Abuse of privilege

My brother, Frank Edoho, is in the news, as he always has been. Only that this time it is for what you may call a wrong reason. The world is aghast because Frank is no ordinary guy and ought not to pass ordinary fart. In case you did not know, he is the guy who burst onto the scene of his profession, searching for and making people millionaires and in the process spreading untold joy to a continental audience.

Compelled by a very troubling matrimonial situation, he chooses to go public. As happens almost always in such cases, the public communication goes south. The complainant somehow becomes the accused. Jungle justice is that unpredictable.

The next and subsequent chapters have only granted an ever-ready, ever-prying public unfettered access to stench that no marriage can survive. Some of the pages feature Frank’s estranged wife singing like a canary; something we all hope is the figment of the ever imaginative social media users. Of course, the rest of our sick world, ever without any shred of empathy let alone sympathy, have been grinning away, smiling away and smirking away in pure satanic ecstasy. I have tried to no avail to understand how and why mockery is the way to go when human beings run into horrendous weather.

Just yesterday, as I readied this entry, USA-based pugilist, Mr. Enobong Umohette, WhatsApped me. His chat had something to do with an unexpected political downturn recorded the previous day in Imo State. A new entrant had, despite all the build-up hoopla, lost out in the House of Representatives primaries. Mr. Umohette wanted me to comment on the public reaction to what had looked like an impossible loss.

My response was terse. No need to mock. Mockery is both inhuman and ungodly. To which the guy in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, playfully retorted with a reply I thought was more tersely: “Then, The Boss, please, tell them to keep their big mouths shut!”

Mr. Umohette was both correct and right. Human beings should learn to shut the f–k up. Especially when we are too angry, or sometimes too excited. Boasting or pride can instigate mockery.

Alas, that still cannot be enough reason to jubilate like Satan when something untoward happens to another human being. Well, except you yourself are of Satan. It is immaterial how arrogant or boastful such a one was or is. Two wrongs, as they say, do not and cannot make a right.

Granted, Mr. and Mrs. Edoho -as they then were- misyarned, big time, however, understanding the pains inherent in what they are going through at this time, all that their children and they deserve is privacy. Still, it is important to tell husbands that even when marriage goes kaput, it is unmanly to take the story to the marketplace. Real men seek no validation from the public.

The same rule applies to wives. Wives are customised confidants who should never allow themselves to be provoked or tempted to the point of forgetting that initial love or the good old days. A woman who rants about having been breadwinner or her husband’s sponsor may all along have been an enemy or a snake. Human beings should count every advantage or vantage a privilege.

When things go asunder, ex-sweethearts should force themselves to remain confined, guided or restrained by the echoes or aftertaste of sweetness enjoyed while the relationship lasted. It is okay for two or more people to go their separate ways but it is un-okay to broadcast or publish the dirty minuses of that erstwhile union. In fact, methinks it is childish and almost unforgivable to do so. Adults must learn to shut all entrances as gently as we can since there is a likelihood of reuse in future.

As I was saying, even life itself is a privilege where God is concerned. Yes, life is a human right, but a divine privilege. Man should never abuse this one privilege. Man should live and lead life as humbly, as maturely and as understandingly as cannot.

It is an abuse of privilege to forget what and who you should remember while remembering what and who you ought to have long forgotten. This mannerism even smacks of ingratitude or pride, or both. Man ought always to be thankful. Appreciative people do not abuse privilege.

Appreciative people are not classless, are not dishonourable, are not ranters. They may get angry with or even leave those who treated them poorly but they never cross the border of decency. They never descend into the abyss that borderline personality disorder is. They never because of a misunderstanding reveal hitherto unknown lurid details of what transpired when the going was good.

To do otherwise is to abuse privilege. To do otherwise because the other person did likewise is gross abuse of privilege. A person who understands the very weight of privilege does not run to the virtual village square just to have own say or just to even things out. Privilege is a cross, that everyone ought to bear like a stoic.

As we make to round off, let us attempt a list of contextual privileges. It is a very long list. So, please, be patient. Here you are: age mates, bedmates, besties, classmates, schoolmates.

Benefactors, clients, family, friends, spouses. Bosses, underbosses, capos, soldiers, “made” men. Coaches, colleagues, generals, guardians, men. Masters, mentors, partners, teachers, wards.

And, the list goes on. You can get in the church or religious set-up and establish the obvious chain of privileges. Get into the business world, get into politics, get into aviation: they all have a privileges architecture. There are uncountable privileges that must never be abused, everywhere you turn in life or human relations.

God bless Nigeria!