Overenthusiasm and inaction are both harmful in crisis times.

Since childhood, humans usually learn about the standard of living from their surrounding environment, from parents to classmates to birds and animals. As they grow up, many children spontaneously learn about while some are taught the dos and don’ts—both social norms and laws of the land. In this process, the key influencers are the parents and other seniors in the family and neighbourhood, school teachers, civil society leaders, religious leaders, police personnel, and other regulators under the State machinery.

These influencers become important in a community or society or country by acquiring knowledge from books, religious scriptures and social norms, and also by using various marketing tactics.

Despite knowing the basics, whether the children will adhere to the norms and rules depends on the ethical values of the family or the society. On the other hand, the acceptance levels of acts and thoughts with regard to the norms and rules change over time. Although this change is evident, a section of the population—mostly the younger generation who are facing the situation for the first time—may not accept it. But the seniors, who have experienced a transition period, will accept the reality and be aware of the next generation of the future.

These occurrences and consequences will be normal, predictable and positive only when a society largely upholds the spirit of knowledge, discipline, unity, self realization, ethics, tolerance and peace. While the academically educated and self-educated people of the world become aware of these good deeds and the benefits of being peaceful and rational through their parents, society and the State as they grow up, a majority part of the global population remains dishonest, intolerant, disorderly and unsocial where the standard norms and values are weak or unclear. If this lack of social or ethical standards and a culture of negligence towards rectifying the shortcomings continue for a long time, it leads to normlessness, deviance, and social instability among individuals and groups.

The recent movement by public service job seekers against quota for the freedom fighters and women gaining moral, emotional and physical support of the opposition bloc and their sympathizers is an ominous sign for Bangladesh: it shows how the influencers have spread hatred and mistrust towards the judiciary and the executive body in the past. While the demands are irrational, the approach of placing the demands is also derogatory towards the freedom fighters and the women. Moreover, the students changed their demands several times and provoked the ruling party and the police many times in two weeks with inflammatory speeches and by testing the nerves of the law enforcers.

Keeping mum on the students’ arrogance and distasteful language, their sympathizers have often referred to the students as small kids whereas most of the coordinators are directly linked to an opposition political party which campaigns against the Awami League leadership and Chhatra League using abusive words and says they will welcome anyone joining them to oust the government.

And when the students refused to call off the movement even after the apex court met their demands, the opposition bloc urged them to oust the government and told their party members to take to streets, resulting in massive bloodshed for several days. They made ruling party members and the police their prime targets, and killed some of them brutally by organizing mobs; for example, a police officer of the PM’s protocol wing was hung from an overbridge after ensuring his death in torture on the streets of Jatrabari, a Gazipur Jubo League leader’s body was hung from a tree while 15 Chhatra League members were thrown off a six-storey building after cutting their tendons.

All these happened after the death of a Rangpur student named Abu Sayed who was seen asking the police to shoot him during fierce clashes on July 16 and the Chhatra League beat up students and movement supporters on Dhaka University campus the previous day.

Apart from killings and torture, the way the students and their sympathizers rampaged on the streets and burned public property after vandalism and looting can never be justified.

So, why would civil society, some mainstream media outlets and the opposition bloc call them innocent students unless they’re closely linked to a conspiracy to unseat the government? Can an innocent, childish student kill someone this way?  Yes, they can. They have heard about similar killings by the armed cadres of a certain political party to instil terror in the people and seen that the State has failed to ensure tough punishment in those incidents. It should be noted that no military or democratic government has been able to complete trials or execute verdicts in the cases of campus murders or deaths of law enforcers.

These civil society leaders are advocates of human rights and democracy, but they’re shamelessly very selective. They usually speak against any brutality but have kept mum in the case of the student movement since it was directed against the incumbent government.

Let’s do some soul-searching.

It’s undeniable that we live in a society with significant differences in opinions and hostility among major political groups, civil society platforms, media outlets, state-owned entities and private investors, and the so-called neutral celebrities and influencers, and thus, impacting the lives of millions of people in the blink of an eye. These actors are largely non-violent but are corrupt and they harbour nepotism and irregularities in everyday life.

We should also admit that enmity and brutality are a normal issue among family members, neighbours and people from a nearby area in rural settings; there have been many instances of enmity and bloodshed among two landlords or elite families for generations, for which the ordinary people suffer the most.

As a nation, we’re divided. However, despite such hostility and limited space for democracy and human rights, Bangladesh is advancing as a country on various fronts, including high economic growth and rising exports with long-term prospects, lucrative white-collar jobs inside the country, a booming media industry, progress in human index, and the use of internet and digital devices.

It implies that the new generation, learning from their seniors, is becoming more disintegrated from a unified family system, and is becoming more selfish, rude and shameless. It’s clear that in near future we’ll witness miserable occurrences since the government will take legal and political measures as a consequence of the mayhem.