In need of psychotherapy

Bangladeshis have always been known for their extreme emotions. Our people have marched to rebel against the US going to war with Iraq and also revolted when Humayon Ahmed decided to hang his imaginary Television Serial character Baker Bhai. We have made a fuss over the hanging of Ershad Sikdar, (reminder: he was accused in 50 cases including 22 murder cases and was known to be a top criminal of Khulna) his death received more publicity than the deaths of his murder victims.

Being emotional we have celebrated the only time the Bangladesh cricket team won against Pakistan, a celebration which came close to the joviality of 1971 when the people of East Pakistan defeated West Pakistan and created Bangladesh. Being emotional, we have beaten to death the Imam of an Ahmaddiya mosque in front of his ten-year-old daughter, and being emotional, we have gathered singing Amar Bhai er Rokte Rangano Ekushe February in the early mornings of every 21st February since 1952.

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Being emotional, we have condemned the way Iraqis have beheaded American hostages, the way American soldiers have tortured Iraqi prisoners, and while being emotional about these, we have overlooked the chopping down sessions of contract killers and blood baths created by local thugs in Bangladesh. Being emotional, we supported (some of us) and damned (rest of us) the 9/11 attacks on the World Trade Center and Pentagon. Being emotional, we have created a saga of mock monarchy, keeping power in the family, falling deeply and blindly listening to the history of past and future empty promises from so-called prominent mouths.

A Webster definition for "Emotion" is as follows: a moving of the mind or soul; excitement of the feelings, whether pleasing or painful; disturbance or agitation of mind caused by a specific exciting cause and manifested by some sensible effect on the body. Now if the word "extreme" is added to this definition the whole idea changes, extremely emotional being the most appropriate state of a Bengali mind and body.

In most cases the "developed-world" doesn't consider emotion to be a positive aspect. Finding a "balance" in emotions and limiting feelings makes a successful person. Paying a therapist few hundred dollars an hour, people in America and Europe learn to swallow their emotions, only spitting out the necessary leftovers for the right time and place. Sure, Gandhi starved for days to get what he wanted, but today that same emotional guilt trip will just not work, and the developed world realises that fact.

So the standard spells excess emotion to be a negative concern, and since the world follows the standards set by the developed world, Bangladesh being a developing country is way behind catching up to this benchmark of minimal emotion. The amount of excess emotion is not shown in reports by the World Bank or USAID but if the amount of Bangladesh's emotions were to be accounted for, Bangladesh would be overflowing with this commodity, adding another written and recognised alarm of backwardness that Bangladesh faces during her developing stage in her constant race with the world.

If one is to psychoanalyse Bangladesh, a few disorders would appear vividly. For example, Intermittent Explosive Disorder which defines as episodes of aggressive outbursts resulting in either destruction of property or physical assaults on others. Bangladeshis easily qualify for this. Our aggressive outbursts to all happy and sad incidents resulting with destruction and assaults are nothing but an everyday event. Not only do we devastate when there is desolation, but even in happiness we are heard of insulting and harassing the weak and meek, i.e. during New Year's Eve of 2002 in the heart of Dhaka's university area a young woman was brutally stripped of her clothes, assaulted and molested by a bunch of young men, who were just having a jolly good time!

Then there is the psychological disorder Pyromania, which is a psychological problem that primarily involves setting fires -- also something Bangladeshis can relate to. Setting buses on fire during strikes and burning temples and mosques in the name of revenge for some riot in another country defines a frequent tale of Bangladesh.

Not to mention Kleptomania the impulse control problem which involves the compulsive stealing of items not needed for their monetary value, the one problem Bangladesh definitely suffers from. The disappearance of big chunks of foreign aids to make fat wallets fatter and eating up all allocated funds for general administration by over-paid administrators without accomplishing any points of administrating -- perfect symptoms of a Kleptomaniac.

We Bangladeshis are afraid of words related to psychology. Our idea of psychotherapy can only exist in extreme cases involving mental asylums. So we rather live in denial making our physiological disorders bigger and pretend to be completely normal performing all abnormalities. We rather act civilised while acting barbaric, while all our basic raw instincts and emotions rule our minds, our bodies and as a whole, our country.

So before we hear this from an outsider, I thought as an insider I would spell it out and throw the news. Bangladesh is in need of major psychotherapy, now the question is do we bill the therapy expenses to foreign aid or internal administration? Ideas anyone?

Iffat Nawaz writes for Lifestyle, The Daily Star.