Why activists must start to tackle harmful narratives

I, ordinarily, would have skipped this James Onen post but I will list why, in fact, activists must start to tackle harmful narratives; 

1. It gains currency amongst those who are misinformed and deters collective unity 
2. It energizes the community of those fighting 4 good outcomes in society
3. It identifies, isolates and deals with the purveyors of the narrative ideologically and coherently.

I say all this to start off being respectful because I don’t intend, in the paragraphs following, to do so. I will aim to ridicule [which is what you have done to the protestors of yesterday] and use that as a tool against you in the way you have used it against the activists.

So your thoughts on this matter were not even pedestrian thoughts. Pedestrians interpret the road for oncoming traffic, interpret the demarcation of sidewalks et al. We can’t accuse you of thought from that assertion. It’s a tired and rehashed trope. But it has the staying power of a male ejaculation; long enough to plant a seed but nowhere near the point of causing an orgasm for all parties involved.

You may be convinced that it’s contrarian thought. It is not. I’m here to allay your fears. Contrarian thought has deep roots in opposition to popular thought. Except yours is a popular albeit false thought that activists in Uganda only engage in activism for fiduciary incentives. It’s made by people who have imagination constraints. It serves the narrow motive of alienating popular discontent and attracting to activism people with fiduciary incentive alone.

It’s also the kind of thought prominent with people who despise agency. They see activists as nothing else than agents. That they are incapable of thought, interpretation of interests, forming of bonds and alliances and internationalizing local problems.

Let’s say, for example’s sake; the majority of drugs in Ugandan circulation are heavily subsidized by governments like the U.S. and international institutions. Does that make patients – who on some occasions include you – agents of the U.S.? But brought closer to home; you make so many lackadaisical arguments on this platform and they are read, plus you’ve been on morning radio platforms for decades; are all people here or those who heard you on the radio your agents?

So let’s probe why you ridicule activists; it is that first, you have no spine of your own to stand by what you believe in: you see no path to a world you would rather live in, and you’re incapable of imagining it (heck you can’t even make a pedestrian argument). That’s what gives you pleasure in ridiculing those creating the world they’d rather live in. If there’s light at the end of the tunnel for your world it’s a waxed-out candle about to be blown out by wind or collapsing into the ground.

Activists have to endure those hindering the world they want to live in; from abusers of power, illiberals, and then endure people like you; in the cascade of importance, you’re the bottom-barrel scrap. It’s why they’d rather skip you. But left unattended your sloth raises to the top. You wouldn’t know the texture of a proposal even if it were read to you as a nursery rhyme. And yet activists, on top of pushing for a better society, have to also bear the fiduciary responsibility of bringing the world they dream of to fruition.

I hope in 2025 you can, with your identity as fat boy transfer some of your weight to intellectual thought and not rehashed and tired tropes that have been long recited and run their currency. I have encountered many like you in my short span in this Uganda and it’s always a matter of time before this dysfunction deals you the bad hand. I hope and pray when that time comes, you meet it with the same ridicule you meet the people fighting to solve it