Nigeria’s Sociology of Vanity -By Kehinde Oluwatosin B.

Given that we are a society hostile to reflection, death is one of the few events that takes us into a compulsory state of reflection. The mood around the grave, of the possibility of eventually entering into the grave, of the aftermath of the grave is almost similar across cultures in Nigeria.

Death reminds us of the transient nature of life and the meaninglessness of living. Of all that is said at the demise of a loved one , if you will forget anything it’s pardonable because, it is possible it was not said with enough repetition to stick in your memory, however to forget “vanity upon vanity is vanity” is unpardonable.

Vanity upon vanity has been an inseparable part of the sociology of the grave and at every death, we are reminded of the vanity upon vanity mantra.

Another event that takes us into compulsory reflection, is the return of Christ. This is mostly applicable to Christian faithfuls. The teaching of the rapture,the Antichrist, hell and the end time imposes a toga of fear on majority of Christians.

The rapture is the reason we have momentary children of God, the rapture is the reason a rapture preaching church might not be crowded. The rapture pride itself as a regulator of the human conduct for after every message on rapture there is a positive, although momentary change of attitude.

All of these reflective possibilities have changed given that we are a nation whose yesterdays is always better than today. It is important to note that the yesterday I’m referring to is not a tale into a distant past only, rather our immediate yesterday.

Everything old is always better than the new in the Nigerian context. Our capacity to reflect has not only dwindled it has collapsed that even the two previous events: Death and the coming of Christ are not even enough to align us back to reflection.

That part of us that should have been given to reflection has been replaced with crass materialism and vanity. Of all my few years in this world, I have never seen a generation so given to vanity like this one. When I say this generation I’m talking of both the young and even the old who have been tilted towards the culture of vanity just to be among.

The craze of vanity is so bad, that even previous events that takes us into reflection are now used as a conduit to express our vanity, for instance people now take selfies at burials of the influential and post on social media to tell us they were also there.

If you want to have a first hand grasp of our disposition towards vanity , just register on instagram. I want to believe, the instagram is Nigeria’s destination of choice in all things vein.

On instagram,everyone is either slaying, advertising their new cloths, their new spouses , their cars, the latest country visited, ladies and women placing their hands between the space left between their lapped loins as a new form of pose.

It’s often amusing when I see excessive displays of these things, I tell my self that the inventor of the instagram platform is hardly known, yet we pride ourselves on being users than makers.

Everything the typical Nigerian prides on is often a product of other reflected societies , yet she’s is hostile to reflection and asking shamefully: “who reflection epp?”

The church is not even left out in this hostility to reflection and
sudden tilt towards vanity. In an attempt to retain the crowd ,the church has numbed all reflective kind of messages.

A cursory look at the just concluded big brother Nigeria (BBNaija) opens a window into this cascade into vanity as many began to waft and wrap prayers points to reflect the names of the winner.

The only reason why we saw winners of bb naija as our point of contact even in our prayers is our disposition towards vanity ,consider these and even the recent furore and frenzy towards a guy buying a car for his girlfriend imbuing into our communication base a lexicon of assurance ,then you understand that in the Nigerian context that vanity upon vanity is not vanity but celebrity status.

It’s the sociology of vanity that makes people steal in government and after such acquisition investment goes back into vanity. I wager that, if this culture of vanity continues the best leadership will not change Nigeria. Think on these things.

Kehinde Oluwatosin Babatunde is a prolific writer and public speaker.

Email: Kehindeobabatunde@gmail.com
Twitter: @_tqatq