Identity

I get confused by this word - Identity. I dont know what it means. All I know that it is a complex word and it represents a complex idea.

Often people talk about making their identity. Young men and women who read and re-read Ayn Rand talk about it most often. They want to be successful to make their identity. I dont understand what they mean. It is again a curious word - Success. I dont know what it means. The people who think that they think better define it for us. They define is differently though. Shiv Khera says that it is a progressive realization of a worthy goal. (God knows what would happen if he could meet Camus by any chance! Well, he is rather too redoubtable an adversary for the poor man!) He does not take the unworthy goals into account for his definition. But this word worthy is again contentious and difficult. Who will decide the worth of one's goal? There is no unanimity about the worthiness of the goal of Osama Bin Laden. Who is right and who is wrong?

Some say that hitting your target is success. Your target might be anything. The man who assassinated Kennedy was a successful shooter. The man who blew up Hiroshima was a successful bomber. Similarly we can have successful criminals and successful terrorists by this definition. Dont you think Dawood Ibrahim is successful? After all he accomplished what he targetted. He is a successful gangster. We know his name. He has made his identity.

So we see that making identity is being successful in whatever we do. It doesnt matter what we do but how successfully we do it. There can be a man who has mastered the art of killing people. And most of us not only approve but also appreciate it. There are a lot of blockbusters and chartbusters to support this argument.

So making identity is a political act which might not be moral. It is predominantly earning fame and what fame can fetch. There is nothing noble about that. Nobility follows in the later generations to justify the ends. People want to be heroes. They want to be popular or notorious. They want people to talk about them. They want people to listen to them. This is what they want- acknowledgement. But then I see a contradiction!

We use this word only when we want to highlight ourselves on the background of the world. The more the differences, the more pronounced is our identity. People ask me: Who are you? They wish to know my identity. They wish to know what is unique in my personality. How am I different than others? Even I ask myself this question. I want to compare and contrast my individuality with my surroundings. I also want to know my identity. I can see the physical similarities and dissimilarities with others. I want to see the metaphysical aspects too. I know that the modus operandi to do this is to introspect, to look within. This is the way to see what we are in originality unadulterated by the contaminating influence of others.

But here the scope of confusion is even more staggering. Can we have any identity in isolation? Can two eyes floating in infinite colorless void even know about their existence at the first place?

NO. They can not. And anyways the very idea of identity is meaningless and senseless in isolation. It is always with respect to some standard. It always presumes the existence of other. It is a social concept.

And it is a substitute for something we dont have. All of us want to know about ourselves as such. But we it is not possible or at least not possible for everyone. So we use this concept of compare and contrast with the others and we name the unique part of us our identity.

But is it not meaningless even then? We are not created out of void. We are a product of the intermixing of the elements of the society we live in. How could we be different? How could we extricate ourselves from our genes and clock and home? What is unique in us save the proportion of the properties common in mankind? So how could any social concept like identity separate us from rest of humanity when it is impossible? Why is so important to us? Which type of existential necessity does it fulfil? These questions often baffle my mind.

I have already made a point that making one's identity might not be a moral act. And if we pay heed to the opening page of Godfather which reads- 'Behind every fortune there is a crime' then the fetish of the word success looks absolutely absurd. Why would the society want us to be successful? Well do we idolate the celebrities who despise us? Why do we go to theatre to watch 'D'?

Because we want Heroes, right from the childhood. Initially we read comics and feel the power vicariously. Later on the presence of these heroes give us a sense of direction, a ray of hope, a break from the mundane affairs of humdrum life, a ride full of thrill and adventure in the world of imagination. So the successful people behind the fortune of whom there is a crime enjoy not only approval but also the adulation of the masses. In the barter the fans get their share of dreams and pseudo-identity.