Category: Social

Jordan Peterson is wrong about Equality of Opportunity, here’s why

Pritam MondalLeave a comment

My main argument against ‘Equality of Opportunity’ would be to simply look at human history, all of humanity started their journey from Ancient Africa in this cruel wide world and now suddenly there’s inequality among people.

Thing about humans is, everyone likes to hate someone beneath them in social hierarchy according to the zeitgeist, everyone, be it an elitist condescending a commoner, noble culture to savages, upper class to less fortunates, White Caucasian to Black Africans, Black people to Asians, minority A to minority B, men to women and so on.

‘Equality of Outcome’ on the other hand raises the question of fairness, in humanity’s search for a just society, equality of outcome questions the entire premise of ethics and morality itself, that is, why would a ‘lesser man’ get the opportunity when there’s plenty of the elites left.

I mean, why give a desk job to a woman when the statistics suggest men are historically more productive?

Why give a senior position to a black man when you know a white caucasian is more likely to seal the deal?

Why give the role of Mary Kom to a northeastern women when you have Priyanka Chopra with stellar track record?

Why worry about accommodating queer people in your workforce when simply denying their existence and continuing with gender binary is more profitable and requires less managerial expenses?

Why would you give a dangerous job to a desperate man when you can get a machine to do that work without all the liabilities of involving humans?

Why bother electing Dilip Ghosh or Anubrata Mondal to power, when they are seen as expendables by their own parties and the people are very much accustomed to see their leaders with brahmin surnames?

Why bother thinking about others when you can in fact think about Yourself?

Netaji flirted with too many dangerous ideologies, for anyone to carelessly follow him

Pritam MondalLeave a comment

There’s a problem. I am concerned about this growing trend of hero worshipping in this country. Since childhood I’ve been observing Netaji was not one of the heroes much celebrated across India. I’ve often wondered about the political implications behind that, but now, for better or worse, the whole India seems fixated on making him the poster boy of Indian Independence.

My fellow countrymen have this weird fanaticism about hero worshipping, be it a cinema hero, a historic one or a mythic, when you elevate someone to the levels of divinity it becomes impossible value that person as a human.

We have seen it happen multiple times, with Gandhi, Bhagat Singh and now with Netaji. Members of every political parties are trying to claim Netaji in their niche ideological agenda, taking a certain aspect of his deeds and maximising that while carefully manipulating the masses to forget other things.

This is the reason, we need to consider all historical figures as persons not as some divine holy cow, so that it leaves some room for criticism and understanding the character better.

Blindly worshipping Netaji could be disastrous to this country, and to teach children from young age to blindly make him as a role model is also troubling. Netaji flirted with too many dangerous ideologies, for anyone to carelessly follow him.

For their own agenda, left parties have been trying to appropriate him as a Communist since few decades, which is not true. He had his views on communist revolution but he wasn’t a communist by a long shot.

People often wonder about what would have happened if Netaji was our first prime minister instead, they should know they he would have never become a Prime minister of a democratic India. He wanted a dictatorship in India and many of his “sudden admirers” today secretly wants the same thing so they’re using him to preemptively safeguard their position.

Enemy’s enemy is my friend is a good strategy I bet in a war, however, the frequent statues of Netaji we see on every roadside with him raising his right arm to a Nazi salute with a ‘Heil India’ slogan (which could be traced back to Hitler himself) gives another picture about him, who actually admired Nazism along with bits from Bolshevik movement, a Nazbol to precise.

INA was great for its contribution in raising morals of the whole country in later stages of Freedom movement. A lesser known fact in this regard is a division of Indian legion that fought in europe under the direct command of Waffen-SS. While we may overlook the European division of Indian Legion, the Japanese on the other hand were directly involved in INA’s eastern front. The Japs used to do shooting practice on captured British Indian soldiers, their war crimes alone can fill a book of history, if you think, had the INA been successful in defeating the allied forces, Japs would help establish a free nation in India, you are gravely mistaken. That was never the plan and was never going to happen.

All things considered, things turned out to be favourable to us, it was the end of second world war and the dawn of cold war, the allied forces realised, the colonies could easily fall into Soviet ideologies given how the oppressor and oppressed narrative was easily sold here. The INA led movements and rise of leaders like Netaji, Bhagat Singh just confirmed their suspicions. It was a lose lose scenario for Britain, in the end they gave up on colonisation instead of letting India become another fascist or Bolshevik nation to stand against allied forces.

The Fear and Dilemma

Pritam MondalLeave a comment 
The fear of messing up, that engulfs my psyche 
Being aggressive is not so much, a counter to it.
Every move I play, every word I say,
I know, will be judged, 
based on my roleplay.
If we are but a character in our own novels,
how capable are we to become the lead?
preferred by our choice.
Do we bend the story, kill the king?
set the Damsel in distress,
Only to have her rescued and marry her in a palace?

What do we do that makes it ours?
what should we do to keep it fair?
If Venus had come to earth, and we bowed before her,
would’ve been simple, not much unfair.
For I wouldn’t have to play always by the book,
For I wouldn’t have to seek new ways to look cool.
Things are changing and I’m ageing as well,
I know not much mistakes, I can afford before farewell. 
Judgement will be passed and nothing can be done,
I may be conscientious but am I really beloved.
How do I actualize, in Maslow’s pyramid?
Do I follow the Buddha and skip the in-between?
There’s been a hollow in my heart, for far too long now,
in the Quest to fill the void, I need to go on an adventure.
It is this that I have trouble with,
why do I have to be alone, in my own story?
This is a war that must be fought
For every inch of her precious soul, a pacifist will die alone.
A nice one will give up, a bad one will hurt,
How do I be one, who wins in the end,
How do I write it so it ends up being fair?

The damsel, I had made her in a poetic regret,
For she didn’t wish it to be rescued by me,
For she didn’t have to be in danger to begin.
How do I rescue her when she’s not in danger?
How do I make her fall in love?
When there’s little I can offer.
Leave it to fate or should I build it bit slow,
Or should I give up on my own novel,
As I’m not heroic enough of a character? 
Decisions that make us Kings, lead to the bloody boulevard
How can I be so heartless to soak her in blood?

Rhea Chakraborty: latest victim of India’s deep-rooted misogyny

Pritam MondalLeave a comment

In a conservative paradise ‘Bahu’ takes the blame for every dreadful thing happening to the son’s family.

Starts with this classic Indian overdramatization, where the common mass couldn’t accept a suicide of someone known to have Bipolar disorder, rather the media houses made a godly figure out of him. He is Sushant the Flawless, the Chivalrous, the Pinnacle of Male kind whereas lesser-known facts about his luxurious lifestyle and million-dollar club parties are carefully downplayed as that would’ve portrayed their ‘fabled hero’ in a bad manner.

Now, who would be the Godkiller? Such a charming guy always looks so happy on Instagram, surely he wouldn’t commit suicide, depression is such a western weakness, here in India depression is only good for writing essays on @facebook, nothing less, nothing more. Probably why India is in Top 10 depressed countries of the world. Now, coming back to the point which is, at this point his followers and media houses have successfully Sherlocked the post-truth that he was indeed murdered.

Next, is to ridicule the idea of Suicide to a degree where people begin to say Gandhi did nothing for India’s freedom and whoever says he is the father of the nation is uneducated or less informed and the counter idea that Sushant was murdered becomes a public knowledge sort of thing. Public knowledge can be hideous as people tend to use available public knowledge to base their further theories.

This is important as people have unconditionally accepted this as common knowledge that Sushant was murdered and Rhea was a gold digger who has done it.

Now, why Rhea of all people? Because, it’s easy to blame her, she represents everything a typical conservative population hates. In typical conservative families very often the Bahu gets blamed for taking their Son away, brainwashing their son with ill, controlling their perfect children like a witch. Not to mention, those conservatives subliminally possess a crooked sense of what women should be, how women should behave. Why I’m saying subliminal? Because, there are quite some people who’d be vocal on social media about a progressive society, however, in their mind they have been passively brainwashed from an early age, how a woman should behave in this country and judging by so they have formed their own standards, like cuddling with a fatherly figure becomes unacceptable, women in the industry are mostly fraudsters and ‘charitraheen’ who only use men to climb up the ladder. In almost all such scenarios the common public would easily find it acceptable that the ‘Bahu’ or the ‘Girlfriend’ figure is the culprit.

Considering how people are legally entitled to their opinions, I’m not gonna question their personal opinion, however, I’m going to protest is how the Media houses mainly a certain someone called Goswami, has taken up the responsibility of Witchhunting. For those of you don’t know what witch-hunting means, it was a mediaeval custom where every social or natural disaster was blamed upon a random woman, condemning her as a Witch and then she’d have been sacrificed to god by the trial of fire.
Evidently, this wouldn’t have helped with whatever disaster they were facing however, this was enough to sway the Commoner’s emotion into thinking the state is Just and is taking care of them.

For months now, we have been in this ordeal of a joint economic and health disaster. Rising cases, Job losses, flood, Exam dilemma all are important issues at hand, however, the ‘media’ here is broadcasting hatred of another kind like an eyewash to more important issues at hand. The specific media houses I talked about has a long track record of finding soft targets and inciting hatred, however, until now their target audience was limited to the blind follower category in Political spectrum, the current SSR episode, in contrast, have invited even the most retarded group among them all, the apolitical mob into their target audience.

As mentioned earlier, these whole toxic SSR bhakts have administered a force field to rationality, where they’d not believe any verifiable evidence at all and they’d make anyone’s life a living hell, deny even the basic human rights to people who are just ‘accused’. They need not wait for any court verdict at all, simple escalation in legalities is enough for them to be convinced in their hard coded beliefs. Following which, they went ahead banning lots of films and people from the industry not considering even once how that’d affect so many workers who work under those personalities. The toxicity drives madness on the street, Rhea recently posted a heartbreaking video of how her family is being tortured and harassed by the mob, even if her father is a retd. army officer, his service to the nation was not enough for the mob to restrain themselves from lynching him. Not to mention, these people would celebrate anytime Karan Johar commits suicide.

For me, this entire Sushant Singh Rajput episode feels like a display of India’s hideous Misogyny and expose of those apolitical Bhakts which certainly is a display of Collective conscience too. On a personal level, I’ve been rage-blocked and even Insulted by many fan-girls from this category recently, some of whom I’ve had helped immensely regarding their resumé and job recommendation. Some of them who even went ahead disrespecting me had completely forgotten I had helped them in their needs. The hatred has taken over their better senses, they have become so much invested in this emotionally that rationality has completely left their intuition.

People get into debt by buying things they don’t need and can’t afford

Pritam MondalLeave a comment

Epicurus said, the meaning of life lies in the pursuit of happiness, since then world has become so fast-paced nowadays, that every once in a while one has to update himself just to stay relevant, stay social. Needless to say, people in twenty-first century have become obsessed with materialistic possession. In the whim of maintaining common ground with peers or in other words to go with the trends many people usually tend to buy things which would prove to be disastrous to their credit scores later.

This kind of behavior is becoming quite common in present days, might be due to the fact that it is possible to procure things at will on monthly installment basis through credit cards; which when added with the upgraded convenience of mobile banking and online shopping has significantly deluded the conscience of one’s immediate possession. In addition, there is a psychological factor to this excessive consumption. The modern day targeted advertisement mechanism that works in personal data being collected on a gargantuan level helps manipulate our decisions about a product subliminally. Not to mention, Social media sensations and peer influence play a great role in this.

The solution to this problem is simple yet hard to nurture: logging expenses on a daily, monthly and yearly basis in essence keeping track of expenditure will sure help individuals gain insights of their ledger balance. Furthermore, public awareness programs should be conducted on how targeted advertisement affects our conscience in spending money on things that we don’t necessarily need. Schools should take a proactive role in administering mandatory courses about merits of maintaining a good credit score and to circumvent a bad one.

Overall, there are increasing instances of people falling victim to this consumer centric society mostly due to surrounding temptations and personalized advertisements. However, this can be avoided by monitoring expenses on a regular basis and in being extra cautious about dealing anything related to money.

 

Cultural transgression and relics of patriarchy

Pritam MondalLeave a comment

Cultural norms revolve around our society’s progression. This patriarchal culture and mindset will be changed over time and it’ll happen so spontaneously; while Love is a constant, binding people together since eternity, the cultural norms around it have evolved ever since, Marriage being a mode of conduct for social acknowledgement of ownership to it becoming notion of lovers being united forever. But in all cases a true motive of marriage remains that is to announce to the society that this woman is taken. While there are some tribes where they mark the man with symbols as well but the underlying idea of it hovers around marking a good commodity with a sold out tag. However the society has progressed much from the days of King Oedipus when it was socially acceptable if not celebrated to marry a deceased king’s wife like an Inheritable property similar to the throne. Social acceptance around two people loving each other has a long line of history an marriage being just one aspect of it. If love be the foundation of marriage then it can still be seen in some parts of the world Love is considered as least valued factor while arranging a marriage.55554480_1980540078711045_4320504896664109056_nIn a progressive society also, there could be extreme measures taken to ensure none can take ownership of the commodity called Wife after a man’s death as not a long time ago this country itself was suffering from Satidah. And the freakish thing about it was at that time it was socially justified and was morally acceptable as well, logics were inferred that if you take an oath to be a partner in life and death and life after death then its only romantic for you to die when your partner dies. Now this is quite unthinkable right now but back in the day if some woman thought it so then she would have been criticised by the society. This gives us the insight that Our moraliy and ethics should not be static or firm beliefs they should be challenged whenever our perception changes or grows. The mediaeval customs are mostly perished but still the relics of patriarchy remains. One can argue a person should only go with a partner who believes in same ethics as he or she does but that leaves out a question for us, what if this acceptance of a dominant symbolism is just as wrong as accepting Satidah in their respective timelines? What if some certain man a century ago was so ahead oh his time that he accepted marrying a widow without any second thought but the society around them cursed them for it. The society has no place in their decision making but it can sure smash a newer thought to dust and thus unnecessarily slow down the path of progression. For all I could say we need to accept the other person in our lives as a complete different person altogether, in that we respect their individuality and unique personality. I can fall in love with a woman for all the reasons there is and for all the reasons there isn’t but what if suddenly she says, she won’t be displaying relics of patriarchy by wearing vermillion on her neatly parted hair that her mother told her to maintain since adolescence? Shall I forget all the love I have for that woman upon hearing this and declare it a deadend for our relationship? Or should I make her believe that for sake of social acceptance and my inner cowardice of not being able to fight the social norms for better, she should wear it even after she found a profound reason not to do that? Or should I use the old trick of forcing her to do it for Love or should I use my ego and peer support to logically or forcibly brainwash her mind in a process of questionable enlightenment so that she would submit to acceptance of it herself and would feel guilty of thinking as such? This lives me with one diring question of what would I have done if I was born two centuries ago in the age of Satidah

Pritam Utpalodhi

Why Supreme Court Struck down Section 497 Adultery law?

Pritam MondalLeave a comment

Supreme court has struck down another archaic law on 27th September that is IPC Section 497 the Adultery law. The 158 years old law stated a woman has absolutely no say in the case of adultery, she can not even be punished for adultery, she is just a commodity, she has no say in it. Such medieval mentality is because of the time when this law was created 158 years ago, women were seen as properties of their husbands.
So if your wife involves in adultery with a person then that person will be punished. A typical case of Adultery means a conflict between Two Men about the Ownership of a property called ‘Woman‘. Furthermore, the law states, A Man can not involve himself in a relationship with another Man’s wife.

This again emphasizes the fact women were treated as properties of men and also there is another important thing be noted here, Read attentively the line where it says, a Man can not be in relationship with another man’s wife, that means a Man actually Can involve in relationship with other unmarried women, and there will be no legal issues.
This is the reason why so many marital rapes happen in the subcontinent and in most marriages in typical orthodox families, the woman has to suffer a lot of ordeals of what one being ‘not-being-loved’, with this kind of archaic laws active and where marriage is rather treated as a service agreement with non-negotiable terms for lifetime, people of this subcontinent often forget Marriage is based on mutual understanding and above all Love.

Now that this medieval law is withdrawn, this is one step forward towards a better and more mature society. In a good society, Marriage should be meant after Love only. In a healthy society think of marriage as an act of officially committing or publicly acknowledging being in a relationship with someone. But in reality the Indian marriages are often like a formal contract that you sign for Life, like owning a slave in medieval ages. So now, if a married man or woman stops loving his wife or husband at some point or if he or she fell in Love with someone else or in a typical conservative Indian marriage where She is never Loved by her husband, but she finds someone who loves her, in these cases the marriage should be considered as Failed marriage and that the official relationship is to be considered as already over.

Up until now what was happening here is that the husband files a case against the other man and that other man by law is declared a Criminal, and in all this the wife has no say except she could face severe Mal-treatment from her Sasural. The remedy Supreme Court suggested is, when an incident of adultery takes place then instead of putting a case on that other Man and tagging him as Criminal the married couple should just divorce and move on with their new life. Cause when you do not even love your officially acknowledged wife or husband anymore then that relationship is but just a contract only, and the Other Man or the Other Woman should not be tagged as Criminal for loving someone with conscience. The statement “adultery is legal” is not appropriate, it can mean many things, but what Supreme Court emphasized is on Decriminalizing adultery meaning, loving someone outside of marriage can be anything but isn’t an act of Crime by any means, and so the parties involved are not to be referred as Criminals.

One should remember adult relationships are conscientious, when it is conscientious from both sides then it isn’t rape or any crime like that. An adult man or woman is no one’s property thus none can forbid them from loving anyone. Now the question of morality comes whether you should do it or not, now decriminalizing adultery doesn’t mean its mandatory, if someone truly loves his or her life partner then there’s no logic in involving in extra marital affairs. The law simply means this Conscientious act of Love is not to be considered as a crime, this may very well mean the official marriage is over but this is no act of Crime.

Actually in a way this will enforce the responsibilities of a relationship, cause in southern Asia in Indian subcontinent specially marriage is a bond often taken for granted. Marriage here is like owning someone for life, the husbands here more often than not usually don’t care much about their wives after marriage, treat them as luxury commodity. Now that this law is changed, the men and women of the subcontinent finally will have to understand, that they need to put actual effort in Maintaining the relationship from both sides and have to take care of each other’s problems and needs.

Now there are several divorce laws and relationship laws some of them are even based on Mīmāṃsā, Manusmiti, Muslim laws, some of them makes the man liable to pay for his divorced wife’s living. Many women exploit that but now that the case of adultery is struck down, now in a case of a woman who is leaving a man for another man I think new laws will be made and the Man can defend himself financially.

I think this is a liberal step, western countries long have this liberty. Loving someone other than your wife or husband is not a crime but what that means is that the current marriage is over. We are likely to witness an increase in divorce rates but that’s not necessarily a bad thing for the society, faulty marriages will be over. Divorces will be like breakups and marriages be like commitments and that is how it should be.