Who is an Indian

Who is an Indian? Interesting article in the Wall Street Journal on identity, nationalism.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB126084908630491631.html

Suddenly, the NRI who rushed for the American green card, the Australian citizenship or the British passport insists on Indianness. On his/ her Indian cultural heritage. Tracing back the generations and lineage in eager longing to establish the link.

Is this a rush to identify with looming success. As they say, success has many fathers.

Being Indian has a rapidly emerging (and I argue, still largely undeserved) cache. Of intelligence. Street smart - Jugadoo. Starting to be successful (sic). Innovative even, to an extent. Of the future. Of Bollywood. Of IT. Of Yoga and mysticism in sync with software and the Nano. Vital, flowing, India.

I do not wish to judge. But if the same person once and earlier always insisted on being called Trinidadian, Kenyan, British etc. rather than Indian s/he is being convenient. Here was a person distancing him/herself from India ashamed (justifiably) to be tagged Indian. Now eager to hitch his/ her wagon to the star. To achieve by association rather than achievement.

A rising tide lifts all boats. And the NRI wants to move up too. Even if by tenuous heritage. Best of luck. Which way the wind blows, the straw bends.

Tiger Woods

I see the Tiger Woods "scandal" with scarce disbelief. There is no justification for his alleged behavior, no excuse for his callousness. He has wronged. But wait a second, he has not wronged you, or me, or the public at large. Certainly not the media which has gone to town with the moral angles.

What is the benefit of this yellow journalism? Did his wife get information about new alleged liaisons from the newspapers, and even if so, how does this help her? Did the channels "out" a enemy of the state, and so did they perform a public duty?

The Tiger Woods saga is a case in point of the 'TRP chasing' downhill slide that world media is inexorably going towards. Punch the fallen, especially if he was right up there prior. Show that the bigger they are, the harder they fall. Feast on the remains of trashed dignity.

Are we not to blame equally? We want the ringside view on the trashing. We want to hover and look over the shoulder at the shamed, and a secret side of us feels the better of it, even if hypocrytically. Not for us 'he who hath not sinned must cast the first stone". Eliot Spitzers all of us. Now HE was a public figure that needed bringing down - sponsoring tough legislation against street trafficking with utmost indignation at the harm to society one day, and hiring high priced call girls the same night. Walk the talk he did not.

Marion Jones cheated her peers by taking drugs. She hurt others. She cheated on the public. She hurt the sports' image by doing something wrong WITHIN the sport. Vilify her all we must.

Now one could argue that Woods created a public persona of the family loving clean sports superstar. And sponsors paid him huge amounts to endorse their products. Did ANYONE in their right mind buy products and services from these companies because of that image?

Would you invest in a ponzi scheme only because Sachin Tendulkar appeared for an advertisement of the scheme? Would you do your own research and undertake a rational buying decision? If not, YOU are naive, gullible. Susceptible to advertising that brainwashes you. You value form over function.

You are probably the kind of person who would deify a hero and villainise the person if such an event happened such as befell Tiger Woods. Blame yourself. Not Tiger Woods.

Now if Tendulkar endorses a company that makes crap cricket equipment and you bought it and were dissatisfied, he deserves tabloid journalism. But Tiger did not advise you not to have affairs and then quietly go and conduct his indiscretions ( a la afore mentioned Eliot Spitzer). He has not been advocating fidelity and truth. He is a golfer. That is all. And if the Nike clubs he peddles(d?) make you feel less like Tiger because of this scandal, go out and practice.

He is a morally conflicted man with many demons who needs help to value what is important to his long term health - his wife and children. He needs counselling. He needs deifying for the right things - his superb domination of golf.

Leave him alone. Leave his family to be. They don't need our curiosity. They do not want our attention. They need our quiet sympathy and tacit support to sort their affairs. For the sake of the children. For our sake. Because we need families to be the bedrock unit of society, and these are becoming a dying breed in our rush for individuality. More on that later!

Arrogance and Resentment

I was getting into the lift this afternoon in the office and motioned to someone already inside to move further in as there was sufficient space to allow more people to come in. He glared at me.

Tell the poor driver who blocks the road to stay on the left side. Ask the person who wrongly walks on the road at his own peril to instead use the pavement. Invite someone to honour the queue like you do. Insist that someone who throws waste on the road puts it instead in the dustbin.

Most civilized people would be first embarrassed, knowing they were caught out doing something wrong. Then they would likely comply.

In India, you would be abused for trying to educate. There is an arrogance that is breath taking. The sense is of superiority, of being better than others. The caste and class system means one cannot be told of being wrong. The sense of false pride requires that one cannot be pulled up in public, no matter that one's actions are not worthy of pride. There is no absolute benchmark in our culture, it is relative to the surroundings. So the educated Indian is a boor in Bangalore, and a Roman in Rome. Indians are ashamed of being out of place in the 'developed' West and will largely conform to some basic disciplines. That is however too much to expect back home in India. Here we are too busy, too tired. The government has not provided toilets. The city council has not placed enough dust bins. The public works department has created terrible roads. The person in front of me drives badly.

The sense of not doing wrong oneself, but believing that everyone else does. The sense that others must be responsible and oneself is blameless and is doing all one can.

This arrogance combines quite nicely with a sense of resentment. There is an ill will towards one's perceived betters. The class system also has institutionalized a constant and nagging negative envy. The story of the Indian crabs in a bucket refusing to allow the best crab to climb out and escape, pulling him down every time is a good metaphor for the situation. Our political class has espoused socialism as a way of tapping popular anger at one's own poverty. The zamindar is a good target. The landlord always has obtained his wealth on the backs of the poor laborer. The rich have got there apparently at the expense of the poor in movies and political speeches.

In a road accident, the larger vehicle is to blame. The pedestrian hit by a cyclist while crossing the road without looking, the cyclist swerving into the path of a motorcycle, the bike rider who attempts to squeeze at high speed between two cars. In every case, there is no attempt to understand cause. The mob sides with the underdog. The under class will never want to learn from the perceived upper class. The messenger significantly altering the meaning of the message.

The arrogance and resentment that permeates India means that we will never become better where we should. We will not become civilized. Yes, many will become rich. More will become prosperous - the much touted middle class. We will harvest the demographic divide. The hopeful even argue that with an improving economic future, we will become gentler. What of our culture, our civilization. Brash. Loud. Bling. In your face. Big, bigger.

I despair. The mark of a civilization is an awareness and education of right and wrong. Compliance to this is an individual evolution but a mark of a developed society is to extract a collective larger social will on its inhabitants. I see neither in our immediate future.