Against all greatness

Knowing fully well that The Hindu is a better paper, what makes some of us reach for The Times of India? When both papers are right in front of us, all things considered, The Hindu should never have to compete with The Times of India. Yet, there is a place for sub standard, mediocre, and absolutely crappy product in every sphere! How do we let this happen, even when there are no financial ramifications involved?

How do we voluntarily choose to watch song and dance programmes on television, when it is on plain view that neither is the talent on display so breathtaking, nor is the format of the programme all that exciting? Quite simply, we have a great amount of space reserved for the mindless, for the easy access "fun" experience, which can take us from one moment to another, without having to tax our minds. This can be therapeutic once in a while, but when we put up with sub standard all the time, we are on a slippery slope.

Visit the Madras Boat Club and you will find fairly elite people enjoying dinner on the lawn at the back, facing the river. If you were smelling impaired, you'd have the greatest time, but whatever is wrong with these morons that they would completely ignore the stench of the river which is nothing but sewage?! It is unbearable and most sane people would run from that stink, but for the members of the MBC, no problem! That's the amazing part - it is as if it is normal to pay a lot of money to experience dinner with the huge stench of sewage all around!

There was a question in the Indian media asking where our Obama was. A bit of a stretch, perhaps, considering Senator Obama is yet unproven, but the signs of a visionary leader are there. The signs of greatness are there without doubt. So, if there is an Obama amongst us in India, we have to kill him early, and nothing succeeds like India stifling any and all attempts at greatness, no matter who it is putting the effort. We love to pull everyone down to the average, below standard level, so that we can all be in a level playing field. India is one of the few countries that still genuinely believes in making it as hard as possible to be great. Collectively, we hate it when someone forces us to set higher standards for ourselves.

A few weeks ago, I called 139 to find the status of my train, and got an automated voice telling me it was on time. I went to the station on time and found the train was a hundred minutes late. I was furious, for what is the point of having this automated system if I cannot get accurate information? A hundred minutes of my time is valuable, but more than that, the lousy maintenance of the system is no excuse for stealing a hundred minutes of my time! I duly filled out a complaint, in triplicate as the Railways have it, and got a sympathetic railway official who gave me another local number to call to get "reliable" information! This is the problem I have with India - we never seem to make intent and action meet.

We celebrate chaos and we love being out of order. It is all great if this order we are fighting against is one of extreme regimen, and we are losing our minds and our freedom, but completely to the contrary, we do have a lot of freedom! We have so much freedom in this country that we don't have to perform up to snuff in anything we do. The few of us who choose to be great at what we do, have to do whatever it is that we do in complete insulation from everybody else, because we don't encourage any attempt at being great at anything, unless it is close to bringing a windfall bonus!

Even the educated amongst us eat at unhygienic places, do not demand basic sanitary standards out of our all encompassing logic that there is no point, and almost consider it unfashionable to take action against the ever ready low minded unthinking mediocrity worshipper that can and will affect our lives negatively. The bus that plays a movie way too loudly absolutely beckons us to walk up to the driver and tell him to put down the volume. In extreme cases, I have had to cut the wire to the speaker directly above me, and damn the loss in entertainment value the other deaf passengers have to endure! Sometimes, we have to be militant about keeping our sanity. The truth is, you pay for a bus ride, not for the noise, and you bloody well have a right to a peaceful journey.

The Indian government machinery is famous for recruiting low minds, and absolute morons. When there is a quota system designed to infuse the system with underperforming idiots, who won't be fired if they don't perform, this is to be expected. But on our side of the coin, we have every right to demand that they perform. The right to complain is something we should not have to think twice about, but given that we put up with a mediocre system, there is absolutely no need for us to be stuck with the faults of idiots who can stall our normal conduct of life. The Right to Information is a great right, but only when exercised.

At all levels when you demand information that is not forthcoming, you are bound to meet an attempt to intimidate you, either through a low mind government servant that throws attitude or ignores you until you make it unbearable. And then, your decency will come under question, with the underlying hope that somehow you will not be willing to let go of a little dignity, and will therefore "behave" when you don't get the service you deserve. Sloths who work for the government think it is their birthright to not perform, and act as if you are acting way above your authority when you ask them to simply do their jobs. Why do we put up with fools like this? Because we love them!

We in India have this enormous empathy for the underperforming sloth, unless he is a cricketer. That is the one uniform that carries a lot of responsibility. The cricketer must be an all conquering, intense, positive, world class performer with attitude to boot! Everybody else is allowed to graze on the plateau of collective pathos. Why is it that we demand so little for ourselves when it isn't hard to do so? Do we love so much to be backward? Or is it our discomfort with the pursuit of greatness because it demands that we get off our lazy butts and become active?

Fact remains that we love to belong in some kind of greatness, as long as we don't have to work for it. Our five thousand year old heritage is the biggest culprit in breeding this lethargy in us. Who can take that away from us? Nobody, and that is the problem! What work does it take for us to lay claim to having one of the greatest civilizations in our ancestry? Nothing! What joy! But, what are we willing to do to make India work better today? What can we do to make our lives better? Forget the patriotism and nationalist nonsense - it isn't worth the sweat. It is worth the sweat to have our system work properly, atleast for most essential part. Let's forget about the thousands of years of our forefathers' legacy that is supposed to be all bathed in glory. That is part of this land, not part of our lives, our nation or our realities today.

What India is today is a herd. A herd of mindless, selfish, uncaring, unspiritual individuals who don't really care about anything remotely reaching greatness. We have no place for original thought, no tolerance for brilliance, unless that brilliance is unstoppable and already at its pinnacle of achievement. And then, we have our cynicism towards over achievers, only too eager to find faults in individuals who have taken their passion seriously and climbed their own peaks. We are a negative lot, finding humour in failure, comfort in low thought processes. We'd rather be led than show the courage to beat our own paths. This is the reason we will be badly affected by shifting paradigms, that other people control, for good or bad.

We are happy to be defined by others, by trends, by messages that subtly alter the way we think. The Indian today is one whose character can be palpably demonstrated by the way the vehicles on our roads have become extensions of our egos. We are always one step away from becoming a mob, because we revel in our little triumphs when there is no risk to our own status quo. We are vastly available to an injection of collective stupidity. We love rumours because our lives aren't that interesting anyway. We discuss other people because our minds have a hard time discussing ideas. At best, we discuss events, because we have the time.

Aha! Time! That is the big one! We just have the time to remain stagnant - no wonder we allow stagnation. We are not in a hurry to get anywhere beyond where we are. We are sedentary but not content, inactive but unhappy. We would like to ensure as much safety as possible to be built around the coccoon of mediocrity that we have mired ourselves in. What can be better than to be unaware? Ignorance has been bliss for a long, long time. It is proven and it is tested against everything. So, we choose to be ignorant.

So, what does an Indian contribute to life on earth as humans? What goes in comes out. We swallow mediocrity by the ton, and spit it out. This shouldn't surprise anyone, for just as we don't mind corruption, we condone laziness, incompetence, and generally do whatever it takes to avoid friction. We are weighed down by our legacy, burdened by our glorious past, and we refuse to come to the present where we don't really count for much. We are the rat race. But then, we are great Indian rats! See, one of us is by Lord Ganesh himself!