In Bangladesh, individual rights, rule of law, individualism and equality are extremely esoteric concepts. As many people of the old continent still do, Bangladeshis believe in societal values and norms, but place much less importance on inalienable rights that should actually be enshrined into law.
Islamists preach equality (but neither believe it nor practice it). Equality means equality of genders too, not simply a fokir being able to stand next to a borolok in prayer or giving Fitra.
Bengali culture is classist as it is and Bangladeshi capitalist exploitation widened wealth disparity that exacerbated the problem. Family lineage, pedigree, political association, and other such structures have ensured “unequal” dispensation of the law.
Who is in power on any given day determines who gets treated unfairly and who with respect but the only guarantee is the people in the lower rung of society always get treated unfairly or don’t have the same opportunities.
There is no steady, permanent, indestructible ethos of equal, individual rights and freedoms that drive Bangladeshis to succeed without being unfairly held back.
Without these inalienable guarantees, laws are created by a small handful of elites for personal gain, which ultimately leads to a lack of respect for the rule of law, chaos, exploitation, weak institutions, and sometimes destruction.
This is not a problem unique to Bangladeshis. Many other groups, large and small, suffer the same. It is why so many old world groups flock to the West. With large volumes of migration to the West, discontent towards these incoming groups have also started to appear among the locals, because a large number of migrants bring with them these habits of a lack of respect and understanding of the rule of law.
Migrants cannot be viewed with respect and are seen as parasites who come to exploit resources of the country they migrate to.
Laws are created by a small handful of elites for personal gain, which ultimately leads to a lack of respect for the rule of law
The wars that these migrants are fleeing are a direct result of the failure of our old world countries to organize ourselves to ensure the absolute and inalienable rights and freedoms of individuals at home. The failure to hold everyone at every level to account without discrimination and favouritism is what leads to the destruction of our civilizations. Every life does not have the same value because the laws don’t guarantee it and people don’t believe it to be true.
The old world countries typically fail to guarantee equal rights and access to resources for a driven individual to succeed. In some instances, a socialist state distributes resources for free which actually stifles free enterprise, but this is usually a cover by the ruling class to appease the public in order to stay in power. These countries typically do not ensure individual rights and freedoms.
Problems exist structurally in the West too, but don’t bring your whataboutism here. The basic disparities in the system of laws between a Western country and Bangladesh is too wide for there to be any legitimate argument.
There is absolutely nothing special about Bangladesh that time-tested guarantees of individual freedoms that work in developed nations, won’t work if enshrined into law and practised by all institutions and individuals.
Bangladesh isn’t a small Eastern European or Latin American country where the failure to rebuild the system will go unnoticed. Bengalis are the third largest ethnic group in the world. What happens at home will have repercussions for generations.
Enshrining inalienable rights and freedoms will shape the laws of the land and bring about drastic improvements in the Bangladeshi civilization that will reverberate for generations.
Mir Shafi is a Bangladeshi-American with a background in geopolitics and international relations. He is a former policy researcher at a think-tank, focusing on education, healthcare, and law enforcement. Having lived and worked in Bangladesh for several years, he closely observes and researches the country's developments.
