Fantasies are usually constructed around struggle between good and bad. Why fantasies, most modern day fictions, movies (save but feel good movies like The Devil Wears Prada) and documentaries and editorials of ideologically inclined newspapers are spun around the concept of good and the bad.
So who is good? The western world or Islamic revolutionaries? And who is bad -capitalists of the west bent on world domination or Islamic terrorists? No doubt, answer depends on who wins -CNN or Al Jazeera -in struggle to bring the 'truth' to your home.
So why is everything divided into good and a bad? Good and bad are subjective perceptions and these can be influenced upon and are subject to change.
Who is to blame for partition of India? Jinnah or Gandhi? Pakistani and Indian histories have different tales to tell. History, advocates of post-modernism believe, is highly subjective and seriously compromises on the truth. It is grossly affected by biases of the writer' and the reader.
Talking in terms of social sciences, an idea leads to a thesis. A debate on the thesis, or an objection to the thesis leads to a conflicting idea called the antithesis. Hence, we know that there are two dominant and mutually antagonistic views on anything and everything.
Humans, by nature, don't have the ability to take objective truth at face value. We try to fit all new information we get into preexistent schemas. These schemas, in turn, are based on our attitudes and beliefs. A mismatch between an existing belief (schema) and new information leads to cognitive dissonance. Since it is not easy to change attitudes, people discount facts that are in contradiction to their self-belief.
A differentiation between good and bad is also made as an instrument of persuasion. It is easy to change the attitude of an individual or to create new attitude if one strikes at emotions of the individual. Perhaps that is the reason why movies that show allied win over axis powers in World War 2 are 'inspirational', so also fantasy movies like Lord of The Rings.
This leads us to a very pertinent question -a question on the institution of religion in society. All major religions are based on a struggle between good and bad ultimately leading to victory of the righteous. Mythologies and folklores are driven on this duality. In Hinduism, we have Gods and rakshasas, God and Satan in Christianity, and the believers and kafirs in Islam.
Perhaps the only major world religion which isn't based on this theme is Buddhism. Buddhism, in its original form, wasn't a religion in fact. Gautam Buddha was silent on existence of God and Buddhism had emerged as a school of thought within Hinduism. However, it can't be denied that as Buddhism spread over various countries of east Asia, many folklores and local myths got integrated with the religion to give it a local flavor and better appeal. Point to note here is that man's belief on the supernatural has always been based on two metaphysical elements -God and Satan. God is credited for good luck and Satan is blamed for all that is bad in life.
We humans, in spite of all the achievements that may lead us to believe we can control nature, are weak. We are powerless against nature. We are powerless against destiny. Hence the need to develop shields to protect us -both physically and psychologically -against these forces. 'Good' and 'bad' are defense mechanisms man uses to bring in consistency in thought process.
I take the liberty to conclude at this stage that no one is good; and no one is bad. Perception is an indispensable weapon for us humans to defend ourselves from the ugly -from objective truth.
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