TWO-EDGED EFFECTS OF CULTURAL GLOBALIZATION (IKA TO NOTE)
By Chief Dr Onyekpeze
As stated earlier on, “cultural globalization destroys diversity and displaces the opportunity to sustain decent lives through a mixture of many cultures.” Global poverty, consumerism, and waste existing side by side with misery and indigence are some of the greatest injustices of globalization. The worst evil in globalization is that the Western World is exploiting other nations. They dictate the price, and many others have nothing to give except their labour. At present, it is only one direction. Almost everything comes from the West; others are consumers in the global culture.
In the same manner, certain unhealthy Western elements are becoming common and rampant in the global culture. Such elements like abortion, ‘gay rights’ and same-sex marriage, drug and human trafficking, prostitution, pornography, suicide, gross self-interest, waste of human lives without fear of prosecution, increased death rate as a fall out of assassinations, political and religious violence, and other social and moral vices, are trumpeted all in the name of freedom in the global culture. Some of these evils are noticed in many societies around the Ika community and some of the elements in themselves, are fast becoming aspects of culture, and are already infiltrating into Ika culture.
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Though globalization is another name for Colonialism, at the same time, its benefits cannot, but be bought since the Ika do not have them. It can be a form of exploitation. It has become a two-edged sword. It depends on the person who uses it. Pope John Paul 11 aptly opines that “globalization apriori is neither good nor evil. It will be what people make of it.” For instance, the academic-cum informative benefits of the Internet, the Global System for Mobile Communication (GSM), Television, Radio, Western education, Christianity, Banks, etc, cannot be said to be evils. For example, mobile phones have transformed the telecommunication industry in Nigeria. Interestingly, these devices (GSM) can be used to make telephone calls from almost anywhere provided there is service.
The problem with globalization is not that it is evil per se, but that what is being paid for it is far greater than what benefits are derived from it. This will continue for a long time because many cultures have yet to produce their version of these benefits.