Fanatical Activism

Today we are blessed with a society which is getting progressively more and more aware of various issues and its impacts. A generation of youth with an acute sense of social responsibility are out there being activists of various causes. Be it Democracy, Anti Corruption, Environment, anything, today we have champions for these causes spreading awareness on these issues. In many ways these youth are very much like the bards and ascetics of the past.
In our hallowed history several are the movements that were nurtured and carried forward by these wandering bards and activists, who forsaking the luxuries of a settled life lived a nomadic life with their sole aim being the spreading of their cause. It may be heroic and noble tales of some particular king or warrior or it may be the advocacy of a certain set of beliefs and values. Either way they were activists spreading the word of social awakening. While these bards and ascetics had to mostlt resort to the fabric of religion to portray their causes, today's activists are no longer shackled by such limitations.
However there is one thing that today's activists forget when advocating their causes : logic and reason. Of late I have been involved in several discussions with activists which have all invariably turned heated. Some how the Bush diktat of "Either you are with us, or against us" has been adopted as the war cry by these activists. These activists in their extreme exuberance forget that their causes get tarnished when they resort to such narrow minded attitudes.
Personally I am the farthest you can ever be from being a person of social conscience. I do not think I have any philanthropic tendencies, I also find selfless activism to be distasteful as far as I am concerned. I would be the last person you would see giving alms to a beggar. My life revolves around myself, my family, my friends in an expanding radius of diminishing value attributed. Frankly it is because I can not afford to do anything else. How can I fend for the well being of some distant tribals in some distant village or some endangered forest or the freedom of some unjustly punished person when my own immediate environs is far from secure? Yes, it is a an extremely conceited world view but also one reason I genuinely admire activists who throw away shackles of career or any routine luxuries for the advocacy of their beliefs. In fact  I consider myself to be the perfect layman, the sort of person these activists ought to convince for their advocacy to be a success.
But that is precisely where these new generation activists fail. Recently I had been part of a discussion on the Jaitapur Nuclear Park controversy. An esteemed activist, who was my junior in college started the discussion on the evils of nuclear power. Rightly so I concurred with him on the perils of nuclear power but also said about how we dont have any alternative.  I pointed out to him that of the energy sources in the world 65% of power is derived from thermal sources (coal and oil), 20% from nuclear power and only around 15% from renewable power of which a lion's share is provided by hydroelectric power and less than 0.1% by solar power and wind power. The activist friend of mine was of the opinion that development ought to be sacrificed for the sake of cleaner environment. There the contention ensued which resulted in him calling me a troll for "refusing to understand" the dangers of nuclear power and me ultimately cutting off contacts with him for the douchebaggery.
Then there was the other environmental activist friend who considered loss of human lives an acceptable price to pay for environmental protection. He did realize in time that fanatism in his advocacy had caused his aims which are extremely philanthropic in nature to be advocated as extremely misanthropic.
The point however remains, what merit is there in the advocacy that we should stop development? How much credence can we give to such statements made by people who are unaware of the part electric power plays in their daily lives? I mean how much longer would it take for the 0.1% to supplant the 20%? Meanwhile these activists want to condemn the very people whose well being they are advocating to arrested development. Dont they realize that healthcare, communication, transportation - all these facilities that are every day improving the lives of thousands of unprivileged are all through power? Will these activists dare to go for a month without any dependancy on electric power -  and that includes not using any product made by electricity too. I wont call them arm chair activists, because they do go out there and preach, but do these urban activists really realize what rustic hardships really mean?
Even in the latest Jan Lokpal issue, fanatic supporters of the Lokpal bill consider any person expressing a difference of opinion as a supporter and promoter of the systemic corruption. Thousands of people have mobilized all over India to support the Jan Lokpal bill, unfortunately not even 0.1% of them might have really understood its implications. Those of us who challenge its terms and question its efficiency are labelled "unpatriotic". Meh. Screw them! After all it is because they do not have reason and logic to back up their claims that they are getting caustic!
Basically I have only one thing to tell to my activist friends - learn from the bards and ascetics. Those activists from the past, who have been instrumental in such social changes as the propagation of Ashoka's diktats, the social awakenings brought upon through Buddhism, Jainism, Hinduism, Christianity and Islam achieved their causes not by antagonizing the lay persons through fanatic preaching but by engaging them with logic and reason. I hope that my activist friends, at least those who are in it as a life's work and not just a fashion fad, would consider this advice strongly.

If not you would end up causing the greatest ever harm to the cause you are propagating.