“Mom, I want to become a chef when I grow up.”
“Dad, I want to become a dancer or singer when I grow up.”
“No son or daughter of mine is going to take up such a low-level occupation. You should pursue something respectable like medicine or engineering.”
Students, you’ve been one at some point or you probably are a current student just as I am right now. Being a student is something that we’ve all experienced in our life. However, I’d say students have now been reduced to the position of being the pallbearers of education. The scapegoats of knowledge. The unwilling martyrs of their parents’ shortcomings and expectations.
With the steady advent of AI and various other online tools, it isn’t us who’s using AI as a tool; rather it is AI that has us on the tip of its fingers. We have become dummies being puppeteered by the ventriloquist that is Artificial Intelligence. We are dependent, and we have no free will nor free thinking. We are putting ourselves in harm’s way, eradicating our own cranial abilities and becoming slaves to fiber optics. What happened to the inventors? The annoying, overzealous kids who question everything, including their existence? The education system plays a huge role in promoting this mindset. It favours memory and hard work rather than intuitive thinking and problem-solving. It turns promising inventors into mindless corporate slaves with no ability to make decisions whatsoever. It is truly a pitiful sight. We have become the pallbearers of education, taking knowledge to the grave. We must crave knowledge rather than throw it off the edge.
Knowledge and education are great pursuits; however, they carry an underlying burden, the weight of carrying the shortcomings and expectations of our caregivers. This is a common occurrence in Asian countries, where parents enforce their dreams onto their children. If they can’t achieve these pre-set goals, they are shunned and cast away as failures. Children bred and raised to become tools for someone else’s academic success grow into co-dependent and emotionally detached adults. It disrupts normal neural functioning, creating individuals who constantly crave praise and approval. This is one of the sad realities of students.
They don’t encourage you to chase your dreams. Instead, our lives are governed by the actions of others our parents. You can be a dancer, you can be a singer, you can be anything. Yet society has designated only a handful of “acceptable” occupations such as doctor or engineer. I vaguely remember watching the movie Dead Poets Society. One of the main characters, Neil, had an affinity and love for acting. Unfortunately for him, he had a father who opposed this idea, refusing to acknowledge his son’s gift. Instead, he wanted him to enrol in an elite military school. Unable to handle his father’s disapproval, Neil took his own life a tragic ending to what could have been incredible potential.
If we as a society continue to enforce these invisible rules onto others, where is the innovation? Where are the free thinkers if people’s lives are determined by prerequisites they never agreed to?
As a society, we should promote the idea of free thinking. We must loosen the shackles of living someone else’s dream and promote individuality. We should aim to produce future innovators, not slaves to a textbook individuals who carry knowledge, not burdens.
On World Students’ Day, celebrated in honour of Dr. A.P.J. Abdul Kalam a scientist, a dreamer, and a believer in youthful potential we must pause and rethink. This day is not just a date on a calendar; it is a reminder that students are the engines of progress, not the victims of pressure. Dr. Kalam believed that students carry the power to transform the future, but that power can only exist when we allow them to dream freely, to think boldly, to question fearlessly.
As a society, we must promote free thinking. We must break the shackles of inherited dreams and let individuals choose their own paths. We need innovators, creators, artists, scientists, and leaders not robots conditioned to replicate the same old ideas. Let us raise a generation that carries knowledge, not burdens. Curiosity, not fear. Passion, not pressure.
Because the world doesn’t progress through obedience it progresses through imagination.
Written by: Yeran Fernando
Image courtesy:
Featured Image: https://shorturl.at/maXve
Figure 1: https://shorturl.at/MAYGT