A response to Ravi Dev

Dec 23, 2022 Letters

Dear Editor,

Please allow me to respond to Mr. Ravi Dev’s letter: ‘War in Guyana between ‘good’ and ‘evil’, Dec 19, 2022’ Letters (https://www.kaieteurnewsonline.com/category/letters/)

Mr. Dev’s use of the phrase, “rather than ordinary people” categorically states that he sees the PPP and their supporters as “ordinary people.”

This is an extraordinary misuse of the everyday understanding of that concept. There is an important distinction between political organizations and ordinary people, even though the organizations are made up of ordinary people. Political organizations can make the claim that they are leaders of the people, shaping the peoples’ hopes and aspirations, thereby implicitly and explicitly separating themselves from ordinary people, in their efforts to represent them.

This is the historical movement from direct representation to indirect representation, as such the whole parliamentary system of government dating from recorded history to the present.

Mr. Dev then gives us phases of the historical struggle, from 1953 to the present, struggles that had political parties leading the masses, interpreting the movement of the national struggle and the agenda of the political parties in winning support for the party programs as decided by the leaders as distinct from a collection of “ordinary people.”

In depicting “the other” people as seeing the other “other” as a sinful collection, Mr. Dev brilliantly arrives at the conclusion: “In other words, holding that the PPP and their supporters are by nature evil (and racist to boot) rather than ordinary people, it is not difficult to see how attacks against them – a la Mon Repos – can become normalized.”

Mr. Dev, in an act of religious inspiration, informs us that: “What justification, ultimately, can be offered for ‘acts of evil’? The wages of sin, I am told, is death.”

Told by whom? Certainly not by Foucault whom he used to support his historical analysis and then stabs him in the back with his anti-thesis of “ordinary people.”

In the Bhagavad Gita, Krishna commands Arjuna, who refuses to engage in the killing of his kith and kin, to “Pick up your bow and fight.” For Krishna, it was a matter of good versus evil. For Arjuna, it was a question of the cost of war, the price paid in the killing field. Was it worth it? Krishna’s admonition of Arjuna was premised on the fact that Arjuna belonged to the warrior caste, whose duty was to wage war. Is Mr. Dev being informed (told) by adherents of the Bhagavad Gita, or by other religious formations of ordinary people?

Amartya Sen, a Nobel laureate, in his book “The Idea of Justice” concluded, in hindsight, that the slaughter that ensued in the famous battle was not worth it, claiming the Arjuna was correct in questioning the cost of victory. We are witnessing a similar battle in Ukraine, where the principle of ‘no NATO country will be allowed on Russia’s borders’ is being fought out with horrendous human suffering on both sides.

Mr. Dev, in his “ordinary people” method of analysis, that of abolishing the political institutions from the masses, and replacing it with the concept of “ordinary people” would transform the battle of the Bhagavad Gita into a fight between “ordinary people”. The very depiction of Arjuna as a member of the warrior caste, alerts us to the foundation of structural analysis of Hindu society, a caste society during that period of history. The very concept of a caste society, the division into the rulers, warriors, workers, would violate Dev’s description of “ordinary people.” Let us ignore those who are untouchable. Furthermore, Krishna’s depiction of the battle being that of right and wrong, suggests that “ordinary people” stands on both sides of the divide, along with their leaders.

Mr. Dev use of social analysis in his opening salvo, was intended to confuse rather than to edify, to lead us to his thesis of “ordinary people.” His aim was to ascribe the labels of right and wrong to a racial profile. He has remained faithful to his thesis of “biological atavism.” I would have liked to ascribe a higher motive to his intent, but the facts prove otherwise.

Mr. Dev knew the answer before he started his analysis, that the Mon Repos event could be used to vilify the “other.” It is possible to lay blame at the feet of some of the political leaders, even on the assumption they did not instigate or support the attack on “ordinary people” at Mon Repos. They should have condemned the attack on innocent persons. Mr. Dev could have simply said so. He would have been on the right side of history.

Sincerely,

Rohit Kanhai