The intellectual crisis of the Somali youth.

[N.O.R.F]

THE PROBLEM

 

Pride: One will distance himself away from any form of support system for his/her son/daughter who is in dire need of help. Whether it be help from Somalis or from other groups. One does not want to be seen as failing his children even tho this may be obvious. The blame will always point to ina hebel ayaa inakaayi sidan ka digay!

 

The System: We all and see that the system is failing our yuut, from school age, where they are told that the only hope thay hav is as an apprentice in a dead end job (personal experience until i fixed up),trying to be black and being a player is more impoertant than learning. Kids are living for now rather than living for 2mrw!

 

Somali Community; Devided, no more family unit. Families have become more like 2.4 children where one will do whatever and dows not get recognition for what he/she did whether good or bad.

 

 

more..... but i'm at work and supposed to be coming up with some figures for this building.....

[Sophist]

Northere, perhaps.

[underdog]

"Separation occurs at the point of enlightenment."

In any situation there comes a point when you see things in a totally different light (Dr. Covey's famous Paradigm Shift). I think that's when we start thinking "why can't everyone see what I see?"

 

 

Sophist, you make some very valid observations on the current state of Somali youth, but on the same token I could use you and a number of other Nomads in this forum to argue the exact opposite.

 

I've heard a number of explanations as to why we seem to be stagnant; Culture, Religion, Ambition, etc.

In my opinion we as Somalis have a culture that is as vibrant, active and colorful as any other. Our support for it is evident in our Ethnocentrism...we ALL have it. So I doubt that problems lies there. Religion is so engrained in most of that even when we seem to "wander" away from it we find that the rules still guide us because it makes sense. So the problem isn't really religion based.

 

Ambition is next. Ambition (or lack of the same) doesn't discriminate across racial, social or even financial lines. Ambition is craving sparked inside us to achieve something, to create something, to improve something. There can be no ambition if there is no stimulation of the mind. Some of us might misinterpret that as education, but I've seen too many "educated" individuals who specialize in quoting famous lines and indulging in their new-found class rather than effectively using their talents. Instead they group up amongst themselves and move as far away from the little people.

 

This brings me back to my first statement "Separation occurs at the point of enlightenment."

And this ties in directly with my proposed solution to this dilemma. Most of the youth today need to see "it" work. We need to see Somali people achieve something and not scurry off to distance themselves from their people.

 

Role Models, Sophist. Show us it works and then maybe that can be the spark that ignites our ambition. I thinks it may be futile to tell people what to do rather than show them

[Sophist]

Salams to you all,

 

Underdog

 

Interesting thoughts overwhelm me but at the thought of them penning them down makes me shrivel with the potential outcome. But I tell myself, a good writer (which am certainly not) aspires to write in fashion that would not (to borrow your word) ignite the fire that will engulf the soul of our continuation (contributing to this fine xero rageed-excuse the manly aphorism ) and perhaps divest ourselves of the mainstay of this reasonably practicable forum.::::-perhaps such task would not be realised in this post; nevertheless that should not be a deterrent.

 

In the first part of this thread I speak of what I termed Intellectual debauchery. Without repeating myself, this profligacy is indeed permeating into our young minds without the much notice of the parts concerned. This is a objective fact. The saturation of licentiousness (used here in negative fashion) is one that boggles my tired mind- tired because of great effort paid to-without much expectation of material gain- to this matter. I don't criticise out of whim. But indeed I observed certain facts that is corrupting our 'culture'.

 

 

You say our culture is vibrant. I agree entirely with negative effect. Where is this vivaciousness you speak about. An energetic and pulsating culture does not rid itself off its core elements, but what it does is to take what is what positive from that which they see in others. This is not the case in our society. The majority (no pedanticism is needed here) is assimilated to the negative aspects of western culture-MacWorld culture, as they term it recently.

 

People accuse me of looking down my fellow brothers, that is an utter tosh. I speak about those truths because I feel bad about the state of our society. This is nothing to do with self-aggrandizing-never have I proclaimed that I am not partly westernized (of course it must be said Without my knowledge ).

 

On the point of showing them rather than telling them (whoever they and me are ); as I said just moments ago, I don't regard myself better than "them". Likem Socrates, I see the faults, and I am trying to discover HOW we can break this newtonian inertia.

 

Upon writing this, I don't expect anyone to embrace what I have written but only to ignite (to borrow your word again) the fire in their intellectial capacities.

 

Here I retire for the morning; perhaps return later this afternoon-- if Allah permits me to.

 

Sophist

[TRUTH-SHALL-SET-U-FREE]

hmmm quiet a lot of interesting points of view had been stated here. What i am here to introduce, i have no idea whether it would assimilate into this conversation on not, nontheless wanted to point out. Recently i had asked someone "If somali parents read to their children back in somali?". Her answer plus others seems to indicate, as a nation, we definitly don't show great tendency toward picking a book and reading in our spare time but rather talk/gossip. I personally feel that in order to grow and expand one's own horizon We as a nation have to read and expose ourselves to different written ideologies/concepts/cultural and social behaviors. It isn't to say we have to accept them all, but to have an intellectual awareness of different view points and maybe in term gain beneficial debatable qualities that can help us make logical dedictions and intelligent choices. I feel without pushing our kids and ourselves to read has tremendously created a deficiency in our intellect capacities. And maybe one of the first steps we can take is to encourge or even force ourselves and our children to read and therefore stimulate our minds. Sorry if i rambled on or interrupted the flow of this on-going debate.

 

ciao

[Xafsa]

Good god!!

[rudy-Diiriye]

great balls of fire!!!

[wind talker]

<--- rolls a blunt for Sophist...Take hit..then I'm sure u gonna go all ghetto dawg hehe

[Paragon]

^^^ lol WInder talker. He might be needing it now since its exams time

 

Sophist, I had to bring back this topic sxb. Its such an interesting topic. Further serious discusion may help us understand the 'intellectual crisis' Somali youth seem to face.

[Sirrus]

Sophist, you normally pose a masterpiece of utter incomprehension and unessesarily heavy verbiage. You speaking ungrily, simply bloats the mayham of your style. I hope you don't intent to seduce the jury with your aristocratic persona. If so first make sure they are not commoners. All in good jokes. I see your anger, this multi headed serpent we call community needs to take active and effective function to reduce our social degradation. A young somali kid once confided in me that "somalia would out excell the rest of africa because many somalis are here learning knowlege we can use" The truth of the matter is, many youths are adopting hopeless counter-cultures of the west. Likewise the remainder such as you and Zaylici and reluctantly I, are being lost to integration. So rather than be superflous critic, be hamble, rather than angry.

 

Walaykum A Salam Wa Rahmatullahi wa barakatum

[raula]

So Sophist brother, what's your worry? Is it that the somali youth are depleting in intellectual means or WE SOMALIS are the poorly acculturated to the western civilizations? Besides, when you criticize the nomadic lifestyle of the NOMADS(in this case Somalis) equating it to the ramification of their economic, political and socio-cultural standpoints; are you implying that the western civilization never went through such a turn-point in their history of existence(meaning that they always possessed the intellectual cranium with the advanced technological tink-tanks to support their fate? I dont get it? I always was brought up that every individual or society had a timeline; a history from archaic to contemporary times. So, the somalis are no different. We might still be living with the traces of paleolithic culture but some are happy with such lifestyle.

 

However, my observations reveal that the problem with our youth is not a dichotomous equation that can be solved by exactly pin-pointing to the vague etiologies but a mammoth situation. One of the problems, is the family structure and lack of egalitarian roles in the family. If I elaborate on this- I would lurk behind on my final research papers but insha-allah I will intricate on them when time allows.

 

You also mention "What you write is a direct reflcetion of our Inner being" -I disagree with you and say that you are GENERALIZING. This might be a piece of me, but not my entire reflection.

 

Ma'salaama

[Strawberry_Xu]

What you are suggesting is a sense of censorship. The be-silent-if-you-don’t-have-anything-worth-saying mentality deployed can easily be transformed into, “don’t speak, unless we find it useful”.

 

Good God, I'm so tired of hearing this all the time from Somali people with their communistic beliefs that every (in this case, intellectual) property belongs to the general community. I personally am sick of having my words scrutinised by people I know, for their patriotic worth.

 

I think a lot of young intelligent Somali people today face this pressure to employ their talents in manner that will benefit their ‘nation’. Often accompanied by the excessive (and cruel) use of emotional blackmail, to amass a pool of talent for the greater good. These communistic tactics serve nothing but to alienate the youth who feel pressured into a practising something, decreed to be of value by a few.

 

I would say the reason are nation’s gone to pieces, is that we never had any individual progress. I would say, let every Somali individual find their passions, eventually some of that passion will seep back through into the community.

 

I’m not advocating complacency however, just the promotion of individuality.

 

If a reasonably intelligent Somali student decides to study the arts instead of Medicine or Engineering, something barely short of social castigation occurs. As a film student who had quite good grades in school I have often been subject to this form of manipulation and contempt, by a minority who personally have done nothing to empower and improve their community in any way.

 

I think a lot of decent and intelligent Somali people face the same pressure these days. Where they are judged by their potential value to Somalia, rather than any personal attributes that complement them.

 

Honestly, if you want to change the world, there are better forums than the internet to do so. Go do something practical, and don’t patronise the people here for their interests, just because it doesn’t have the magic power to rebuild a broken nation.

 

You seem to forget what a forum like SOL has accomplished. It’s given scattered Somalis a place to reunite. It’s allowed people like me who don’t feel as much part of their local Somali community, to prevent becoming too alienated from their culture.

 

I personally am an ardent promoter of free speech of all kinds. We need the drivel as much as the coherently directed symphony of intellectual thought. These trivial subjects in the forums you speak of, are what matters. I hope you are not suggesting that we curb our personal experiences of our daily lives, so that we may discuss what you think is ‘important’.

 

 

And finally, remember verbosity doesn’t equal intelligence.

[NGONGE]

Sophist, I'm not sure what your point really is, brother. 'The intellectual crisis of the Somali Youth'?

 

You seem to have some sort of point that you're trying to convey but it's just not getting through to me! What the hell does the title of the thread mean?

Do all Somali youth have to be 'intellectuals'? I'm assuming that's what you're saying (because you've compared them to other nations). Are all Sudanese youth intellectuals (are most of them? 40%? 20%?).

 

Like I said, I'm not sure what you're trying to get at here, but I took the liberty of making some assumptions of my own as to what your thread (rant) relates to. I think, in simple, crystal clear english, what you're questioning is the wisdom of the Somali youth. You're wondering why things that seem really obvious and clear to you don't seem that obvious to others! How can educated and evidently intelligent people sit around and spend hours discussing the pros and cons of a Farax's/Xalimo's choice in clothes? How could they waste their time comparing a Playstation to an X-Box?(I hear X-Box's are best by the way).

 

There is no intellectual way of discussing the above mentioned topics (well, there is but it would be too false and contrived). It's trivia, humans like to discuss trivia. There is no harm in it. It's main stream. The lowest common denominator!

Trivia is something all can agree on. Some of those taking part in these threads are interested in poetry, literature, science and philosophy. However, it would be very silly to assume that ALL would have the same interests or the mental capacities to take part in such discussions. We're all different yet we're all the same. The beauty of it all is that someone who a few minutes ago was posting to a thread about 'Best Chat Up Lines' would now be seriously replying to a thread about "The Fall of Western Civilisations." (I'm not sure if either thread really exists).

 

Intellectuals are a lonely lot.

[Sirrus]

NGONGE

 

 

To sum it up brother Sophist, is simply frustrated with the same trend of moral and cultural decline we see, day in and day out. You are right, not everybody should be judged against the Sophist ideal standard, but we must begin somewhere. I personally find the males are more suseptible to this culture clash, but I do not posses imperical data to support the assumption. Futhermore on a hersay note, I was lead to believe the issue is more prevelent in UK than any other somali occupied territory.Go figure...

[postman]

verbosity doesn’t equal intelligence.

I think that should be tattooed on Sophist's forehead.

 

 

Sophist , I think you do have a point when you say Somalis tend to assimilate the negative aspects of western culture. However you need to be reminded that this phenomenon is not something particular to Somalis as it also happens to most migrants. You should not be dismayed. In time most migrants come to their senses, after having come to understand the pros and cons of the host nation’s culture, they have a tendency to make rational choices towards their future.

 

What's more I don’t think the generalisation is entirely necessary, I have seen cases where two out of five brothers have worked hard through high school and subsequently through academia, whereas the rest became drop outs [in academic sense] and found work at local factories. So in any case there are variations, especially when there is such a vast exodus of Somalis to the west, you are bound to have those who get assimilated into other cultures and those who after [inevitably] having adopted some aspects of others cultures remain intact and benefit from the experience.

 

Peace