The Shamelessness of Mediocrity

While listening to a qawwali by Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan, one feels that contemporary music on radio or TV
these days is mediocre in comparison. Same is true when one compares it with giants likes Iqbal Bano,
Farida Khanum, Pathanay Khan, and others of previous generations. Sports being no different where
Jahangir and Jansher once ruled the world of squash, or the institutions of PIA or Punjab University were
ranked high in their respective sectors. Pointing to his rendering of Amir Khusro’s poetry, Farid Ayaz, a
surviving old school qawwal articulates this phenomena as, “not that those who can render it
(vocational) exist anymore but I am afraid that those who can even understand it (academic/intellectual)
don’t exist anymore”.

This article concludes my understanding of societal degeneration in Pakistan due to multiple factors
including the crass inequality and vulnerability of working classes which precludes social mobility
through hard work; the rat race among the privileged classes which normalizes unethical behavior; and
lastly the predominant culture of mediocrity (bhairchaal) which is an antithesis of excellence and
innovation.

To understand this culture of mediocrity, I assess higher education as a case for the production of the
privileged classes. The issue pertaining to social and family norms needs little discussion as it was aptly
portrayed in Amir Khan’s “3 Idiots”, whereby the choice of education and career is seldom one’s own,
leading to a lack of drive with the primary interest of getting a piece of paper – the degree. More
important though is state’s apathy towards provision of academic and career counseling at school,
college and even university levels.

The point being that neither infrastructure of schools nor attendance of students can inspire them to
become critical thinkers driven towards doing something new and different. Instead, the software (non-
quantifiable subjective elements): the quality and dedication of teachers, pedagogy, curriculum and the
cultural environment are the real differentiating factors. To this effect, one can understand the current
situation of societal stagnancy through three examples: one, the decline of sports as once the inter-
collegiate cricket finals boasted one of the biggest events of the city of Lahore with the likes of Wasim
Akram playing for Islamia College Civil Lines; two, the decline of critical thinking, reasoning and
discussion as the debates at Islamia College Railway Road could extended the whole day till after
midnight; three, the decline of citizenship as students aspiring for student union president at
Government College Rawalpindi would need to speak extempore in front of the whole student body on
a topic picked from a jar. Thus, one can’t just blame the individual (student) who is no longer provided
the opportunity, rigor or self-confidence by the institutional landscape. This is exactly what Farid Ayaz
stated by giving credit to his elders for giving him rigorous musical and intellectual training that is no
longer available.

Still, the above discussion does not completely explain the lack of “spirit” to change, leading to a
perpetual cycle of mediocrity breeding mediocrity. For that, our very conception of education needs
assessment so that it’s rooted and relevant to be able to critically engage with our reality. Eg., the
concentration on language (English/Urdu) at the expense of comprehension precludes critical thinking;
complete lack of experiential learning and a disconnect between vocation and academic leads to both
the undermining of vocational, and knowledge generation without any relation to ground realities; and
lastly the treatment of students as children (rather than adults) throws out the development of
responsibility in them because rights and responsibilities are part of the same coin. This explains why
the vast majority of universities that offer degree courses in Environmental Sciences don’t even have
waste management and waste segregation at source, or those with Mass Communications/Journalism
programs don’t have student newspapers.

Thus, it is no wonder that the civil bureaucracy stopped thinking and executing governance reforms long
ago, instead limiting itself to pushing files while borrowing ideas from the IFIs or donor agencies. It is
also no surprise that the new government’s slogan of “Naya” (new) excludes discussion on the
overarching strategic vision and calculus of the security state which has kept us begging and insecure for
four decades while perpetuating political mediocrity by quelling social movements that critique this
disastrous direction.

Still we incessantly quote the rise of China while failing to acknowledge or comprehend the
transformation of strategic vision, and innovative spirit injected into its body politics by Deng Xiaoping in
the 1970s and its rigorous institutionalization in the 1980s.

As Malek Bennabi states, “genius is but the eruption of the obscure effort ascending across the entire
social spectrum of a society for spouting at its summit”, we fail not because of a lack of individual
brilliance but because our general ecosystem built on the shamelessness of mediocrity is heavily stacked
against producing change.