I have received comments over what I
wrote two weeks ago – I write every 15 days – liking the idea of paying
attention to the negative social behavior gravely contributing to wasting
resources and destroying available facilities… also, those commenting tried to
detect aspects of such unacceptable attitudes, their degree and consequences… because
we cannot achieve any progress if we just kept calling for reform and change in
the official administrative side.
I really don’t know if the local
authorities in governorates, especially Cairo, Giza and Alexandria along with
ministries like those of endowments, electricity and Interior would respond to
what I detected of wasting water in the streets over the hands of buildings’ doormen
or Bawabeen[1],
or in mosques and fields… also wasting electricity in mosques, specifically in
the month of Ramadan … or they would say “nothing but words written in a
newspaper… and no one will pay attention to it”… that if they read what I
wrote.
It’s certain that professors of
Sociology, Social psychology and Pedagogy have paid attention to the widespread
negative practices in behavior of human societies… but I don’t know precisely
how much our professors in those disciplines here in Egypt are interested in
analyzing such phenomena… especially those phenomena related to the unawareness
of the gravity of such practices, like wasting resources and energy and
threatening roads’ safety and buildings’ foundations… also threatening the
safety of passers-by…
For example, there is an average of 20
to 30 apartments per building, and each apartment has at least one car if not
more… and then the doorman or Bawab can leave the water hose open for hours to
clean all those cars… and as a result, the streets’ asphalt will erode and sewerage
system will start to discharge forming small puddles of waste water where insects
can proliferate…etc… not to mention the heavy loads over the electricity grid
due to leaving hundreds of high-voltage air-conditioners running all night long
in Ramadan and during prayers’ time that may extend even after the prayer
itself to the lesson given after it or the time the mosque Imam spend with some
worshipers… that if not the mosque servant meant to keep those air-conditioners
running so that he can rest in the cool atmosphere.
I always seek the historical point of
view of all what I write or say; may be due to my specialization or my passion
in history… and so I imagine that history completes the efforts exerted by
Sociology and Social psychology which may pay attention to the factors and
motives driving communities to commit to a certain pattern of behavior,
including violence… on the other side, history doesn’t only search in the
historical era that witnessed that social behavior… but history itself is
discussed as a main factor affecting social behavior.
I believe that disruption in the
historical course is considered the most important factor lying behind what we
witness of severe negative practices controlling the Egyptian social behavior.
To be more clear, I say that Egypt has
never witnessed a continuation for any of its renaissance projects since the
time of Muhammed Ali Pasha experiment… as Muhammed Ali Pasha renaissance project
was hit by the treaty of the Convention of London in 1840… also, the
renaissance project of Ismail Pasha – no matter the disagreement over his
policies – was hit by debts and foreign interference… also, Nasser’s
renaissance project was hit by the defeat of 1967 where many reasons lie behind…
as international and regional conspiracy plans had a decisive role behind this
defeat… such disruption in the renaissance projects led to absence of social
experience accumulation and of deepening the values related to the style of
each of those renaissance experiments.
To make things clearer, one can say
that capitalism and liberalism have social values connected to them and that
were accumulated through time… such accumulation and stability of those values
in the Western societies for example have led to a comprehensive system that
does not allow one or any small group to break the established systems and values…
ahead of these values is respecting freedom of others and maintaining others’
rights in the streets, parks, buildings…etc… also, the continuation and
stability of democratic socialist regimes like in some countries of northern
Europe… or Marxist socialist regimes like in China and Cuba… have led to a
system of social values committed by everyone… where sever legal punishments or
strict social reactions await anyone who may violate such system… also values
of work, sharing and respecting public money advanced…etc.
In Egypt, we were deprived from
continuing our national or renaissance projects… consequently, our progress
couldn’t be represented by a continuous graphical line with ups and downs… or
even represented by connected circles, with each one leading to the next… in
fact, the graphical line we had was nothing but disrupted neighboring dwarfed
lines…
I here say I believe the damage that
hit our standards of discipline and social behavior of the Egyptians is
attributed to the absence of such accumulation and historical connectivity…
We shall continue tackling this case
later.
Translated into English by: Dalia Elnaggar
Translated into English by: Dalia Elnaggar
This article
was published in Al Ahram newspaper on March 27, 2014.
To see the
original article, go to:
#alahram #ahmed_elgammal #Egypt
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