Nature has blessed
North America with enormous bounties, and human
effort and ingenuity have turned it into a cornucopia
overflowing with all that human desire could dream
of. There is, however, no limit to the cravings
of human desire. The eminent Urdu poet, Ghalib,
has beautifully described it in the following
couplet:
Hazaron khahisin
icy ke her khahish pay dam niklay
Buhat niklay
mere arman laikin phir bhi kam niklay
While almost
all religions, Buddhism in particular, and numerous
sages have advised mankind to suppress desire
as it lies at the root of many evils, achievements
in this world have often been prompted by intense
desires. And, intense desire leads to intense
determination. Genius is marked by intensity,
and gumption combined with dogged determination
has brought success to many a man. No less a person
than Michelangelo prayed: “Lord, grant that
I may always desire more than I can accomplish.”
Everything we
have in America is the result of desire. Indeed
desire is the motivating force of life itself.
The Qur’an,
the Bible and all holy scriptures uphold the virtue
of contentment. The Qur’an says: Hold on
to patience; patience of beautiful contentment.
The Bible advises:
Having food and clothing, let us therewith be
content.
Socrates upheld
contentment as the “natural wealth”
A Chinese sage,
probably a Buddhist, thought that happiness lay
in the ability “to lose all desire for things
beyond your reach.”
All religions,
sages, thinkers and philosophers have encouraged
human effort but in the right and moral direction.
Only such desires have been castigated as transgress
moralities and hurt other human beings: only such
fanatics and bigots have preached and practiced
asceticism as were drop-outs of societies for
a variety of reasons.
The American
society and its astonishing attainments have been
built mainly upon the burning desires of individuals
to achieve their dreams and the freedoms afforded
by the society to realize those dreams. The immigrants
who reached the shores of America with dreams
to labor and live well were not fettered with
negative ideologies or concepts but were egged
on by a forceful “can-do culture”.
To the entrepreneurs pursuing their dreams no
river was deep enough, no mountain high enough
to thwart their march in pursuit of their dreams.
By any standard,
the landing of man on the moon, the Internet,
the satellite communication and a host of other
technological advances are no less than miracles
of the modern age with America contributing the
most to these miracles.
While the innovations
are all laudable, as they have made life easier
and longer, they have also wrought certain malevolent
changes. The sequence of desire-effort-patience-fulfillment
has been overtaken by a culture of instant gratification
that has dropped the element of patience from
the natural process, giving rise to distortions,
harmful side effects and a set of debatable values.
The most widely
mentioned is the change in family values. The
discovery of the contraceptive pill in mid-sixties
has caused a virtual revolution in gender relations.
The premium on virginity and the postponement
of sexual intimacy till after wedlock has yielded
to instant gratification and the acceptance of
sexual experiences as a normal feature in a subsequent
commitment to marriage. Even the aura of romance
attached to love has taken a back seat. The concepts
of family, fidelity and stability in marriage
have all changed. They have been sacrificed at
the alter of instant gratification.
A new scale of
values has taken over. It includes: living together,
live-in boy or girl friend, single mother, single
father, gay couples, instant availability of porno
material on Internet, and so on.
Technology has
sparked a very fast tempo of life. Every thing
and every one seems to be on the run. Time has
shrunk despite an increase in life expectancy.
This has led to fast food chains, telephonic orders,
Internet shopping, Fed-Ex and UPS services of
overnight deliveries, buy-now-pay-later schemes,
the facility of returning a merchandise you decide
not to keep, pay in easy installments and a host
of similar schemes tempting customers to indulge
in instant gratification.
Half a century
back when I purchased my first Ford car on installments,
I discovered how difficult were the “easy
payments” and how much more I had to pay
by way of interest. I have not bought any thing
since then on “easy” installments.
An “easy” installment is an oxymoron.
The fast tempo
of life may have afforded man new conveniences
and the ability to accomplish a lot in half the
time, but it has also brought in its wake new
problems. Take the fast food chains, for instance.
They serve such fattening items that if you eat
there regularly you can see yourself gaining weight
at all the wrong places.
Statistics tell
us that 61 per cent of all Americans are overweight,
and obesity is now the major cause of death. Half
a century back, fair, fat and forty were the ideals.
A fat person was thought to be substantial and
well to do. Now only the poor and the careless
are fat. The wealthy and successful regularly
jog and work out to keep sinewy and slim. If you
are 30 pounds overweight, you are middle class;
if more, then you are poor. It shows that the
person lacks self-control. Etiquette demands all
rich persons, particularly women, be slim.
The culture of
instant gratification is rooted in the abundance
created by technological capitalism. The system
stands on the questionable premise that both human
beings and nature are there to be exploited, no
matter what the cost. Nature is being ransacked.
Jobs have been transferred to the cheap labor
markets of India and China to widen the margin
of profit. Economic capital, particularly of the
corporate sector, has been no doubt rising, but
the moral capital of the people at large is depleting.
That is a social consequence of the new economy.
Instant gratification
has been made possible by the easy access to credit.
The facility (or virus) of credit card is found
in the pocket books of all. Interest rates on
these go as high as 25%. Yet, it affords the holder
the temptation of getting his/her desires fulfilled
without wait. It all starts with a small debt;
but a small debt is like a small pregnancy, it
keeps growing. Let me add quickly that I do regard
credit as inevitable for economic activities such
as trade, commerce and investment. What I am talking
about here is the trap of credit card debts that
are largely acquired for instant gratification.
The high rates of interest charged on them may
be regarded as usury.
In America, the
lowest twenty percent of the people remain stuck
in that category because they are unable to reconcile
their net income with their gross habits. They
can’t resist temptation. An income for them
is what they can’t live without or within.
Many among them live so far beyond their income
that they may be living apart. Their credit cards
land them eventually in bankruptcy courts.
“You
can’t survive in this society without a
credit card”, an acquaintance assured me
ten years back. I took a bet with him that I could.
Last week marked the completion of the decade.
That has prompted me to write this piece. I have
won the bet, but I lost him to a heart attack
within two years of the bet. I have kept my resolve
to do without a credit card not because of the
bet but because of my belief that to enter into
a credit debt for the instant gratification of
an avoidable desire, is an unmitigated folly.
Fortunately, all members of the South Asian community
that I am acquainted with are fully cognizant
of the fact that a cavalier use of the facility
of credit cards for instant gratification of avoidable
desires gets stuck into the craw like a fish bone.
No wonder, few qualify to be called obese.
