A vote for Wally

Wally Martin, our good friend from Langley, BC, has decided to contest the coming provincial election in May from his constituency, on the Green Party platform. A self employed small businessman with an inclination to believe in long term sustainable solutions rather than the current trend of politicians, offering instant short term fixes for everything.

A committed environmentalist and a decent human with an inclusive political outlook to life focussed on sustainability and long term goals, he hopes to serve his community and the Canadian people into refocussing and looking generations into the future, instead of looking for solutions that last for a month or a season.

I spoke with Wally on phone on 11th of April 2013, about his decision to stand for election in a 3 minute statement. Then on April 16th, Wally read out another statement about himself, in another short talk. Both of these were recorded and have now been converted to podcast, linked below.

Wally Martin - Measure once, cut twice

On 18th of April, I followed Wally as he went knocking on doors in is constituency, drumming up support for his candidacy. That was covered in the video below.

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Good luck – Wally.

My fast disappearing backyard

Ten years ago, my thoughts on sustainability hovered around the question of overpopulation, resource crunch, peak oil, global warming and the military industrial complex.

Today, those worries are not gone – but more have been added. I am ten years older, and feel almost certain, that, in the west, this is the first generation in more than two centuries that will be worse off in average than the previous generation in terms of financial security, even as this generation spews unbelievably large quantity of junk on the planet.

A nagging feeling that science was being subverted by voodoo economics and snake oil selling politicians did not help. Then came the economic crunch in the making. Average Americans were supposed to be in debt of several thousand each on their credit cards and hundreds of thousands on their home lone. Without being an economist, I could understand that money was being created out of thin air and this was not only creating endless inflation, it was not too different from legalized counterfeiting and ultimately unsustainable. I became intrigued by Ron Paul and his views on money supply, and a warmongering economic philosophy. There were two American politicians that intrigued me – Ron Paul on the Republican side and Dennis Kucinich among the Democrats.  Both were maverick, on the fringes and sidelined.

I developed a healthy suspicion of the Chicago school of economics and Milton Friedman. By the time he passed away in 2006, I had glanced across a few of his books, read up more

on globalization, on WTO on world bank and IMF, and had developed a nagging suspicion of it all.

Early in the new millennia I moved from the US to Canada, one of the best moves I have done in my life that started in India and saw me through all the oceans of the world, and then to Hong Kong and Florida. I came to love the earthliness of Canadians, their sense of balance with nature and their dealings with the first nation people.

Soon, the Iraq war happened, Bush defeated Kerry and got re-elected in the US, and Canada made a serious turn to the right when Stephen Harper came to power at Ottawa.

I lost my parents one by one, and my uncles and aunts. Before long, I was among the most senior of my close relatives and had no one to look up to. My perception of the world started changing. Its terribly lonely, not to have anyone to look up to.

Kolmi, Paul and kids

Through a cousin, I came to know of Quail Spring Permaculture and through Kolmi, learned about AID (Association for India’s development), who were having their annual seminar in Seattle that year. Kolmi connected me up with them, and I ended up attending it in late May of 2011.

It was another eye opener for me. I came to know some inspirational persons in the process and could see how a handful of dedicated people could trigger grassroots level change for the better and from the bottom up. Names that stick with me till this date are Ravi Kuchimanchi, Aravinda, Kiran Vissa, Revathi, Somnath Mukherjee, Jonathan Fine and Kamayani Mahabal among others.

Subsequently came in touch with UBC Social Justice Center and good work done by socially aware student body. They have a Facebook page and I got invited there some years ago.

One thing let to another and friend Arun invited me to the White Rock Social Justice film society and their film shows. Met more Canadians concerned with social justice. From there, and from connection with AID-India I came to realize a new struggle on the horizon on the world food supply and an ongoing effort or Corporate takeover of agri-business away from the farmer. I also learned about Genetically modified crops and animals, and its patenting issue.

Vandana Shiva

I ended up speaking with Ms Vandana Shiva on phone, about corporate theft of community knowledge and about biopiracy. A long one hour talk a few years ago was converted into a podcast. The realization came on the need to preserve seed diversity in the face of rapid annihilation of seed varieties under a mono-culture onslaught of the GM pesticide peddling corporate interest.

I came to understand a fundamental shift in national Governments where corporate interest overshadowed long term interest of citizens, of nature and of the planet.

As my involvement grew on sustainability for the planet, there was a cementing of the belief that the planet was getting globalized on multiple fronts – through corporatocracy on one end, and through a mass movement mushrooming up to resist it on another end. It was a classic class struggle in the making.

I got to know of the farmers march in India through ASHA (Alliance of Sustainable and Holistic Agriculture) and my talks with Kiran Vissa and Kavitha Kuruganti. I also came to know of God’s little acre farm in Surrey, BC and Jas Singh, its farmer.

I came to know of movements to declare Surrey as GM free zone, same as Richmond and a dozen other communities in British Columbia.

I came to know Bobbie Blair, and her work towards GMO free Langley. She invited me to speak for a few minutes at the Langley Town Hall theatre after the show of a movie – One man, One Cow, One Planet, and I did so. It was more or less my first attempt at public speaking on the issue of GMO.

…. more to come here later …

Wish I could write like them

It has been only about two months since I started this blog. So, I am only two months old as a writer here. Not a writer of fame. Not even a writer with published books. Just a guy that wrote a blog or two.
Yes, some of these blogs are musings, like a diary. This is one such. Then there are some postings that attempt to write about writing a novel. Still others seem to be part of a novel. Some are my perspective of the world around me.
I am essentially trying out my hand, playing a few practice games as it were. These trial runs may help make me a better writer in the eyes of the readers. Or perhaps I shall decide to write as a creative outlet, and not necessarily to please others.
But what should I write about? This is the sixty four thousand dollar question.
I have thought of writing a novel. I have actually done more than that. I have dabbled with it for a few months, going as far as two hundred pages, before tossing half of it out, and finally putting it in temporary cold storage.
The thing is – one could write a novel covering issues far removed from one’s own life. For example, I could write a science fiction, or a satirical comic book.
But then, I could also write a novel that borrows from my own life experience about the world as I see it. This choice is attractive to me because I already have certain lifetime exposures an developed an opinion about things. I am an opinionated person, did I mention that before?
But hang on – is my own life experience interesting enough to the reader? I have no blooming idea, but would guess in the negative. A reader would likely find my outrageous views and endless rambling quite a bellyful.
So, back to square one. Do I write for others, or do I write for myself? Most folks write or paint or create music such that others will not only enjoy it, but also hopefully pay for it. So, there is an economic prime mover hiding behind some of the creative outlets.
But, there must be exceptions. Vincent Van Gogh, I am told, never sold a painting in his lifetime, and died a poor man. In fact, the world is littered by painters, writers and musicians that died poor, but whose creations became famous after their death, enriching a group of middleman in the process. This probably goes to show that, if the meek fail to  inherit the earth, the middlemen might.
So, if I wished, I could write on whatever took my fancy. I could write about my worries about the future of the planet through climate change and human encroachment into every niche and ecosystem. There are many that have already written on this. Perhaps I would merely add some noise in an already noisy field.
But then there is this habit of pundits of selectively focussing on only certain sections of the problem, while avoiding mention of the others. Very few in fact address the whole package.
Few, for example, blame it our on our perception of ourselves. Man has not evolved enough to question man’s own core belief about being a superior species who enjoys the right to let other species live of die, at whim. The mainstream thinking supports the  notion that destroying a tiger, a whale, a forest, or even an entire species, is alright if it can save just a single human. Life of a single human is more sacrosanct than an entire species, or even a family of creatures. Our faith and our system dictates that we are the chosen people, by no less than God himself.
This, to me, is a laughable humbug and at the root of most injustices perpetrated by man – against another man, another creature or against nature. Religious leaders, Ethnic groups, Racial groups, Cultural groups, Economic groups, Politician, Social reformer, Writers and especially the foreign college educated smart Alec of the world lose their tongue and shy away from addressing this main question – why should man be more valuable than the rest of the planet?

Creation of Adam - Michelangelo

So, with all due respect, the writers of this world have perhaps not done enough in this field either.
Sure, there are a few that did question this conventional wisdom. But the subject is basically under the radar for the masses – masses that are still intoxicated about God having created man after his own image, or about the importance of having a so called modern civilization, even if it destroys everybody’s habitat.
On websites dedicated to the environment, one can these days find new information, or “revised” assessment, of effect of an increasing human population on ecology. Folks are tiptoeing around the topic – too scared to call a spade a spade.
My thoughts would often stand at the edge of these dark and ominous issues that just would not go away. The state of the planet, the state of our society, the degenerating state of Santiniketan and the mindlessness of the Tagore chanting diaspora, the apathy of fellow humans, especially the selfish class that come to take advantage of the trappings of an advanced society, but refuse to give anything in return – these were depressing turns of events. They depress me. Yet I find myself unable to shut them out completely from my thinking. Thus, writing about it too provides an outlet.
I remember, three years ago, I was in Santiniketan during the annual fair in December, called Poush Mela. Originally this was conceptualized by Devendranath Tagore as a fair to let folks of different faith systems to exchange views and understand each other. This was later modified by his son Rabindranath Tagore to play a key role in  revitalization of Bengal’s degenerating rural environment. This village fair was fine tuned to bring village goods, both material and cultural, to the urban clientele, and to raise awareness and appreciation of rural products, thus creating a market for it. This was supposed to provide a source of income for the craftsmen and artisans, and help sustain the lifestyle and creative vitality of the village, which would not just feed the cities with agricultural products, but also provide the source of its spiritual and artistic refinement.
Today’s December fair of Santiniketan, the so called Poush mela, is such a grotesque caricature that it may deserve a blog of its own – or rather, a book of its own. Urban products and services take precedence over rural products. Products from far off lands gets preference over local products. Rural craftsmanship and its support gets nothing more than lip service. Urbanized folks prepare “ethnic” looking goods, to sell to a new breed of ethno-conscious buying class. Babus come from afar, have a lot of fun, song and dance, take pictures, clap hands and cause a media blitz. The villager and his welfare, the original goal of the mela, is all but forgotten.
And the middle class Bengali crowd as well as the ex-student body, cannot get enough of this hideous caricature. There is no one, either in Santiniketan or outside it, to even think about the reason these events were designed. The decay of the original ideal is complete.
Anyhow, three years ago I was there. I remember being rather involved with a handful of friends in opening and running a stall at the Mela grounds, but one that did not sell anything. The stall provided quiet space ambience, free of charge, to help older generation ex-students to get to know the younger generation, as well as the locals of the area, both urban and rural. It broke from tradition and tried to do something different to facilitate human to human contact, hopefully removing cultural, generational and class barriers based on ignorance. That was to be our small contribution. We did not beg for donation and bore the cost ourselves.
But as it happened – there was another stall, in another location in the fair, that was promoted by ex-students. It presented attractive cultural items, music, speech and sold some books, paintings and such.
I was asked to take the microphone and speak something for ten minutes to the listening crowd. I started out, talking about our efforts to do something worthwhile and addressing some of the problems facing Santiniketan.
I was stopped in mid sentence, and was advised not to talk of any controversial issue. Either speak good and positive, or do not speak at all.
I stopped and stepped back.
I have never again gone to speak at that venue, and likely never shall. If self-criticism is undesirable in a society, that society is for sure going down the tube. That is how I see it.
So, on a personal level, it has been rather frustrating and disheartening for me to face the fact that my own kind almost never stands up for anything worthwhile. I got several painful lessons on this. There were effort to do something on the ground in and around Santiniketan, just to pay back for what it gave us, which was more than just education. It gave me my humanity and my world view. The effort required support and volunteers, to start a few good measures that were taken for granted in the times of Tagore, and were all but forgotten today. There were a few that were willing to spearhead the effort. But, such efforts thing fail, repeatedly, due to lack of sufficient conviction among those that benefitted from Santiniketan.
Back in Vancouver, I was once heavily involved in garnering support for a gathering in front of the library and a March to Indian Consul, protesting the imprisonment of Binayak Sen in Raipur India on framed up charges of sedition. We wanted to create pressure on the Government of India through a coordinated work in several cities across north America and Europe. I tried to energize my known friends to participate in that protest.
On both occasions, I was highly disappointed and frustrated by the apathy of most of the people I approached. Some even ridiculed us for our wasted efforts. A few Canadians, and even Americans that did not know much about Binayak Sen, still came forward and joined in the protest once told about the situation. But our fat brothers and sisters stayed home with their crackers and chai, and perhaps watched hindi soap opera or stayed at couch potato with a can of beer.
My disappointment in people around me has been long standing, steady, and by now, quite predictable.
But there are always exceptions – thank goodness for that.  It is those exceptions that makes life worth living. Through that protest in Vancouver, I came to know folks I might not otherwise meet, and these have enriched my life. Through efforts in Santiniketan I have come to appreciate a handful for their dedication and integrity, and that too has been a source of nourishment for our psyche.
So, going back to those whose writings I admired,  I could name a few.
One is Gwynne Dyer.

Gwynne Dyer

He is a Canadian born journalist and author. As far as I know, he had moved to UK and lives there. I came across one of his books, named Future Tense. It talked about the changing scene in the pecking order of the world of humans, and liked it. That prompted me to seek out and read another book – The Mess They Made. The second book dealt with the war in Iraq and the mess it created. Dyer influenced me in his journalism.
At the back of my consciousness, I suspect the influence of Rabindranath Tagore still remained rather strong. Tagore, born a century and half ago and who wrote mostly in a different language and followed a different linguistic style of the time, did write a lot and they influenced me – not just by the content of the writing, but because I could step past the writings and try to enter his own mind, and try to imagine what made him feel the way he did, so that he could write the way he wrote.
I am not talking about the music he created, or the dance drama he composed, or the novels he wrote. I am talking about the essays he wrote and speeches he prepared, and discussions he had, covering socio cultural issues, issues of race, culture, class, caste, race and religious differences, issues of poverty, and issue of  social and economic exploitation and the role of creativity in opening up of the mind.
I could see that he was a thinking man and did not stop at conventional wisdom. Challenging conventional doctrine and orthodoxy was as innate to Tagore in his time as it is to me in mine.

Rabindranath Tagore

He had observed how Indian urban class exploited the rural landscape in the new westernized model of economy. He recognized how rural humanity had historically been the lifeblood of India and the source of all of India’s creative excellence, the fountainhead of its spirituality, music, literature, philosophy, and world view. He noted how this urban exploitation of villages follows an economic model that was counter-productive for India and also unsustainable. These realization was, in my book, very profound for a person that was known merely as a poet and a mystic.
He realized India would lose her unique power of independent thought and creativity unless the rural landscape reached an equitable and complimentary economic relationship with the consumer class of the cities. As long as the village was exploited by the city, like a babu and his servant, the general degradation of Indian society would continue, even if it appeared to be doing well superficially in the cities.
I find observations like this to be exceptionally profound for that time and place. This indicates a penetrating and contemplative sharp mind that was, compared to what he was surrounded by, mind boggling and generations ahead his time. Till date I am yet to find another person speak of it quite as penetratingly or eloquently, especially among the politicians of India or any other land anywhere.
He did not just rest on his laurels having written about all that observation. He made real effort, without Government backing and without him being rich any more, in the villages around Santiniketan. He tried to attract brilliant socially conscious people from around the world, to join him and study the details of the rural lifestyle and find ways to improve it – socially, economically, culturally, and find a formula, a software, that india could use in the future, to lay the foundation of a just society and an equitable human race at peace with itself and in harmony with its surroundings. India was to be a pathfinder for the rest of the world. This had been India’s historical contribution in the past, and was also India’s destiny in the future, Tagore felt. In this vision and his efforts at this field, he stood alone. Very few others could see thing this penetratingly. He was also among the very few, even today, to rate humanism higher than even nationalism.
His efforts  to find means to redress the economic imbalance between the village and the city was, in my book, among his most profound gift to mankind. He created cultural functions, to influence the babu class of Bengali bhadraloks to open its eyes and to learn to recognize the villager as his equal, and as one that provides him with food and sustenance. He tried to teach the middle class that folk culture was source of all finer and world beating philosophies and arts of India. He tried to make the city dwelling babus to develop a degree of respect for the village, and to rally in its revival. He tried to get the urban self absorbed class to learn to value the produce of the rural artisans instead of hankering for goods made in European factories. He tried to have the so called educated class realize the weak foundation of their society and endeavor to address them at their root, and not just make symbolic gestures like denouncing the Union Jack. He tried to point out that exploitation by the British was only possible because India was exploited by Indians to start with.
He promoted an internationalism that allowed for free thoughts and cultural exchanges to percolate through and enrich mankind without having to deal with national barriers. His efforts were not restricted to India alone – but covered the east and the west. He did not condone either a hardcore nationalistic view that everything of India was great and foreign goods and ideas should be rejected outright, nor did he support a blind faith in western civilization to be the answer to everything, or that the east had no skeletons in the cupboard of its own.
Its unfortunate that these realizations, thoughts, views and efforts of Tagore are mostly forgotten by the chanting masses of Tagore worshippers as well as the media and the punditry. These were not properly understood even by folks that lived around him while he was alive. Today the Tagorean banyan tree provides shade for all. Hordes of pundits enjoy the shade and are making a career living off it and are still as blind as a bat.
So, there are original thinkers that wrote like Tagore did in his time and a few others that do so today. Then there are people that dirty their hands with real social work like Tagore, Gandhi and others did in their day, and others are doing  today.
I wish I could be a little like them.

India’s greedy social climbing brainy youths

Debal Deb (https://www.facebook.com/debaldeb01) is a fantastic character. I can say that, although I never me the man. I came to know of him through Madhusree Mukherjee, who herself is no pushover.

I have been trying to find an opportunity to interview him on the phone for a podcast, but he is a busy man, and I am a working man and we are half a world apart in our clocks. So we have not managed it yet.

Meanwhile, I come to know of his posts as I befriended him in Facebook. One of the reasons I have not quit Facebook completely, is that people like Debal are not around, as far as I know, on google + or other places.

Anyhow, I find I share many of his views about the root of some of the social evils of our time, and share some of his frustration about the general apathy of India’s upwardly mobile youth. Living abroad for so long, I have also come to be frustrated by the same apathy that afflicts the earlier generation of expatriate Indians that have succeeded in finding a cozier niche for themselves in the west. At a professional level, they are all mostly successful and able to compete with the rest. But on the level of humanism, their apathy has been made glaringly clear to me in the past few years. I too was part of the scene myself. But, like all thinking people, we are apt to evolve with time, and be influenced occasionally by chance encounters that force us to peek outside of our comfort bubble.

I was influenced by a chance encounter with the daughter of a dead cousin brother. The cousin was from India. The wife was American. The daughter lived in a permaculture commune in California. She, her mother, and her baby came to spend a few days with us in Vancouver. That triggered a cascade of events. She linked me up with other Indians that were trying to do something meaningful in their spare time in helping out India through more sustainable projects as well as participating in many events that related not just to India, but to all people everywhere. She had a personality that was so different from the run of the mill Yuppy that it was like a breath of fresh air going through my house and my life. Anyhow, that link she provided helped me connect with a wider world of people. And so the story goes.

Now, back to Debal Deb – He wrote something that I found very apt and worth sharing, within Facebook. It attracted some good feedback, which resulted in more observations from people within my Facebook circle of friends. Debal Deb, in his busy life, managed to notice some of these points, and came back to respond.

The thread became important enough, in my mind, to deserve a more permanent spot.

I am going to copy it here, as a special blog post – including comments from others. I shall inform them of this decision within that thread itself.

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I wish our bloated Indian greedy youth, drunk with their corporate jobs, satisfied with their high salaries and perks, stop once to think about what their employer does to the farmers and the natural world, and consider doing something like this! That would be genuine patriotic act – more than watching Amir Khan on “Mangal Pandey” and “Lagaan”.
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Worth sharing.

Chirajyoti DebChaitali Mitra and Nabanita Banerjee like this.

Ravi Dwivedi shared Debal Deb‘s status update.

Basu Tapas Very true indeed, they do not have the intelligence or far visions…

Sandeep Shukla One question: those Europeans who declined job offers from Dow etc..why did they. Even interview with those companies? The companies can’t be offering jobs unless they applied! Does that mean that they would have taken these job had better alternatives not come up?

Priyadarshi Datta It is not that. Sure money is great and making it is even better. Balance comes with old money. The next generation and so will the next. Hope it is not too late by then. Dwarakanath made money, son Debendranath spent it grandson, Rabindranath was the product of old money. So with the grandons of Rockefella. Hemendranath Datta lost it in one generation and the rest was struggle.

Tony Mitra

You have your unique way of looking at the world, Priyadarshi.
I might opine that the old money of Dwarkanath, or rather, of the early generations of the “Thakur” clan of Jorasanko area, were “new money” of the time when the British were establishing a permanent base in Bengal.
I would also suspect that this new money came at the expense of the poor Indians – in short, the new rich Indian class emerged as collaborators of the British, helping them establish a stronger foothold on the subcontinent.
Along with all that, came education and eventually, a sense of social justice. Thence, the generation of Dwarkanath Tagore, having been born into affluence and not having to spend all waking hours in a struggle to feed his family, those who were born in progressive families and with the right questioning mind could engage in issues of social relevance, and a sense of Bengali-ness – expanded as a part of Indian-ness, came up. Folks got engaged in raising awareness of the fact that they were not independent, and the British were, ultimately, unfair to the average Indian so that an Englishman on average to enjoy a higher lifestyle. It took a while to filter all this in, and eventually different people of the next generation addressed it in different ways – Meghnad Saha, or Surya Sen, or Gandhi, Tagore, or Aurobindo, Annie Bessant, Charles Andrews, or Subhash Bose – each of them addressed it in his own way, and not all of them were born Indians.
But, if you go further back – those that were rich and powerful even before the British arrived, themselves were collaborators of the ruling Mughal emperor, and were in turn selling the country for the benefit of the ruler, thus enriching himself in commission. The main difference might be that under the Mughal rule, a social mass consciousness of Indian-ness did not arise, perhaps because the Mughals were not filtering money out of India to enrich a foreign nation, which the British did. Or perhaps the reason was something else.Anyhow, Rabindranath Tagore was partly the genes and intellect he inherited, partly the influence he was under as a growing child in Jorasanko under intense nationalistic flavor of thetime and efforts at nation and society building efforts. Also, his world view was influenced by the extensive personal exchanges he had in his tours across the world in all continents, and his personal contact with the famous folks of the time, from writers and intellectuals, to politicians, religious heads, scientists and social reformers.
Rabindranath Tagore was influenced by many many factors.Todays upwardly mobile social climbers that came out of good colleges and, for example, work for exploitative corporations – are just a new version of the old “collaborator” class.The difference is – these kids grew up mostly in todays middle class families. These families, at least in India, got into the middle class slot only in the last two generations, more or less.
Goes to show – our middle class is probably an uncaring, selfish and blind class that helps nurture selfish individuals that will collaborate with institutions that hurt his nation – and yet live to brag about it.This topic is way too complex – but its good to air out views and think about it. I feel thankful that, just like lotus grows in filthy ponds, the earlier affluent generations did create Gandhi and Tagore and the rest of the reformers, same as this generation has created the Vandana Shiva, the Ravi Kuchimanchi and so many others, including Debal Deb.Whoops – long post.
Cheers.
Subin Das

Tonu, do you think you are going to influence present generation with your talks? If done; they are just going to turn around and say,” What about you all?” How and why did you do what you have done to achieve your goals? Now that all of you have settled to a comfortable life style with lots to spare, why ask us to sacrifice and rally for a cause which does not harm their means and ways to glory? Isn’t it we who should take some blame for such deplorable state which our younger generation have come to? Actually; it’s high time that we look back and think seriously what damages we have done to them, by our own activities.
Tony Mitra Subin.. I fault it not just to ourselves – but at our Bengali middle class mentality that started about a century ago.
Tony Mitra

A century ago, this was not perhaps a hot topic, but today, with awareness rising, there is not enough excuse for ignoring these issues. As to my generation – they are the biggest disappointment. There is one thing to say about the younger generation though – the older generation is going to die. The younger one will be left holding the basket. So, they will not have the luxury that their forefathers had, of kicking the can down the line. The shit is going to be falling on them.
Debal Deb

Tonu, you have very precisely painted the broad difference between the early middle class youth and today’s middle class. A significant section of the early middle-class youth was socially conscious, introspective, and participated, even took a lead role in, social reforms. In contrast, today’s “educated” and “enlightened” middle class don’t give a dam for the development refugees/ farmers’ suicides/ dowry deaths/ global warming/ industrial crimes … as long as their comfort level is not affected, and are only interested in new models of cell phones with 12 functions, of SUVs, of AC fittings in the flat, … and yes, skin creams to look fairer and fairer!
In response to Subin Das’s very apt point: Bribes and corruption were all the time – from the age of Mahabharata. But do we remember anyone of our generation who considered taking or giving bribes to ethically neutral? Those who gave or received bribes wanted to conceal the fact, in shame. Today, it’s a fact of life. I (and surely all of us) have seen many young men pressuring their parents to gather money in order to pay “facilitation money” to ensure his employment in a govt. job, and then preparing for “recovering” that money (and more) from the “clients” of the office, soon after getting the placement. “Kickbacks” and “facilitation money” are simple steps to one’s career building, and nobody cares to waste time in compunction or guilt. [Bribing is not confined to money alone, and may include renting out one’s girl friend, too, to please “the boss”.] In our generation people hated to marry their daughters to a policeman. Today matrimonial columns advertise “extra income” over salaries of the suitor.
In 2001, I was in California when 9/11 happened. I witnessed how thousands of American youth organised public seminars, rallies, demonstrations, street lectures, street shows etc. to denounce the Iraq war and accused the US govt for waging unjust wars in different parts of the world. University campuses at Berkeley, Santa Cruz, Santa Barbara, and Davis became hot with students’ protests, and many professors participated too. In 2009, I witnessed, in Berkeley and other campuses of UC, massive student protests against privatisation of education and fee hike. The govt had to back out. In both these years, there was hardly any noticeable protest on those (and other) issues from the youth in India – especially eastern India. Rather, a majority of the middle-class youth accepted the moral superiority of the US to attack Iraq. Coke and Monsanto, to them are angel saviours of Indian uncivilsation.
One of my good friend, Saptarshi Biswas once served in Monsanto Co., (left some 4 years back), but never cared to know about the company’s crimes in India and other countries. He immersed himself rather in poetry (which I am not belittling, of course) thoughout his tenure with the company. He represents a highly intelligent young man, well versed in literature and information technology, but why did he not feel interested to know the company’s deeds, while the anti-Monsanto movement was simmering all over the world, and posted regularly on the Net? That’s Zeitgeist.
Debal Deb

‎@Sandeep Shukla: The individuals I cited – all are very well accomplished biotechnologists. Three of them were offered job by Syngenta and Monsanto Co. Two more, from Italy, were interviewed and offered jobs, but when they discovered the company’s profile, relinquished the offer (with no “better alternatives” in sight). I also cited a technologist from USA who got placement at Strategic Defence Intiative (SDI) = “Star War” project, but quit soon after she leafrned the objective of the project.
I understand quitting job for Indians always implies shifting for a better opportunity – unrelated to ethics or ideals. When I myself did the same in 1996, most people believed (some still do) that I got a better job in terms of higher emoluments & perks. This is the mindset I was referring to, in contrast with the youth in the West, who stormed in Genoa, Seattle and Cancun; who rose against Monsanto in Germany and France; who demanded closure of all nuke plants in France and Italy; who gathered in Barcelona to demand economic DeGrowth; who have abandoned techno-urban comforts and built sustainable communities in US west coast, Italy, Spain, Greece, Mexico… And I am a first-hand witness to all these movements led primarily by the youth. As a concerned Indian citizen, I always wonder: When will WE ever learn?
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Tony Mitra ‎Debal Deb – reading posts like this makes my day.

State of our lives

So, whats up with this planet and how is it fairing in this new year of the lord 2012?

Well, firstly, it makes not enough sense to number this year after any Lord. Besides, it appears kind of silly, to follow a calendar starting from the death of Christ, as if there was nothing before that. And since there was quite  a few historical events before that, there is this mathematical anomaly of a missing zero. I mean, there is year 1, and the year previous to that is year -1. The year zero is missing – a mathematical impossibility.

Apart from that, ideally the year should have been representing the age of the planet, and if we wish to avoid a lot of zeros after the number 4, we could have found a way to do that, just like the number 12 represents the year 2012 today.

This is not to criticize the life or efforts of Jesus Christ, or against the Christian faith system. It is just a view that, for the world to follow a calendar, the death of Christ appears to be an inappropriate datum line for either the planet, or the history of human presence on this planet.

It is easy to guess that hardcore believers of other religions also wishing that the calendar be shifted to the times of Budhha, or Mohammed or Krishna or Zoroastra of Cyrus the great. And while we are at it, why not Gengis Khan or Confucius or Tut Ankh Amen for that matter ?

Anyhow, this issue is not going to be resolved by tonu rambling on a blog, so I shall move on, removing mention of the lord, and just calling it year 2012. So then, what is the state of the planet?
Do we have a clear indication from any source, anywhere, that can be taken as a standard measure of the state of the planet? Is there any common platform and mass appeal to consider the state of the planet ?

Is it important at all ? After all, the planet has been here for over 4 billion years, and likely will be here for many billion years more, even if you and I shall be gone, and even if humans will have probably evolved into something else before dying out, while life form as we know it is snuffed out of the planet, and as the planet loses its habitable environment, and as the sun dies out eventually, plunging the whole solar system and this corner of existence into deep darkness.

Well, for some, it is not important to consider the state of the planet, because, on a short term basis, nothing is particularly wrong with it – even if in the long term everyone and everything must die. But for others, the state of the planet, that of the well being of its inhabitants, particularly of humans and human induced changes to the environment that affects flora and fauna as well as global climate – is a hugely important issue, and things are changing rather rapidly, so much so that a changes during a single human lifetime is at times too great to really comprehend.

Is there a historical precedence of species overpopulating itself and over-developing itself to extinction ? I believe there are, and that humans are proving no better than lemmings or cockroaches, technology and God notwithstanding.

So, what is the state of the planet ?

Too long and evolved a subject – so I shall come back to this time to time. This writeup is just a musing of 20 minutes at lunch break. I was actually having a dish of Bibim Bam – its Korean. If you never had a bibim bam, you should try once. I mean, just for the name itself. How can anyone refuse a dish with a name like bibim bam ?

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So what is the matter with the planet ?
What is the matter with its climate, its environment, its air, water and soil ?
What and how much have we, the humans, done to preserve, or destroy it ?
At what rate are species going extinct in this age of human technology ?
What awaits us down the line ?
Is there a population bomb waiting to take everybody down ?
Is there reason to worry?

Living in North America, there are scores of people around the world that think coming to North America is the next best thing to going to heaven. And within the continent, it is USA in particular, that appeals to disgruntled folks around the world as a magnet, a mecca of freedom of speech, human rights, and the chance for everyone to rise to his or her potential – its the American dream.

Today, the affluent society around the world, and particularly of old Asian nations such as India,  appear to be blindly in love with a rather shallow version of the western pop culture and superfluous extravaganzas. But, is the American dream really sustainable over the long run ?

Is it repeatable on lands other than the US? Is it sustainable even within the US ? For how long and in what fashion ?
Meanwhile, what is happening to the planet, to the civilization, and indeed, to the future of our race and our ecology ?

I have a lot more questions than I have answers.

Tonu