Bangladesh despite all its shortcomings is still regarded worldwide as a land of unfathomable potential and extraordinary promise. Many a thing can claim credit as one of the reasons for such flattering appellations. A long list of things, from immense reserve of natural resources to the advantageous geographic position, can be drawn up to summarize them. But if we are to probe deeper, we will discover that the most important asset that Bangladesh has is its youth, comprising about a third of its population of 160 million.
They are the future torchbearers of the glory and pride of the nation that has been accumulated by earlier generations over centuries. But in order to assume that role, they must get acquainted with the national values and culture. Cultivation of such values is primarily the responsibility of the generation preceding the youngsters.
But are our youth being groomed to become ideal citizens? Are they aware of the challenges facing them in the way of upholding national honour? If we are to look at our present society and wonder whether our youths are moving in the right direction, we won't have a clear answer, because there are two opposing sides to the story.
Internationally, our youth are admired as brilliant and bright minds that are capable of matching the finesse of world class competition in academic, professional, and athletic arena. So numerous are the examples, that a listing of all such accomplishments within the last 15 years will not fit into this one page of newspaper. They are winning competitions, going abroad in world class institutions like Harvard, MIT, and Oxford, working as foreign professionals in TNCs and MNCs like Unilever, BAT, and Reckitt Benckiser.
Yet, for all these are worth, there is something that seems to be missing all along! We all know life is not fair: rising tide does not always lift all the boats; some just drown under the surge of tide because they are abandoned in helplessness. A significant portion of our youth, unfortunately, belongs to that category. We live an in age which is defined as the Age of Discontinuity.
In this age, a great chasm has opened in the fabric of our society; it manifests itself in a variety of ways: acute generation gap between parents and children, lack of respect for the elderly among the youth, taking a more individualistic and selfish stance towards life, and finally dependence on vices like porn, prostitutes, drugs, and rule-breaking for dealing with need for self-gratification and psychological issues like depression.
The older generations, with their natural preference for stability and tradition, demands conformity to such ideals for the sake of greater wellbeing of their younger family members and loved ones. But cultural shift that has led to the abovementioned chasm is driving the wedge deeper by the days, ruining the chance of any reconciliation and consensus in the wider society to deal with these issues.
Many things are responsible for this cultural shift, intrusion of foreign culture through media and entertainment, and lack of attention paid by parents and older family members are the primary ones. We live in a world of globalization, with all its baggage of individualism, commercialization of sexuality, hedonism, and consumerism. This stands in stark contrast to everything that our organically developed national culture upholds.
The thing which could have mitigated this was a caring & nurturing parental guidance. But the social dynamics is changing rapidly, in many families both the parents work.The mother is regarded as primarily responsible in this patriarchal culture. In a more enlightened society, we could expect that both parents would share the activities associated with raising kids with equal seriousness, thus helping the mother to bear an unfair load of burden in raising and monitoring children's behaviour.
This disconnection between parent and child, from the very early childhood, is bound to have its negative effects. Rich households can employ nannies and maids, but nothing can substitute the parents in the moral and intellectual development of a child. In the emotional, if not physical, absence of their guiding hands-the parents and elders-the youth moves into the dark realm of drugs, porn, and other vices with regrettable consequences.
One of the solutions to such problems could be to counter messages that contradict the values which shaped our society through ages via innovative ways in popular mediums. Parents and elderly needs to take a more active role in inculcating values that they hold dear, and wish to see being practiced by their loved ones from the younger generation.
(The writer is a student of IBA, University of Dhaka. Email:
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