Rimbaud

I shall say – not a thing: I shall think – not a thing:
But an infinite love will swell in my soul,
And far off I shall go, a bohemian,
Through Nature – as happy, as if I had a girl.

Occupy History

We are the 99% is one of the most prominent messages of the Occupy Wall Street movement. It is true that the top 1% of the population have inordinate power and wealth when compared to the rest. It is beyond evident that this inequality exists and one has to be delusional to not see it. However, the notion that this is a new phenomenon or that there is a sudden increase in wealth inequality because of Bush's policies or Cheney's evil grin is not based on historic facts. In People's History, Howard Zinn writes that in 1687 the top 1% owned 25% of all wealth and the number went up to 44% in 1770. History shows that the wealthy have always been wealthy. The system has been rigged from the beginning.

Power of Vulnerability - Brene Brown

Vulnerability is not weakness, nor is it optional. We can't opt out of the uncertainty, exposure, and emotional risks that are woven through our daily experiences. Like it or not, vulnerability is coming, and we have to decide if we’re going to open up to it or push it away. The only choice we really have is how we're going to respond to feeling vulnerable. And contrary to popular belief, our shields don't protect us. They simply keep us from being seen, heard, and known.

If there's anything I've learned over the past decade and experienced firsthand over the last year, it's this: Our willingness to own and engage with our vulnerability determines the depth of our courage and the clarity of our purpose. Even if letting ourselves be seen and opening ourselves up to judgment or disappointment feels terrifying, the alternatives are worse: Choosing to feel nothing -- numbing. Choosing to perfect, perform, and please our way out of vulnerability. Choosing rage, cruelty, or criticism. Choosing shame and blame. Like most of you reading this, I have some experience with all of these alternatives, and they all lead to same thing: disengagement and disconnection.

One of my favorite quotes is from theologian Howard Thurman. He writes, "Don’t ask what the world needs; ask what makes you come alive, and go do it. Because what the world needs is more people who have come alive."

Vulnerability is not easy, but it’s the surest sign that we’ve come alive.

http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/en/brene_brown_on_vulnerability.html

Chanson d'automne

The long sobs of
The violins
Of autumn
Lay waste my heart
With monotones
Of boredom.

- Paul Verlaine

Maslow

I have always wondered why it was in the interest of politicians to keep the 99%, also known as dirty fucking hippies, poor? Because they are evil doesn't quite cut it for me.

And it stuck me... and maybe it is just too obvious and everybody else already knew it. But atleast I arrived to this party.

It is simply Maslow's hierarchy of human needs. Keep the unwashed masses worried about their survival and they have no interest in other higher needs like dignity and compassion. Right and wrong. All of this is 'misdirection'. So we don't care what they do. we are too busy running the rat race. keeping our eyes on the ball. Fill in your favourite cliche here.

OMG! I am so stupid to not see it before.

Bhagwati is not wrong

Jagdish Bhagwati is incredibly credentialled. He is the Professor of Economics at Columbia. If I remember right, he was in contention for the Nobel prize a couple of years ago. So when he wrote 'The Outsourcing Bogeyman' , a lament that so few understand that everyone wins from outsourcing, I was more than a little bit shocked. I expected better from Prof. Bhagwati. That Republicans are pro-business and democrats pick on defenceless businesses by calling them names and demonizing them in the media is a narrative congealed in popular discourse (Cry me a river, won't you). Forget that the Clinton administration initiated a lot of the current outsourcing policies and the Obama administration has been steadfastly loyal to big money except for the occasional posturing.

Politics aside, I understand that there is no room for protectionism in the free market system. I understand that liberalizing trade with developing countries opens new markets to sell American wares. In turn the developing countries gain jobs because of their competitiveness (read cheap labour). The good professor is right. Everybody wins.

Except.

The trade surplus that America gains in this transaction goes to the wealthy banks and businesses while the jobs that are lost are from the middle class and the poor.

Yes, free market is free market. But what can be done about the jobless. What good does Prof. Bhagwati's assertion that everybody wins do to a family of four whose breadwinner has been laid off as his job has been shipped to India or China. What fault was it of his that he was born in the United States and not in India? He can't meet Michael Dell over cocktails at Davos and ask him for his job back, can he?

And Prof. Bhagwati, you want fallacy, I give you fallacy. The businesses that are outsourcing are not doing so only because it is uneconomic to maintain in the west (as you so delicately put it), they are doing it because they can boost their profits and give more to their shareholders. It is not the role of the business to care for anything other than their bottomline. I dig that. This is where the government can step in and play a role. Not as a force of protectionism but as the defender of its citizens' ability to pursue life, liberty and happiness. The government for instance, can say that while it cannot stop the businesses from outsourcing its operations, it can impose a tax on the profits that corporations make by reducing its operating cost. But since imposing a tax on corporations is equivalent to class warfare, killing your children and siding with devil, it is politically untenable, economically populist or not. A reasonable alternative is presented wherein no new taxes are imposed but merely the suspension of tax incentives given to businesses. Not all tax incentives, for I am no commie. Just the tax credit received for outsourcing; a Clinton-era initiative that encouraged businesses to outsource before it became the 'in-thing'. That is not the same as railing against evil corporations, is it? That doesn't make the world any less flat, does it? (Yo! Friedman, ever heard of Copernicus). Maybe that money can be used to, I don't know, re-train the unemployed, invest in infrastructure or create jobs that aren't outsource-able.

On a side note, Carly Fiorina got shellacked in the elections not because she was an evil person who outsourced jobs. She was not elected because her background as a businesswoman does not add any credibility to her as a person capable of protecting the interests of her constituents. That was the position that she was contesting for; a lobbyist for the common man in her state. HP has enough lobbyists, thank you very much. Who will speak for the voiceless if the members of Congress and Senate are also lobbyists for the interests of big business?

As hard as it maybe for you to believe Professor, I don't want to lynch businessmen. I want an equal contest between the aspirations of the poor and the needs of the business, even if the arena in which this bout takes place is the 'free market'. Is that too much to ask?

***Alert*** Political rant ahead

A friend shared this article by Kanchan Gupta on FB. I was totally going to applaud Mr. Gupta... if only he had said Soviet style a few more times, used the word 'Orwellian' in case we mistook Big Brother to be a vapid TV show and thrown in a nazi or brownshirt reference or two into the mix.

Obviously, I have a few issues with his punditry. Kanchan writes

Everybody knows that the route to a corruption-free India lies through radical reforms that will ensure minimum government, maximum governance

Isn't it like saying "Everybody knows that the secret to long life is healthy living". Maybe I have been missing insightful articles that he may have written in other places, but what exactly is his trillion dollar idea that will ensure minimum government and maximum governance. All of us wish nothing more than to have the biggest bang for buck. Pray do tell, Mr. Gupta. What does this radical reform that everyone knows about and doesn't fatten government look like? I am asking because if there is a bill or policy that would do it but is not being adopted because of lack of political will, political rookie that I am, I'd like to know what it is. Is there any country that has done these magical reforms that you talk about?

Kanchan helpfully hints

But that’s a tedious process which will also mark the end of entitlements

which begs the question: what entitlements? We have no working concept of social security. There is no unemployment insurance. There is hardly anything that you will call medicare. The only entitlements we have are PDS which gives subsidized rice, wheat and such and without which starvation would reach Somalia levels (FAO puts our undernourished at 21% which is about the same as it was 20 years ago) and government hospitals and primary health care system which is the closest thing to affordable access to medical facilities that more than a third of the country is ever going to see (according to World Bank, the number of people below poverty line is 455 million). Public education has worked miracles, bringing our literacy levels from humiliating to about average.

I am all ears... explain how private enterprise is going to make India a better place. I'd like to ask Kanchan what govt programs does he want to shrink. What programs does he want to axe? What entitlements are holding us back. I hope Kanchan is not suggesting that the best way to get rid of corruption in government, is to get rid of government. I mean, if we didn't have a police force at all, then we wouldn't have to bribe the constable in the street corner. If there was no Dept of motor vehicles, then we wouldn't have to bribe to get a licence. Some reports suggest that only 42% of PDS reaches target population. If we perhaps abolished PDS (and not replace it with something similar), then we'll control corruption?

That is not to say the Lokpal bill is the silver bullet that will change everything. That is not even to say that corruption is the only thing that stands between India and greatness. Yes, populism can be bad. It can be misguided. Look at the Teaparty. But does Kanchan not think that more transparency and a watchdog body has the potential to deter government officials from taking bribes? Isn't it worth trying?

Or put another way, is there a non-governmental player that could possibly act as an effective overseer of government?

As for the bilge about Checkpoint Charlie, the socialist official scowled as he checked his passport and didn't smile or say good morning because he wasn't paid for it. I wonder if on the way back to American sector of West Germany, did the freedom-loving capitalist official give him a coca-cola and a blowjob? Are we still selling copy by scaring the world of the red menace? I thought we hated them terrorists these days.

That's a spin

According to this article in Rediff, Breivik was a Christian fundamentalist who wrote in his 1500 page manifesto that he was inspired by the Knights Templar, a 12th century armed Christian movement with a history of battles against the Muslims to save Europe. This should not be confused with the Hindutva ideology, writes an RSS member. RSS, for the uninitiated, is the armed Hindu movement with a history of battles against the Muslims to save India. Clearly, they are as different as day and night.

In related news, crows are white and milk is black.

By the way,

"killing innocents is reprehensible in strongest possible words. But the attempts to link it to Hindutva movement are also equally reprehensible"

He could have removed the word "equally" and still would have been an enormous douchebag.

And just to prove that Hindutva is not ideologically similar to the Norwegian, the first commenter, a Vishnu Sharma helpfully writes, Brevik's anger is understanable but his actions were premature.

Night and day, I say. Completely different.

Well! That's a spin that would bamboozle even Sachin.

Update: The author of the article led me to believe that sensationalist newspapers were trying to link Hindutva with Breivik based on passing references to the state of India. This is what Breivik actually wrote in his manifesto about the Hindutva movement

It is essential that the European and Indian resistance movements learn from each other and cooperate as much as possible. Our goals are more or less identical.

The PCCTS, Knights Templar support the Sanatana Dharma movements and Indian nationalists in general.

Don't mess with John Stuart Mill

It is better to be a human being dissatisfied than a pig satisfied; better to be Socrates dissatisfied than a fool satisfied. And if the fool or the pig are of a different opinion, it is because they only know their side of the question.

Unselfish v Selfish

We humans are not selfish and all rules and laws made with the assumption that we are basically selfish should be done away with. This was the argument put forward by an article in the Harvard Business Review called 'The Unselfish Gene'. I am not adequately qualified nor did I pay sufficient notice to this article to competently critique it. But I always thought that 'Selfish gene' by Dawkins (and the title is a play on that) was very clear on one thing: He was not calling humans selfish. I mean, the whole idea of the book was that genes were selfish and they would do just about anything to promote their best interests even if said interests were not favourable to the human who possesses them. Human selfishness in so much as they are caused by the genes are eminently alterable. Altruism and generosity are cultivable traits.

Why then would some noted intellectual heavyweight declare that Dawkins was wrong and that we are unselfish?

Because context matters.

In Harvard Business Review, the unselfishness of humans as proven by study X, survey Y and thought experiment Z is irrefutable evidence that it is time to de-regulate the markets. Banks are good; Businesses are kind. We don't need the government telling us to curtail predatory lending or not increase charges on credit cards. We are UNSELFISH. Global financial crisis was caused by a few bad apples. We are all intrinsically good people and we can police ourselves. Don't burden us with rules and regulations.

Say it with me, "Financial regulations are so 80s"

An open letter to a Kollywood knight

There is as much logic in your argument as in a typical Tamil movie. If you didn't get it, I meant, not that much.

Let's start at the beginning. My comment regarding the selection of national award for best actor was: Was it politics or was it well deserved? This was not an aspersion on the abilities of all Tamil born. Voting for Vijaykant not withstanding, I know not all of them are complete morons. One constantly hears that Tamil people in general and Tamil cinema in particular haven't got the recognition they deserve. If one were to accept the supposition that politics played a detrimental role in the national award chances of Tamil cinema greats in the past, is it unfair to question if the award was a consequence of a rigged selection process. Or is it political conniving only if we lose and well deserved when we win? Is it discrimination only when it favours somebody else? And is it unfair to ask that question given that the report also included this in the brackets - "son-in-law of Rajnikant". Are you claiming favoritism doesn't exist at all or merely that it doesn't exist in the national awards committee?

I need not repeat here the already debunked myth that we have suddenly learnt to make better movies in the past decade. The proportion of good films have remained pretty much constant, at around 3-4 films a year as you put it. There is nothing to indicate that we live in some golden era. And 4 films out of 100 is not defensible.

Oh, btw, questioning the productivity of Tamil cinema doesn't make me a stooge of Hollywood. Why would you even bring the productivity of Hollywood into the conversation? Tamil cinema's failings are its own. It is not caused by Hollywood. Bad cinema is bad cinema, no matter from where. Unless your argument is that no film industry can ever produce more than 4 good films a year, I am going to consider that a non sequitur. Also, Tamil cinema cannot aspire to use Hollywood as its business model. It is regional, with a limited language-specific audience. Try French or Korean film industry next time if you want to make a comparison.

And you didn't really mean that quality of work cannot be measured, right? Because last I checked there was Quality Assurance and Quality Control in almost all industries, where they use calculations, not always the brutal ones either, to define and quantify "goodness" and "acceptable standards". Why would you think the film industry is exempt from such measures? Have you checked Rotten Tomatoes or Metacritic? They use numbers based on critics' ratings and reviews. And oh! it avoids subjective biases by using weighted factors. Is it infallible? No. But it sure separates the wheat from 'The last airbender'. Ironically, a bunch of people sat in a room together and decided that X was the best. I mean, if quality of work, this being an artform and all, cannot be determined, then what the hell were they doing giving out awards.

If you were to argue that it does not make business sense to make good movies, I'll totally accept your premise. One could perhaps even argue that productivity, in the context of Indian cinema, is not measured by the number of films of good quality (as assessed by an independent panel of experts or a national awards committee), but by a more desirable metric, *kaching* the box-office collections. But if you argue that "good" movies don't exist and that one is same as the other, then it is disingenuous, to say the least. Admit that a quality film culture is not going to happen because of business reasons. There is no market for meaningful cinema. Period. And you know what would change that; us. The film industry is a service provider and if the customer is satisfied, there is no need for them to improve. Why would they?

I mean if we stopped worshipping mediocrity, then perhaps, just maybe, they may feel compelled to make movies that don't leave you wishing to gouge your eyes out. Wishful thinking, perhaps. But the undeniable fact is that our best is not good enough. We could live in denial of it like we do with athletics and pretend to be content with what we have. Or we could stop the parochial chest-thumping and actually do something. No pressure.

Eliosy - Quartet

I said to my soul, be still, and wait without hope
For hope would be hope for the wrong thing; wait without love,
For love would be love of the wrong thing; there is yet faith
But the faith and the love and the hope are all in the waiting.
Wait without thought, for you are not ready for thought:
So the darkness shall be the light, and the stillness the dancing.
Whisper of running streams, and winter lightning.
The wild thyme unseen and the wild strawberry,
The laughter in the garden, echoed ecstasy
Not lost, but requiring, pointing to the agony
Of death and birth.

My email to an SBS producer who wanted to talk about the ADFA scandal

I am happy for you to mail me. However, I am not sure if I can be of any assistance. You see, I do not belong to Defence. I am a civilian and was an international postgraduate student. And research students like me are quite cut off from the undergraduate students. Our interactions were limited (if any) to lab demonstrations and teaching assistance. We do not live on campus (unless pulling all-nighters in the lab counts).

If I may be so forward as to opine - while what happened to the girl was criminally wrong and that the situation could have been handled better by her superiors I'd say that the situation at ADFA is not unique compared to other tertiary institutions in Australia. Freshmen at all universities go pub-crawling and the barely-out of-teens do stupid things with their new-found freedom, including inappropriate sex. Not all stupid things are equally stupid though. I almost got married when I was 20; the guys in this particular case thought it would be cool to film a girl without her knowledge. Obviously they went completely overboard and were deplorable in their stupidity. They should be punished for it. Perhaps discharged from military if not serve actual jail time. It would remind them that actions have consequences. It would serve as a deterrent to future pranksters who forget where the line is.

However, I do not see it as a systemic failure of any institution even if that is the most prevalent and juiciest narrative. I hope you will not take it badly if I say that the media has milked this scandal for all it is worth (and more) and maybe it is time to do a special on something more relevant like Will and Kate's wedding.

Update: I have since writing this reconsidered my opinion. I think there has been a systemic failure of the Defence force to properly deal with problems of sexual harassment. And SBS is not so much feeding media frenzy (some of the other media outlets did do that) as being a commendable watchdog on this issue. 

Wrestling pigs

You: Blah blah blah!!!! I am right!
Me: Sorry. That didn't sound logical. Could you explain?
You: You think one way; I think another way
Me: True. But it still doesn't make sense. Not all truths are equally true, you know
You: You are being impractical
Me: Sure, I am still in university. And yes I read books. Still, I don't think pragmatism changes anything in our blah! blah!
You: BLAH BLAH BLAH!!! YOU ARE WRONG!!!!!
Me: OK. Let's not argue. Forget about it. Let's just watch TV
You: I WON!!!! I WON!!! I AM A BRILLIANT THINKER WITH PROFOUND IDEAS THAT NO ONE IS ABLE TO CONTEST. [in a Stewie from Family Guy voice]I LOOK BRILLIANT, DON'T I? I DO! I DO!

Another class-A rant

I was with a friend the other day and it was a little bit shocking to realise how far I have strayed from the pack. This friend is in the process of negotiating a marriage. It is sort of an arranged marriage - in that he found the profile on some matrimonial site and he initiated the process but his parents in India are proceeding with the meeting the girl and her family and arranging the whole thing. His parents, unsurprisingly, are not thrilled about this particular alliance as this was something that he initiated on his own. Plus, the girl belongs to a different community. My friend, though, was unimpressed with the alliances that his parents were bringing him for the past year and a half and thought to take a little more initiative rather than entrust all control to his parents. So far so good. This is how things work. Apparently.

But a peace treaty with the Taliban would be a more fruitful enterprise than negotiating two different families and the ancillary uncles and aunts and such to agree to a marriage. For one, his father needed convincing (coaxing, begging, threatening in turns) just to visit the girl's family. Shows how the arranged marriage is not all about doing what is best for the son, but a power-struggle. Then there is the sage advice, 'It may all seem great now but wait for a few years and there will be unanticipated problems". And any attempts at quelling this challenge, results in a shouting match - "You think you are smart and that we are all stupid!!! Listen to us. We have lived longer than you"

Obviously the problem here is that my friend cannot (more like, will not) ask his parents to sod off and marry this girl against their wishes. The whole idea of him SUBMITTING to them and agreeing to an arranged marriage would be completely defeated. He could put his foot down but be kind and gentle and get them to agree. But there will be, at best, a grumbling halfhearted agreement, waiting for the first signs of trouble to say, Told you so. He could let them have their way and not marry this girl but she is, in his words, "a hot chick". A price catch. But he is not shallow Hal... no!!!!! she is also humble. Hot and humble being the killer combo deal that he was looking for.... what more could a man want.

And there is the money. The girl's father lives and works in Muscat and was a man of the world, he will know what do, unlike the other alliances that fell through because the bride's parents were unwilling to give him a few lakhs. But no! he doesn't take dowry... no calling it a dowry is so 20th century. This is not dowry... this is just the girl's parents emptying their savings willingly to give to their daughter and son-in-law. It is not robbery if you are not wearing a ski mask and holding a gun, is it?

Perhaps, I am not making my point clearly. What I am trying to illustrate with the distasteful actions of my friend is that gender inequality survives in this day and age and while all 'male-chauvinism' may not be as crass and overt as my friends, we have institutionalised this disparity in remarkably subtle ways in marriage. This is why marriage, in my head is indistinguishable from slavery... sure, some white families treated their black slaves well, fed and clothed them and didn't let the dogs at them. But slavery it was. If marriage is slavery... and men are the white slave-owners, well! that would make my friend, the Grand dragon of the Klan. And just as many blacks accepted their fate as what they deserved, being savages and all, women, brainwashed into accepting their own inferiority, submit themselves to, even gleefully look forward to, this bondage. For the greater common good, I suppose.

Screw it, I am going to bed

Neela sayam veluthupochu dum dum dum... Raja vesham kalanju pochu dum dum dum

There was once a jackal that while attempting to flee from a mob of stampeding humans, pursuing it for eating their prize chickens fell in to a vat of blue dye. The jackal managed to extricate itself and scarper to its forest home, where it received a strange and unexpected welcome, its animal neighbours having never witnessed such an exotic foreign creature before in their lives. Being quick-witted and all, the jackal claimed that it was a powerful alien creature sent to rule them all; to usher a new era, an age of hope and justice. The animals welcomed the idea of a new leader; they were suffering under a brutal and ruthless ruler for years now. Voila! the blue jackal was made the king of all jungle. Obviously it meant that it didn't have to sneak into farms and steal chickens anymore. The plight of the animals didn't improve much. But then, it didn't particularly deteriorate, so there wasn't much to complain.

And then it rained.

Neela sayam veluthupochu dum dum dum... Raja vesham kalanju pochu dum dum dum

"The blue dye has washed out dum dum dum... The King's mask has been torn apart dum dum dum"

Glenn Greenwald has more on this fable.

But I'll say this much : The greatest moral leader of our lifetime has been stripped (pun intended)

An argument against marriage

"marriage" with it's elaborate rituals proposes to act as enforcer... a 6 ft. diameter Samoan bouncer who can beat the crap out of you if you put your toe out of the line. my argument is that while some people may need the threat of punishment to stay committed, those of us who don't, be allowed to have a relationship without the intrusive presence of the Samoan.