This essay was awarded a Silver Prize in the Senior category of the International Essay Competition organised by the Royal Commonwealth Society, London, in 2016.
“Thousands of years ago, the first man discovered how to make fire. He was probably burned at the stake he had taught his brothers to light. He was considered an evildoer who had dealt with a demon mankind dreaded. But thereafter men had fire to keep them warm, to cook their food, to light their caves. He had left them a gift they had not conceived and he had lifted darkness off the earth. Centuries later, the first man invented the wheel. He was probably torn on the rack he had taught his brothers to build. He was considered a transgressor who ventured into forbidden territory. But thereafter, men could travel past any horizon. He had left them a gift they had not conceived and he had opened the roads of the world.
That man, the unsubmissive and first, stands in the opening chapter of every legend mankind has recorded about its beginning.”
This is an excerpt from the famous courtroom speech delivered by Howard Roark, the protagonist of the bestselling novel, The Fountainhead, by Ayn Rand, where he is portrayed as a young, ambitious, motivated yet maverick ‘individual’ who seeks to propagate the philosophy- “all conventions are boundaries ready to be transcended” and thus, often finds himself at loggerheads with the society, which treasures the ancient and forbids the avant-garde.
Roark, a student of architecture, was expelled from his institution because he didn’t want to restrict himself to the creativity of his ancestors; he rather wanted to let his own creative juices flow free and run naked on the sheets. He wanted to erect buildings not in the style of the classic antiquity but the one that could mirror his originality. He valued individualism over traditionalism; he refused to conform to the orthodoxy. Thus, innovation became his crime and expulsion, his punishment.
Such is the case of an individual in today’s society; he is forcibly buried deep down inside the earth like a dormant seed, proscribed from widening its roots and elongating its shoot. But there’s always life, even under apparent stillness.
In all these eons, there were individuals who treaded courageously as the ‘firsts’ on new roads armed with nothing but their vision. Common to all of them was that the step was first, the road new, the vision unborrowed, and the response they received—contempt. The great creators—the thinkers, the artists, the scientists, the inventors—stood alone against their contemporaries. Every great new thought was opposed. Every great new invention was denounced. The first motor was considered foolish. The airplane was considered impossible. The power loom was considered vicious.
What better can you expect from the world which had someday condemned Galileo and thought that he was out of sanity??
Individuals have long been discriminated on the basis of their gender, caste or race. In the 1700-1800s, women didn’t have the right to vote because only men enjoyed that privilege by the virtue of their gender. Dalits didn’t have access to education and job opportunities because of the underprivileged status awarded to them by the society. And who’s unaware of the highly discriminatory Apartheid policy in Africa???
Rosa Parks, an individual, refused to give her seat to a white passenger and became the first lady of civil rights’ movement. Raja Rammohan Ray became a victim to criticism when he raised his voice against the then societal practice of sati and advocated widow remarriage. Mahatma Gandhi was the pioneer of Anti-Racial discrimination movement in South Africa.
But not always is the individual correct and the society wrong. There can be exceptions too, say for instance, the language dispute in the constituent assembly of India. It was composed of a well-represented body of individuals who reflected the multi-lingual and cultural diversity of India. But things got sour when an individual called R.V. Dhulekar demanded that Hindi be made the national language of India. He also went on to say that “….those who do not know Hindi should leave the assembly then and there”. He was faced with fierce opposition since a vast majority of the Indian population didn’t speak a common language, not even Hindi. There were Anti-Hindi movements in the south of India, particularly in Tamil Nadu. The typhoon on the discussion table came to an end when the constituent assembly adopted a more moderate view that English be made the official working language of the Government of India while the states were left at their free will to choose any of the regional languages to be the working language of the state government.
So, should individuals always remain sensitive and thus, be considerate of the needs of the crowd??
As individuals, unanimous agreement on a certain issue is like expecting the cuckoo to build its own nest. But human beings, unlike termites who do not possess individual personalities but still reside in a society, are social animals. We are inter-related and interdependent like the bees or ants. We have to be conscious of each other’s needs because boon for one must not be a bane for the other. So while we, as individuals, should and must be free to pursue our own passion and act at our own free will, we should and must also be aware of the consequences our actions can have on others. It shouldn’t be like “I’ll build an industry because that enlarges my profit margin, even at the cost of the health of the environment of the earth that endangers the lives of millions”. Individuals must collaborate or at least negotiate so as to act in accordance with mutual needs and thus, attain meaningful success.
What the society needs to comprehend is the fact that “as many drops of water make an ocean, likewise many ‘individuals’ make a society”. Society, hence, is an aggregate of many units called ‘individuals’. A society CANNOT exist without its individual components just as a dish loses its taste when even one ingredient goes missing. But too much of one spice can also spoil the dish. Similarly, too much emphasis on individualism threatens societal bond and unity.
Both the individual and the society should and must behave like a pride of lions. While a lion wanders in the forest free and alone, all the lions unite themselves when they take an aim at their prey. In the same way, the society must strive to recognize individual needs and try not to subordinate individuals in servitude to the needs of his fellowmen, which may or may not be in his best interest and at the same time, come forward to protect it from the trials and tribulations of the dynamic universe.
Just as water, the nectar indispensable to human life, is formed by a bond between hydrogen and oxygen (both of which are equally important as individual gases), a more diverse yet unified confederacy can only be formed by amalgamating individual needs in right proportions with equal importance.
Different times will require you to act differently. So, accordingly, you have to decide if you want to be a voice (an individual leader), an echo (a blind follower) or a part of the chorus (work happily in a team).