IMAGE: BTS | Source and Copyright: LG전자 | Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic
Over the course of the past seven years, BTS have shattered countless records, produced meaningful and incredibly awesome music, achieved amazing milestones, improved South Korea’s economy, appeared on American and British TV shows and changed the lives of millions of people for the better.
They have done all of this while singing in Korean, speaking mostly in Korean, posting on social media in Korean and staying true to their original self – and, here in lies an important lesson for my fellow South Asians, especially Pakistanis and Indians.
It is their skills and talent as well as their character and behaviour which sets BTS on a much higher level than their fellow artists and groups. They are amazing as individuals and awesome as a group because they work hard everyday to improve the field they work in. Each and everyday, they increase their knowledge and expertise as musicians.
BTS’s success show us that we should improve ourselves as individuals, improve our skills, make our selves more knowledgeable than yesterday and most importantly stay truthful to our roots.
Regardless of whether you’re a coder, a software developer, an engineer, an accountant, a journalist, a business person, an investor, an artist, a sports player or belong to any other field – your first objective should be to become the best version of yourself in that field.
This commendable attitude of BTS members entails a lesson for all of us: stay true to yourself rather than conforming to some phony, man-made standards.
You may ask: “why does BTS’s example include an important lesson for South Asians?”
From a very young age, we – as South Asians – are always taught to communicate in English. “Learn English because it will make you sound more intelligent”, “speak English because people will respect you more”, “master the English language and you will have more ‘rishtas‘ coming for you”, etc. This is just a glimpse of the obsession that South Asian communities have with wanting their children to speak English.
A major reason for this obsession is due the colonial rule by the British in South Asia, a brutal 200 year rule that ingrained the idea that everything associated with the British is great and amazing while everything non-British belongs in the dumpster and down the drainage. Although the British Raj ended in 1947, this colonial propaganda remains alive to this very day.
Putting the historical context to one side, it is evident that the present attitude of most of our societies is completely antithetical to BTS’s success story.
Instead of obsessing about a language, we should obsess about becoming better human beings, we should obsess about excelling in a our careers and work places – that’s what intelligence and respect should be judged on, and not on one’s ability to speak some gibberish from the language of our former colonial masters.
Emulating BTS members can actually free us from this colonial mindset that we have all been living with even after the end of colonial rule.
Now, I am not saying that you shouldn’t learn English or any other languages. You definitely should and the more language you speak the better it is for your brain and for your overall health.
But learn a second language with the right mindset, learn the language because you may need it later in life (when travelling or working) or may want to learn the language because you might love a particular culture. With the right mindset, learning a new language can become an absolute joy.
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Raza Hussain is an award-winning writer: the Extra-Mile winner of the News Quest Young Reporter Scheme 2014 and the recipient of the ‘Talent for Writing’ certificate by Young Writers. He was also awarded the ‘Prize for Outstanding achievement is Sociology‘. Twitter: @M_Raza5 | Instagram: @M.Raza.H
