Thursday, January 31, 2008
Chp 162. Peer Pressure
Dark was the sky and cold was the night,
the bustle of Aizawl, now reduced to null.
There in the darkness at its deepest height,
screams out a man, breaking the silent lull.
Sanga was just 18, a bright lad from yore,
Smart and educated, an aspiring gold-mine.
His pa was an officer, his ma a pedagogue,
Together they nurtured him, nice and fine.
Today he’s a destitute, high on dope,
Struggling for a fix, on anything that he finds.
Ma and pa were anguished, they lost all hope,
They blamed themselves, guilt filled their minds.
How could this happen? What did they miss?
He felt so normal, just like any other kid.
And then they saw it, the pattern and gist.
One friend was in jail, the other had OD’d.
They never imagined, he could be influenced,
Oh how wrong you are, the parents of Mizoram.
Things are different now, things have changed,
There’s no more zawlbuk, there’s no more farm.
The youth of today, wallow in empty hunger,
He’ll do anything his friends do, be it fag or beer.
Moving from there, to other substances stronger,
A hunger for acceptance – such is peer pressure.
Tluangi was only 17 - fair, attractive and tender,
She was a popular girl, in her esteemed school.
Her folks are divorced; she lives with her mother,
All the girls envied her, and all the guys drooled.
But everything changed, the day her picture appeared,
On the local newspaper, for everyone to see.
She was caught one sultry night, all oiled up and geared,
Ready to sell her body, at the back of a taxi.
The mob called her whore, all her respect were gone,
They wanted to burn her, their hatred enhanced.
Who would have thought, she only did it for a phone?
For she didn’t want to be, a girl with no balance.
Such is the peer pressure, our youth of today face,
Being an outcast from a group, is not an option.
They will do anything, to remain in this twisted race,
Be it drugs or theft, even murder or prostitution.
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16 comments:
Who would have thought, she only did it for a phone? For she didn’t want to be, a girl with no balance. Really???
Sad, sad, sad. but who's to blame here?
"Ready to sell her body,
at the back of a taxi."
Nice rhyme there...
You sir are a genius...hehehe
but the big questions is, what can we do about it?
@ soldier and 3d:
Good question there. Who's to blame? It's the society's fault of course, but then, blaming the society is not a very constructive approach. I think we should sweep that aside and try to deal with each individual problem. I honestly feel that we are advancing extremely fast, too fast for our small mentality to handle. Everybody wants to have this and that if their friends or neighbors have it. And this is natural in every society, but the difference between our society and other more advanced societies is that, we simply cannot afford all that. Yet we strive hard to have it. The day we stop competing with others, is the day peer pressure will reduce.
And I also feel Parents shouldn't treat their kids like how their parents treated them. Each generation is different and if we conduct a behavioral analysis on the children of this generation, you will observe a completely different slope at the learning curve.
wow.. pu kim, it's so interesting.. keep it up.. love to read it..
And so.... the blame game continues.!!! Theres no end to it, its not just our Mizoram, jesse!As 3d said What can we do about it? that is the Question, and dont blame parents or society or peer pressure everytime. If that was true, all of us would have been like that!
Great rhyme and great poem. Psychedelic rhythm to you mate! How did you leave those blank spaces between stanzas? I poetry too, but my blog is private ;o) Whenever I tried leaving those spaces, the alignment goes back to normal after publishing. Maybe we can swap some poetries too. Plz assist me on the alignment.
I think peer pressure is something you'd find even way back in pre-Christian Mizoram... the only difference is back then wasn't much to crave for like today's 30k cellphones. And the kids then didn't have any access to narcotic drugs.
I guess everyone has to take the blame. But in the end its the person who makes the choice. Not the society.
Hola Sandman, it's nice to see a new post here. I have some awards for u! :)
http://mariuca.blogspot.com/2008/02/beautiful-awards-for-mariucas-friends.html
God, it is so scary. Real but shaking. Peer pressures are huge, but I wish people were stronger, so they could stick to their judgement of right and wrong
dude, i can't believe this.Druglords prey on N-E girls to act as peddlers
http://mailtoday.in/epapermain.aspx?queryed=9&querypage=4&boxid=275671144&parentid=2129&eddate=01/28/08
@ Pu Puia: Thank you thank you :) Glad you like it. Be back for more :)
@ Anonymous: It would have helped had you given me the link to your blog too :) I use html command " " to leave that space after each line, because in blogger, the publishing is WYSIWYG so it is not possible to leave those spaces by pressing space-bar or tab key.
@ Marzie: Love the awards!!!! Thank you so much dear Marzie. I will be making my award section soon, where I will display all the lovely awards you peeps have given me.
@ Soldier: Yes dude, I have read about it. Disgusting. I might even write something about it to take out my frustration on that sicko Vinod.
@ Phoenix: The people should be strong of course, but where will that strength come from? I don't think it is an inborn quality, so society has a role to play in nurturing that strength.
@ Last Templar & Tetea:
I don't blame the society. But I believe peer pressure is still the main culprit here. Most of these kids barely into adolescence, will do anything to be in "the gang". You know how the society is in Mizoram right? Where everybody talks about this guy and that girl. In the midst of all these, most of the youth wants to be on the "cool" side. They don't want to be mocked as losers or outcasts. Comon, seriously tell me, when you were a kid (or travelling on a train between kolkata and chennai, lolz) have you not done at least ONE stupid thing because your friends were doing it?
Tetea, right with you on your comment. Those days when our parents were kids, they didn't have much luxury to compete with, except maybe who has the most "lawis" or "sakhi lu" etc. But now, all the kids want to have this cell phone, or that lap-top. Parents sometimes don't understand the whims of their kids and they either succumb to their wishes or deny them such luxury.
From there, things can turn ugly. If the kid gets what he want, he will eventually want more, until his parents cannot afford it. If he doesn't get it, while all his friends have it, then he will do something drastic to get that.
Answering to 3d's question, I think we must change from the basic, such that kids have no place for such a competition on who have the best. Schools should be very strict to see that their students don't possess any such things. I feel they should even ban the students from coming to school with bikes. You look around in Aizawl, and you will see it immediately. Guys and girls will make fun of anybody not wearing the latest fashion, or a shoe that is out of fashion 1 year ago. Sure you and I can handle that and we don't care. But will that be the same way a teenager will handle it?
I am not stereotyping here, but our Mizo culture is much more liberal compared to other societies in India. School children in Mizoram are already doing what other people in other society considers to be "adult stuff", like romancing (nula riming), ciggarettes, booze and even experimenting with drugs. Such a situation makes everything more volatile.
Great poem here..sad but this is the present situation, isn't it. I dare not think of our future unless we wake up NOW
please do write something about this. get him real good.
here's some pic from Iron Maiden mumbai concert.
http://s135.photobucket.com/albums/q126/jamespudaite/
This is great! We live in a world of shallow values; those values are sadly sought after.
Living in America, I am extremely disappointed in how our media fuels the problem. Britney Spears is more important than starving children!
I don't have children (I'm trying to get some women pregnant...hahaha) but if I did, I wouldn't allow them to watch the garbage on TV. Then again, you don't want them to be ignorant of the real world.
Both society and greed work together, setting the mark for cheapened morals. I'm so glad I made it through my youth and maintained my values.
@ almost: please, do the honors of waking up everybody :-)
@ soldier: I just wrote out my feelings about that issue you mentioned. Hope you read it.
@ Bobby: Bobbyyyyy :) Nice of you to visit. Speaking of America (as in, a different cultural perspective, per se), the way we bring up our children is very different from there and here in India. Likewise, the stage at which a child becomes independent is different compared to America and here in India. Overall, I believe everybody needs support and guidance when dealing with peer pressure especially at such an early stage.
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