Copying blindly corrupts
“Everyone is unique in his own way and should be proud of his identity. It's good to admire someone and try new stuff but blindly following anything, and sacrificing your identity is not correct” — Sapan Nigam
Technology has turned the world into a global village making it possible for people to see, admire, learn, and emulate the behaviours of others (acculturation).
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However, that does not mean people should lose their unique identities, ethical behaviours, and cultures.
Sapan Nigam’s quote draws attention to the need for an individual, a group, or a nation to avoid copying blindly and sacrificing their identity for someone else’s.
This is because maintaining one’s identity gives one the greatest strength to eschew corrupt acts and to also succeed in life.
From observations, most Ghanaians, more specifically the youth, copy foreign cultures blindly, which if not controlled, may result in identity crises.
Accordingly, this article draws attention to the adverse effects of copying blindly and the need to safeguard our unique Ghanaian identity for posterity.
Copying blindly
Every individual is created as a unique being with unique traits and a specific path to chart.
In my career as an instructor, I have had students express their desire to be like me, which I find worrying.
To mentor students for them to become who they are created to be, so they can fulfil their destinies is a great achievement.
However, the desire of students to be a replica of someone else is a deviation from the norm. According to Sapan Nigam, learning positively from others and making them a part of you is good, but you cheat yourself if you strive to be a copy of someone else.
You become a fake and not the real you. This is the mentality most Ghanaian youths have.
They pay attention to others’ talents and achievements rather than developing their talents to the fullest. Ways Ghanaians copy blindly include emulating behaviours that are acceptable in the individualist culture of the Global North and forgetting that they live in a collectivist culture, thereby creating dilemmas they struggle with.
Gross disrespect for elders/superiors in society, use of unacceptable language, and blindly following fashion trends even when uncomfortable, among others.
The contextual scenarios from which we copy blindly are not applicable to the Ghanaian culture.
For instance, the US and European ways of life are different due to the fact that same-sex marriage is morally right to them but wrong to us Africans/Ghanaians.
Similarly, polygamy practised in Africa is morally wrong to them but right in the African/Ghanaian culture.
It is expedient to note that as Ghanaians, we are a people, with unique cultures, languages, attitudes, behaviours, and ways of dressing. Jeremy McGilvrey opined that “Life is the most difficult exam.
Many people fail because they try to copy others. – Not realising that everyone has a different question paper.” Copying other cultures blindly makes us dilute our true nature—our greatest strength—leading to our inability to think and learn independently to succeed in life.
Also, copying blindly can make us lose our creativity and innovativeness. Creativity and innovativeness are two important keys to emancipation and without them, we are bound to still be in bondage, and it looks like that is the situation we find ourselves in at the moment.
Creativity is the process by which an individual or a team produces novel and useful ideas using knowledge and skills.
Individuals become creative once they identify their talents and develop their potential through knowledge acquisition, skills, and competencies which constitute the raw materials needed for creativity to occur.
Another way of promoting creativity is for the citizenry to be made to understand the complexity and diversity of life rather than copying others blindly.
Copying blindly inhibits innovation as those who strive to be innovative are motivated — something duplication seldomly encourages. Dreaming (creativity) alone is not enough because most people may have dreams but may lack innovativeness.
Thus the ability to find solutions to very complex problems makes one innovative.
The propensity of the citizenry to engage in and support new ideas, novelty, experimentation, and creative processes may result in producing future leaders equipped with the needed know-how for sustainable development.
Copying blindly prevents calculated risk-taking, proactiveness, and opportunity-seeking.
It has negative consequences that can make people over-dependent on superiors such as the state to create job opportunities for them, rather than creating opportunities for themselves. This over-dependent mentality is partly caused by blindly copying without questioning why those who are being copied did what they did, the processes they employed to achieve their results, the environment within which the results are being achieved, and the sustainability measures they are taking to achieve continuous progress.
It is, therefore, prudent for us to think critically to arrive at solutions tailored to our problems rather than copy blindly. Could it be that our inability to solve the teething problems bedevilling the nation is because of blindly copying others’ approaches? Is it possible to use our creative and innovative tendencies to develop tailored solutions that would better address our problems? Answers to these questions may lead us to the right path.
The writer is a lecturer at the Ashesi University