The impact of literacy on us can’t be quantified, but it’s not what defines who we are. Being a literate contributes to so many things about every individual. It’s capable of influencing our lifestyle, reasoning, decision making, but there are several other factors that contribute to our overall identity and character. While literacy can improve our lives or broaden our perspectives about life, it’s just one aspect of the diverse nature of human experience.
If not for anything, literacy gives us exposure and knowledge to approach and handle things differently around us. It distinguishes us when we adopt the influence, and you can easily tell that a person is learned from their speech, interaction, and others.
For example, I have boarded a bus where the conductor was a graduate, and you can tell from the way he was speaking to us. A woman disrespected him, and he handled it how any knowledgeable person would have done. He told the woman not to look down on him because he is a graduate, and she felt embarrassed in the end. I can tell that the woman thinks she can get away with the insults she threw at the conductor just because she speaks big grammar, but it was the other way around. It turned out literacy had a good impact on the bus conductor than the woman.
Another experience showed me the opposite side. I once lived in an environment where there were very few literates, and it’s one of the worst places I have been. There was zero tolerance among neighbors, and they fight about every slight disagreement. Their manner of approach to issues is just completely terrible, and the most annoying case is that they have successfully influenced the younger ones in the community.
Being the type that loves to interact with everyone, I got caught up in a messy situation there. I was returning from work, and upon arriving home, I realized that my neighbors were settling an issue. I just walked past them, and a man started shouting that if I had waited, he would have broken a bottle on my head. I wondered what must have prompted him to say something like that, so I went back. The other neighbors were holding him, preventing him from coming to me. I was completely confused and asked what was happening. Someone said the man was alerted that I was having an affair with his wife, and he has been threatening to hurt me since morning.
Honestly, I didn’t know what to say and just went inside my room because I was too exhausted for such conversation. It’s not the first time cases like that have happened, but it didn’t involve me, and that was the first time. After resting, I went to look for the man and sat him down to clear his doubt.
Whenever he raised his voice, I always reminded him that we are not fighting. I ended asking for the source of the information, and we summoned the woman. She started stammering, mentioned names, and it turned out to be something they started as a gossip. After clearing the issue, the man apologized, and ever since that day, I became a judge in the house. Later, my fiancée came around, and one woman jokingly told her that I was caught cheating with a neighbor’s wife. My fiancée just laughed and said her man won’t do such.
While literacy can play a huge role on us, it doesn’t define us like I mentioned earlier. I have seen literates do questionable things, and I wonder if whatever education they’ve had didn’t have any influence on them.
We can’t blame them because their traits, background, experience, culture, values can also be a huge influence on them, so literates don’t complete us as humans. It doesn’t guarantee any ethical or moral behavior. Literates can behave poorly, just like an illiterate can behave very reasonably than many literates. I have seen illiterates do things that you would rarely expect, and we can as well commend their values, upbringing, and others.
Regardless, being literate is a crucial thing because no matter how little it might be, it would make a difference for us. For instance, I was watching a video where a popular TikToker said his private part was itching him live on camera. He sounded very nasty, and everyone around him corrected him. His girlfriend told him not to say such. She insisted that he composed himself, but he got angry instead.
He repeated the statement a few times again, and a bit of literacy wouldn’t have made him say such a thing. Even if he did, he would have taken correction, so we can’t look down on literacy.
All Image Are Mine.