#BlogFest #50DaysCountDownTo2015 – Day 02. Written by @bekexjj

 I had diarrhea for about two days, it wasn’t a pretty experience and this piece wasn’t written to educate you on the causes, ordeals and prevention of diarrhea. Googling the word would furnish you with more than enough info. But still I have chosen to use it as a reference point because it dealt me a very important practical lesson.

Diarrhea is practically the same thing as excreting feaces. They are both sides of the same coin. But what makes one acceptable and when absent it becomes a cause for concern while we sternly wade off the other is control. Take control out of the excretion process and a huge problem arise.

In lieu with what has been mentioned already this post isn’t about diarrhea. So forgive me meandering when I could have gone straight to the point as the crow flies. Moreover if you are one with a sight that is a bit pristine, you would have seen the theme lingering causally in the paragraph above; CONTROL.

Yes this is all about CONTROL.

With the vitriol that flies around daily across cyberspace and niajaspace a re-education of the significance of that simple yet extremely important word is paramount. Especially when one takes into cognizance the current political climate of Nigeria, it is vital we learn how to be logical beings so we would not tilt to one side of the spectrum and leave our moral compass unbalance.

I personally steer away from political debates because most times it is always about two teams, “FOR” or “AGAINST US.” Appreciate a singular act of the president and you are swiftly categorized a ‘Jonathanian’, criticize a tactical mishap from him and you are ‘An Unapologetic Buharist’. Ask why the Northern leaders are speaking less than they should about the Boko Haram menace and you are quickly labeled An Ethnic bigot whose judgment is clouded by his historical hatred for the North. Air your suspicions that Boko Haram has a political undertone and you are tagged A Boko Haramist. Be a lone voice on a thread online and you are brandished as the most popular plural person alive ‘HATERS.’ The list goes on and time and space would not permit me to spell them all out.

The crux of my plight is civility. The onus is on us to learn to criticize the government yet having enough sincerity in us to applaud them when significant progress is made in a particular area. A perfect display of maturity as most of us agree with is to entertain an opinion without necessarily agreeing.

Analyzing things objectively instead of taking the lazy route of attacking the personality of those involve while neglecting the issues at stake is vital. Posterity would not forgive us if we feed the next generation with half-truths breed out of stereotyping.

As the erudite Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie once said “the problem with stereotypes is not that they are untrue, it’s that they are incomplete.” Besides when a truth is incomplete, by definition it becomes a lie.

Our stereotyping based on ethnicity and religiosity has landed us significant progress as a nation and turned us into the most civilized and developed nation of the world. But if you accept the previous sentence with a dismissive sneer as you would do if someone tells you, you will experience a white Christmas in Nigeria; then you need to think deeply about your approach to topical issues.

Adjust your moral compass and sail towards having a more balanced opinion instead of jumping into the popular bandwagon. Don’t just spew words without first analyzing the issue at stake. When you do you will suffer from oral diarrhea. And like the implications of diarrhea, you grow weaker and weaker and death becomes inevitable. It would have been awesome if the death was limited to the cessation of existence of a mortal being. But this death transcend beyond that, it concerns an ideal, morals, the fine thread that sew the fabric of society as we now it.

Alas people, before you defecate exercise restraint, you just might be suffering from a case of oral diarrhea.

Written by – James Becks RobertTwitter handle: @bekexjjand blogs @ 4Unansweredprayers.wordpress.com

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