Superstition, The Bane Of The Nigerian Mind

"Suffer not the witch to live" the pastor would quote from the ever poetic bible verse and is rewarded with an ear quaking "Amen" from the ever excited congregation. You could see the pouring emotions of deep fear as they shout and pray for the witches and wizards in their villages, uncles and grandmums and mother in-laws always at the center of this suspicion to die. You would see cases where continuous chants of "die! die!! die!!!" rents the air all meant for the alleged witch who supposedly by some spirity diabolical means is hindering their progress or health. This is a sad reality of the Nigerian society.. People blame abstract concepts like 'witches, Wizards, demons and devils' for their misfortune but never themselves. Such mindset is an extremely dangerous and disturbing and is exactly detrimental to the progress of such a person. Nigerians should learn to shed themselves of such ludicrous mindset that their misfortunes are shenanigans of some Uncle in the village because such mindset instills that imaginary fear that makes you look for imaginary solutions that in actuality will never work. I have said it time and again that anybody who blames every other person for their mistakes or misfortunes or conditions doesn't deserve to be trusted because they will blame every other but themselves for circumstances directly or indirectly is as a result of their own actions. We are in a remarkable millennium of outstanding scientific breakthrough in every aspect of human endeavour. We know that someone who breaks down and experiences severe seizure is neither possessed by any demon or having a demonic attack, that is a primitive way of rendering a diagnosis which is not only incorrect but far from ever being correct. It is a shame that in this 21st century world, there are actually humans who still hold such beliefs and even hold it to be true, that is particularly insulting to the human intellect. There was a time the European society was like this, every plague or unexplained event is attributed to some abstract ideas like witches, demons and co, it is known in human history as the dark ages.. we know how better off these society turned out after evolving pass such mindset. I watched a documentary in the discovery Channel about a tribe deep in the African rain forest, oblivious of any form of civilization, in fact they still go about Unclad. These people still hold the belief that illnesses are caused by evil spirits and as such require sacrifices to heal. The narrator was amazed how primitive such society is in this 21st century humans delude themselves with the notion that the whole world is almost civilized. I shook my head, if only he knew we still experience this in a large scale even in a supposedly civilized society like Nigeria. - A society where Children are being beaten up and abused while being accused of witch craft. - 2 year olds are being left to die in the open because one idiot claims he is a witch - Old women and men are being beaten to death by a mindless mob gripped hard in the shackles of a nameless imaginary danger or fear. - A society where unidentified ailments are automatically works of devils and witches while in a sane clime it should have been empirically scrutinized to ascertain the actual result and in doing so save millions of lives in the future. -The most sad of these is that this is also a society where people heap the blames of their own misfortunes on these abstract concepts. Tell me how anybody can be a master of his situation when he thinks that he is a victim of that situation? It is evidently clear that the victim's mindset diminishes the human potential, by not accepting responsibility for our actions and circumstances, we greatly reduce our ability to change them. tell me how one can succeed when he thinks his situation is the handiwork of someone and something else and not himself and by doing so rather sees himself as the victim of that circumstance.. Your misfortunes are not as a result of witches and wizard or that weird looking uncle in the village. No, we live in a random world of unstopping chain reactions of actions. Good things and bad things happen and can to anybody at any time and where by accepting this we will learn to accept the reality of our own conditions and accept full responsibility for them only then can we proffer real solutions that can actually change them, chanting in churches or temples or bathing in rivers to change your situation are more like digging where you should be filling up. Nigerian Nollywood i particularly also blame for a good percentage of this because they give a distorted view of reality but anyone who swallows such distortion is also part of his problem which is simplistic gullibility. It is time Africans (Nigerians) stop falling preys to Babalawos, Alfas, temple masters, pastors who fill your heads with a complete imbecilic superstition and fear .. Nobody can help you more than you and you can start by changing your mindset ... If you wear a red glass you will always see everything in a shade of red. So too if you fear witches/wizards/demons and live with that fear, you will see every slight fall out or whiff of wind as actions of witches and wizard.. It is time to take off the red glass and rid yourself of that fear that can only diminish your own potentials.. Africans should wake and rid themselves of these pitiful reverence of nonsensical superstitions or it will be the bane of our development.