My uncle and aunt are my ‘parents’ now. My uncle too supports me but I have a problem with my aunt and other relatives.
Because I see everything through a scientific lense and everything that passes through it always goes against the tide. Superstitions are completely opposite to science and my superstitious relatives therefore find it difficult to deal with me.
But by going the opposite way I am helping my relatives. How?
Everybody has his or her own right to believe in what they think is right for them. Right? But...there is an exception...
This right exists only till it doesn't do any harm to others around. The moment we realize some harm is being done because of these baseless beliefs, we have to negate them, fight them and try to eradicate them.
The health of a society as a whole is more important than an individual's right to have his or her beliefs.
I will now tell you a real story to underline this point of mine.
Recently while I was travelling with my aunt and uncle in a car, we found grey pumpkins on the way and my aunt wanted to buy one and asked the driver to stop the car..
"Do you want to prepare 'fryums' with it?" I asked her.
"No. I want to hang it in front of my house. The old one has become black because of peoples' nazar', she replied.
Before I opened my mouth, she immediately added after seeing the expression on my face, "There is no need to criticize me. My beliefs are mine. You have to respect them if you want to respect me".
My aunt very well knows I don't believe in such superstitions. So she tried to put a brake on my lecture on them.
I respect my aunt as she is older than me, loves me and looks after me. But that doesn't make me respect her beliefs. Why? Because her baseless beliefs are harming the societies we live in! How?
She goes and tells everybody around that 'Nazar' (Buri nazar in Hindi/Urdu, evil eyes, looks, views in English, 'disti' in Telugu) can cause harm and therefore each and every person should use grey pumpkins to neutralize the effect of 'Nazar'. Okay, if that gives them some sort of satisfaction, we have no right to say people cannot follow what they believe in. But when she spread this superstition, everybody around started believing in it. So all her neighbours started using grey pumpkins too. These pumpkins, after sometime, became black, not because of 'nazar' but because of fungal spores.
What is worse is these spores come out of the pumpkin and spread all over the place whenever a breeze brushes it causing allergies in people. Imagine a whole neighbourhood infested with these spores spreading asthma in the vulnerable! How can I respect such a thing?!
No, I cannot respect my aunt's beliefs. I respect her and her right to have such beliefs to make her mind remain calm with a belief that a grey pumpkin can remove 'nazar' and protect her and her family. But it is causing harm to the society we live in! Therefore, I have every right to criticize, educate and remove these misconceptions and baseless beliefs. That doesn’t make me disrespect my aunt. I am only trying to protect her and other people with my ‘disrespect’!
Therefore, I started my lecture…
Superstitions don't have any science behind them!
So if you are fighting with your parents regarding superstitions, don’t worry, you are doing the right thing. You have to think about and view the broader picture. Thinking about only your parents, narrows your vision.