We must teach our children the value of wearing masks

With all the noise being made about wearing masks, you would think that we have embraced the use of those things, right? Wrong! 

It is only when a stern-faced guard blocks our entry into a bank or some other place that we realise we have forgotten or neglected to wear a mask. Luckily, there is always a mask seller nearby. So we just buy one to gain entry. 

Masks are not our thing. They are a Japanese thing! That is what I discovered when I visited Japan in 2003, 16 years before coronavirus came along and upended the world. I will always remember the sight of Japanese people wearing snow-white masks everywhere: At the airport in Tokyo, in the commuter trains and buses, in restaurants and shops, in offices, on the streets, and in the bullet trains connecting Tokyo to Kyoto, Osaka, Hiroshima and other cities I visited.

Here we are being told to wear masks to prevent ourselves from catching [or spreading] coronavirus. There, the Japanese wear masks largely because of their culturally courteous society. Their objective is to prevent any germs one might be carrying from spreading to anyone else. Those people think about other people first. That is what courtesy is all about. Courtesy simply polite behaviour.

Courtesy is the same reason why I never heard a mobile phone ring in a public place in Tokyo, a mega city of 10 million people, where basically everyone had a phone. In the trains and buses, I saw notices politely reminding passengers to keep their phones in silent mode so as not to “annoy other passengers” if a phone rang! There were also “priority seats” reserved for pregnant women, the disabled and the elderly.

Why are Japanese a courteous lot? Simple: They are taught from childhood to exhibit polite behaviour. The family is seen as the most important institution for socialisation, instilling discipline and shaping the character of children at a tender age. 

Let us think about this for a while. With the rapid spread of Covid-19 even in rural communities, why don’t we see everyone donning a mask? It is because family values in our society have been under serious attack for quite a while. 
We have learnt never to give a damn about other people. 

Each of us is a centre of our own little universe. See what is happening before our very eyes. Every two-bit politician is running as a self-centred Independent candidate in the 2021 General Election!
They say they have created an “Independent movement.” Shaa, tell that to the birds!

Truth be told, our family structure has been so shaken at the roots that we have allowed our children to grow up independently. Like some kind of wild plants. 
What do we see now with that kind of attitude? We see nasty headlines such as the one in the Daily Monitor of October 26 stating that there were 4,300 teenage pregnancies reported in March, April, May and June.

We must take advantage of the Covid-19 era to find time to teach our children the value of wearing masks as one way of instilling a sense of courtesy and nationalism in their minds. 
Either we add courtesy to the nursery/primary school curriculum or we risk going down, down, down!

Dr Akwap is the deputy vice chancellor for academic affairs at Kumi University.  [email protected]