Your Excellency the Governor of Sindh and Patron of Habib University, our inspirational and honorable commencement Speaker, Dr. Azra Raza, Chancellor Rafiq Habib, members of the Board of Governors of Habib University, members of Board of Directors of Habib University Foundation, vice president academic affairs Chris Taylor and esteemed members of the Faculty of Habib University, Parents, Guests and of course Habib University Trailblazers & Class of 2020 welcome to the first ever Habib University online convocation!
Trailblazers of 2020 is the third graduating batch from Habib University. As many of you know, we gave our first four classes specific names of cofounders, pioneers, trailblazers and pathfinders, in acknowledgement of their imagination and courage to join a new institution.
With that, we were always expecting some attention-seeking middle child antics from our trailblazers, but never thought that the universe would fashion such a global upheaval to make your commencement this extraordinary and memorable, congratulations class of 2020, you have successfully attained the utmost attention of the entire university.
But seriously, I want to express my admiration and gratitude for you and especially your families. You rose to this unprecedented challenge of being disrupted at the most crucial time of your academic journey, during your last semester, and for many of you it wouldn’t have been possible without the love & support of your parents and your families. Well done you’ve made us proud!
While we are celebrating your accomplishment, I would request to remember those who have lost their lives to this still unfolding and menacing pandemic. During the last few months we at Habib University have also lost two of our stalwarts, Ali Suleman Habib, one of the founding members of the Board of Governors and a driving force in the success of our University and Dr. Asif Aslam Farrukhi, a founding faculty member, a champion unlike any of regional languages and literature in the country, with profound knowledge of the world, and a rarely seen devotion to his students. On behalf of Habib university, I am honored to acknowledge and salute the contributions of these two wonderful departed souls and offer our deep condolences to their families.
Dear Trailblazers, on your special day I will invite you to reflect on three historic deeply connected unraveling phenomena being witnessed in the past 6 months.
1. Being “developed” or not is a false binary
Coronavirus has exposed the utter wrongheaded-ness of the entire story of the progress/development. While many have been pointing the environmental catastrophe and destruction of the natural world which is directly attributed to the existing development paradigm, those voices are silenced by the cacophony of citing the “great merits” of modern material development and the so-called “systems” which are created as a result….well turns out it was largely a hoax… as we watch in shock the richest and the most resourceful countries rolling over and have millions as sick and dying in their midst, no coherent policy, overwhelmed systems with disadvantaged and poor suffering disproportionately, and their politicians and public being distracted in mind-numbingly strange debates about masks vs freedom…in contrast places like Senegal or Vietnam ensuring basic and adequate protections for all their citizens…this pandemic crystallized the calculus of either developing a society & economy geared towards creating and hyping the making of a 1000 billionaires at the expense of 500 million people or maintaining some modicum of a social contract with your citizens…you cannot have both!
Another dimension of these toxic realms of “progress” that has been laid bare are claims of the great “scientific advancements”…if you read the guidelines handed out during the 1918 pandemic it had two “primitive” points…wear masks & maintain your distance…so in 102 years that’s the net worth of trillions being invested in the so-called “advancement”
this is an outcome of viewing knowledge just as a vehicle of immediate material pay-off, when mega pharmaceutical corporations are only seeing value in life style therapies or expensive clinical drugs…the idea of public health is not good “capitalism” values of Jonas Salk the inventor of polio vaccine are bad for business..,..who famously declined to patent his vaccine, …by saying…”patent..there is NO patent..could you patent the Sun!”….building your insights about what has transpired in the realm of “development” in the past 5 months, will inspire you to imagine a different world.
2. Insanity of “information”
Linked to the mindlessness of “progress” is one of its ubiquitous outcomes…information technology and near insane proliferation of social media, during this pandemic the social media has shown a comically nightmarish dimension of misinformation, conspiracies, cynicism, willful ignorance and a general death of common sense. It’s been wielded cynically for politicizing of public health challenges as PR calculations…where truth or facts would be determined by volume of your outreach matter how much Columbia university, can advocate to its 380 thousand followers on twitter, not using hydroxychloroquine randomly, because it can be fatal, based on clinical data, it will be immediately mocked and undermined by someone and their 83 million followers…this is not a fair fight…and this is just one example in from a litany of similar horror stories.
Now Shareholders & CEO’s of many of these social media giants have no intention of introducing any sensible measures to prevent the dreadful fallout from such manipulations…
in spite of this, there’s still strong reason to remain optimistic about a constructive potential of these forces…but it would require leaders like our trailblazers…you are far better equipped to navigate these endless labyrinth of the virtual worlds…most from my generation would be largely clueless, until just few weeks ago thought that Tiktok was some kind of chunky candy…
3. Unmasking of the brutal racism.
linked to the above two, the positive potential of social media, made it possible for us to view the vivid images of shocking injustice and outright tyranny stemming from putrid racism, which is among the foundational values of the contemporary world, others being envy, violence, cutthroat competition and exploitation. Nevertheless, the reaction to these incidents has been inspiring and powerful and in the process architects and icons of modern history are being exposed as genocidal monsters that they truly were. In this regard, Habib University Education has done something unique for you. We asked ourselves one key question while crafting our intellectual fabric; How can a society or culture survive when they do not have an independent view of their own literature, their own art, of their own thoughts, of their own social structures, of their own view of reality and the universe, from the point of view their own civilization. While this remains a daunting work in progress, Habib University is indebted to the efforts of its founding faculty members to advance this mission of our institution rapidly in the short span of six years. We see that the beauty of knowing understanding yourselves with your own lens will never result in being bitter and vengeful, instead you’re wise and insightful. This wisdom and insight are crucial to meet the challenges which I have highlighted. These challenges emanate from the very shape of the world that has been rammed down history’s throat over the last 400 years.
Habib University Trailblazers my parting advice is to always reflect on what you were invited to learn at Habib…
Cure your Cynicism with passion & ikhlas
Challenge the Ugliness & destruction with grace & beauty
Address Laziness, indifference & incompetence with Ahsan, rigor & excellence
And tackle Exploitation & avarice with Ahsaan & goodness & service
Class of 2020 the future is yours to shape with this wisdom and insight of Yohsin, we are always going to be your cheerleaders in your journey, congratulations!
Modern industrial civilization has developed within a certain system of convenient myths. The driving force of modern industrial civilization has been individual material gain, which is accepted as legitimate, even praiseworthy, on the grounds that private vices yield public benefits in the classic formulation.
Now, it’s long been understood very well that a society that is based on this principle will destroy itself in time. It can only persist with whatever suffering and injustice it entails as long as it’s possible to pretend that the destructive forces that humans create are limited: that the world is an infinite resource, and that the world is an infinite garbage-can. At this stage of history, either one of two things is possible: either the general population will take control of its own destiny and will concern itself with community-interests, guided by values of solidarity and sympathy and concern for others; or, alternatively, there will be no destiny for anyone to control.
Class of 2020 the future is yours to shape with this wisdom and insight , we are always going to be your cheerleaders, congratulations
Cynicism with passion & ikhlas
Ugliness & destruction with grace & beauty
Laziness, indifference & incompetence with Ahsan, rigor & excellence
Exploitation & avarice with Ahsaan & goodness & service
contemporary society is an aggregation of self-interested individuals necessarily bound to one another neither by their shared civic commitments nor their moral rectitude, but, paradoxically, by the tenuous bonds of envy, competition and exploitation
Modern industrial civilization has developed within a certain system of convenient myths. The driving force of modern industrial civilization has been individual material gain, which is accepted as legitimate, even praiseworthy, on the grounds that private vices yield public benefits in the classic formulation.
Now, it’s long been understood very well that a society that is based on this principle will destroy itself in time. It can only persist with whatever suffering and injustice it entails as long as it’s possible to pretend that the destructive forces that humans create are limited: that the world is an infinite resource, and that the world is an infinite garbage-can. At this stage of history, either one of two things is possible: either the general population will take control of its own destiny and will concern itself with community-interests, guided by values of solidarity and sympathy and concern for others; or, alternatively, there will be no destiny for anyone to control.
As long as some specialized class is in a position of authority, it is going to set policy in the special interests that it serves. But the conditions of survival, let alone justice, require rational social planning in the interests of the community as a whole and, by now, that means the global community. The question is whether privileged elites should dominate mass-communication, and should use this power as they tell us they must, namely, to impose necessary illusions, manipulate and deceive the stupid majority, and remove them from the public arena. The question, in brief, is whether democracy and freedom are values to be preserved or threats to be avoided. In this possibly terminal phase of human existence, democracy and freedom are more than values to be treasured, they may well be essential to survival.
