity’s present stage of development, we cannot expect any more of a government other than operations and administration. Certainly not moral leadership. The only reason the Judiciary (which deals with right-and-wrong) is a part of government is that it MUST. Privatized dispute arbitration is still in the far future.