Column | Can we import civic sense?

Dear reader, we are already in October! October! How did we get here? When did this happen? Were we informed? Why does this keep happening?I have no idea. All I know is that once again, we find ourselves hurtling towards the end of yet another calendar year. The other day, I was speaking to a young software engineer. In the course of breaking the ice, we decided to swap life stories. “Okay, Sidin,” he said. “Tell me about your work history. What kind of things have you done in life?”“I have been working for exactly 25 years,” I told him. “I started my first job way back in 2001.”He giggled. What happened, I asked him.“Nothing, nothing. I just realised that you started working three years before I was born.”“Ha ha ha ha,” I said, making a mental note to send this enterprising boy a box of kaju katli, laced with cyanide or arsenic or analogue paneer or some such, for Diwali.“Sorry, sorry. No need to get upset, uncle,” he said in jest.Cyanide, arsenic and anologue paneer, I noted to myself. No point in taking any chances with such reprobates.A few days later, I was recounting this chicanery to a friend, when he got quite upset. “Uncle, it seems!” he said. “You know what the problem is with kids these days, Sidin? They have zero civic sense. Absolutely none. Zero.”Readers, shall I make one confession? Just between you and me? I think Indians are making far too much of a fuss about civic sense. These days, you simply cannot browse the Internet, check social media, or even read a newspaper without someone, somewhere, complaining about our national lack of civic sense.And you know what? I am fed up. Not because these complaints are unfounded. No. I dislike a driver propelling their car up the wrong side of the road as much as any of you. And I too cringe in embarrassment when I see fellow citizens chucking garbage out of their car windows. Or cutting the line at airports. Or defacing public property. Or pilfering things such as toiletries, blankets or bogeys from a train.Make no mistake. These are all horrible things. And they must be condemned. But, my problem is with the constant moaning about “civic sense”.Let me explain. Look at the average superhit blockbuster film these days. The story usually involves a tremendously violent young man massacring people in wanton fashion, briefly pausing to sing one or two duets, before resuming the pillaging and murdering and beheading. But, of course, he is doing this for a good cause and therefore his rampages are to be forgiven. Not only that, we are then subject to endless YouTube Shorts and Instagram Reels valorising the noble violence of our protagonist.Let us look at the average advertisement on TV these days. Perhaps, it will be a campaign for a new ugly, muscular Sport Utility Vehicle. This is my SUV, some ugly muscular fellow will say. I will use it to drive all over unspoilt nature. I will use it to play music loudly. I will speed all over this highway. Come, join me in driving an idiotic car like an idiot.Or look at the average news programme on TV. A screeching anchor will encourage a smorgasbord of semi-sentient idiots to all scream at each other about some stupid trifle that has no material bearing on the welfare of a country that currently ranks 130th in the world when it comes to per-capita income. Often, a Mughal is involved in these absolute shenanigans. And of course, don’t forget that the idiots all treat each other with animosity that is a hair’s breadth short of homicide.Readers, my point is this. If you subject the citizens of a nation to non-stop nonsense, morning to evening, in every conceivable setting, with no recourse to the merest experience of politeness, decency, or sociability, why in the world are you suddenly expecting civic sense? Where will it come from?Maybe it can come from China. Can you import civic sense? Do you need a licence?Anyway, I think we need a word to refer to this misplaced expectation of civic sense in a world where people are surrounded by unbearable idiots. And that word is: boorgeoisie.Example sentence: “The boorgeoisie held an emergency meeting in the colony WhatsApp group to discuss the ‘shocking decline in basic decency among today’s youth’, immediately after which three members got into a vicious argument about parking spaces that culminated in one uncle name-calling another uncle’s wife.”Have you been complaining about civic sense recently? What is wrong with you? I will hit you with my SUV.The writer helps early stage companies communicate better. He blogs at www.whatay.com.