Society Must Decide for Itself the Future It wants to Bequeath

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Society is a complex organism. One with many faces, many rules, many seeking to enforce those rules, many cultures and subcultures, many institutions. Whatever the many facets, the one near constant is change in all of them.

The many faces change. You see a beggar on your street one day, and the next day he is gone.

The rules change. At the busy canteen down the road, you pre-pay for a fixed amount of food, but at the temple not far away, you get food - as much as you want, for free.

The many cultures and subcultures coexist - some happily part of the whole, some with latent tension. The urban rich throw money at meaningless pleasure, while the urban poor who breathe the same air watch in hunger and jealousy, with no mutual empathy.

Change is, but, inevitable. Still, in the last 70 years, change has been more rapid than ever before with society choosing to hunger for material wealth and pleasure above all else. It is not that the rich, the letch or the ungrateful did not exist in the 19th century and centuries past, but in the late 20th century these qualities were increasingly seen by those with loose morals as the only goals in life; and of course the others had to compete, for to be jealous and to covet is human.

No longer did one need to work hard even when not watched. The protestant work ethic in the West is long gone, it being replaced by a take-all-you-can non-ethic that is appreciated and rewarded. No longer must the thief hide his booty; he can place it on his fireplace for all to see. For, the wretch that he stole from had in turn stolen from another, weaving a tangled web around the whole town that could no longer be untangled.

The adolescent boy need no longer prove his honest intentions to society and the girl's parents when asking for her hand. His comrades had resolved to free themselves from the tyrannical society they lived in that asked too much of them, and it was a worthy enterprise. In the institution that they had just created, contentment was not spoken of, and their ranks kept swelling. And what if the girl's parents themselves were in the ranks? 

Each nation or clan has sought, at some point in their existence, to lay down new ground rules for their society. Most Eastern civilizations have long held intellectual development, philosophical inquiry, oneness with nature, the arts, and the containment of sensory pleasures as their lofty goals. Not only was this on a personal level, but society cooperated in this common goal by maintaining the right environment for the journey towards its achievement. With a mutually held set of values and society acting as a mirror, children were safe, men and women were content with one another, the village well was kept pristine for its precious water, and the teachers imparted education for the purpose of creating brave, intelligent, and kind men and women who they could call their students and the future of the world around them.

The common thread for this seemingly-utopian society can only be the common good, not the individual's pleasure. 

Our society of today has ground rules that transform themselves faster than a chameleon. One day, the accountant's duty was to be honest, and the next day he is expected to obfuscate as much of the truth as possible. And, without conformance, his family would go hungry. With conformance would come not just the erosion of what remains of his ethical values, but the birth of a new generation with a fraction of the values that were left in him. Change may only be visible when comparing subsequent generations now, but given the thousands of years that man has existed,  significant change for the worse with every passing generation does not augur well for the future.

Every now and then some in society take it upon themselves to (re)establish a set of values that will carry into several future generations and benefit the nation immensely. The establishment of the Sikh community, with a singular focus on hard work, bravery and selfless service to their like and brethren, is one such beacon for others to admire and adopt, even in these degenerate days. Without them, the bloodbath around our newly erected borders would have created not puddles but lakes.

Rituals, symbols, and values all come together to define the ground rules for a society's present and more importantly its future. Without these, society will only be a large mass hurtling towards certain oblivion.   

It is Government's Responsibility to Address Macro Issues

There may be other formal definitions of Government, but mine boils down to this: "...to address macro issues affecting the country".

Below is an example of a macro issue relating to industry and employment.  

Governments normally consider it their responsibility to spur industrial growth and employment. The higher the per capita income and the lower the rate of unemployment, the better a government's performance is considered to be. However, issues such as unethical employment practices - recruitment policies, work conditions, impact on educational institutions, balanced societal development, etc., usually never get addressed. 

Can a model be evolved for addressing issues such as these?

The IT services industry in India is by most standards a flourishing industry, having created prosperity and a huge middle class of software professionals over the last 15-20 years. While this may be a good thing when viewed in isolation, it may have brought more harm than benefit. Many harms can be listed. However, here are a few important ones:

• Neglect of other industries, educational tracks and professions
• When one industry dominates handsomely, other industries and related educational tracks are neglected. What the IT services industry has done is tilt the preferences of students towards feeder degree programs such as 4-year engineering.
• Study of the social sciences, including psychology, history and other disciplines is very important for the growth of any society and culture. While government cannot change student preferences, the least it can do is mandate more balanced curricula to include a combination of majors and minors, foreign languages, and some mandatory social science subjects such as philosophy, politics and economics. What a balanced curriculum will do is create well-rounded educated citizens and not slave-trained professionals.
• Wide disparity in exposure to the modern world and between regions
• Colleges in urban regions that have a concentration of the IT industry naturally have an edge over colleges in other regions. The disparity in exposures and opportunities become even more pronounced between the urban and rural. 
• The government can mandate (or subsidize) exchange programs between rural and urban colleges, as well as higher subsidies and infrastructure support for colleges setting shop in rural areas. The concentrated corridors chock-full of colleges that we see in many Indian cities today is a highly wasteful exercise that that government should have checked years ago. 
• When there are world-class (or whatever class we can manage) colleges in rural areas (with a quota for local students), the benefits will trickle down much better from urban to rural areas. Also, urban students living and studying in rural will develop a better appreciation for the rural world and our natural resources, rather than be armchair-professionals and managers making ecologically disastrous or negligent decisions. Rural-dwellers, when good infrastructure and educational opportunities become available, will be less likely to migrate to our overcrowded cities. 
• "Don't ask, Don't tell"
• Our governments adopt a "don't ask, don't tell" policy, whether knowingly or unknowingly, towards work conditions, unethical practices by companies, etc. Several of these actually impact people in more ways than one might imagine. When working ungodly hours becomes the order of the day, the safety of women is at jeopardy as we already see from our national news. Also, while executives and ambitious employees may  work 14-18 hour days (since they choose to, or because they get compensated highly), there is no reason the entire workforce needs to be in that situation without choice. The results include less time for families to spend time together, and inadequate mental and cultural development of employees' children. Legislations that can help include - employee wellbeing audits and surveys, a ceiling on the percentage of employees that can be in such perpetual-stress roles, etc. 
• As long as the IT industry relies on the sheer number of employees, and cheap compliant labour to make unethical dollar profits via outsourcing contracts, these societal issues will continue to fester. It is in India's best interests to nudge the industry towards other value-based models where slave-trained labour is not the key commodity. 

I see MPs and ministers making speeches, saying things like "please respect our natural resources" or "please study social science subjects, not just computer science" (usually at colleges or at public functions). These speeches are useless, unless as legislators they can back it up by making the right macro-economic/societal decisions that make things happen. Mere urging of citizens without taking an inch towards setting the right incentives is nothing less than criminal behaviour.

Surviving and Keeping Sanity in the Modern World..

Image courtesy:
http://jagadishnarhem.blogspot.com/2010/10/pollution_13.html

Modern man (yes me, and you - if you were born in the 20th century) has got to be the most self-centered human yet in the earth's millions of years of existence.

With the industrial revolution, mass production and a capitalistic profit-driven have introduced and legitimized many criminally abusive practices that have been destroying the earth and human existence for over a century now.

1. We plunder and pillage the earth daily for its treasures. Resources like oil and gas can power our lives for but a few hundred years. Not only will future generations not have that luxury, but we will have polluted the earth to a point of no return.
2. Clear water, virgin soil and fresh air are the most basic elements of life on earth. 
• We let none of these be, for our own selfish comfort is more important. Even when we feel guilty about abusing any of these most fundamental of resources, we feel the guilt for but a second before we go ahead with our abuse anyway. For, our acts are only indirectly related to the heinous crimes. That well-packaged bag of homogeneous-looking fruits clearly used fertilizers and genetic seeds that will render the soil useless within a few generations. Do we stop to think about our role in the value chain of abuse of natural resources?
3. We abuse our own bodies with alcohol, drugs, medicine, and chemicals for no more than cheap thrills, quick solutions or superficial good looks. 
• Some of us who cannot get by a day without drink refrain from it when pregnant lest our new born have defects or mental illnesses, but that is much too rigid a constraint on our freedom, isn't it? Why must an as-yet unborn child control us so? Why must we not take a quick pill to rid ourselves of that pesky afternoon migraine or self-inflicted insomnia? Isn't it an easier solution than healthier living with good food, exercise and sleep? Why must we worry about the addictions and genetic impacts that we will be passing on to the coming generations? And, of course we can't step out the door without a face full of make-up. We must, at the cost of our future generations, inhale and expose our skin to chemicals that the honest pharmaceutical companies sell in shiny little environmental friendly bottles. 
4. Our cellphones and microwave ovens, for two easy examples, are technologies with which we subject ourselves to a daily dose of harmful radiations. 
• How can we let a minute pass without checking our phone for that elusive intelligent Facebook post from a friend of a friend of a friend? Oh, what if we miss a call on the second ring, and are excommunicated from our species? We must not let a a few thousand new cancerous cells get the better of us. We can always fight the disease, blame it on something or somebody else, cry with the well-meaning not-for-profit Oprah, and pretend to be heroic for some reality TV glory. A few minutes of entertainment and being connected (for we are new-age professionals) are of course more valuable than avoiding autistic children and grandchildren, why do you even ask?
5. Nature has provided for abundant food and nourishment. What do we do with it all?
• Abundant food and nourishment you say? No! We are forced to grow chickens and cows, and wait for them to die (oh no, why would we kill them ourselves?). Without that wonderful protein that nature has no way of providing to us (beans and lentils? I'll pretend I didn't hear you) we wouldn't have the strength to sit up and read that news article on the UN's peace and non-violence efforts.

Hypocrisy, a high premium on individual freedom at all costs, a material focus on comfort, and an utter lack of vision past our noses define our current age. I'm afraid our future generations are going to be worse and worse. The principles we teach them, the environment we leave them, and the institutions we pass on to them will be no match for the problems they will be faced.

Those of us who have some conscience and selflessness will have little impact on the world around us, and should be content with the small contributions we can make to the world, compete just enough to keep afloat in the mayhem, and remain as nature-friendly as we can while we focus on intellectual advancement.

Each new generation will come up with temporary solutions and 'kick the can' down the road. Answers to the problem of the spread of diseases and ailments will be new gadgets and drugs. Answers to the problem of impure water will be newer methods of purifying water, not the control of water pollution.  We will continue to hypothesize and measure our impacts, set thresholds for pollution levels, disagree endlessly, and convince ourselves that a better world awaits us. 

The earth will give up on us when there is no one left that can acknowledge what we've done to her.

Rape, Controversial Comments, and a Lack of Reason

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Rape is a common occurence in India. And from reports over the last few years, New Delhi is ahead of all other regions in the number of rapes. The recent rape, and subsequent death of a 23-year old girl in Delhi was perhaps the last straw for the general public who took the streets last month. This is currently a simmering issue, and I hope something comes of all the attention to this heinous crime.

When a crime such as rape is reported, different thoughts (relating to the cause) run in the minds of different people. Most of these possible causes have merit in them, with none in particular being the smoking gun.

Someone who has a more conservative mindset and is generally against liberalization of the country is going to express a general concern about the fast changing family and social dynamics. This is a valid concern, but when expressed in the aftermath of a reported rape, the media (and the frenzied people, as a result) start interpreting these opinions as a commentary on the rape victim. Sure, many actually make comment that lay blame on the victim in an outright manner or say things that do not make much sense (Asaram Bapu's comments, as has been reported).

• People who want to express their opinions, and draw attention to the fact that we need to address the social issues with rapidly changing family setups, a general cultural decay, etc., must be extra careful especially in the aftermath of such crimes. 

Of this group, some tend to comment about womens' clothes, which usually becomes a hotly debated topic. I've seen arguments by people about rapists committing the crime even when the victim is dressed in more conservative clothes. 

• For one, in a free country a woman can wear whatever clothes she pleases. No arguments there. What irks some is that the conservative person deemed the (usually) Western attire for the rape.
• Whether that was the reason or not (it certainly cannot be the sole reason), in some cases it must be one of the reasons. People who indulge in eve teasing do end up picking girls who wear less conservatively more easily as their targets, and there's no denying that. 
• Films and TV programming end up pushing provocative dressing in women, which no doubt corrupts the minds of the young and old alike. There's no denying that either. So, sweeping these under the carpet or vehemently denying these when trying to determine the general increase of mens' libidos is foolish. Of course, looking at the victim's clothes and then ascribing provocative dressing as the reason she was raped is not the right thing to do.
• Remember that what is considered normal dressing by an urban crowd may be considered provocative by someone who does not have exposure to the modern urban world.
• Men who are not gainfully employed or have been raised in violent circumstances or poor neighbourhoods are also generally more likely to indulge in such crimes.    

Someone who leans towards a breakdown of law and order as the problem is going to propose that there be more stringent punishment, better security to prevent such crimes, better lighting in public transport, etc. All of these are valid suggestions. There is no denying that the country desperately needs law and order.

• My good friend whose grandparents hail from West Punjab (now in Pakistan) told me recently that his grandmother kept saying that when she was young, it was always safe for girls to move around in Lyallpur (now Faisalabad). Unfortunately we are not able to maintain the security that existed pre-1947 (barring the Partition-related riots, of course).
• If you focus on law and order, remember though, that law and order can only work to a certain degree. In many Western countries, there is generally high levels of law and order. A lot of this has to do with people being very compliant, having trust in the system, and general contentment. 
• As an unrelated example, there is not much that law enforcement can do to prevent video piracy (beyond a certain degree), even in advanced economies. Still, that there is low levels of piracy is largely due to the vast majority of people not indulging in piracy. People are willing to pay for content/services, and there is a general respect for art and the work of people.
• As governments are more and more resource-constrained, there can only be better electronic systems in place, not more law enforcement manpower patrolling the streets. 

The bottom line is that law enforcement is but one thing we can improve to deter or prevent such crimes. Even with good law enforcement, political correctness and an extra dose of minority sensitivity, for example in the UK, have become phenomena that make people look the other way when crimes such as rape occur. See this blog post for reference. I know that's a blog post and so can have an extra dose of bias, but I have read an article on a UK news site before (on how policemen ignore such crimes due to a fear of being labeled racists), and can't seem to locate it now.

Some recent comments by Mohan Bhagwat, the head of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, have caused an uproar. This is largely due to blatant misreporting by the media, mainly CNN IBN, I believe. 

Watch this Youtube video of one of his speeches from which IBN misquotes.

• There is nothing wrong with his 5-6 minute speech (answer to a public question). He describes the respect that women have been traditionally accorded in our country, and the view towards the role of women. In this context, he uses "India" to refer the country where that world view and respect is eroded, and "Bharat" to refer to the country where they are upheld. Nowhere does he refer to Western influence or say anything about oppressing women, or blaming them for anything. His answer, in fact, is mostly about explaining how men end up doing such crimes when they are valueless. 
• What I liked most in his answer, though, is the point I made earlier about law and order not being the only answer. Understanding how our tradition of respect to women (among others) is being eroded is very important, and we must arrest it, to set things right. 
• Sure, there is a Western influence component to this, where our children are lavished on, not raised in a disciplined way, etc., and this includes exposing them to movies that are completely against what impressions you want to leave in children. 

I am yet to locate a full video of Bhagwat's speech where IBN claims (or would have you believe, via a soundbyte) he advises men to caste off women who no longer fulfill the marriage contract of taking care of their husband. The snippet that IBN keeps playing only indicated to me that the context in which he must have made this comments was in reference to how women and the institution of marriage are treated in Western countries. A bit of a generalization of course, but largely true. The Indian institution of marriage is much more respectful of society, children, and the couple themselves.  IBN, though, has been playing this video and sensationalizing it as if Bhagwat recommends that men use-and-throw women. Completely untrue as far as I can tell (and per the RSS spokesperson) and very blatant misreporting. I hear Sagarika Ghosh did a bit of an apology, but there should be more stringent punishment for media houses in such cases!

I see a general unwillingness in people to consider other opinions, and to acknowledge that there are several factors contributing to crimes such as rape - including law and order, cultural decay, lack of importance for family and other social institutions, a blind eye to film and TV programming that leaves negative impressions in young and old minds alike, a glamourization of sex (especially the variety outside of marriage and pre-marriage), a violent or poor upbringing where one might start coveting or envying the more affluent etc. One or more factors contributes to each particular case, and mentioning something that another is sensitive about hijacks all discussions and reasoning..

People are waiting to smear others, especially when any reference is made to culture, tradition, the institution of marriage, etc. Waiting, in fact, to say things like "people of this generation have moved on", and the likes of IBN take advantage of this flippant nature for its TRP gains with sensational soundbytes. Even worse are comments such as "RSS = Taliban", from people who have no idea about the organizations in the first place (beyond sensational headlines) or degrees of comparison. One is a cultural nationalist organization that has committed no crime and the other is a violent terrorist organization. 

I've written this post as a "think out loud" exercise. There might be a second part to this, but comments are welcome!