Are You A Closet Racist?

My Own Private India
http://twitter.com/thejoelstein/status/17265335792

Is this article supposed to be funny? Am sure the immigrant Indians that Joel Stein is targeting are not laughing. On second thoughts, such articles will always seem funny to one demographic group. The group that's poking fun at the expense of others. Is it less funny if the one cracking the jokes belongs to our circle? I have seen some videos of Russel Peters on Youtube. His comments/jokes are far worse, yet they don't seem so.

Some days back I was standing at the PATH station watching a NYer making snide comments at two women from Philly like how they like to talk and not listen. The women were new to the city and ignoring the group of people who was offering them advice on how to move about. I was watching them and thinking that if one is determined to be prejudiced, there are so many options available: language, accent, state, religion, color, appearance. Take your pick and enjoy poking fun!!

Back home, we like to take it to another level by having violent outbursts against outsiders. By North poking fun at the South, South looking down on North, West gaping at East and nudging/laughing. And then we moan when we are cornered in a foreign country. We want to keep our prejudices and expect others to give theirs up. 

Coming back to the article, is it worth getting all riled up? I have never really read the Time magazine. But I thought it would have better articles than this lame-ass attempt at humor. The "apology" just makes it worse. There are better ways of expressing shock at the changes that immigration has brought about rather than resorting to digs about multi-armed Gods. The reactions to the article are equally bad. With some people attacking the Americans and their culture, raking up Stein's Jewish background, etc etc.

Truth is everyone's a closet racist, the problem is when they come out of the closet!! Am not sure which would be better, if more people came out the closet so that at least you know who you should watch out for. Or unknowingly staying friends with someone who would make snide/nasty comments the moment your back is turned. Maybe if our circle of friends and acquaintances was bigger, it would change things. If you had a friend who belonged to the group you disliked, would you not think twice before saying such things?...

Linking to Lekhni's post on the same article http://elekhni.com/2010/07/why-joel-stein-will-not-apologize/

To Vote Or Not To Vote...

Till this morning, I hadn't decided whether I would vote or not. One major reason for that was that I hadn't yet decided who I was going to vote for. In the end, I finally dragged myself to the polling booth. As I stood in front of the electronic voting machine, I was almost tempted to cast my vote by doing "In pin safety pin, in pin out".

As a child, I always used to hear/read stories of the triumph of good over evil. Forget that, even in movies, you see Uncle Sam's heroes vanquishing all evil; be it villains, terrorists, aliens, dinosaurs etc etc. When it comes to elections, is there ever a clear cut demarcation between good and evil? Today, I did not choose good over evil. I chose the lesser evil of them all. (At least that's what I think; only time will tell whether I am right or wrong!)

P.S. I have never been able to show the middle finger to anyone. I find it very off-putting. Even when I am hopping mad and swearing left right and centre, I have never been able to do it. Once, I tried to see how it looks; by raising my middle finger in front of a mirror, and was absolutely disgusted by the image. But today, I will gladly show my finger to anyone!!

Some Things Just Never Change...

A few days back I was attending a session on HR practices in the workplace. And the trainer was explaining to us how discreet and impartial and unbiased HR guys are when dealing with issues that the employees face. To explain that he gave us a hypothetical example of a female who had leveled a sexual harassment charge against one colleague. The issue was resolved, but in a matter of few months she raised the same charge against a different person, and then one more time against a third person. To highlight how unbiased they have to be when dealing with such cases, the trainer asked us, what would any normal person think in this scenario. The room fell silent for a minute or two and it was easy to figure out what everyone was thinking. And as one guy voiced that thought, it irritated the hell out of me! And I ended up blurting out "Or maybe there were a lot of perverts in that company who took advantage of that one woman!" Needless to say, no one else said anything more and the trainer quickly moved on to other topics!

Thankfully, I have never had to face any such serious stuff. The two or three random minor incidents that did happen, I think, every woman has faced. (Should I be referring to these kind of incidents as minor? No incident how small seems minor when its happening to you.)And has learnt to take it in her stride. It's such a shameful thing to admit to. To have to accept such things as a part of being a woman.

This is not going to be a post for women's empowerment. I was just trying to think out aloud how on top of everything else that a woman has to deal with, harassment gets added on it. Sometimes more than the harassment, it's harder having to deal with judgmental eyes of holier-than-thou people...

Lest We Forget Our Culture...

Is it election time already? Or are there designated days of the year when Indian culture needs to be saved? Since the last few days, Indian culture is on the news again. There are too many links over this issue, just putting up a few over here:

http://sify.com/news/fullstory.php?id=14847393
http://www.rediff.com/news/2009/jan/30-pub-culture-is-not-desirable-karnataka-home-minister.htm

So what next; are we going to have conform to all the diktats issued by the saviors of Indian culture? When the Taliban came up with their perverse agenda, did they start in the same way? Impose restrictions on people all in the name of religion/culture; which made sense to a few people so they agreed and then slowly everything blew out of control. Ironical that these so called defenders of Indian culture are following the footsteps of the same people they like to hate so much!

The youth of India is getting corrupted! Am not saying that, it's what they are saying. We drink, we dress inappropriately, we dance provocatively, we behave indecently in public, we are materialistic, we have loose morals, and the list goes on and on. The funny thing is, even if we, the youth, like the so-called western concepts of freedom and enjoyment, it's not the be all and end all for us. We follow religious practices, at least whatever fits with our sensibilities. We worry about our jobs, studies, career more than we do about our culture. We leave the major decisions of our life to our parents like marriage; and even when we fall in love, we check the religion, caste, state of the person, so that it fits with our culture! Rest assured, O leaders and politicians, the culture that you so badly want to preserve is still in place; even though there is some stuff in there which should have been chucked out long ago. Ahhh, what more do we have to in the name of Indian culture?

Quick before I forget, let me jot down some points about Indian culture:
1) Drinking is not Indian culture.
2) Clubbing and Pubs/Malls are not part of Indian culture. And girls going to pubs is definitely not Indian culture!
3) Valentine's Day is not Indian culture.
4) Boys and girls hanging out together is not Indian culture.
5) Girls wearing western clothes is not Indian culture.
6) Mixing with people of other faith is not Indian culture. No prizes for guessing the other faith.

Oh no no no no, I forgot the rest of the stuff in the list. What to do, Indian culture is so vast and my memory is so poor that I can't remember everything!

Freedom Is...

What does freedom mean to me? Nothing special really. I think I take freedom for granted, that I should be able to say what I want, do what I want! I was thinking about the extremes we have with respect to the fundamental rights of our constitution.

Right to equality

We have abolished things like untouchability. But if we want social equality, why are we pushing for more and more castes and reservations? If we have abolished titles why are we still using terms like Maharani, Nawab for some people? And when it comes to equality before law, power and money has put some people above the law. People have gotten away with scams, frauds and even murder.

Right to freedom

Its ok for us to have saas-bahu soaps on prime time with scandals, extra-marital affairs, illegitimate children, superstition etc etc on prime-time. But every time a high-profile movie releases, one or the other group decides to take the law in its hands and protest against a scene or a song. We sue artists for expressing their creativity. Tell me, what % of Indian population goes to art exhibitions and what % watches T.V.? And why doesn't anyone ever protest against sleazy B-grade, C-grade films?

If the Indian Constitution states that we have the freedom to reside and settle in any part of the territory of India why do we resent people from other states? Do we want to be a nation or a ghetto?

Right against exploitation

I don't know if forced labor still exists. But child labor and trafficking of human beings certainly does. It's not the evil landlords who always employ children, the so-called elite and educated class also doesn't think twice about employing children as long as its cheap labor.

Right to freedom of religion

We give people right to choose their religion. But when everybody starts exercising it, we disrupt the mass conversions and threaten those who have converted.

I think my post is getting too long so I will just skip the rest. If you are still awake after reading this far, you can check this out: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fundamental_Rights_of_India

If you think about it, our constitution has probably taken care of everything. Even if these seven fundamental rights are observed properly, it would solve half our problems. We need to send all the politicians for a crash course in democracy and constitution first!! Democracy is a tricky thing isn't it. The way I interpret these rights may be totally different from how you do. What may be an aimless protest to me, it may be freedom of expression for you! And that's what is best about democracy. That both of us can voice these different opinions and live in the same country!