Tag History

An Elephant and a goldfish

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Long time no blog…

Its been 758 days since I published a blog. I have since drafted 40 blogs but never finished even one of them. Now I completely understand the concept of ‘Writer’s block’. There were a lot of reasons such as 2 international relocations and busy work schedule, but above all, it was just the lack of enough interest and motivation to rant (write) about something. I always peeved about George R.R. Martin not completing Winds of winter or not even giving a tentative release date for it. Now I get it. If you are stuck, you are stuck. If I cannot drag myself to write a couple of hundred words on a generic topic, who am I to judge someone who has the grueling task of completing an epic series of books. But looking at Mr. Martin shifting his focus to making some easy money for HBO by helping them make shitty spin offs of his work, my worst fear is that ‘Game of Thrones’ will end up being the Sagrada Familia of books.

May be the ending of the TV Series was the actual ending he planned. The last 2 seasons were bad. In fact, calling them bad is an understatement. Especially compared the rest of his work. I totally agree that that was the only logical ending possible. I am a little proud that I predicted the fate of most of the characters. Its was just the pace and screenplay that ruined everything. The outcry and disappointment of fans may have caused him to reconsider another/alternate course to the story line and may be he is stuck.

Now that I have beat around the bush infront of my house and also all the bushes around the neighborhood, lets get back to the point. Elephants and Goldfish are on the opposite ends of a very particular spectrum – ‘Memory retention’. At least that’s what people have you believe it. Researching for this blog led me to a fact that it is actually ‘Bees’ that have the shortest memory and Goldfish have been unfairly maligned about their mental abilities. Renaming this blog to ‘An elephant and a bee’ would have been easy enough but I did not want to burn the few remaining credits on DALL·E to create another image for this blog. It also reinforces the point I am trying to make here.

What we now about the world is driven by the narrative set around it and there are only a few but very influential ‘entities’ in the world that do this. For every Rupert Murdoch there is a George Soros. For every Fox News, there is a CNN. For every BBC there is a Al jazeera. All these ‘entities’ want you to see the world in Black and White. The world we live is too complicated to be put into 2 buckets. If you read between the lines, you will see that everyone has an agenda.

What’s the first headline you see in any major publication since the last one month? Its the Israel and Palestine conflict. Who created the problem in the first place? Yes, the Jews were driven out of the middle east but it was centuries before the colonization by the British. The jews were allowed to migrate back to the region by the British and then after the 2nd world war, United nations passed a resolution to carve Israel out of Palestine. If you care about Jews so much and wanted a safe place for them, why not carve our the just now defeated Germany or some other part of Europe? If the US, who had so much influence in the UN was so moved my the Zionist persecution, why didn’t they make a 51st state for them? California or Texas would be climatically Ideal. US already has so many places names after European towns and cities. Who stopped from creating a new Jerusalem? Wouldn’t creating a Jewish state in the middle of Arab world be the most dangerous thing to do given the history of hate between the Abrahamic religions and track record of the would be neighbours?

You may say that it was to correct the historical wrongs and the . But some things are beyond salvage. If they did want to truly correct the wrongs of the past, most of Europe should have given back all the wealth looted from its colonies. The self proclaimed ideal nation – the United states should have vacated America and given it back to the Natives. None of them happened. It will never happen too.

If the reason was to give Jews back Jerusalem and their ‘Holy’ land, they should have set the example, they should have destroyed Mount Rushmore and given back the natives their holy lands. The British in India should have given back Ayodhya and Mathura back to Hindus. The Australians should have given back the occupied sacred spaces to the Aborigines. The Spanish and Portuguese should have given back the Incan gold and don’t even get me started on Africa.

Pardon my french but Who the fuck divides a country that way? Let alone a country, who the fuck does divide anything this way?

If you think about it, it doesn’t surprise me at all. It looks to have been done on purpose. It was the perfect way to permanently destabilize a region and ensure that there can never be peace. It was after all a model that worked perfectly well only a few months before November 1947. India was partitioned. It ended up with East Pakistan and West Pakistan bordering India on both sides. What about the Hongkong situation? There is a clear pattern. The United states politicians still do this till date to their own country. Its called Gerrymandering. Its done to ensure that the black and hispanic voters do not have a majority in any district or county. Its not even subtle.

You can live life as a Goldfish – Forget what happened in the past and live life as it come or an Elephant – Never forget anything that happened to you. But the problem is that they want you to be an Elephant about all the wrongs done by you and a Goldfish about all the wrongs done by them. They want you to be a Goldfish and tell you that Goldfish has a very short memory even if that’s absolute bullshit.

Its a pattern that has been and is being repeated across the world. They will keep doing it. They do not want anyone else to prosper or live in peace. They do not care about any faith other than theirs. The do not care about any race other than theirs. It happened to middle east, it happened to Americas, it happened to Africa, it happened to Oceania. It happened in parts of Europe.

Americans and rest of Europe were greedy but the British have always been petulant. If they cannot have it, no-one can.

Status-quo

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mount rushmore destroyed - Google Search | Red dead redemption concept ...

Scott Morrison, the current prime minister of Australia has received a lot of flack for his comments on January 26th being a holiday. It was the day on which the British landed in Australia. For the aboriginals or the natives of the land it looks like the celebration of colonization and reminds them of the oppression. But Mr Morrison spoke just like Mr Trump after Charlottesville when he said that there were fine people on both sides. Both of them did it based on their electoral calculations. But the way they portray it is like “This is the status quo”. It is true that Natives of Australia and America have been reduced to negligible percentages of the population. Just like Persians/Parsis can no longer call Iran their home or Mesopotamia whose ancestors cannot call Iraq their home anymore. The status quo is that both countries are now Arab states. The natives are not welcome anymore.

But strangely, the same people who talk about status quo when things change talk about taking America back from immigrants. The same argument was the reason English voted for Brexit. The overwhelming feeling of we are being marginalized in our own country is causing all this hostility. If they want things back to the way they were, where do we stop? Do we go back to 19th century? 18th? how about 3000 BC? Even if you manage to build a time machine to travel back in time, you ought to set the date you want to go back to?

Mount Rushmore is a very recognizable monument, built in the honor of colonists by the colonists. Americans may have had a war with the British and gained Independence. But unlike most of the British colonial empire, it was Europeans fighting Europeans. In the 1800’s, Black hills region where this monument was later built was granted the the Lakota people, a native American tribe. But later it was taken back and they built a monstrosity on the sacred lands of the Natives. There is still a legal dispute going on with the tribe demanding the entire land be returned to them and also reparations be paid in billions. Why not go back to 1800s and give the land back to them?

This is not new to America. In 1490, Jeruselam had 150 Jewish families. Most of them were driven out of their land by Arab invaders, just like the Parsis and Mesopotamian s. The UK, supported by US, carved out the Arab occupied territory to create a home for Jews and thousands were transported back to their ancient homeland in ships. Not sure why they did not do the same favor for the Parsis who took refuge in India. They have to apply the same standards to every one. Right? Nope, they do it only when it serves them.

One of the bloodiest event in post Independence India was the demolition of Babri Masjid. The Hindus argue that the Birth place of their beloved god should instead have a temple. It took decades to solve the problem but in 2020, finally the temple construction started. This scenario is a little similar to the Jews wish to return to Zion but is also very different in another way. Even now, 80% of the Indians are Hindus. The British managed to take a lot from India. But they couldn’t take Indians out of India. As per 2020 census, Native Americans constitute less than 2% of the US population, i.e 5 million compared to 96 million. The construction of the temple has sparked a wide spread condemnation from many western countries as rise of right wing nationalism. But they are comparing apples and oranges here. Indian government was trying to erase the monuments that remind the oppression of the Mughals who preceded the British in looting India. They are trying to wind back the clock and return the the way things were in the past.

Its just stupid to have the photo of Mount Rushmore on the Lonely plant USA edition. So, they put the grand canyon.

Lonely Planet USA by Lonely Planet, Paperback, 9781743218617 | Buy ...

But what did they do with the Indian version? By the way, the Taj mahal is also in a way a symbol of oppression. This is just hypocrisy. They should have the same standards for all Lonely planets. They should have the same standards for entire planet. They should have the same standards for every person on this lonely planet.

Lonely Planet guide to India | MCN

The main objection to the argument is again would be Status quo and hurting the sentiments of the Minorities. So, USA and Australia are hurting the sentiments of minorities by keeping the Status quo but India is India is doing it by changing it. Weird right. You might take me to a Right wing activist. Trust me, I am not. I am just looking for logic in all this mess. So, everyone should just calm down and decide. Do they want to change the status quo or keep it. If they want to change it, how long do we go back?

Its funny that the same argument written by an American would be called a left- wing argument. Just like the side of road we drive on may be the political definitions of Right and Left are also reversed here.

Donald Trump was the revenge of Conservative America for Barack Obama. They will no doubt be plotting another revenge for Kamala Harris. They should just accept the fact that the history is repeating itself and the new immigrants are taking over the old immigrants. To borrow their words, that is the status quo now. The only difference is that it is happening in a more civilized way with far less bloodshed. It they don’t agree with it, they should wind back their clocks, demolish all the monuments they built, give back the country to the Native Americans, get on the ships to England and home their ancestors accept them as at least refugees.

Deal with the devil

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In 2008 when the United states elected their first non-white president, most of the world saw it as a welcome change for a country whose past is drenched with the blood of colored people, but what these folk ignored was how much it would irk the red part of the country. Their response has been so extreme that the entire world will have to face the repercussions for at least the next decade and the country may have to deal with it for next several decades. The country that was Obama nation, has become an abomination is less than 4 years.

One useful thing that happened here was that they showed what they really are. I initially drafted this post on 1st of October, well before the 1st vote for the 2020 US elections was cast. I was under the impression that the country was in for 4 more years of misery and we were in for 4 more years of laughter at their expense. Well, I turned out to be both right and wrong. 74 million Americans negated the 70 million Americans who wanted 4 more years of Trump. Even if you disregard his pre-political life, what he has said and done in the last 4 years should have convinced any sane person to not vote for him again.

It would be the equivalent of Indians electing a guy who lives like Vijay Malya and talks like Kamal R Khan, becoming the laughimg stock of the world and then again deciding to re-elect the same person.

This number 70 million. The largest ever vote for a loosing candidate in an US election is therefore a much more important number than the 74 million that Joe Biden got to win the election. There is an old Indian saying “यथा राजा तथा प्रजा” which roughly translates to ‘As is the king, so are the subjects’. It still relevant in today’s age where democracies have replaced monarchies in most of the countries. Trump’s subjects were mostly psychopaths or his partners in past crimes. But the word subject has also a new meaning with respect to the changes in the way leaders function. The modern day subjects are instead the citizens of the country. Thus the saying has to be turned on its head to be relevant now.

यथा प्रजा तथा राजा. As are the citizens, so is there elected representative. Trump not only showed us what he is but he has also what America really is. It’s a place where people from other countries go to make money and for this money, they tolerate the bigotry they are subjected to. Most of the world thinks that last four years are an aberration and come next year the status quo that existed till 2016 will return. But reality might be far from that. In 2017, this blog started with a prediction of what America would look like under Trump. Now I’m going to make another prediction of what the next few decades will look like.

I predict that Democrats will retain presidency for a long time and the civil unrest in America will keep worsening. Here is how it is going to play out…. Assuming that Trump doesn’t pull off a coup and stays in power.

Come January 2021, democrats are going to fall one seat short of senate majority, meaning they will not be able to do anything significant they planned to do once in office. Trump will keep hammering away on Twitter like a psychotic reality show judge humiliating its contestants. Rupublican law makers, who are now accepting the reality that Trumpism is here to stay with America will keep supporting Trump for the fear of not getting votes from the Trump base. Now that he has lost the immunity of being the president, there will be a flurry of law suits and investigations against his businesses. He will get convicted for a few minor things but will not have to do any jail time because the Republicans and the judges he appointed will see to it that most of the sentences are in fines and settlements. Trump will run again in 2024 and lose. He will continue to cry fowl and play victim. He will lose by a greater margin then now because some of the Americans who voted for him this time will come to terms with who he actually is. But the majority of the under educated white American voters will stick with trump.

One variable in this prediction is Vladimir Putin staying healthy and in power. If he doesn’t and someone else takes over and decides to humiliate America furthur by releasing evidence of all the allegations of interference, It may pave a way for more Americans reevaluating their allegiances.

Why do I make such bold and gloomy predictions? Data suggests that an average trump voter is non college educated and white. In other words ignorant. It will take generations and great effort in terms of educating them and their offspring of the realities of the world. The current political setup makes it extremely difficult to do it. After all this is a country that still refuses to accept metric system.

These people still live in their bubbles of outdated principles and are resist any reality checks. Most of the world has moved beyond race superiority, mainly because of the globalization. There is no turning the dials back. The anger and frustration of having to live through the precidency of a black person for 8 years made these gullible Americans make a deal with the Devil. Now there is no way they can break this deal. All of us have to now endure this new reality. The non white people in the US have no other choice but to make a deal with democrats. Because democrats say that they represent so many types of people with such varied priorities, they will not be able to cater the any of the needs. People in America will keep pulling their hair out, trolling each other and screaming at each other and the rest of the world will sit back and enjoy the show.

How will history remember us?

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Coco is a 2017 Pixar animation film about a boy who accidentally enters the world of the dead. An interesting premise, right? The movie is his race to get back to the living world by dawn, so that he doesn’t remain there permanently or in other words – DIE. In this movie, there is a very profound scene where the boy witnesses a dead man die. The confused boy asks his companion, Hector what just happened and Hector responds saying that when a person is forgotten, that’s when the ‘Real death’ happens. These forgotten souls don’t have a place, even in the land of the dead. That made a lot of sense. Once no one knows you ever existed, you never existed (at least philosophically).

This got me thinking. For the sake of argument, let’s assume that there is a land of dead and there are lots of souls there living just like we do in the living world. They exist as long as someone remembers them. Because being remembered is the most important thing in that world, lets assume the power and stature in that world is directly proportional to the the number of people who remember you. But there is a catch here, this isn’t a fair logic. I am pretty sure that Chengiz khan and Hitler will stay longer in the memory of the World when compared to Nelson Mandela or MK Gandhi. I say this because, our brains are hard wired to remember threats. Its a means of survival. So, its not fair that bad guys get better stature in this world, so lets assume good memories are a credit and bad ones are a debit. That evens it out to a pretty fair world. Its a fictional one, so it can be fair.

I haven’t invented this concept, it’s the same concept of a good vs bad ledger that most religions of the world preach. The more good credit you accumulate, the better is your after life or next life. I guess, our ancestors believed that this was the only way to keep the us in check.

One thing common between Chengiz khan, Hitler, Mandela and Gandhi? There are all historical figures. These are the guys who fill the pages of history text books of children across the world. No one else would be remembered for more than 4 generations. My history text books mentioned a lot of important events that occurred in the past. So good, mostly bad. If my memory serves me correctly, we are living in the first ever event that effected the entire world since the Triassic–Jurassic extinction event. That’s 65 million years ago. I am not counting the last ice age which ended about 11,700 years ago because it did not effect the southern hemisphere.

earth during the last ice age 3D Models - CGTrader.com
Model of the last ice age.

The corona-virus pandemic has hit the world hard. It was in a way Nature putting us in our place, but most of us don’t seem seem to realize this. We are so very eager to get back to out ‘Normal’ or sometimes simply stupid that we are continuously throwing caution to wind and add fuel to the fire of this epidemic. It has reached every nook and corner of the earth. From the tribes in the Andaman to the indigenous people of the Amazon, no one is being spared. This is what it must have felt for people in eastern Europe when the Chernobyl nuclear reactor exploded. The country that was responsible for alerting the world did every thing possible to cover up until there was no where to hide and by the time the world know what was going on, it was too late. Covid-19 makes the incident Chernobyl look like a fire in a dumpster

Sowell's Law Blog: Chernobyl Nuclear Disaster 30 Years After
Chernobyl radiation spread
File:COVID-19 Outbreak World Map.svg - Wikimedia Commons
Covid-19 outbreak world map

I know I haven’t done anything worthwhile in my life to be inducted in to the history books hall of fame or ‘infame’. But I do believe our entire generation will be held responsible for what we are doing now and will have a special place in the history, may be even a separate chapter for us. The worst part is that we don’t know if and when this will end. If it does end, how far is the next Zoo-tonic virus pandemic? According the National Geographic, 16% of all humans can be attributed to Zoo-tonic diseases and they also make up 75% of the emerging infectious diseases. AIDS, Mad cow, SARS, Ebola, MERS, Swine flu and now a new strain of SARS. If we continue going against the laws of nature and keep exploiting it in every possible way, the next deadly disease will be right around the corner waiting to pounce on us.

There is still time, Our actions over the period of coming months will determine how our future generations will remember us or if there will be a future. History is always written by the victors, at this moment of time I am not sure if there will be any.

Vantage Point

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Mississippi Burning is a 1988 movie based on a true incident. In June 1964, 3 civil rights workers disappeared and the vehicle they were traveling was found burnt. After 2 months of federal investigation their bodies were found buried. They were all shot. Their crime? Trying to get voting rights to black people. 9 were arrested including a cop and a pastor. The maximum sentence given out was for 10 years and no-one served for more than 6 years. Oh yeah, and the jury said pastor was not guilty because they couldn’t convict a… ‘Pastor’. The all white jury was later found to have some former KKK members.

56 years later, May 2020, Minneapolis – the capitol of Minnesota was burning. Reason, a black man died (technically murdered) in police custody, in broad day light, on the street. So, has anything changed? Did it get worse? What’s wrong with America? What’s wrong with Americans? What’s wrong with white people of America?

It’s been just more than 3 years since I have started writing this blog. My first ever blog (in my opinion) was my best work. That’s because I had pondered over those thoughts for years before I started typing them down. In hindsight I was kind of prophetic. Watching these protests unfold across the United states and later across the world, I wanted answers. I was 13,022 km away, but had a unique vantage point. Unlike popular opinion, I don’t think the white supremacists hate colored people, I think they are shit scared of them and they are paranoid. For that matter, Not just I think a lot of people are scared of black people. Not just black people, in a lot of countries, the race which is majority is paranoid about a race that is minority. Except in India I don’t understand the rationale behind it.

India which has always been predominantly Hindu, was ruled by Islamic invaders for 600 years and then was handed over to the Christian invaders who ruled it for a neat 190 years. It was under the rule of a minority that never pandered to the needs of their citizens. So, I do understand that the Majority of India doesn’t trust their minorities. Well, not all minorities, the Christians do not directly represent the British. Indians are not paranoid about Buddhists or Jains, not even Parsis who are as their name suggests Persians who sought refuge in India when their country was invaded. But Muslims have long reminded Indian people of atrocities that the Mughals committed and I do understand the psyche behind the distrust.

But in Europe and Americas, where black people were enslaved and forcefully brought in and exploited for generations. Even today, most of them do not have the social or economic means to displace the Majority. So, what do they fear? Are they afraid of revenge?

Side note: Why are only black people called African Americans in the US? Why are people from countries north of Sahara desert like Morocco, Tunisia, Egypt or Algeria called Middle east people? If doesn’t make any sense.

– A random thought

I have theory of relativity (not as complex as Einstein’s). The amount of fear or paranoia between 2 races is directly proportional to the relative difference of skin color. Fairer races believe that they are superior to darker races. I believe this is the subtle conditioning of brains using a tool called language.

skin: worldwide distribution of skin color variations - Students | Britannica Kids | Homework Help

Language plays a large part in how we perceive the world and we multiple languages have repeatedly hammered the idea that White is good and Black is bad. Which list would you prefer to be on? Black list or a White list? Would you be happy being the black sheep of the family? Don’t you think that such phrases cause a Unconscious bias in your head?

Indian Truck Art on Behance | Truck art, Art drawings simple, Pop art design

Now coming back to America, though banning gun ownership can drastically reduce the race related murders to just verbal or physical assaults and save lives, lobbying of fire arm manufacturers and the 2nd amendment of their constitution make it impossible to stop Americans from owning Guns. Argument of pro-gun folk in America is that it is necessary for their safety. Any civilian saying that they need a gun to protect themselves reeks of cowardice. This adding to the paranoid nature of Americans is what is causing so many problems. Why else would someone chase and hunt down a person jogging/running through a neighborhood?

So, the logical choice would be to educate people that being darker doesn’t infer character. We can get rid of this cowardice in future generations by having more diverse schools and exposing children to more cultures. As for the adults, I think they need to develop a new vantage point to see the world. Unless this happens now and happens fast, some 60 years from now another city/state will be burning and a some other confused soul will be writing a blog (or what ever this thing will be called then) about how nothing has changed since June 2020.

Also, we need to clean up our languages.

The Purge?

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Its here, Its there, its every where. There is a new epidemic town and every one is going bat shit crazy. If George Carlin were alive, he would have said ‘I told you so’ and showed you his middle finger.

Words of wisdom

Humans as a species have been on a path of self destruction for over a century now. In the name of technological advances and progress we have been going down the scale of the most important aspect for survival. Immunity.

I am a prime example for this. My parents wrapped me in cotton wool since childhood, making me very fragile physically. They were always scared that something might happen to me and now after taking so many precautionary medicines, my immune system is so weak that even the common cold takes 2 weeks and tons of antibiotics to go away.

The only thing on every ones minds these days is the Corona virus. As of 4th March 2020, the corona virus has infected people in 79 countries. There are 16 people in Iceland who have it. 16 people. A country with a population density of 3.5 people per square kilometer have a disease that is spread through human contact.

I always admire the new ways Nature tries to put us in our place time and again. I also admire the foolishness of our race because we never seem to learn.

When ever we put people in difficult situations, their true nature comes out. All the racists out there have been spewing hatred on the Chinese. Insulting their culture and food habits. Its like pot calling kettle black. As usual the wise ass clowns on social media are spreading all kinds of shit on the social media. Forwarding unverified, false information adding to the mass hysteria. They forward a bunch of messages a day and think they saved the world. But one thing is true, Nature has this time come up with a new plan and its going to take a monumental effort to get out of jail this time.

Lets look at the numbers. Scientists say that if not properly dealt with, the virus will infect about 60% of the world population. The death rate after infection is about 3.5 percent. For the first time in history, lets assume that the governments and politicians do their job efficiently and the percentage remains same. 60% of the world population is about 4,661,186,400 and 3.5 percent of it is 163,141,524‬. That would be 2% of the total population. That’s peanuts when compared to the black death that killed 30% of the world population. It wont even cause a dent to humanity. Its just a scratch.

So, why are most people behaving like its the end of the fucking world? May be we have become too sensitive? May be we are reading too much into this disease? Or may be we are even underestimating it and it is a purge by planet earth to offload some of the burden it is having to bear because of humans. We will only know this once the dust has settled.

I mean, to be fair, the planet probably sees us as a mild threat; something to be dealt with, and I’m sure the planet will defend itself in the manner of a large organism. Like a beehive or an ant colony can muster a defense, I’m sure the planet will think of something. What would you do if you were the planet trying to defend against this pesky, troublesome species? Let’s see, what might… hmm… viruses! Viruses might be good. They seem vulnerable to viruses. And viruses are tricky; always mutating and forming new strains whenever a vaccine is developed. Perhaps this first virus could be one that-that compromises the immune system of these creatures. Perhaps a human immunodeficiency virus making them vulnerable to all sorts of other diseases and infections that might come along and maybe it could be spread sexually, making them a little reluctant to engage in the act of reproduction.Well, that’s a poetic note. And it’s a start and I can dream can I?

George Carlin on Plant earth

But one thing is for sure. Again in the words of George Carlin, “The planet is fine, we are fucked“. May not be immediately but we definitely are eventually.

United Knobheads

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What goes around….Comes around…



The British people have been called many things. They are stereotyped to be tea drinkers, football fanatics, sophisticated, overly polite etc. But recently they showed what they actually are.. STUPID. Yes, It’s offensive to call an entire country stupid. But I’m not calling all of them stupid. 17410742 of them are. That’s roughly 37% of the electorate. Not sure if the numbers quantify me calling them stupid. If you are wondering where I got that number, It is the number of people who voted Yes for BREXIT in 2016. 

Well, you can argue that in everyone is wise in hindsight. But voting for something without knowing the complete ramifications is in one way stupid. The April 2019 deadline for BREXIT is approaching fast and it is getting more and more amusing to watch the circus unfolding in the English parliament. This is what happens if you over estimate yourself. The architects of this chaos were basically some selfish politicians looking for some mileage. 




There was a very popular propaganda by a guy called Boris Johnson. He tried to take growing nationalism in the world to his advantage and the jury is still out on whether he succeded in his plans. Below if a photograph of the bus he used for the campaign. 


This Mr Boris Johnson curiously shares a lot of things with one Mr Donald J Trump. I’m not talking of physical similarities.(Though they look like brothers to be honest) I’m referring to how they came into political power. Just like how Trump used scare mongering among white Americans that their jobs are bring taken by migrants, Migrants rape and kill white people, world is being unfair with their trades with US. Boris also used a cooked up figure that UK was paying 350 million pounds a week to EU and this can be freed up for the betterment of the country rather than helping our poor countries in EU. Both their empires have been built on Lies. 

Then, when they did get into power, just like Trump’s promise to build a wall in the US southern border to keep out the dangerous Mexicans, promises of Boris fell flat. Trump first promised that Mexico will pay for the wall. That did not happen. Then when the house was with Republicans, they did not grant funding. Then, after mid-terms when the house went to democrats, he began saying that Democrats were blocking the wall. Mr Boris went an extra mile. When he was supposed to be helping out draft the BREXIT agreement with EU, he resigned from his position and returned to being a back bench MP. Basically both of them know how to disrupt the economy and government. Both of them don’t know how to take responsibility. 

Now that UK is heading for a potentially No-Deal BREXIT which leaves the country in economic doldrums, I’m feeling very happy. You might say that I’m deriving schadenfreude.(I have been wanting to use this word for months now, and I finally got to use it. YAY!). You are right. After what they did to the world in the name of colonization, they had to suffer. A country whose crown jewel (literally the Jewel in the crown of their queen) is stolen from a colony, A country whose meteoric rise was built on the blood and bones of the people that they colonized deserves to suffer.
Well, it is not happening in the scale of suffering they inflicted on the world but it is happening on some scale. It reminds of a saying “what goes around comes around“.

There is a popular saying during the imperialist days of the world. The sun never sets on the British empire. I hope that April 12th, 2019 will be the day it happens.

Wrong packaging

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Expected vs Actual


Ever seen a wrongly packaged item? At least one of the toy in the below image is wrongly packaged. Right? What if the package was opaque? You wouldn’t know the mistake until you go home an unpack. What if you ordered online?

My wife once ordered a shampoo online, they sent conditioner. I requested an exchange citing wrong product. There was a guy to collect the old item and 2 days later, got a new package. Again a conditioner. Now I was really pissed, I called customer care and gave them an ear full (we all know that the customer care executive doesn’t give a rats ass about our problem and is just going to read out pre-scripted responses, but venting out anger is very satisfying). After a lot of apologies and another exchange request. I finally for a new package the next day… Voila… another Conditioner. I was laughing because I didn’t know what else to do. My wife said let it be and I accepted the delivery. It then turned from funny to hysterical. Next day, i even got an email asking me to review the product.  

Now here I was not happy because we sort of had a contract when I made the purchase.I agreed to buy a specific item. Actual item was different from the expected item.
  1. Democratic People’s Republic of Korea
  2. Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka
  3. Federal Democratic Republic of Nepal
These are the official names of North Korea, Sri Lanka and Nepal respectively. Now, the official names carry a lot of prefixes. I know you wouldn’t mind calling Sri Lanka a democratic country or Nepal a federal republic. But I know its ironic to call a dictatorship in North Korea a democracy. This is wrong packaging. Right? I mean the name on the package is different from the product that is inside. 

Now, let me get to my country. India. India is just referred to as India. But it’s a also called Republic of India. So that’s setting low expectations than the above countries. But there is a catch here. 
Here is the preamble of Indian Constitution:

 WE, THE PEOPLE OF INDIA, having solemnly resolved to constitute India into a SOVEREIGN SOCIALIST SECULAR DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC and to secure to all its citizens
 JUSTICE, social, economic and political;
 LIBERTY of thought, expression, belief, faith and worship;
 EQUALITY of status and of opportunity; and to promote among them all
 FRATERNITY assuring the dignity of the individual and the unity and integrity of the Nation;
 IN OUR CONSTITUENT ASSEMBLY this  26th day of November, 1949, do HEREBY ADOPT, ENACT AND GIVE TO OURSELVES THIS CONSTITUTION.

In the preamble of the constitution, India is called  
a SOVEREIGN SOCIALIST SECULAR DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC.
Yes, that’s all the words from your civics book. I mean literally all the words that can be put in front of a country name and that sets the bar very high. I can kind of understand the folks who wrote these words. They wanted India to be the good boy of the class. But these are not just words, these are the principles on which they wanted India to run. 

So have been able to uphold these principles we set for ourselves?

I’m not going to list the dictionary definitions of each of these words. I’m just going to use layman’s language to do a fact check.

Theoretically India became a Sovereign on 15th August 1947. The British left for good and that meant that we were our own bosses. But have the governments acted with authority of their own? Every government for the fear of loosing votes and also due to greed gets influenced by not just internal forces but also to multi national conglomerates. So, that’s principle flushed down the drain.

Now, do all the citizens get an equal share of resources in India. No, so we are not socialist.
Then is India secular? India has been melting pot of world religions. In a true secular country Government doesn’t interfere with religion and Religion doesn’t interfere with governance. Now we all know that it’s not the case in India.

In a democracy, government gets elected by the people and all people have equal say in the election. But if you look at it in simple words, this also directly means that if a 100 people vote and at least 51 people want a thing, the rest of the 49 should suck it up and shut the fuck up till the next election. Looking at the number of protests, PIL’s, law suits and agitations – It is any thing but a democracy in India. 

So what are we left with now? Yes, Is India a republic? For this I do have to go back to a Wikipedia definition. Its easier that way.
A republic (Latin: res publica) is a form of government in which the country is considered a “public matter”, not the private concern or property of the rulers. The primary positions of power within a republic are not inherited. It is a form of government under which the head of state is not a monarch.

Now, In India rulers behave like the country is their private property. Most positions of power are definitely inherited. Politics in India are a family business and finally, though our head of state is not a monarch. There has been more than one Monarch like figure who was directly head of the state or worse, held no position of power but made all the decisions. So, I’m going to flush that down the drain too.

Just like my wife gave up on the shampoo and adjusted with the conditioner. Indians have turned a blind eye to what we aspired to be and what we turned out to be.

Well, its good that we do not call our selves SOVEREIGN SOCIALIST SECULAR DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC of India or SSSDRI.  It sounds silly,awkward, ironic and would be lying through our teeth. Lets continue calling our country just India. But for the sake of sanity, lets amend the preamble to the below text.

 WE, THE PEOPLE OF INDIA, having solemnly resolved to constitute India into a SOVEREIGN* SOCIALIST* SECULAR* DEMOCRATIC* REPUBLIC* and to secure to all its citizens
 JUSTICE*, social, economic and political;
 LIBERTY* of thought, expression, belief, faith and worship;
 EQUALITY* of status and of opportunity; and to promote among them all
 FRATERNITY* assuring the dignity of the individual and the unity and integrity of the Nation;
 IN OUR CONSTITUENT ASSEMBLY this  26th day of November, 1949, do HEREBY ADOPT, ENACT AND GIVE TO OURSELVES THIS CONSTITUTION.

*SUBJECT TO CHANGES

Frogs in the well

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Have you seen the 2014 Sci-Fi film Maze runner or read the Maze runner series James Dashner? If you have’t i’ll walk you through. If you have watched it, please skip to the next paragraph. This movie starts with an unconscious boy, his memory erased, deposited in a community of boys living in a place called Glade. The glade is surrounded by very high walls. Outside the walls is the Maze, a labyrinth of high concrete walls covered in ivy that changes every day. The Maze houses strange, lethal creatures known as Grievers. Grievers are described as amorphous monsters of metal and flesh. The Gladers are trying to stay alive as well as “solve” the Maze by running through it as fast as they can while tracking movements of the walls and trying to find an exit to escape.They only do the running in the day and return to the glade by sun set.

I consider this film as a Scorn/Homage the human civilization (please decide which one after you are done reading this entire thing). The small group of boys represents almost all types of persons that have ever walked the earth. Well don’t look for holes in my plot yet. Its only 2 sentences til now. I know the claim that a group of people can represent every human ever is a tall statement. Let me try to justify my claim.

In the Glade, there are 2 types of people.
1) The ones that abide by the rules set by previous inhabitants.
2) The protagonist who challenges the rules and tries to explore beyond.

The the 1st category again has certain sub categories. One set of people are very happy with the status quo they are happy with the things as they are.They fear anything new. Then there are others who not only follow rules but go super crazy if one doesn’t.
Finally there are some, who after looking at protagonist, think he makes sense, shift sides and start following him out of the Glade.

This is how humans started out. Early men/women lived in groups, defined rules for based on their experiences. They feared any thing new and anything they did not understand. Then someone like the hero of Maze runner comes around and started exploring. So they started moving beyond the metaphorical ‘Glade’ that was their immediate surroundings. Then lots and lots of years later, we reached the level that we had a map of most of the earth. But still we thought we were the centre of Universe and Sun went around the earth (Such arrogance and self-centric). We thought that the earth was flat. Then lots of years later, we reached moon, can now see beyond our galaxy. So, when we started out as cave men. The comparative sample size of our known to unknown might be same as our current known to unknown. The ratio might even be larger, but lets for the sake of argument say its about the same.

Hunting & Gathering : Hubble telescope = Hubble telescope : All that there is to know.


That way we are still Frog’s in a well. Well, not frogs exactly, Frog wouldn’t be presumptuous for one thing. Because we are human’s in a well, we have come up with a lot of stuff and thus my point finally arrives. The thing I have a feud with – Faith.

Almost all religions are human-centric. For all the years human mind had to evolve to its current state, this is very Naive. Most religions even depict god very human like. As per May 2016, earth is home to an estimated One Trillion species. Of one trillion species on earth, God is like human and has set rules for humans, doesn’t care for the other 999,999,999,999 species?

he heaven, hell, rebirth, ledger of good vs bad, what is good, what is bad, what to eat, where to eat, when to eat,what to say, what not to say, what to wear, what to do, when to do, when to fuck, how many to fuck. I say What the Fuck?
It really makes no sense to me. Like Maze runner, some people chose to remain where they are and came up with a couple of theories. Each theory was ‘a theory of everything’. They are against people who want to explore and see definitive proof before they buy into a theory. I mean why the fuck would so many people be so gullible?

It still amazes me that the guys making up stuff without moving their asses have more subscribers than the other lot. I guess that’s why Big boss has better TRP’s than than Discovery channel. They believe they are house mates in a show run by their “Big boss”. He is always watching them, giving them a purpose, rating them, ranking them, eliminating them and if you have been a good boy, giving you a reentry wild card.

I believe though we are humans, we have been thinking and behaving like Frog’s in a well.Just like the story, many would like to hear from a Frog that has seen stuff that’s outside our well.

May be that’s why we have been fascinated by Aliens.

The correct prepositions

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The grammar of governments for governance


In the final school exam, English was everyone’s dread. This was because, we did not have a defined book from which the questions came. We had 4 sections, reading for 35 marks, writing for 35, literature for 15 and grammar for 15. Obviously 15 marks in grammar were the only section where one could score 100%, so my father decided that I need grammar classes. The instructor followed a simple technique that I never understood then. He used to get photo copies of ‘fill in the blank’ questions. Everyone in the class got some 10 mins to answer them and then we were asked to take turns to read out the answer for each question. One had to explain why he/she chose the answer if it was correct. If it was incorrect it would be next guys turn to tell the correct answer. If everyone failed he used to give an explanation. Also, he wouldn’t tell us if the answer was correct or not if we couldn’t explain it. 

I’m a condescending person by birth. This default urge to correct people gets me on the wrong side of people frequently and the grammar classes in school have only exaggerated my condescending nature. Whenever I hear or read something, I check if its grammatically correct. Of all the parts of grammar, I believe prepositions are very important. In certain occasions there are more than one preposition that can be used. Each one gives the sentence a different meaning. The best examples for these are our constitutions. Yes, the founding fathers of every country were pretty smart about how they framed the sentences in constitutions. Let’s look at Indian constitution,
Art. 19 of the constitution now provides six freedoms, namely :
  1. right to freedom of speech and expression,
  2. right to assemble peaceably and without arms,
  3. right to form associations or unions,
  4. right to move freely throughout the territory of India,
  5. right to reside and settle in any part of the territory of India,
  6. right to practice any profession or to carry on any occupation trade or business.
Art 25 adds freedom of religion.

There are some restrictions too
Firstly, the state may impose restrictions on the exercise of the right to freedom of speech and expression on eight grounds. These are:
  1. defamation,
  2. contempt of court,
  3. decency or morality,
  4. security of the state,
  5. friendly relations with other states,
  6. incitement of offence and,
  7. sovereignty and
  8. integrity of India.
2 of the 7 freedoms are very interesting to me.
1) Freedom of speech and expression

It means that you have the freedom to express yourself. This is one of the biggest lie in our Constitution. Anything you say can be categorised into one of the restrictions and you can be held guilty. Now a days, going by the News. India’s soft power is trolling.See what happened to Maria Sharapova when she said, she doesn’t know who Sachin tendulkar is? I think if you really put your heart into it you can find fault with even a simple ‘Good morning’. Now Freedom of speech will never work until people are mature enough, and it ain’t gonna happen. So, what we should have is Freedom from speech. In other words a kind of shield or protection from idiots. Our governments cannot guarantee freedom from speech, so I guess for now you have to learn to do it yourself. See a simple preposition change effectively changes the meaning. The next fundamental right gets even more interesting with the same change of preposition.

2) Freedom of religion

Constitution of India assures its citizens that they can practise any religion as long as it doesn’t violate the above mentioned restrictions. But this is again a very clever phrasing of a fundamental right. A religion by its nature is defaming to other religions.It defines a morality that defies common sense. It effects friendly relations with other states. Effects the security of state. So, it more or less qualifies under every restriction mentioned above. What we actually need is freedom from religion. Religion should not allow people to dictate how others live their lives. But its exactly what it does. So, we need freedom from it, not just of it. 

Rest of them though might be grammatically more accurate are also a sham.

  1. right to assemble peaceably and without arms – Are we allowed to really assemble in peace? Only when your government wont mind it. 
  2. right to form associations or unions – Again only if the political persons in power think it does not endanger their ambitions in any way
  3. right to move freely throughout the territory of India, – Big joke again, J&K is off limits. So are various parts of India(conditionally). An Andhra guy is not welcome in Telangana and vice-versa. A non-Tamil is not welcome in Tamil Nadu. Well Bihari’s not welcome anywhere. Well there are some Marathis that fume at the site of certain language speaking Autowallahs. I can go on but you get the point. Right?
  4. right to reside and settle in any part of the territory of India – Explaining this would be just repetition of previous sentences. 
So. in practice the Constitution of a country is in place to control it’s citizens not to protect them. It is a rule book using which political parties in the mask of governance can enforce and indoctrinate their ideologies and agendas.

If you find any grammatical errors in the post, please let me know. You must have had a better teacher than me.