Noxious Education

One of the favorite past times of minders and do-gooders on the Internet is to bemoan absence of liberal art in IITs ostensibly because it is lack of liberal education which hinders IITians from developing a more well rounded personality. Instead IITians end up with a very narrow and inadequate perspective (i.e. mere engineers). These lamentations should not be taken seriously, for one those saying it doesn’t know much about engineering (this is true even if they are engineer), Engineering is more than advanced calculus and fluid dynamics, but more about engineering later. The main reason why these should not be taken seriously is irrespective of merits of liberal arts in theory (And I do believe it has merits), the way liberal art is taught in India is bunk. Liberal education in India is a cesspool of Communist/Socialist propaganda, always hostile to the idea of India. For example, Dr Ashley Tellis of IIT Hyderabad. Dr Ashley Tellis when not busy being apologist for Naxalists, is actively jockeying for Indian chapter of NAMBLA. Now I don’t know about free speech and all that, but I see no reason why my hard earned money should used to pay these creeps. Call me (NIUCMCM) North Indian Upper Caste Middle Class Male, but I don’t see what exactly is value creation by LGBT studies or Postcolonial Theory, and the fact that government extorts money from me for these nonsense kind of bothers me.

Slutty Aspirations

It is one thing for Gen X (or it is Gen Y, or may be it is Gen Me, never mind) types to claim that Savita Bhabhi is some kind of empowerment statement for Aaj Ki Nari; one pays as much attention to them as to a typical emotionally insecure, craving for peer approval, adolescent, with internet access. However when the same rubbish starts appearing in Wall Street Journal then one can not be faulted for being irked. Then allow me to put this stupidity at the rest.

 

Now as it happens I believe that banning Savita Bhabhi was a terrible idea, least of all by some faceless babu having no accountability to people. Also while if you ask me there are better issues to make a last stand on as far as freedom is concerned, well, to each his own.

 

What makes trash objectionable is whole thought process of the clique of coolness behind this which goes something like, “Hmm, OMG Savita Bhabhi is having sex because that’s what she wants and she doesn’t give a damn about the social customs, which, let’s face it, are just there to repress women anyway because how dare anyone tell women what to do with the body, DAMMIT I AM SO COOOOL!!!!”

 

This is problematic because

 

1. I don’t know how much actual Indian porn (i.e. desi sites of yore or before that Mastram, google it for yourself) these people had the opportunity of ever reading, but slutty housewife (i.e. Savita Bhabhi) is a stock character in it (along with maid, the shy bride etc). It pains me to state the obvious but these characters are intended to fulfill the fantasy of the male readers, of easy sexual gratification without social encumbrances, hence the promiscuous women (because normal males don’t actually fantasize about rape). So people searching for women emancipation in porn should have their heads examined.

 

2. However what I find most repelling about such thinking is that it actually degrades women. It implies that a woman can only be called truly emancipated if she reduces all of her complex persona to target for male lust. “Now, now”, the cool people will protest, “What we admire about Savita Bhabhi is her defiant attitude towards social mores (Because you know social mores are totally uncool)”.

 

Granted, there are social norms which are unjust; one is confounded as to what is exactly the problem of “modern” types with social norm in this case i.e. marital fidelity. Suppose if the situation were reversed and it was a husband cheating on his wife, will any one consider it cool for a moment. Of course not! They won’t consider it as cool because it is not cool, and this is why cheating husbands are not a role model in society. Why should it be different for wives then? Clearly such double standards are there only because in a Freudian way, the “hip” crowd can not imagine of women as anything more than automatons not concerned beyond sensual gratification, for them women are nothing more than vagina (hence the vagina monologues).

 

These people, who are nothing more than libertines, dread conceiving women (and men) as social creatures. So indoctrinated are they by the effluvium of sexual revolution that for them life is nothing more than endless orgy with no obligation for society. Infact society is just obstruction in way of the gratification they seek.

They can give impassioned speeches about freedom, but what they want is slavery to the senses, only they are denied this by presence of a discerning society with a core of morality.

 

As someone said Civilization goes not with a bang, but with a whimper.

Now I am truly depressed

Hey Bhagwan

I don't get it

But it is awesome

Sauce for goose ...

Why yes if  single occurrence of above average summer, hurricanes etc is a justification for anthropogenic global warming and ensuing hysteria, then it is but fair to grant that single occurrence of cold winter is its refutation. Also see, hoisted by own petard, dying by sword etc.

Special Comment: Problem with smart people

Ritwik has written a series (still continuing, I believe) of posts, which are most profound. I say profound because they are boring and I left them midway.

Now it is possible that Ritwik is writing these posts with a very narrow audience in mind, to be specific, people whose knowledge of economics goes well beyond eco 101, in other words people who are comfortable with jargon, in which his is right approach.

 

However in case if he is addressing this to a general audience, which I believe he is, I think he has failed. And the reason he failed is he broke two basic rules of blogging. One people don’t like long winded posts, and second people are turned off by jargon.

 

This is important to remember. Jargon has its uses; specifically it helps in condensing the prose; however that assumes that your intended audience is comfortable with the jargon to the extent that they don’t have to recollect what that jargon means every time they encounter it, or worse look up its meaning.

 

This is why use of jargon should be specific to target audience. Frequently the presenter deploys the heavy artillery of jargon to impress people; unfortunately it ends up confusing them. As a result the all the effort that went in preparing the message goes to waste, a result of picking up the wrong strategy for communicating.

 

PS. Now people may say that just because I didn’t get it doesn’t mean others won’t get it, because I am dumb or something, unfortunately this is wrong, I am <s>smart</s> above average and ignorant (Ravikiran said it so it must be true)

Poor User Interfaces

Scott Adams discusses some of the terrible user interface that irks him no end in his latest post. Now properly speaking this topic falls under Neelji's area of expertise, but as it happens there are quite a few user interfaces, specifically of telephone custom service, which despair me of life every time I try to use them, in increasing order of annoyance they are.

1. Inconsistent interface: The principle behind user interface design is astonishingly simple, it should be easy for the user to use it. Now the use is made easier if the designer tries to follow the generally accepted practice as much as possible, that way user doesn't have to learn anything extra for using the interface. This is why right mouse click works almost identically in the similar contexts. Which is why there is no reason (except that customer care is staffed with sadistic sociopaths) to explain the fact that quite a few companies design the interface so that the number to input in order to directly talk to their customer care executives is different from the usual one (number 9). This is irksome because one has to listen to complete automated message and remember the particular option as exception.

2. Not retaining Input: Now it seems obvious that if user enters some input (for example during authentication) it should be remembered for further use later in the process. Which is why it is very annoying when one has to repeat the same inputs to the customer case executive.

3. Non intuitive interface: The worst infraction is the interface which simply doesn't make sense, for example one has to go to enter a series of option before the option for direct communication with the customer executive becomes available, which is extremely frustrating when one has to do exactly that.