Gotabaya and State Building = Gotabaya vs Victor Ivan

Religions and state buildings are historically intertwined. Actions of Galagoda Attte Gnansara Tera shall be understood in this context. Victor Ivon seems to miss this point in previous article published in Colombo Telegraph.

Once religion was what kept the realm/boarders somewhat coherent and in the shape of a modern state - think about the both Roman Empires. What changed when the Holy one changed into modern nation-states is the inevitable caricaturisation of old ideas around social contracts. This is the period we now recognise as Western Enlightenment. The subjects which once kept within the boarders of states together by good old power and the belief of God now changes into somewhat secular subjects which happened to be living in social contracts.

However, it is obvious for those who realise it that even today the core of the Western beliefs are still broadly based on the Christian religious underpinning. It is because of it has a strong appeal to common ethics, not the other way around. The gravity of the point of West against the Rest makes sense when this point is realised.

Meanwhile, in the distance land of Sri Lanka, what kept the subjects of it all together as Sri Lankans? 

To my understanding, it is the lack of historical sense of what it means to be a Sri Lankan overwhelmingly unifies them as Sri Lankans? Last five hundred years of colonization has lot to do with it. This is the reason why Sri Lankan does not know what they dressed, what they ate and how they lived within that period. That is the birth place for lack of historical being of modern Sri Lankans.

Some say it is the character of Sinhala Buddhism that kept the common sense alive and gave the identity for its subjects, including to none Buddhists. If so, what that really means? In my understanding there had nothing offered the Sinhalese an identity as such which they could be proud of. Their proud identity is revealed only by their inferiority complex to westerners; by the desperation of theirs to run away for greener marshlands elsewhere; and by the demoralizing talks of theirs of their nation. I am not ignoring the dreams of many of those who wishes to make the land greener and prosperous. 

So, the creation of an identity which all Sri Lankan could be genuinely proud of has to be a post-war endeavor, and a very difficult one. But how does we do that. They is no rocket science here to grasp but only to look into the main characters of the society and enhance their potential. History teaches how bad things could go wrong when attempted to create a whole new identity - Ex: Aryan race of Hitler. 

Buddhism is what easily accessible element of the society to creat a strong and a proud identity. But whole point of this endeavour is that this could not be implemented as a national policy. That could attract domestic and international critisim inflicting great damage to the nation-building project.

So, the dramas of Galagoda Attte Gnansara Tera is to understood in this context - to what extent his actions solidify the subjects of this land.  Watareka Vijitha Tera is also a great puzzle of this post-war identity building process - he reinforces Gnansara. Creations of solid identities have naver being far away from brutalities. Nation-building is not for wobbly bobbly individuals. Victor Ivan is to understand that. Philosophy is for philosophers. Action is for doers, for politicians. Change/create things as Marx said. That involves destruction.