the Media Revolution

If one believes the news channels, especially the private ones, India seems to be in the throes of revolution these days. Antics of some self appointed representatives of the society has been elevated to 'the second freedom struggle'!

I have always maintained that this one is a mere photo-op for many, and a political stage for some.The 'kewl' generation wants it's own 'revolution', and so would clutch at any straw. The anger of the nouveau riche, who believe that they should, by default, own the country, at finding themselves as equal as anybody in dealing with the state, has been dubbed as the people's grouse. What's essentially a nice, harmless way for this anger to be vented, has been conveniently termed a ‘revolution’!

Well, they are only belittling the word ‘revolution’. Revolutions are not everyday shows. Revolutions occur when the troubles faced by the large mass of people become so bad, that defying the state authority and suffering the consequences is better in an absolute way. Based on the last statement, nothing about the current freak show is a revolution – for one, it is not a large mass of the nation, just a lakh or two of glory hunters and political axe grinders in a nation of 1.2 Billion. For another, they are not actually defying the state, though they may have made the government pretty uneasy. Nor are they suffering any consequences for their efforts – ask these ‘twitter freedom fighters’ whether they would be able to stand it if our largely benevolent state also started to play its part in their ‘revolution’ and started behaving like the colonial state. Finally, their ‘problem’ is not so bad. In reality, their ‘problem’ is just about enjoying the thrill of “Revolution lite”. Even if we take their claims at face value (that they are fighting ‘corruption’), still, their troubles are not the worst in the country. Those crying over graft on the internet can never really feel the actual trouble of the large body of people eking out a subsistence very precariously, without any sort of security in life. It is their revolution that we need to fear, as their troubles are already past the consequential costs of an uprising.

Then what about this ‘second freedom struggle’. Well, they hold annual “Civil War Enactments” in the United States – although they do not have the audacity to name it the ‘second’ civil war – they actually respect the Civil War heroes enough to not try and place themselves on the same pedestal. So, we might say it is something of that sort. Given the ease of having such ‘struggles’ in an internet connected, media covered era, we might soon have third, fourth, fifteenth freedom struggle. Just switch on the TV, and relax with a tub of popcorn. Revolution is here in your parlour!

The price of transparency

A man’s social life is just a very well-orchestrated charade. As Shakespeare had so well said – all world is a stage. May be the bard did not mean it in the same way as I mean. I think that the way one pulls oneself around in the presence of any other person is a just a well-played role in the charade mentioned above. The amount of time we spend in figuring out what to wear to work, what to say, and what to do, so as to create a ‘good impression’ can be explained only in this context. Recently it has been joined by questions of where one buys, where one dines and where one goes to movies, too!

Living the way one really is, at heart, requires no mental effort – it just comes naturally to us. Alas, very few are blessed with such a “presentable” real self. For most of us, this real self needs some sort of make-up before it can be paraded out. The amount of make-up is dependent on the level of closeness between the person (s) we are interacting with. For close members of the family, spouses, siblings, we might be putting on a very light make-up. Yet, who can, in all truthfulness, say that they reveal their all to anybody – their spouse, their kids, their parents, or even to the Almighty?

Is this bad? Speaking from a purely evolutionary perspective – anything that exists is not bad in itself. As I have already said, this play acting is merely a way to cover up our un-presentable self. If, god forbid, this ‘self’ was to emerge in all its glory, it can hurt many persons. Most individuals will have some clashes – they may be competitive (as in a business scenario), they may be related to tastes (one might not really like one’s spouses dressing style), they may be related to expectations (parents who might think their kids are losers) etc. Everyone aspires to be clash free; yet, the sad reality is that these clashes do exist. So, our playacting helps us avert the actual playing out of these clashes. So when a friend asks how well he played, you do have to say he played well. That’s the rule.

However, any play acting cannot, as a rule, be carried on for long. The difficulty of carrying on an act depends largely upon the amount of deviation from the real – the amount of ‘make-up’ we put on the real self. The really contorted displays of ‘self’ we put out to, say, business clients, cannot last more than the few hours of the presentation. The slightly modified ‘self’ we put out to school / college friends can last through the course. The minimal make-up ‘self’ we put out to spouses, kids, parents or siblings may well last a lifetime. Yet, for all these acts, we do need breaks, of ‘me-time’, where one’s true self can emerge, in the safety of complete privacy. Without these periodic ‘blow offs’, any act would be difficult to sustain, and we know how essential these acts are in keeping the social relations largely amicable.

So here comes the role of ‘transparency’. What ‘transparency’ actually does is to diminish the ‘me time’, and bring more and more part of our lives into public domain. People react by extending their ‘stage shifts’, working extra hours on their ‘self’; in other words, striving even harder to maintain the cover. All this while the supporting intervals of pure privacy are diminishing, and there is no opportunity to blow off the tension of the act. Ultimately, there is only one logical conclusion. The act breaks apart, and realities come out, to clash violently. No one is better off.

Anybody who has been noticing for the last few years would see that as a society, we seem to be more intolerant and more dissatisfied than ever before. So much of rioting and ‘protests’ were not so common earlier, and the rate of growth is alarming. There may be many reasons for that, but I think that the mushrooming of media is the main culprit. It has chipped away at all the act and left open the sores and wounds which pain us today. There are things one might tolerate, but one might not like to be seen tolerating – so put a camera this way, and you get the intolerance. There are things we might do, but would not like to be seen doing – put a camera this way, and you get inaction. There are stunts that we might not like to pull off, but we might not like to been shirking from it – put a camera this way, and you have 50 % of the rioting that is going on in this nation – ‘defending’ the faith, ‘defending ‘the language, the region, the nation, what have you. Many of these problems would have reached an amicable compromise, had they not been under the glare of spotlights. The society, unfortunately, does not have enough patience to play act 24 X 7.

The advocates of ‘transparency’ are very vocal. Unfortunately, this whole debate itself is subject to the laws of transparency – it is the ‘right thing’ to be seen supporting 'transparency'! Well, the main point put forward in favour of transparency is that it brings out the conflicts in the open, where the general pressure of the society helps their resolution. I would say that most of these conflicts are hidden by acts only because resolving them would exact a higher price than that incurred in hiding them. Then, there are some natural conflicts, that can never be resolved. The conflict of buyer and seller, the predator and the prey, and the like wise. Bringing out the truth of these relations will not solve the problem, but actually accentuate it by making it ever present. What is so sacrosanct about transparency itself, if all it leads to is conflict?

To conclude, we must say that there is a naturally ordained level of transparency in this world. What we show and what we hide is a blend perfected over millennia of human evolution. Let’s not disturb it in the name of some misplaced sense of ‘ideal’.

An Apology; and a Warning

"Be careful what you wish for; you may get it"

I am here to make amends for some of my posts from my rather 'immature' days - those dealing cynically with our polity and the instruments of our democracy. I take it all back - unconditionally. For this is the time that our democracy is being threatened by a coalition of the lunatic fringe and the the self righteous, who seem to have mutilated an iconic Tilak statement - for them, "Raj is my birthright". No body denies there have been failings from the side of the Establishment, and the anger to justified. However, being the 'dramatic' Indians that we are, there is a real danger of something irreparable happening here. While all the moral posturing that is being done is most definitely in pursuit of some objective other than the advertised one, there is a real chance that something very bad might emerge from this. There is an ancient quote - "Be careful what you wish for; you may get it."
It's not that nobody is seeing the fault in this.The Government of a Sovereign state is being blackmailed by a demagogue - over demands, which largely comprise of funny ones, really funny ones, and the dangerous ones. It's the third type that is really bugging me - demonetising the economy, rolling back the education to 17th Century, draconian laws. I am not alone in this. It has been commented on similarly by leading journalist in newspapers. However, in these times, newspaper reading is a drudgery left alone to competitive exam preps. the majority is getting its news from the television - where screaming anchors are trying to out do each another in becoming miniature clones of the 'holies' blackmailing our State. It's getting into dangerous territory now.
The problem with seeing things bad for a long time is that people fail to realize that it can get worse. People say that the State has failed to deliver. I say, just look around in the neighbourhood. Stop looking just at the developed world - look at the mess in the region to see how well we have done in comparison. If time is given the remaining miles will also be travelled. However, being the dramatic Indians we are, we revel in extremes. Either we'll bear it stoically, or we'll go all or nothing. What is not being realised is what happens if the State collapses under such pressures. Will it be 'all free no governance' - in other words - anarchy? While anarchy is not a good place to be in, even worse could be the entities that effectively replace the states. As long as there are societies, there will be governments. Currently we have one whose top is chosen by people, and whose machinery is designed on merit. If it fails the people, they have the option to bring in a new set at the top. Do they think a 'government' made of 'Civil Society' or godmen would be better. In my opinion, they qualify neither on electable popularity, nor on selectable merit. So they are doing what best they can to wrest power - blackmail the state in its moment of weakness. I appeal my non existent readers to not be a party to this daylight robbery.

On injustice, bureaucracy and Nuremberg

Most, if not all, of the injustice done in this world is done at the hand of administrators - the so called 'cogs in the wheel'. Human beings, on the larger part, have a natural tendency to avoid hurting another being just for the whim. If one's actions evince clear discomfort in somebody, we take steps to make amends. However, the sheer scale of injustice around us shows that despite our best intentions, we have not been able to stop injustice as a species. May be the reason lies with the fact that we rely on administration.
Firstly, administration has the effect of separating the decision making from the execution. In bureaucratic organizations,with multiple levels of hierarchy, a vast chasm often exists between the person who signs the paper and the person who takes the action. When coupled with the fact that the person receiving the orders has to obey them completely, on the pain of severe disciplinary action if not anything else, it creates some interesting situations. There may be some error of grammar, or meaning in the orders, leading to absurd actions being taken at the ground level. There may be conflicting orders within the same letter, or between two letters from the same office. This can happen when the person signing the first letter is different from the second, because of a transfer. It may often happen that some order, framed and signed on whim by someone higher up ( or transcribed wrongly by someone middle up), who has long since been transferred,( or has retired, or has been dead and buried), is still in force, and is making life hell for all at the receiving end, simply because there is no concept of feedback, and no one has asked for the repeal. This can give rise to 'quaint' traditions - 'quaint' for those who are not at the receiving end. The machine rolls on, creaking and chattering, but the operator is in the soundproof cab. Sample this joke:
A new monk arrives at the monastery. He is assigned to help the other monks in copying the old texts by hand. He notices, however, that they are copying copies, and not the original books.

So, the new monk goes to the head monk to ask him about this. He points out that if there was an error in the first copy, that error would be continued in all of the other copies. The head monk says, "We have been copying from the copies for centuries, but you make a good point, my son."

So, he goes down into the cellar with one of the copies to check it against the original. Hours later, nobody has seen him. So, one of the monks goes downstairs to look for him. He hears sobbing coming from the back of the cellar and finds the old monk leaning over one of the original books crying. He asks what's wrong.

"The word is 'celebrate', not 'celibate'," says the old monk with tears in his eyes.

Secondly, their is a tendency of obedience of orders in us humans. When we receive the orders of someone socially expected to order us, we tend to obey. Often there are rules and strictures to enforce obedience, but as the famous Milgram experiments showed, they are largely unnecessary. Ordinary people drafted into the experiment were willing to give 440 volts of electric shock to helpless 'subjects', simply because they were ordered to do so. In our daily lives, we see normal, caring human beings carrying out all manners of torture, simply empowered by a phone call or a scrap of paper.

In the Nuremberg war crimes trails, most German officials cited 'following the orders' as a reason behind their unspeakable deeds. That did not cut the ice with the jury, and all were punished. However, if all the injustice is done mechanically by us, is it right to punish someone for actions which were not done out of their free will?
In my most recent 'prisoners and guards' scenario, I have noticed one thing - whenever torture and injustice is being carried out by the administration, there are two almost distinct group of ground level perpetrators - those who are apologetic and restless, but are constrained to do so, and those, who are doing it with relish. Nail the latter; find out the one who is adding his own inventiveness to the mix, who is doing more than required. Just nail that vermin.

On Jholawallas (and similar creatures)

I might be repeating this point, and I am not sure about it, since I hardly read this blog myself. However, since we had another of those NGO types forced upon us this evening, I had to write this. I'll keep it short and simple. JKR, through her character Arthur Weasley, once said - "Never trust anything that can think for itself if you can't see where it keeps its brain." Ostensibly, these jholawalla 'do gooders' are in it for 'the betterment of mankind'. All I can say, given the multitudes of these types in our times, is that either we are living in the most saintly of ages - where we can see all these angels walking the earth, or these people's real objectives are really unmentionable. At least the for profit firms are making an honest day's living. Just think.

On 'Being a Man'

This is a short and simple one. The society places a lot of value on facing your ordeal 'like a man.' We had that movie - where the protagonists were lauded as they went laughing to the gallows - one of the most memorable lines of the movie was - "Then I met the third kind..." At the time of writing, there are many luminaries who say that if you submit cheerfully to all the trails and tribulations, you become a 'master', and if you do it under duress, you are a slave. Well, I have a simple question - If someone is out there to rape you, and you submit to it without resistance, does it become consensual? Just think, when you laud the 'third kind' the next time.

On Revenge

I may have lied in one of my previous posts. I do not remember all the times I've been wronged simply to avoid wronging someone else in a similar manner. I've always dreamt that I would, someday, be in the position to, umm, payback, with interest. Now, sages have always told that no good comes out of revenge - nursing the thoughts of revenge has been compared to 'holding a glowing ember in one's hands, in order to throw it at someone else'. I disagree. It was during my schooldays that I, after much saving, was able to buy my copy of 'the Count of Monte Cristo'. It was not the full version - it was an abridged, children’s version, meant for being read over a day or two, at the pace expected of a child. I devoured the book in four hours. This was on a Diwali night (that's why we had a chance to go to the town), and I had foregone the sweets for the purchase, and I gave away my firecrackers, as I was too much engrossed in the book. It was one of the best Diwali's of my life. For here was a book that gave meaning to the life of some of the most downtrodden people on Earth - The OG 'chicks'. I can never put the book on the stock 'my favourites' lists, simply because I've not read the real book - I tried it recently, but the sheer volume of it deterred me. However, even the abridged version told us an inspiring story of an innocent man, with his innocent ways, made to suffer at the hands of few persons, each having his own reasons for doing so. Ultimately, the man in question gets rich and powerful, and has the three persons at his mercy, before having his revenge. The literary critics may differ, but I felt that the Count really enjoyed the whole process of exacting revenge, and the book celebrated the whole idea of it. No questions of keeping the wounds green or similar wishy washy stuff.

Revenge, in its purest form, is a thing to be enjoyed. As I see it, all the wrongs that you have endured are sort of credits you have on your 'deed account' - like any credit on your account, the creation had to be painful, or in other words, involving reduction in utility. However, the credits gained are not painful. To get the credit in bank account, you have to part with your cash. However, when you look at your bank statement, you see your bank balance, and do not mourn the loss of cash you had to endure to get that balance. Then why do we have to be so distrustful of nursing a revenge motive? Similar to the cash / bank example, when you are wronged, you earn this moral, mental right to exact revenge. This is a credit, and like all credits, it is an asset. To enjoy this asset, you need to savour revenge. It is not so weird an idea. If you have no liking or use for money, all the credit in your bank account is of no use. Similarly, if you do not like the exacting revenge, the credits in your deeds account are of no use to you. So, for an appreciable increase in your 'net worth', develop a taste of revenge, or at least, fantasizing about revenge. Go and get your copy of the abridged 'Count of Monte Cristo' now.

There is a thing about nursing the grievances. It is all right to have a 'deed account', you might say, but the problem is, we are mostly helpless in exacting revenge, as people more ‘powerful’ than us mostly wrong us. We are not in a position to spend the credits we earn when we are wronged - in accounting parlance, we have a surfeit of Non Performing Assets (NPAs) on our deed account. However, the financial world has shown us that with careful planning and lot of perseverance, most NPAs can become productive. Surely you might be too small, too insignificant, and too feeble right now - but then, there is a whole lot of possibility of future growth. The only thing true about the pinnacle is that there is only one way from there, downwards. That s.o.b. boss you hate would retire someday, while you would still be in prime of your working life. Again, there is also the scope for future growth. The schoolyard bullies will, in all probability (considering the general IQ of bullies and the bullied) be working at a much lower level of socio-economic pyramid. There is a probability that you would meet them someday. The only thing required of you is to be prepared to exact your revenge - be more powerful than them in this second coming. To realise your current NPAs, one has to remember to strive hard for excellence, to reach at some station while the boss you hate retires and the bully you hate turns to delivering pizza or vending shoes. Thus, the very act of keeping an eye on your earned deed credit and having a desire to realise it is a big motivator propelling you towards excellence. Remember, Edmond had to strive a lot even after he was given a map to the treasure on Monte Cristo. Had the desire for revenge not been there, he would not have become a Count, and would have remained a mere seafaring smuggler.

So, I hope this piece brings some joy into the life of the people whose life is being made miserable by some other person, wilfully. Always remember, a credit earned by you is a debit raised against the offender. Always remember to exact the revenge from this very debtor, and not from 'his kind'. Remember the way of the Count. Happy accounting.