Characterless is NOT equal to Cool

Why does Indian media portray all the wrong habits as 'being cool' these days?

Chain smoking, drinking until one pukes, substance abuse, using filthy bad words in every sentence, having no attachment relationships, extra-marital affairs, wearing provocative clothes and dancing in most vulgar ways, being violent...all seem to be the essential characters for anyone to be popular and desirable now. I agree that they eventually show a 'good heart' in these characters, but I am afraid most people only learn the first part. I am seeing an alarming rate of these characters seeping into my younger cousins and family friends. It's not that people from my generation or earlier ones didn't do all these things. But, there seemed to be sense of shame attached to all these habits and people tried to keep their bad habits as secrets. But the younger people today seem to really think these things are 'cool' and are proud to showcase their habits!

My cousin, who is learning photography to be a professional, did her first practice photo-shoot that shows a guy smoking in most of the photos. She asked my opinion on the pics and I said I don't like the subject. She was really surprised and then said that she likes 'macho men'. When I asked "What's macho about filling your and everyone's lungs with poison?", she had no answer and said "Just relax. It's not that serious. It's cool." Hmm.

My Indian neighbor's son, who is in his early 20s and is a otherwise normal decent guy, has no problem using bad words, talking about girls as if they are objects, about pot smoking etc. openly on social networks with his friends. I am sure a large majority of guys talk trash with their friends, but I have never seen any of my friends or family members (who are my age or older), talking trash in front of the whole world. I have never heard my father use a single bad word in my life, and the only time I have heard J use some slang is when his college roommate calls, but that too he always goes in a different room to take the call.

When I read blogs, I see a lot of Indian girls in their 20s talk about being depressed (for standard reasons that people have in 20s in probably every generation), and they describe how they try to forget their sorrow and problems by drinking, smoking and partying, with great pride. Of course they should be proud of handling their problems in life, but shouldn't there be some shame about not being able to handle them in sober state? It seriously bothers me and scares me a lot about my little nieces.

The bad habit that has reached my generation the most seems to be extra-marital affairs. I heard quite a lot of those among my extended circle of friends within past few years, some of which resulted in divorces and breaking families for their little kids. On my recent trip to India, two of my friends jokingly (I hope) mentioned that they are thinking of having one too, so that they don't become the odd ones!

People always blame Western culture. Having lived in US for nearly 9 years now, I have to say we need to stop blaming others and look at our methods. If we do what they are doing in western world, we should also implement strict censorship regulations like them.

A little kid in India can go to their neighboring grocery store and buy cigarettes saying that I am buying it for my dad. In US you have to show a valid ID that tells the shopkeeper that you are over 21 years old. Same goes for alcohol. No will sell or serve alcohol to anyone below 21 years. In nightclubs, they will put a x mark on underage kids' hands so that they are not served any alcohol. I agree many kids go into lot of trouble to bypass the regulations, but at least it stops most of the regular kids from attaining habits that they will regret when they grow older. No such strict regulations exist in India as far as I know.

Just putting an 'A' in a movie certificate or a statuary warning, and bleeping a few things shouldn't be the end of all responsibilities. All movies and programs in US are rated based on age limit (general, 13 yr, 17 yr). Underage kids won't be allowed in a theater and they will be asked for ID if the age is not clear from appearance. For Indian movies, everyone is allowed to go for most movies with their kids of all ages! In US, all programs shown on regular TV before 9 pm are clean and the really bad ones come only after midnight. Cable TV channels do not have all the regulations, but they come with parental lock options. I think they have recently started the parental lock in India, but I haven't seen anyone using it. I noticed many people watching pretty horrible reality shows with their kids! So I guess we also need an education to keep up with the changes in media to safeguard our kids' minds.

But first, we need to stop showing that being characterless is cool. If you need to show someone practicing bad habits in a movie, please highlight that they are doing so because they are weak, confused and lost. Don't make them the popular, desirable person. Please don't make cheating on one's wife to be a fun thing to do.



I am really getting old. I wrote one of my longest post so far ranting on changing times and degrading moral values! :p

Ignorant or utopian?

Like many other people who believe in scientific reasoning, I was shocked and angry after hearing the Pope's message in Africa on how to control AIDS. I kept thinking that how can a person whom a huge part of the world population considers their leader, can he be so ignorant to say that "condoms can be harmful rather than being useful in preventing the AIDS epidemic"?

Then yesterday when I was sitting in the train and watching the sunset, I remembered the words of a very religious friend of mind who feels that god paints these beautiful landscapes with his brush and colors. And this friend is actually a student of science. Then I suddenly realized that this whole Pope issue is not simple ignorance, it is actually a matter of belief. If someone believes that a disease is "god's punishment" and staying away from "sins" is the only foolproof way to not get sick, no wonder they will consider using protection to be a harmful thing. You see using protection gives freedom to do "sin" which means it will increase the chances of getting punished. Faith and belief does not need more logic than that. One just has to believe something in their heart and that becomes the truth.

I have nothing against religious people. Everyone has a right to choose what they want to believe and not believe. I just hope all his followers listen to every part of his suggestion. Those who stop using protection as per his instructions must also follow his suggestions of practicing abstinence, fidelity and heterosexuality. If they decide to follow only the first part, it is going to take a LOT of praying to cure a fatal disease like AIDS.

Replate

Just a little while back I was sitting outside and saw a homeless guy digging the nearby trash bins for leftover food. This made me immensely sad and guilty for being fortunate enough to have all the food I need to survive, and more.

Thanks to my mom, I have always been against wasting food. She taught me to always take only the amount of food I really can eat. I sincerely follow that rule and try to make people around me do that too. But there are times when we are forced to buy in big portions and then have no other options except throwing away the leftovers in the trash. Today's incidence made me think if we could throw those leftovers in a way that the poor homeless people can get them without digging through the rotten trash cans.

I started looking up on the net. Some people suggested offering the food to a homeless person directly. This did not seem very practical to me. Firstly, I will probably not have enough time or motivation to look for a needy person at the time I have that extra food. And even if I do, the person I offer it to might feel insulted.

After some more searching I found this very simple yet very nice idea called 'Replate'. To replate is to place the unwanted leftovers on top of the trash can that has a lid or next to it if doesn't have a lid. It will be nicer if it can be kept wrapped in a paper bag, say the bag in which the food came in originally.

There can be many critics and concerns about this practice. But until we find a better solution, this seems like a doable idea to me. If others agree with me, then from now on please remember to replate instead of throwing away those half eaten lunches.

Marriage: Shouldn't it be a happy subject?

Majority of Californian citizens voted in favor of banning gay marriage in the state. Protests and rallies are being held against this decision all over the state and media is having a field day.

This whole issue brought up some random thoughts in my mind:

On one hand more and more heterosexual couples who have right to get married, do not care about getting married. And on the other hand, homosexual couples who want to, are not allowed to. It seems sadly funny that we always want what we can't have and don't want the things that we can have.

It seems like a hypocrisy too that the people who are banning gay-marriage are not banning pre-marital sex, adultery and divorce. Aren't these against the 'holy institution of marriage' as well?

Why can't we live our lives on our own ideals and let others do the same? Is that so difficult to do or is it that we just love fighting against each other to keep our lives from getting peacefully boring? I think its the second one.

Yay for President Obama!!!

..and yay to Ohio that finally turned blue..and of course to a very blue California. This year no one can make fun of me anymore as many did in 2004.

Only one regret:
Wish I could vote for him today :)

Thanks to all the people who did..all over the country!

The mother-in-law gene

Yesterday I went to lunch with my host family (a local American family who volunteers to help international students during their stay in this university). The family consists of an old lady (S), her daughters, son and daughter-in-law (V).

Now S is a really nice person. She is extremely helpful, never judgmental or interfering, always politically correct, highly intellectual and well-read (knows much more about Indian history and current affairs than I do!) and an activist for social and environmental causes. In simple words, she is someone whom anyone can instantly respect.

V was my fellow PhD student who completed her degree just couple of months ago.

During our lunch yesterday, I was amazed to see that S kept making V feel bad about the fact that she does not have a post doc offer and highlighting that I have one. I know how bad it feels when you don't have a job and people ask about it, let alone compare with someone else. I can only imagine how bad she felt when a family member was embarrassing her in front of an outsider. V just sat there quietly.

Its not that S has reasons to be ashamed of V. V is very intelligent (she actually made me nervous with her knowledge during a class we took together and she even co-authors a paper in Nature!!). Its just that she can afford to be picky about the job (she doesn't have to worry about visa issues) and so she is taking her time to find the best possible option.

The thing that made me angrier is when one of her daughters came back to town couple of years ago after resigning from her job, S was just too happy to have her back and even let her stay with her for many months.

I would think someone like S will be equally nice to her daughter and daughter-in-law, but I felt that the mother-in-law gene can get activated even in the nicest women. Sigh!

The other extreme

In my previous post, I mentioned that we should not give up on a relationship when maybe putting in some extra effort can save the relationship. But one needs to know when such effort is useless. In case of some people, it can be the other extreme where they tolerate too much. I can think of one such person.

This girl is an engineer with a nice job in a reputed company in India. She had an arranged marriage. At the time of the wedding, her parents gave 35 lakh rupees, 50 tola of gold jewelery, all kinds of household things plus the other usual stuff. Even after this huge dowry, the guy kept asking for a computer, a car and some family property.

My first thought was "Why did she marry a guy who asked for dowry?"

If asking for dowry was not enough, he and his family wanted a son. The girl gave birth to a daughter. The guy never visited his daughter in the hospital and never took her home. The daughter lives with the grandparents.

At this point you would think that now she should definitely leave him.

No, she didn't. She kept going back and forth between her parents' and in-laws' houses so that she can give time to both her husband and kid.

Ok, even this is not the end of the story. After all this, they had a second baby!!!!

By this point I was sure that she must be dead inside. How else can someone agree to have another baby with such a creep?

And guess what, the second child is also a girl. So last time I heard she was still going back and forth between the two houses. Both the kids live with the grandparents.

I don't personally know her but I know her sister. When I asked the sister why they are tolerating this extreme nonsense. She said "If she gets a divorce, then no one will marry me (the sister)". The sister is a self-dependent grad student in US!!!

In my previous post I said that we need to be more tolerant to make a relationship work but this much tolerance is definitely a sin.