Have a little Faith

Reposted from a discussion on FB about whether India has changed or is it still a country of corruption, poverty, and omnipresent filth.

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"India is my most complex lover. And I’ve had complicated relationships. Believe me." I won't mention who said this and in what context coz it takes away from the quote :)

I have been back in India for over 2 years now and I have to say that it is a changed country. India has always been associated with Faith. In any faith based society, what you believe in often shapes reality and the future. The new generation believes in the new India. It believes that this is not their grandpapa's India. They believe that they can change India. They believe that they can do great things in this changed India. Rather than being spectators, they are willing to be the instruments of that change. It is this belief that is transforming the nation.

Though the fundamental change has been a shift in attitudes, much has also changed in India in terms of infrastructure and opportunities. There is no shortage of stories, in both urban and rural India, where people from humble beginnings have transformed their lives and the lives of others. There are so many of these stories that you can't threat them as exceptions. Even the lot of the average man has changed so much. Just think of the growing middle class and what they can afford now in terms of housing, education, electronics, vacations, luxury goods.

Having said that, India remains a land of contradictions. Rural India remains in a state of neglect. With no real economic activity in huge parts of India, there is major migration to the cities. With so few cities and 40% of the India's population expected to be in the cities by 2025, there are huge challenges ahead. How do you feed this huge urban population? What is the fate of people left behind in the villages? Just the shortage of water can bring everything crashing down? What is the environmental impact of the economic activity? What tensions arise due to the change in demographics of urban India?

There are more questions here than answers. Even where there are answers, there are no easy answers. To all these questions the new India simply says "Yes there are unanswered questions. Yes there will be missteps and mistakes will have huge consequences. Yes there are huge hurdles the size of mountains. In the land of the Himalayas however, there are no insurmountable hurdles. All I ask of you is to have a little faith"

That's your sister dude

Out of the blue my friend says, "Yeah, my brother is marrying our cousin, first cousin". Actual conversation I had recently. I am fairly liberal and down with the whole live and let live philosophy, but my reaction was a surprising Ewwwww. Thankfully I didn't say it out loud and thankfully the friend found the idea a little strange as well.

However, it made me wonder what brought out such a judgmental reaction to the union of two people. My first suspect, as with most things, biology. Research has shown that there are increased risk of genetic defects amongst children of cousins. Nature likes at least a little diversity when it comes to the coming together of two gene pools. Perhaps this knowledge is ingrained in us and thus the reaction to two cousins marrying each other. We are reacting not to the union as such, but to the health risk to the next generation. We are biased because of our concern for the well being of the collective next generation.

This bias, however, is based on at least two assumptions. The first being that this couple will have children. This is not true in today's generation and certainly not in Europe and Japan, where there is a growing population of couples who don't have and don't want kids. It is strange then to assume that it is natural that these cousins will have kids. Allow me, for a moment, to debunk that argument by saying that we are talking about a reaction that is ingrained in us over thousands if not millions of years. Marriages without the explicit purpose of procreation is a recent phenomena, so we haven't unlearned that reaction just yet. As far as our nature and generalizations go, it is a safe assumption that these cousins will have kids. Let's go with that argument, for now.

The second assumption is that the risk to the children of cousins is high. As this article points out "the risk of serious genetic defects like spina bifida and cystic fibrosis in the children of first cousins indeed exists but that it is rather small, 1.7 to 2.8 percentage points higher than for children of unrelated parents". What is even more interesting is that this same article also mentions that the risk of birth defects is the same as in women giving birth in their early 40s.

Think however to the news of your 40 year old friend who is going to have a baby. It is most likely something like "Oh I am so happy for you". OK maybe I am comparing apples to oranges here. If this cousin couple were having a baby, maybe I would have the same reaction "Congrats, I am so happy for you". How about a friend wanting to focus on her career for a few years before having kids? Surely, as far as kids go, that is more like the decision for cousins to marry each other. It is a bit of a stretch, but looking at the just the numbers, aren't both those decisions taking the same amount of risk? What is the reaction to a woman wanting to focus on her career? "Good for you". Some might even be concerned and offer a word of advice about the "right" time for everything, but nowhere near the reaction for cousins marrying each other.

Why hasn't nature ingrained the same reaction to two situations with the same amount of rsik ot the next generation? Maybe it is not biology after all. Perhaps the reaction is ingrained not by nature but by society and its norms. How much of how we react to situations is about how society perceives a situation and how it has taught us to react to them. Maybe if I grew up in a society where marrying cousins was acceptable, I wouldn't have had that reaction. Perception rather than objective evaluation dictates so much of our lives. I know I haven't made a solid case against society here, but you get the idea.

Makes you wonder though, how much of us is really objective and how much of us is trained by society to react a certain way, to think a certain way. What part, what percentage, of me embraces the world with open arms and sees it with eyes that don't judge? What part still runs on auto-pilot? Only more questions here, few answers.

This is not about culture, it is about basic manners

I'll admit it, I don't know the first things about when to applaud during a concert. I just wait for the cue from the artist, the crescendo and then the pause. What I do know however, is to arrive on time, turn off my cellphone and enjoy the show. These are simple rules that anyone should be able to follow. Why then can't people follow these simple rules.

I was at a Zakir Hussain concert last night (more on that some other time). The concert started 30 minutes later than the advertised time, which by Hyderabad standards is right on time. As expected, people trickled in more than an hour late. The artists made several pleas to the both the audience and the organizers that this is very disturbing, but the perpetrators continued undeterred.

The people up front, the people who paid the big bucks, were the worst offenders. Not only were they fashionably late, but it seemed just attending the concert was a mere fashion statement. They didn't seem to have any interest in the music. They were there to see and be seen. Another occasion to do the "Good to see you Mrs. Reddy" and a chance to show people they are part of the cultured and the elite. What is it about the elite of this country that gives them this sense of entitlement? Why do they feel that they can break all the rules. In fact, breaking the rules seems to be the way to show that you are important.

Before this starts sounding like elite-bashing, let me return to my main point. People arrived late irrespective of the section they were seated in. A lot of people even left in the middle of the concert while the artists were still playing. For culture that is know around the world for it's art and music, where is our appreciation for it? Why is it that we have no respect for our own music.

I have heard arguments like a lot of people have made money in India, but they are not cultured. They have never been exposed to the music and hence have no appreciation for it. The next generation, if they are exposed more to the music, will develop an appreciation for it. I don't buy the argument. It is an elitist argument that assumes that you need to have a life of privilege to appreciate the finer things in life like classical music. What is beautiful is beautiful. Your bank balance does not change it. Your education doesn't either. It doesn't matter what your background is, people always appreciate the beautiful.

I don't buy the argument for another reason. This has nothing to do with being cultured. This has to do with respect. Being late for a concert and talking on the cell phone during it has nothing to do with culture. It is disrespectful to the artists and the people around you. It is a lack of basic manners. We talk about being a respectful and god-fearing people. A people who respect elders. A courteous people who respect others. I don't see any proof of it.

We might have been a respectful people once, but somewhere in those thousands of years of this civilization, we have lost that respect. It is time we find it back. For if we don't, one day soon, we may even lose the belief that we had it once.