When the worlds collide : The Mangalore Incident

Some thoughts, mostly disjointed, provoked by Mangalore incident.

Playing fast and loose: Now I realize as a Hindutva Fascist, I should be loathing "pink chaddi campaign" as nonsensical, frivolous, and indicative of moral turpitude. Well, I don't. To be clear, I do not completely endorse the campaign, and I am not enthused by the idea that this campaign just ratchet ups the hysteria of the chattering classes or that it feeds the  narcissism (people must be getting bored of this by now -ed, who cares, they don't pay me, screw them) of self righteous class.

Nevertheless, I reluctantly find my self on the same side of fast, forward and loose womyn for the simple reason that a line must be drawn somewhere. And the simple condition is this, it is absolutely unacceptable  to inflict physical injury on a woman*, no matter how earnest or sincere perpetrators are about their objectives.

Beyond this there is not much that I have to say on the merits of this campaign. Sending underwear may be ridiculous, but often ridicule is a effective weapon. Nor do I really fault whoever behind this campaign for diverting the attention from whatever great debate that India is supposed to be engaged at presently (If anything Messrs Pramod Muthalik and Raj Thackeray are more worthy of this distinction), or enthusiastically aligning with liberal-secular establishment to caricature the debate between traditionalism and modernity  ("traditionalists" usually seem to be hell bent on discrediting tradition ) to continue to undermine and stigmatize traditionalism.

The end of illusion (of civil society): Now our secular liberal establishment is utilizing this to the hilt in order to  "secularize" terrorism, however the issue is more troublesome. Yes what Pramod Muthalik and his sena did was indeed outrageous, but before people start ringing alarm bells for "Hindoo peril", it should be pointed out that in tactics what Sri Ram Sene did is no different from what Dravidians frequently do in TamilNadu , or what Gujjars did in Rajasthan or Marathas did in Maharashtra or what MNS is doing in Mumbai or what Kannadigas have done in Karnataka, Sri Ram Sene is guilty of nothing more than employing the tactics guaranteed to be most effective in our political system of mobocracy (or extreme democracy ).

Now comes the tricky part, I concede Indian experience of democracy has never been one of dispassionate deliberations by epistemological modest intellectuals but an uneasy concoction of multitude of identities jostling for material and social rewards, a million mutinies if you will, but even then there was a tradition of arguments, a willingness to talk and listen. I am afraid that tradition is being lost, we are not willing to talk or listen. 

How it came to pass. Even accounting for demagoguery there still remain agents who have aided in this degradation, one is the culture of grievance that has been encouraged by our secular-liberal establishment, where the claims to victimhood has become not only the standard modus operandi for political patronage, but also an ideal for society organized on secularism, second, which pertains specifically to simmering cultural tensions, is the incessant demonization of Indian tradition so as to achieve a state of social tabula rasa for purpose of secular indoctrination.

Our intellectual, all of them dyed in wool secularists liberals stress the importance of a civil society, where it is possible to hold conversation for common welfare. However it is impossible if one side is always denigrated and slandered, if it is declared to be out of bounds.

* Or for that matter on a man, or property. I will confess however, the very idea of anyone hurting woman makes my blood boil, I am MCP that way.

After all, if one cries wolf long enough, wolf obliges. (To be continued ...)