Essay Sample on Gandhi's Critique of Western Civilization's Pursuit of Money

Introduction

Western colonialism brought about violence. Gandhi criticized a lot that the critical essence of Western Civilization was based on the pursuit of a better mundane life. In a society where people's main target is to achieve the upper level of physical well-being, they would measure any of their progress in terms of money even if they might not be aware of this action (but other times they would be conscious of it). Although measuring the progress in terms of money was somehow objective and quantitative, not everything in this world could be estimated, measured, or evaluated by cash. In other words, money could not be the only or even the most critical method of measuring, and better worldly life did not represent everything. Some of the more important things, in Gandhi's opinions, were morality and religion.

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If we go deeper and find out how British people made progress in their pursuit of wealth, we could find out that their elevation in physical well-being was because laborers were "enslaved." They were exploited, and one of the reasons behind their exploitation and "slavery" was, first, the employers' greed to expand their industry and, therefore, wealth. Nevertheless, another reason behind the workers' diligence and hard work was due to their temptation of money. The "luxuries tempted even these workers that the money can buy" . They, under the values of Western Civilization, also cared more about physical well-being and the wealth they owned; thus, they would have to work hard in exchange for these things. However, even though they worshiped physical comfort, we could not say that the exploitation of them was reasonable because mere exploitation was against humanity and morality. We should only criticize the values of Western Civilization for people overly caring about materialism.From Gandhi's perspective, it was evident that the concentration on materialism did not trigger morality. However, it still deserved discussion on why he said so. First, it was reasonable to comment that the exploitation of workers mentioned above could not be regarded as a moral action. Human beings were born equal, and it was immoral to let anyone being exploited for any reason or purpose. However, as people were pushed deeper into materialism and the pleasure that money could bring, it was inevitable that more of the laborers were facing the problems of being exploited, which led to colossal immorality. Second, the more people concerned about their wealth state, the greedier they were. Greed often led to some cutthroat competition or even crimes. Desire could cause theft, robbery, or some other significant crimes away. These could definitely not be regarded as moral. Therefore, Gandhi argued that Western Civilization led to larger immorality.

Gandhi also pointed out that pure materialistic civilization would hinder the development of religion. As far as Gandhi was concerned, faith was "dear to me (him)," and religion was where people could gain power. As affected by Western Civilization, after people began to set the pursuit of wealth and better materialistic life as their goal, it was reasonable to infer that people would not pay much attention to religion, or other spiritual well-beings, as before. It might seem at first that faith did not bring people more than what physical welfare could bring. However, religion gave people "real physical strength or courage." In other words, it provided people the reason and the motivation to live and survive in the world. If people paid less attention to religion, they could only "keep up their energy by intoxication." They were no longer able to live strongly or bravely in this world, and it would lead to the destruction of their mind and thoughts.

In addition, Gandhi discussed the conditions in Indian and made his argument in favor of Indian home rule by saying that Indian home rule set a limit to indulgence. As Gandhi argued, even their ancestors knew that "the more we indulge our passions, the more unbridled they became." Therefore, they decided Indians should lead a life of temperance. Otherwise, even if the mind got what it wanted, it would remain unsatisfied since the thought would never stop. Compared to Western Civilization, Indian ancestors strongly disagreed with indulgence and valued temperance more. They restrained themselves to not let themselves become greedy human beings. Their restraints and temperance would prevent them from further exploitation, immorality, or irreligion. As they did not pursue wealth restlessly, they would not live under intoxication. Consequently, they would have strength that is more physical or bravery that came from their minds. In Gandhi's opinion, this kind of life was more meaningful than the pure pursuit of materialism and pleasures from gaining money.

Gandhi also responded to some doubts that some readers might have. Because some people might argue that if Western Civilization was not that favorable, it could not stay in Indian. In other words, Western Civilization's pure existence in India because it had some advantages. Gandhi disagreed with this idea by stating that Western Civilization did not stay in India out of its strength but because of Indians' assistance. They welcomed the Company's officers and helped them create an environment that was friendly to commerce. Without Indian's help, the English would not be that easy to achieve its goal to expand its market and then stay in India.

The reason why Indian ancestors started to set a limit to indulgence was that they already knew individuals were not supposed to relate happiness with wealth. They valued some other things more than real wealth. They were aware of the fact that the rich were not necessarily happy, whereas the poor were not necessarily unhappy. After realizing this fact, it was clear why Indian ancestors dissuaded their descendants from luxuries. Different from what Western Civilization held, Indian ancestors would hope their descendants to lead a more rarefied lifestyle. It was justifiable for Gandhi to be in favor of Indian home rule because directly setting happiness with wealth was too unilateral and one-sided, and it was usually not the truth that joy was represented by wealth. Unlike the westerners who measured their progress in terms of money and wealth, Indian ancestors indicated that there were some other important things such as morality and religion. They valued honesty since it made them into a better person while they valued faith because it could give them motivation and power of living. Believing in religion also allowed Indians to stay away from over-valuing wealth since most of the religions taught that people should remain "passive about the worldly pursuit and active about godly pursuit." Under this kind of religious belief, Indians would not be blinded by pure materialism as easily as westerners would.

Since Western Civilization encouraged people to overly pursue wealth, materialism and therefore led to the ignorance of morality and religion, which Gandhi valued a lot, Gandhi criticized Western Civilization. Nevertheless, he suggested the advantages of Indian home rule: according to Gandhi, Indians led a life in which they set a limit to indulgence and helped the English to settle down. They also did not overvalue wealth or profits so that they could insist on morality and religion.

The foundation of the contrasts between the colonizer and the colonized starts in chapter 1,"on violence." The colonizers, a minuscule number of people -- when contrasted with the general populace of the colonized -- is characterized as an unrivaled and elite group of people that have established political command over a massive group of people called the colonized. The colonizer maintains his predominance over the colonized by making them believe they are inferior. Fanon discusses the ways by which the colonist retains control over the colonized. In western societies, especially the United States, the general population is monitored through things like education, religion, work, and so forth, yet in a wholly colonized society.

Fanon, who was one of only a handful of remarkable savants that substructured the decolonization struggles that took place following World War II, alludes to this kind of world as a Manichean world. A Manichean world is a world that is part of primary classifications of either white, dark, tremendous, or malice. Since the colonists see the colonized as very abhorrent creatures, it results in the abolishment of ratings that the colonized can identify with, like sex, religion, and class. I feel as though this would be an inspiration for the colonized to battle back against the colonist. People would begin to join around a racial or national cognizance in light of what they begin to understand the colonists are doing. They would eventually lead towards a coalition to fight back against the colonized. Over the long haul as ever-increasing numbers of individuals, start to stir on account of the evil and unjustness of colonialism, bigger and bigger masses of the colonized start to rebel against the colonizer. Therefore, the violent process of decolonization goes into effect.

Yearning for powerful positions that were previously held by the colonist is fought over repeatedly until the nation can agree on eliminating the hierarchical bureaucracy of authority as a whole. This leads to a nation-wide debate within the previously colonized people about the direction the future of the nation ultimately needs to head in. This chapter is extremely intriguing because I do have to disagree that positions of power can be expelled. I believe that certain governing entities are needed, or the system as a whole falls out of place, and I feel that regardless, individuals will dependably endeavor to acquire positions of power. It is the crucial element that drives and persuades specific individuals, and you will certainly always have those particular kinds of individuals in presence.

Fanon tracks the trajectory of intellectuals and realizes that they are merely re-creating a colonial world in a decolonized nation. In my opinion, this is because they are not ready to think for themselves yet or fully 'enlightened' as one may say. They tend to continue to reinstate the culture that was familiar to the people under colonialism while, at the same time, fighting colonialism. For Fanon, though, learning is necessary for the fight for nationalism, but it is a new kind of culture he brings to light, a culture that is created from the struggle to free the nation. As opposed to mirror European culture or advance a widespread black culture, native intellectuals must understand their religion is not only national but also unique. In chapter 1, Fanon had discussed how the colonial world is divided in two ways. The cognizance of the value of African culture acknowledges this division and flips the hierarchy system upside down. Additionally, native erudite individuals are attracted to the possibility of a widespread black culture since they figured out how to esteem universalism in their European-centered education.

Conclusion

In summary, the colonized are shown their entire lives that they are underhanded creatures, and because of this, they are continually scrutinizing the truth of the actuality that they are living in. I discovered this chapter hard to identify with because I do not have the foggiest idea what it resembles to be colonized; however, after reading Fanon's book, I found this chapter disturbing and saddening. Colonization is a vicious process, and because of this, the general population of the colonized may diagnose post-horrendous illnesses and mental disorders in which they create destructive propensities or are inclined to insane breakdowns.