I was talking to my partner about this but unlearning the colonial and bourgeois mindset of the Pakistani “left” or progressive academia is a lifelong process. Returning to indigenous ways of thought and traditions, our people’s reinventions without pandering to the gaze

Of civil society, the intelligentsia or the “West” is difficult when English-language education is hammered into us but it’s so necessary if we’re ever going to be self-confident, freethinking Pakistanis/South Asians. Capitalism in our society doesn’t just deprive us

Materially but also damages our psyche with constant insecurity and inferiority, the need to assimilate into wealth *as a way of thinking* and it’s so important to overcome that by undoing the colonial/capitalist processes imposed on our minds and hearts.