Let's Find a Third Way Soon, If We Can

Ever wondered what sort of a post you should make, especially when you are fired up by some current event? If you are quick to hit the keys, you find that the post practically overflows with energy, especially when you are in a rage. Then the post will probably poke your readers in the eye, and in all possibility, you will get more responses. The more controversial, the better- it stirs them up.

But if you go back to the post a week or a month later, the post appears dated, you wonder why you wrote the things you did. Some of what you said then seem idiotic now, and much of the emotion now reveals itself as a pose.  Intellectually and emotionally, it is sure to embarass you so much, your toes curl inward on their own.

At least that is the way I feel when this happens.

But it does not happen often, because most of the time, I take up something that happened some time back- the more distant the event, the better it is. Now armed with the benefit of aftersight, you know what went right and what went wrong. The sort of things that withstand the vagaries of time stand out now, like those small red fruits we used to pick off the fence. What you write now is likely to sound sensible whenever you happen to go back and read it.

Quite a big build-up to justify the fact that I usually grind the same flour that has already been powdered!

Actually, I happened to read now, an interview of Naom Chomsky in Spiegel Online, published last month.

Naom Chomsky is not someone I want to admire. But there are quite a few interesting things that he says about US, and that made me think about us Indians and the discussion we had here and the brilliant post Soulberry made at TCWJ (This is sort of a rejoinder to you SB, I admire your post, no disrespect intended- I hope you understand).

Chomsky seems to think that the government and its laws are a weapon of the rich. He says, " James Madison’s position at the Constitutional Convention was that state power should be used "to protect the minority of the opulent against the majority." " And then, Chomsky has it, "Even liberals like Walter Lippmann, one of the leading intellectuals of the 20th century, was of the opinion that in a properly functioning democracy, the intelligent minority, who should rule, have to be protected from “the trampling and the roar of the bewildered herd.”"

"We are a society dominated by business interests", he says, and points out, "You cannot control your own population by force, but it can be distracted by consumption."

I think this holds true for India. Soaring or sinking, the stock market makes the headline, but not the price of tomato, one of the must-have vegetables in our homes, which has hovered at around 50 Rupees per kilo for nearly a month now.

Our middle class, regimented by the political class into neat, compliant lines of caste and community,  blinded by the white light of plenty and prosperity, have by a willing suspension of disbelief,  chosen to follow the siren song of business and entertainment industries. Sachin's record found a place on top of the first page, at Indian Express I think, the year by year chart of his growth spiking in sync with Sensex. Pride of India!

I read somewhere that in an interview in Britain,  Gandhiji was asked, "What do you think of our Western Civilisation?". He replied, "I think that would be a good idea".

I am sure everyone who reads this feels some satisfaction that the West has thus been shown its place, with such wit and humour, But in our heart, we want to be more West than the West, "Let's beat them at their own game" . We, in the middle class are proud that we are Indian, but our pride cloaks the anxiety that we are inferior to the west.

Gandhi and Nehru, sought- with what success or failure, time alone will tell- a third way, they had the courage born of the faith that they were the inheritors and heralds of a great culture, but today that culture and its values are perverted by the communalists, negated by the communists and ignored by the intelligentia.

At the end of his interview, Chomsky says, "The intellectual world is deeply conformist. Hans Morgenthau, who was a founder of realist international relations theory, once condemned what he called “the conformist subservience to power” on the part of the intellectuals. George Orwell wrote that nationalists, who are practically the whole intellectual class of a country, not only do not disapprove of the crimes of their own state, but have the remarkable capacity not even to see them. That is correct. We talk a lot about the crimes of others. When it comes to our own crimes, we are nationalists in the Orwellian sense.". 

We have chosen to align with the power of politicians, the business class and that of technology. Our, vast, wonderful heritage serves us merely to cock a snook at the uncivilised, 'materialistic', white, western civilisation even as we make the mad dash to overtake the west in 'westerness', chanting  a frantic chorus 'global power', 'mass consumption', 'GDP'  'Bulls/ Bears' etc.,- all mantras of the west.

By the way, I forgot to mention the poor, where they are, what they do, how they feel...

I don't see them.