The world order is seldom right and many changes that have happened in the history have its roots in one or multiple Rebellion.

You can think about your country, your class, your locality, your own home, many meaningful changes have happened when someone rose against the authority. It can be a child who rebelled against his parents to choose the career that he wanted. An employee who rebelled against his company for better work conditions. Or our freedom fighters who rebelled against the foreign forces to get us independence.

Yet, rebellion is discouraged in our culture and we teach our kids and our teams to be conformists and obey the rules and regulations and not even to think of dissenting or even questioning anything.

Compliance is the Norm

This has been going for a long time and the result is that we have an army of compliant people around us who treat their bosses as god (or devil) and don’t question their actions or decisions and seldom suggests anything.

This is one of the major reasons of us generating substandard output, in whatever we are doing. Nobody questions anything, every instruction is taken as an order from the top and we have become simply executioners.

Even in knowledge industry like IT, we have a ton of executioners and very few rebels. In most of the cases while implementing a software program a developer simply implements it whatever he is told, or copies whatever he finds on the internet without really questioning it. And it’s not entirely his fault.

We have created such a culture where we have carved out specific roles of analyst, manager, developer, quality assurance, etc. and created boundaries in their minds that they seldom think beyond that. And when they do there are always people who would discourage them and would reprimand them going beyond their work area.

Why a requirement is really needed, if there is a better way to code the program, how the end user is going to use the feature, why we are rushing through things, what’s the downside of skipping some processes, these are the questions that are never raised or discussed within the teams. And the result is sub-standard output, a lot of rework and wasted efforts

Long Term Damages

Roles, hierarchy, authority is all ingrained in our psyche from the childhood and our institutions are aiding in this behavior. Even in class asking more or different questions is being looked down upon. The same behavior continues through college and work. We read about the changes and change-makers but don’t understand that most of it is because someone rebelled, someone questioned the status-quo, someone didn’t like the answers that were given. And yet we don’t encourage dissent, opposition, or rebellion.

This culture is making more subservient and if it continues we will not be able to think better, create better, choose better, or even question the right from wrong.

The leaders of today don’t have all the answers, they seldom even the right answers and yet we are following them unquestioningly. Why are we so afraid for our grades, wealth, reputations, jobs that we are not even questioning such things and people. Are we so enchanted by the puffed up videos and filtered pictures that we have we have made our-self believe that this is the truth?

It is only going to go worse from here.

The Answer is Rebellion

So what can we do, if we decide to do something about it? The answer is ‘Rebel’.

Don’t agree to the status-quo and try to change the situation around you in all walks of life. Encourage your colleagues, your team members, your family, your kids to ask questions, to oppose, to show discord and rebel. Hell encourage yourself to rebel. Rebel against the things feel wrong or should be changed. Don’t take the authority and the set process too seriously. Everything can change.

This isn’t about advocating chaos or needless opposition. But making it known to everyone around you that how the world is today doesn’t necessarily has to be this way. It’s about recognizing that change is possible, that improvement requires questioning, challenging, and yes, rebelling against the norms that hold us back.

There are things that have changed for better by earlier rebels and now is our time. Let’s empower ourselves and those around us to challenge the status quo, to strive for better, to dare to imagine a world where change is not only possible but inevitable. And rebellion is a way of life and not something that needs special courage.