21 September 2011

The value of shit.

I watched the runaway Tamizh movie hit Mankatha in a theatre today.

This is what I got - drunk guy, promiscuity, ugly male friends, getting drunk, feeble attempts at humour, the beginning of a plot that came out of a drunk guy's mouth, mentions of a betting mafia, one nice girl and her dad, mention of a huge amount of cash, a hardly believable heist in which half a physical truck was replaced by an identical half when all the victims had to do in broad daylight was turn around to look but did not, girl teasing boy, cars, boy teasing girl, beeps to cut out bad language, a little bit of anger, mention of cricket, profile shots, staring fat guys, flying fat guys, landing fat guys, shooting, more feeble attempts at humour, a shitload of shooting, death, gyrating hips, all the twists you could predict, none you couldn't, loud unmelodious music, small relief at the intermission and a big headache at the end.

It is not hard to see the director's point of view - fun and indulgence can only be booze, smoking and women - for Indian men that is.  It is not hard to see this shit called a movie in some circles is a runaway success.  Can't argue against success, can we?  After all, we live in a nation that measures everything.  So how can we possibly complain?

I remember the Bajaj Chetak was a big hit once upon a time.  The choices were between this lousy three legged horse of a scooter and another remnant of a nostalgic era, called the Lambretta.  The waiting period on this stupid beast was 6 years!  It was in DEMAND!  For some reason, after the choices opened up for Indian auto customers, this damn thing vanished.  As did Yezdi motorcycles and petromax lamps.

In the absence of decent choices, the least rotten shit sells like food.  In fact, it sells AS food.  The most telling symptom of bankruptcy is when shit gets hyped as great food.  But this shit isn't even the least rotten of all the shit available in the theatres today.  It is just the best dressed shit.  Something has to fill the void, sate the hunger.  So why not dress up the first shit that comes down the tube at the right moment?

Ajith has a role in which he enjoys himself.  After torturing himself and us in other roles, this one must be a relief.  So, he's part of the dressing.  Arjun kicked some serious butt as soon as he showed up.  That was cool.  But he's done it already a thousand times before.  If he was the more watchable nonsense, how many grades of shit do we have to have for this load to qualify as a meal?

And yet, people lapped it up, apparently.  I didn't see anybody other than two out of a group of three boys that hollered and hooted on a couple of occasions.  The rest were pretty much numb.  Like in most movies coming on Indian screens today, nobody laughs at comedy, nobody cries at tragedy, nobody claps at thrills and spills, and seriously, if a wheelie got these two boys all kicked, I really have to wonder if they got into a time machine in 1982 and landed right in the middle of our twenty first century Indian shit.  The stoppie was not bad, but check out the kids on Marina Beach doing that regularly.

I wonder why our leading women regularly subject themselves to play out male fantasies.  It is not as if they regularly get to play strong female roles, but do they have to demean themselves all the time?  Aren't we done already with pouting, rubbing, and acting coy?  Would it be so hard for them to rise up?  But if they struggled too much to stand on a pile of shit, I suppose they'd get buried in it pretty easily.

Shit has its value.  It can be used as manure.  Movies like this shouldn't dare compare themselves to such levels of usefulness.

- BSK.

06 September 2011

An Exaggerated Reverence for Fake Notions.

Is it just me, or is this a specialist Indian trait - giving respect where none is due?

I was just criticized for being brash and rash, by a senior Indian friend of mine, and I have no problem accepting I am rash and brash.  But the reason this criticism came baffles me.  He sent me a long list of "Winners vs Losers" sayings, topped up with "the blessings of ABC priest" and a picture of this saffron man.  All I did was place my bet that this priest had nothing to do with these sayings.  That's it.

I was not only criticized for doing that, but a suggestion even followed - perhaps it is because I am unmarried that I am like this!

Seriously, if I got a whole bunch of sayings, "With the blessings of XYZ person", is it not normal to assume that those sayings were being attributed to that person?  Is it wrong to question that?  I wasn't even taking a stance here of any sort, just placing a bet that this priest did not say those things about winners and losers.  I get chastised for that?  Well maybe I should have asked the real question - "Why do you have to put this priest over these sayings if you don't intend some sort of association?  Are the sayings so irrelevant that I would take them seriously if this saffron guy blessed me?  Or is the dude so at a loss for words that he had to tag on to these sayings in case he appears dumb otherwise?

It is no secret that I hate these fucking do-gooders who don't do shit except spread the "good" word.  I am one of those bastards that has no respect for age, and I make no secret of it.  I have no respect for a priest or saint just because that person chose that life.  I do have a lot of respect for an ordinary person who pats a stray dog, feeds some needy person, or waters a sapling diligently.  Enough already with the fake notions about ourselves.

There is an India that is holy beyond question, self righteous, blind as a bat with confidence, but useless in abilities of perception.  The people who come from this India want Indian culture imposed on every damn thing, even if it is practically hopeless.  They love all the "good news" about India that they hear, and ignore all the truth that doesn't sound or look so good.  These are the fools that believe an Indian company can make an "iPad killer" even when they have not done anything but talk about a stupid tablet they are coming out with as their first product, and these are the people that imagine the USA's space program is on its feet because of the Indians working at NASA!

Why is it that these people assume India has the patent on intelligence and culture, even while India's own engineers have not been called upon to clean up the Ganges, and India's youth no longer subscribe to the social values their parents agreed to abide by to their parents?  The harsh truth is, India is a bloody fake nation.  It had some great things going for it in the last few thousands of years, but India the nation was yet to be born!  Since 1947, India the nation has been at the mercy of dogma, assumptions, exaggerated reverence for the wrong things, and this belief system that keeps Indian people individually holy but collectively corrupt and inefficient.

This is not to belittle the success of the Indian postal department's PIN code system, or the various strides Indians have made in various fields.  It is to question our right to imagine other nations have not made similar progress in the corresponding period.  We're going ahead, for sure, but that just means we caught the same evolution bus as everyone else from monkey to human.  Nothing more.  This truth doesn't sit well with this arrogant India.

As ridiculous as it may seem - let's take the first few boasts from this website http://www.nagpurdarpan.com/main/indian.htm  for instance. 

There are 3.22 Million Indians in America.
38% of Doctors in America are Indians.
12% of Scientists in America are Indians.
36% of NASA employees are Indians.
34% of MICROSOFT employees are Indians.
28% of IBM employees are Indians.
17% of INTEL employees are Indians.
13% of XEROX employees are Indians.

First of all, why is America (presumably the USA) the gold standard for "Indians"?  Why not see how NASA, MICROSOFT, IBM, INTEL, and XEROX are ALL American companies, not Indian!

Let's take the 3.22 Million Indians in America.  Okay, so they made it great.  What about the 1.2 billion who are still in India?  The Indian doctors in America are probably very good.  What about those in India?  How many doctors do we have here, and why is our healthcare system so screwed up that most government hospitals are just concentration camps?

12% of scientists in America are Indians?  Great!  The community of scientists in the USA are responsible for the USA holding 90% of the patents since the invention of the aeroplane.  We are using pilots with fake licenses to fly our people in them!

36% of NASA employees are Indians.  Great!  100% of ISRO employees are Indians.  What exactly are we proud about here?  ISRO is the best of the best of government organizations in India.  But the mention here is still NASA!  The gold standard is still the USA in this patriotic message about India!!

If you go down the list of things Indians should be proud of, almost all the great things took place in ancient India, zilch in the nation of India we have today.

We still have too much reverence, exaggerated reverence, for ancient things, and that is why perhaps we don't trumpet the bride burning custom of "Sati" which was also part of India's culture not so long ago.  Now, for heavens sake, stop telling me about how we respect our elders.  I don't, okay?  Those of our elders that are respectable, get my respect.  Those that run with bullshit "do good" notions while hiding behind their own inefficiency and inarticulate, archaic notions of culture, I couldn't give a shit about.  I will never respect anyone just for their age.  It might change if they start acting their age.

Google "proud to be an Indian" and you will see the same old rants about how high the Himalayas are, how beautiful our rivers are, (like there are no other nations which have mountains and rivers that are more beautiful!), and this regular trumpet about "How great our culture is"!.  What the fuck is this culture I hear about?  People shoving each other in all public transportation?  Spitting in all public places?  Human excrement in the open?  Getting killed in stampedes in religious places?  Bribery?  Corruption?  Getting away with murder?  Cops raping rape victims who went to police stations for lodging a complaint?  The list of incredibly uncultured, criminal behaviour is endless in India.  What the fuck is there to be proud of?

But I'm sure we will get some blessings from ABC priest and this country will be great again.  Till then, we don't have to do SHIT.  Especially, THINK.

- BSK.