We often hear of people being described as coming from a “good family” in conversation. My curiosity led me to ask them what it was they considered a “good family,” and the summary of the responses I received over time is as follows.
It is thought to be a family where the person being referred to has had a grandfather, preferably from the paternal side, who was quite well-to-do financially and/or held a respectable job or position in a district town of Bangladesh or even perhaps Dhaka city, even as early as the 1940s or 50s.
It is considered a very good family if the ancestor held an important position in government service, or if the family had a number of people who earned fame as lawyers or judges or in the military or if the family has a decent country home in some district town or upazila, and a sizeable quantity of land and property, and if the members of the family were well-respected in the locality to which they belonged.
Generally, the term “good family” also implies that at least two preceding generations have had a college or university degree, and that the person’s father was also someone of moderate to high importance, and at least held a good government job, or has been a medium to large entrepreneur, or held a reasonably high position in some private or multi-national organisation.
It also implies that the person concerned grew up following a decent lifestyle and had a good education, which may even include having studied in a good private university or in a leading public university, and has a prestigious academic career which may even include having studied abroad.
A good family also implies one where there could be one or more persons who have become well-known or famous in the academic field or in sports or in arts and culture.
Often it translates to a family which has had members holding important political positions up to the 1980s, or earlier. People with family members in politics in the 50s and 60s or earlier in the British era are considered to be from very good families. It also means that no person within the immediate family was ever involved with any crime or scandal of any kind, and is a family generally known to uphold good cultural and social values and a reputation that has not been tainted by corruption or sexual misconduct.
It is expected that members of a good family are well-read and their reading has influenced their lives. It sometimes also implies that the members of the family are, at the least, moderately religious.
Normally, coming from a family that would have most of the above attributes would be considered a matter of good fortune. And frankly, even in the 80s and 90s, that did seem to be the case.
However, for about the last two decades, it can be observed that coming from such a family can actually have disadvantages and hindrances, where often success, especially of the financial kind, has come in heaps to people who have been unscrupulous and unethical, in many cases, through political corruption and siphoning of state funds, and the misappropriation of bank funds, among others.
I would point out that such persons from good families, as defined earlier, find it extremely difficult to give or receive bribes or indulge in any major form of corruption.
They definitely tend to avoid crimes or associating with people with questionable reputations. They avoid places which have shady reputations. They mostly find it difficult to connive and manipulate situations to attain gains in career or wealth, or to cheat, bluff or deprive people of financial gains or opportunities or credit that may be due to them.
Such people suffer from a high degree of self-respect and are mostly incapable of bending principles ingrained into them, or behaving like sycophants in an organisation.
Such people will often give up many opportunities for quick gains. Sometimes, they also deprive themselves of many good chances in life, even if those chances do not require being unethical, simply because they (the people from good families) feel that the activity could be “beneath them.”
Thus, they often would not wish to take job postings in far away inconvenient locations, nor would they like to endure much hassle or pain, nor undertake any venture that is very risky or not well-tried and tested.
As a result, such persons will reject jobs at a junior level or will not feel comfortable doing part-time odd jobs as a student or in the early part of their careers.
Such people also generally avoid challenging the status quo or the prevailing norms. Sadly, such people often retreat from taking bold steps in their romances for fear of social stigma. Such people often avoid taking large bank loans to attempt bold business ventures and even if they do, they do not default on loans for fear of reputation loss.
These so-called “good family” people don’t hold back on people’s due payments and also do not swindle other people’s funds. They consider themselves to be classy and so, unable to associate with many of those who hold positions of importance at present, who they consider to be of a lower class, these people gradually lead themselves towards a slow, imperceptible but certain, eventual social downgrading.
On the other hand, they are usually found to be more generous and spend charitably, considerably beyond what much wealthier people do in proportion. They also spend more than their means in maintaining their quality of life, with ample travel and other perks.
They will live well, dress well and often give an impression of having considerably more wealth and resources than what they really have, thereby saving less and often being unable to buy land or apartments because of exorbitant prices.
Thus, both in their professional as well as personal lives, such people often lose out on many aspects. They fail to climb the social and organisational ladders and are frequently found to be struggling very hard in business and almost undoubtedly avoid politics or badly flounder in it if they do participate.
The solution to this problem is two-pronged. One is societal and the other, personal.
As a nation, we need to reduce the ways by which people who resort to unscrupulous means can be the gainers. To that end, there has to be a comprehensive enhancement of a sense of ethics and moral values across the nation. And there should be stronger punitive measures against perpetrators of unethical acts.
On a personal level, people need to realise that they do not live in the times of their parents or grandparents and that they need to cope with the times as much as they can without compromising on core ideals and values. But they do need to be, perhaps, a little more strategic, goal oriented, a little more competitive and self-centric.
If indeed these can be done, then hopefully, people from good families today can continue to create at least a moderate legacy so that their following generations can also consider themselves to be of a good family, while the failure to adapt to the altered environment will sadly lead to inevitable extinction.
Nevertheless, it does need to be reiterated that at no point was it implied that all success is invariably attained through negative means. Indeed, there is a lot that has been attained through merit, hard work and smart and timely decision-making.
However, even those who have earned success in the present times by dint of positive attributes do also find their achievements often overshadowed by the gains of those who have resorted to unscrupulous means.
And that is why it is important to gradually reduce the latter to not only allow due credit to those originating from “good families,” but also those who have gained prosperity without compromising their ethics.
