04 April 2010 By Reason Wafawarova JUST like the media, intellectualism is often
overrated as both a source of truth and of accurate
information — more so in the field of socio-political
commentary. Blatantly partial academic political activists like
Professor John Makumbe sometimes find themselves in
the luxury of being showered with accolades and
cheerleading adulations for "impartiality and
objectivity", as the MDC-T supporters would say of
Makumbe’s political rants. The deodorising rhetoric
behind this facade is often centred in the fabulous
glory of intellectualism. We are told we must believe
the fallacy because it comes from intellectuals. Just like what evangelists and sect leaders are to
religious fanatics, professors and holders of
doctorates cannot err or lie insofar as their
fanatical followers are concerned. In Africa, the sense of entitlement that comes with
intellectualism is astonishing. However, this is all
but a mirror image of the attainment of academic
titles, as opposed to it being an appreciation of
achievement in academic work. In fact, real academic work is frowned upon and
shunned by many as the tiresome and thankless business
of trying to attain high-ranking titles in academia.
What is attractive is the idea of leading an
intellectual life without engaging in real
intellectual work. People like John Makumbe carry with them an
intellectual life as opposed to intellectual work, and
that way he has created a constituency of fanatical
cheerleaders whose appreciation for intellectualism is
rigidly limited to the knowledge of academic titles
and nothing more. With such an intellectual life as Makumbe leads,
one has a sense of entitlement to supremacy of opinion
— in reality a baseless entitlement awarded by
fanatics and charlatans in the field of the politics
of polarity and fanatical activism. On the other hand, intellectual work requires
constant and concrete proof of one’s ability to
scientifically prove every assertion they make. So you have an intellectual like Makumbe traducing
his political rivals through schoolyard type of
scolding language and there is a ready and
appreciative audience driven by cretinism. To them,
Makumbe becomes a respected professor because of his
hate speech towards a shared enemy, and not because of
his intellectual work. In reality, there is nothing particularly
intellectual about being concerned with world affairs
or the domestic politics of one’s country. In fact,
labour unions, peasants, the working class and student
unions are usually concerned with these issues, and
they are not intellectuals. A lot of people wrongly or rightly believe that
being intellectual means one who works with their
mind. Plenty of people in the crafts, trades,
mechanics, and so on probably do more intellectual
work than most of the people working in academia or in
universities; that is if the idea of working with the
mind is considered the right definition of
intellectualism. A lot of the so-called scholarly work in academia
is just clerical work, and there is no real logic in
believing that clerical work is more challenging
mentally than fixing an automobile engine. This writer for example, can easily do any clerical
work, but can never figure out how to fix an
automobile engine or even a mobile phone. So if by "intellectual" the essence is to talk
about people who use their minds, then society is
awash with intellectuals. However, it would appear
that most people, especially from a political
perspective, do think that being intellectual means a
special class of people, who in the name of academic
titles are in the business of imposing thoughts, and
framing ideas for people in power or for their
political allies, and telling everyone what they
should believe. These people may be called intellectuals, but in
reality they are just a kind of secular priesthood,
whose task is to uphold doctrinal truths of political
groupings they stand as allies to, if not as a central
part. This is why it is very healthy for the population
to be anti-intellectual, or at the very least be
sceptical of intellectualism. There is one thing that this writer admires so much
about the United States of America. There is very
little respect for intellectuals by the mainstream
American community, and even by the media in general.
They are quite farcical about the propaganda model,
about Hollywood and so on, but their intellectual
culture is far from being farcical. During the Vietnam War, people like Noam Chomsky
would co-sign protest letters with such intellectuals
like the Frenchman Jean-Paul Sartre. In France the
letters would hit headlines straight away and in the
US there would not be even a word mentioned about
them. The French media even attacked the American media
for this because they thought this was all scandalous;
and this writer also thinks anyone who ignores Chomsky
is scandalous. But the point is that so many people
were clearly opposed to the war, regardless of what
Noam Chomsky and his respected French colleague were
signing. What difference does it make if two guys who happen
to have some name recognition got together and signed
a statement? There is no compulsive logic why this
should be of any particular interest to anybody, let
alone why the media should scramble for this
statement. What happens in Africa is that if you hit the cord
as an intellectual or as a political icon; then you
find yourself in front of television cameras all the
time, you are invited to talk shops and other such
gatherings. Then you have got to keep doing something
new so they will keep focussing on you, and not on the
next fellow. Well these so-called intellectuals and political
icons often do not have excellent ideas, so they have
to come up with really crazy stuff, so that they
maintain this sense of pomposity and self-importance —
the illusion that gives them so much attention. This is precisely why Desmond Tutu plays the clown.
He has to come up with all this crazy stuff to
maintain his self-importance. He has to please a
constituency that needs his voice to authenticate what
their own voices would be ridiculed for, if ever they
did the proclamations themselves. John Makumbe does the same thing. He has to come up
with cruciferous hoopla against Zanu-PF if the donors
are not going to look for the next fellow. So he
becomes an "intellectual" for describing Zanu-PF
leadership as having "mucus for brains" — that without
even bothering to elaborate or explain his point. Any Zimbabwean who was brought up the traditional
way knows that this kind of scolding is borrowed from
the low level misfits at village beer-drinking
gatherings — a deplorable habit of wayward villagers,
yet it passes for intellectualism when Makumbe has to
keep up with the business of maintaining an
intellectual life. That level of thinking replaces
intellectual work required by conventional academic
practices. About three years ago, John Sentamu had to cut off
his dog collar before BBC television cameras because
he needed to maintain his position above the rest in
the Mugabe-demonisation campaign. You play the fool if
you must, that is what it takes when you are trapped
in the game of playing the authentic voice for the
paymaster. This is the trap intellectuals often find
themselves in. Intellectual work itself is a matter of privilege,
not a reflection of intellectual supremacy. People
work at universities, and that way they are
privileged. Much as they pretend to, they do not have
to work that hard. Often they control their own work,
and they choose when to do certain things and so on. They have resources, they know how to use the
library, they have reading lists to guide them, and
they have all other sources of information availed for
their benefit. Arguably, some of this intellectual work may not be
as mentally challenging as figuring out a problem with
a car, something that clearly requires creativity. But hey, why would an African intellectual involved
with the politics of a party like the MDC-T worry
about intellectual work in the first place? The party itself has never believed in the politics
of public policy. Policy matters have always been
either non-existent or extremely peripheral in MDC-T
talk. This is why a scolding professor like Makumbe is
a very suitable ally. The MDC-T believes their
constituency understands and prefers hate language to
policy. The party was founded on the principle that Zanu-PF
could be shouted and scolded out of power, and this
explains the hate language we read the other time when
Thamsanqa Mahlangu decided to break his
controversy-induced silence to say something about the
youth and sanctions. Anyone who read what the deputy
minister wrote in The Changing Times may agree that
the man wrote like a deputy clown. Zanu-PF youths had outlined their policy position
on the illegal Western imposed economic sanctions and
they gave an ultimatum for a reaction from Prime
Minister Morgan Tsvangirai. Mahlangu, as MDC-T youth
chairman responded by scolding the hell out of
everyone that came to his mind, accusing his political
rivals of being "rented hoodlums" and a "motley group
of hired thugs". This is the same principle behind the hate language
used by pirate radio stations and the pro-MDC-T online
tabloids. Research, policy and intellectual work all
have no such room in the MDC-T’s "struggle for
democracy" and that is well reflected in these
mouthpieces. All one reads in these tabloids is
primitive name calling targeted at Zanu-PF officials. In Europe and in Africa, this business of waving
intellectual titles ahead of common sense is quite
rife. The American public would largely not notice any
such gimmicks. You got to act it at Hollywood and you
will most likely fool them that way. But the problem really is that all that is waved as
intellectual prowess is often nothing more than an
empty intellectual life — a special craft that does
not particularly require any thought. In fact one is
better off when they don’t think too much. That is the
facade we often see as a luminary image of
intellectualism. Society does not necessarily owe intellectuals the
respect that most academics expect. Our Zimbabwean
background is that of village life, with a lot of
people who may not have too much formal education, but
in our way of life they are very literate. They have a traditional court system, they have
wide knowledge about their surroundings, they argue
about things around them, they find solutions; they
discuss problems and fix them. This writer would even
call them intellectuals. They do not need "public awareness" or "outreach
campaigns" to teach them how to make political
choices. They know very well what is politically
relevant to their way of life, and they do not need a
bunch of Western sponsored youngsters to tell them
what is politically correct for them. We have seen these people trivialised and dismissed
by many, in apparent preference for political loud
mouths like Dr John Makumbe, and others who do speak
of democracy with a self-anointed sense of authority
that would make one to be forgiven for thinking that
donors are the custodians of democratic practices. This writer wishes for a society where people treat
intellectuals sceptically the way they should treat
the media and any other characters who anoint
themselves voices for the people, or sources of
accurate information. That way we avoid a situation where intellectuals
become delusional with illusions of grandeur, getting
so carried away that they begin to think they can
impose their ideas on all others. Comments 💬 التعليقات |