Reflections: Things Fall Apart

Okonkwo is a formidable warrior in Nigeria’s Igbo clan. He grooms himself to be tough and ruthless to erase his shame of a father who wasted his life in idleness and disgrace. Although deep down Okonkwo is a tender-hearted person, he forces himself to wear a prickly, hard facade. He is so fearful of being termed weak-hearted that he overcompensates it by externally portraying himself as a brutal, fearsome person. This characteristic of his leads to impulsive acts of violence and accidents, causing him to be temporarily banished from his village. When Okonkwo returns to his village after his exile, he grapples with the loss of his status. To add to his misery, Christian missionaries had started to slowly dissolve his village’s way of life in the name of civilization and spiritual evangelism. This is a story of the clash between two starkly different ways of living, causing us to question if the meaning of civilization is objective enough for one culture to bulldoze itself on another culture.

Achebe takes his time to introduce the culture of the Igbo tribe - their ways of living, their superstitions and Gods, and their sense of justice and morality. As barbaric and crass as some customs may sound to us, Achebe shows that underneath it all lies the same fundamental elements of human nature - feelings of camaraderie, love, affection, fear, insecurity, jealousy, anger etc. Yet, it is unequivocally apparent to us that the tribe’s ignorance is perpetuating mindless cruelty and misery among its own members. But those like Okonkwo, who are threatened by change, resist coming out of their rigid perspectives. However, the point that Achebe makes is, how much authority do we have to force a change? To us, the tribe’s culture is rudimentary and barbaric, and to them, our culture and views on morality are foolish and incomprehensibly weird. Can there be an objective ruling that one culture is more “civilized” than the other?

Since we are armed with Science and rationality, it’s easier for us to make a solid argument of being on the “right” side. Major civilizations have already traveled the path of medieval barbarism, the renaissance and revolutions to get to this point. It indeed is hard for us to sympathize with a culture teeming with inane superstitions that result in heinous crimes. But the story gives a humane face to such a culture, so that we can look beyond the surface barbarism to connect with a common thread. They too deserve some respect and dignified treatment. And in the end, the choice lies with the individual. It is contradictory if the evangelists themselves resort to aggressive and disruptive means to bring about betterment.

The story vividly captures the essence of African villages. It is a tragic, yet honest depiction of the hypocrisies of colonialism.

Civilization and Morality

Cambridge Dictionary defines the meaning of a civilized society as, "describes a society or country that has a highly developed system of government, culture and way of life and that treats the people who live there fairly:"


To me, the definition is still unsatisfactory. What does it mean to have a highly developed system of government, culture and way of life? What does it mean to be civilized? What is it's ultimate purpose? A Utopian land of peace and communion, or merely a sustainable practical solution to coexist and survive in a community? As human beings, does it at all signify any growth to us, asides being an inevitable social "evolution"?


The marked attributes of a civilized world are increase in rational thought, empathy, and compassion to fellow living beings -- can this be extrapolated as increase in morality, moral consciousness? With such a continual increase in moral consciousness, does the future then hold a vision of pre-Pandorian era of happiness and peace, devoid of anything "evil"? If the hypothesis is extended, does it mean we can indeed reach a state of harmonious coexistence without any laws or explicit moral rules, for we would have graduated to a state of social evolution that no more requires rules. Rules in kindergarten are not extended till high school, are they? Aren't tens of thousands of years of evolution enough for us human beings to graduate?


But the reality is that rules and laws have been continually increasing, and even today there is hardly any civilized society, no matter how highly developed, that can afford to suspend all rules and laws for even a single day with the confidence of it's inhabitants cohabiting in peace. In what way have we then civilized? With a zillion rules on decorum and decency, we may know how to eat right, dress right, talk right, walk right, buy the right things... but living right? What does it mean? Am I being skeptical about the above social experiment? Can implicit faith in human goodness, and reliance on the "humaneness" in us hold strong enough in such a scenario? Will the vast majority survive in harmony with merely spurious outbursts?


Another hypothetical experiment - if a baby were to be abandoned in a jungle (cruel, but imagine Mowgli and Tarzan), devoid of human civilization, would the baby also grow up with the acquired humane feelings? Will discerning right and wrong, and judging fairness of situations be part of who he grows up to be? Hard to imagine so. Can we hope to appeal to the "humaneness" of such a jungle man? Will he be capable of experiencing any empathy? Nature, nurture, environment and circumstances play a huge role. If the above two social experiments fail, seems to me that rules and laws are indispensable no matter how much we evolve. It seems to reiterate the Veneer Theory. Are all of us struggling with an internal conflict of animalistic primordial instincts that know not the necessity for morality but only knows the laws of survival? Morality is then a convenience, a practical acceptance, submission for ensuring coexistence. This line of thought explicates that there are perhaps no universal truths/tenets of Good. Religion breaks downs which is obviously why the Church doesn't like to think or even associate human beings as having evolved from animals.


A further line of thought - in terms of current societies, our definitions of civility and morality seem to be more enhanced and prevalent in developed societies - societies that have the means to provide enough resources and quality of life to most, without the inhabitants scrambling for them. Surplus resources makes sharing and waiting for turns much easier. The game of survival of the fittest is reduced significantly in a pampered society. When the need for the game reduces, when one has his needs fulfilled, he can afford to think about others. In a developing society with meager resources and tough competition, civility and morality are secondary concerns. Primary concern is survival. Doesn't matter if it's not your turn in the queue, doesn't matter if you push a couple of people down in the process of getting into the bus (literally and figuratively speaking of course)...if you want to be morally conscious and civil, you will be waiting at the bus stop forever.


As we continue to deplete resources from our planet, isn't every developed and civilized society facing this risk of pandemonium and breakdown in morality/civility as the pampering cushion is removed and people are faced with Nature's wild game of survival? Or is it just my pessimistic streak? Maybe we humans will figure out a "civil" solution without pandering to the pressing crisis.


The tug of war between good and "evil" will continue to exist in each of us. The development of sufficient rational thought, empathy and compassion are alone not enough to surface the "good" and quell the brutish instincts. Circumstances are often the turning point to unleash those attributes that we want to believe are long buried and dead. With more civilization, individual freedom of spirit often gets compromised... the eyes of society become our conscience. Revolutions keep coming and going with every other generation to express that freedom, to release that energy boiling on the surface and yet being pushed down with rules we continue to create. Maybe the increasing trend of rules will plateau at some point in the future, meaning it will be a harbinger for more harmonious Utopian type of society, or perhaps the rules will all breakdown and the boiling "Veneer" within will lash out. I want to believe in the former and look forward to an optimistic future, where our evolved rationality can guide us. But we still have a long way to go, maybe another thousand years of civilization and more revisions to the concept of morality and ethics. Despite perceptions on morality changing, with the lines of black and white getting smudged with every generation, the fundamental core beneath the concept of ethics and morality continue to hold strong - harmonious coexistence.