The curse of the uncreative

The argument, needless like most, comes up every now and then - Is
creativity an exalted kingdom very few people can be in? Or can it be
taught? We Indians are often anxious about what we are capable of,
and usually fancy ourselves more than we are really capable of. For
most part, India isn't a very creative country. It isn't known for
producing creative people, and we do everything possible to maintain
that proud tradition. We're not talking about the arts or cinema,
design of public spaces or architectural grandeur. We're talking
about how hard we find it to simply avoid clutter. The lazy amongst
us will call it Kitsch, but this isn't that. It is our u n c r e a t i v i t y.

Our children grow up under an attack of noise, messages, morals,
information, rules, and competition. How can we expect them to get
creative with anything, when they don't have space even to breathe and
perceive anything for themselves? Look at the hoardings vying for
space just outside the Cantonment Railway station in Bangalore. In
the thirty seconds or less that anybody spends there, about twenty
nine are going to be spent looking for an autorickshaw or taxi. Right
there - no less than thirty five hoardings clogging all visual space!
Maybe we think it is better to have noise than have nothing at all.

For some reason, we seem to mistake "cute" for "creative". Little
children dancing, flying kites, and singing - "Always, G for H,
Goldwinner for health!" -to advertise the goodness of gingely oil from
Kaaleeswari? What's the logic here? We like children, so we'll throw
a few kids' faces on the screen. Then we'll have them jump around to
show how healthy they are and how much fun they are having. Then we
will show a packet of Gold Winner Gingely oil, so people will run out
and buy this shit so that their children can be like these kids on TV?
A kid recommending a bar of chocolate, sure, but how retarded do we
have to be to listen to a kid telling us about cooking oil? Sorry,
that's not creative. It gets downright ugly when Pothy's tries to
sell clothes with kids doing weird things, while we're attacked by the
words - Jackson! Attack! Betty! Repeat! - Pothys! What the fuck!

It isn't doing something "different" either that defines creativity.
Here is a "different" approach gone horribly wrong, on this TV program
called "Life's Like That".

Why are there people sitting at those
tables in the background? Is there any motivation for that? And why
do we have this horribly uncreative shot where one of those background
fools, (on a long lens, with the same screen size as the subject), is
looking straight into the camera?

This isn't just distracting, and for heavens sake, this is not style. It is rank unprofessionalism in
a profession that demands some basic understanding of craft if not
outright creativity. This has to be one more manifestation of the
distinctly Indian u n c r e a t i v e.

Creativity finds solutions, often to mediocrity. That's the reason we
hate creativity! It demands that we move away from our rank
mediocrity in everything we do as India. We are a bungling, fumbling,
confused, overrated, underworked and noisy collective that can't get
its shit together in anything we do collectively. That is why we have
a disconnect between ambition and achievement. It wouldn't hurt to
wonder why there isn't much clutter around the greatest cities in the
world - the ones that people flock to see once in their lives. It
wouldn't hurt to humbly submit that we don't have a clue what we are
doing when we are required to use our imagination.

We have been brainwashed to serve well as slaves. From our education
system where students and institutions and employers bow to marks, to
our political system where everyone bows to the Neta or to money, we
have lost it. And we're not going to turn this around, either. It is
torture, to be living amongst millions of uncreative souls, who do
nothing interesting. It is a curse, and some of us will be lucky to
escape from it.

When a Xylo ad. shows up in the middle of an MGR film on KTV, where
his character espouses the greatness of our culture, model Indian
female behaviour and all the pretentious nonsense of our "culture",
how many people would rush out to buy a Xylo after seeing one very gay
looking metrosexual male hanging out with four designer models inside
one, asking us to have "the time of our lives"? All this on a very
Tamil channel called KTV, being watched by traditional Tamil women?
Please. Someone needs to have their head examined for blowing
Mahindra's advertising budget like this.

Creativity is about learning things from various disciplines, using
knowledge from various sources, and knowing how to apply all of this
towards a cohesive solution. We've seen how bad Doordarshan's
coverage of cricket matches was, and how Channel 9 showed us it should
be done. This has nothing to do with budgets and number of cameras
either. DD is still pathetic because it still doesn't have staff
members that know WTF the art of live sports coverage is about!

The very fact that some people believe they can learn to be creative
means they are too late. Truthfully, it doesn't matter. If you
aren't creative, you don't have to find a job that requires
creativity. No need to worry, for the work that gets outsourced to
India is never likely to ask for our creativity. Isn't that what it
all comes down to?

Sadly, and quite clearly, it appears you CAN find a job that requires
creativity while you can still supply none! A lack of athletic
ability can measurably set you back in the world of sports, and in
plain sight it is not hard to see we don't have a Michael Jordan in
India. Lack of creativity also sets you way back as a productive
community. Creativity is not just about beauty. It is about elegance
and efficiency. It is about implementation that works, communication
that is clear, and an experience that is interesting and never
confusing. It is about a mindset that tries a few different ways of
doing things, with clear motivations for each. It is an attitude, and
it demands clarity in the collective.

A celebration of Kitsch.

Kitsch - from Sakalakala Vallavan to Quick Gun Murugun (why MuruGUN
instead of MuruGAN?), Indian cinema has slowly but snugly covered
itself in this one description - Kitsch, and seems fairly proud of it.

It is as derogatory as Mumbai cinema calling itself Bollywood and
feeling proud of its failure to rise above third rate glitz, spiced
with fizz, sizzle and a burst of shitz. But it is uniquely Indian.
Post independence India (the only India, really) has found its final
sense of belonging! In Kitsch. Our biggest expressions in the world
of art are still very Kitsch.

We're proud of it because we can afford to be lazy under this umbrella
called Kitsch. It is a warm, fuzzy feeling, when a billion of us can
agree to stay mediocre! Well, shitz, we can even go lower! Thank God
the true artists of this country can still stay out of this mess.
They're not in the news, for the news is also mostly ten pages of page
three, and they're not on TV because TV journalism in India is still
very much about decibels and cheap tricks. No wonder there are so
many shrill women thriving in this media culture and not finding
anything of substance to bring to us.

When Kitsch comes about through a work of art skidding on incongruency
and stumbling over paradoxes, finally landing on the inexplicable that
nobody noticed until that moment, it can be very fun, rewarding and a
nice little dose of low brow. It might even start a new subculture if
the subtleties are handled well, and the perspective is fresh. Then
it has the potential to be substantial, even hope to become art at
some level.

With a starting point marinated in the kind of disconnect Mumbai
cinema is famous for, it can take the best aim at creating Kitsch.
German or not, the word has been adopted by India to define itself.
It's a mess. Whether it is cinema, or signboards, or seats in a bus,
elegance please excuse thyself! This is India.

The stench of urine that hits us as soon as our train enters Chennai
Central, the number of times our cinema viewing experience is marred
by idiots letting their cellphones ring in theatres, the confusing
signs that lead to defunct facilities, the phones that don't work, and
people giving advice when not asked - each of this is our celebration
of Kitsch. Why do we take this attack on our senses so quietly?
Because we have been muted by the enormity of Kitsch around us!

A billion people subscribing to nothing but shit will ensure nothing
but shit gets delivered to us, even if a few of us want to be spared
the landslide. People cannot be inflicted with good taste. But if
there is any way the few of us who want to buy insulation from the
"cattle class", we would gladly do so.

Shashi Tharoor, Minister of State for External Affairs got into a bit
of trouble for saying he would travel "cattle class to show solidarity
with our holy cows". The humour in it actually highlights the
experience of being in India. We are a bloody herd. To have a human
experience, in dignity and quiet, it takes some doing in public spaces
in India.

The paradoxes that Paul Merton might find fascinating about India, and
the inspiration that Baz Luhrman might have got from "Bollywood" for
his film Moulin Rouge are nothing but slices others can tolerate from
us. Our Kitschy behaviour is hardly bearable beyond the early points.
It is beginning to wear real thin. It isn't what we should be
subjecting ourselves to, and it certainly isn't something to be proud
of.

Let's stop the parade that "This is India". The middle class is right
now turning snooty with new found wealth, the power to buy, and
doesn't care. The upper class has long since bought the insulation
they need. The lower class in India is striving hard to come up to
the middle class. but they still don't have the means to rise above
their squalor. When they reach the middle class, they won't care
either. Because they are OUR people!

It may be too much for any of us to question another Indian's "right"
to contribute to the filth in the neighbourhood, to drive like a
lunatic, to spread rumours, to disrespect the law, and to be loud and
despicable in every way. Not all of us have the energy to stand up
against all the ills that we are putting up with. If that were the
case, we wouldn't be such a Kitsch society. But we definitely must
get this notion out of our heads that we cannot really change. We are
cattle, (no doubt about that Shashi Tharoor), but we certainly can
express our disapproval and we can certainly behave better. Maybe in
the sheer numbers we have contributed to the Kitsch, we can begin to
dismantle some of it. Kschitz!

Slavery in the internet age.

It was legal to own your slave in the USA, just around the time
Mahatma Gandhi got freedom for India with his monumental methods of
non violence.

One would think after sixty odd years India would be the truly free
country. But one look at our educational system, and we'll realize we
have enshrined slavery, celebrated obedience over pursuit of
knowledge, and concluded that our "system" is more important than the
results it brings us.

The results our system has brought us are as follows:

- The education we consider most important for our children are those
mandated by foreign needs. If the Silicon Valley hires software
engineers, we rush our kids into computer science. If their stock
market dives without a clue, we dive with it!

- Virtually none of our "educated" masses are able to solve any
problems we face. We routinely turn to foreign "experts" even for
very national issues like cleaning the Ganges.

- Our educational system doesn't inspire any of our young minds to
turn innovators. Since the invention of the aeroplane, 90% of the
world's patents have gone to Americans.

Our construction and civil works standards have not been updated since
the 1940s. In other words, we still follow standards set by the
British Raj, while in the USA, these standards are updated every six
months. With the amount of innovation and technology and new
methodology that has evolved in this period, we in India have not made
a single attempt to come up with our own new standards.

Our government machinery and the bureaucrats it has spawned talk
regularly of e-governance, like it is some sort of revolution. Go to
the www.bsnl.co.in website and try e mailing any one of the forty odd
senior officers whose e mails are there in full public view. NONE of
them work! Ditto for most of the government websites, including the
Tamilnadu Police Department HQ. And there is a message from the TN
Chief of police about e-governance!

It was suddenly a hot idea to get on the internet, and so we did,
without a thought on how it would or wouldn't work. We are slaves in
our mind, and looking for a slave driver to force us to do something.
We were forced into the internet age because the rest of the world was
going there and not because we have genuinely embraced it for what it
can do for us.

- Why in heaven's name should the Indian Railways website "shut down"
every night?

- Why doesn't the Tamilnadu Directorate of Technical Education website
have a single means of contacting them?

- Why aren't we still able to vote online?

Out of sheer pride, we built something called a Light Combat Aircraft,
which was by no means the most advanced aircraft in the world, but we
called it "indigenous". The indigenous Kaveri engine produced less
than 70% of the thrust needed to propel our indigenous aircraft, and
we're still pouring our indigeous tax money to buy a foreign engine,
and to somehow convince the Air Force to buy this plane. Why?

Because we're slaves, and we would like to pretend like we love our freedom.

Hindustan Motors and Toyota started functioning the same year. HM had
the protection of the Indian government, while Toyota had to survive
in the world market. We nurtured slaves to our own laziness, while
Japan chose to compete with pride against the best in the world.
Result - today Toyota is the world's #1 auto maker, and HM needs one
stroke of pity from someone's pen to shut it down.

Why do we have to buy a certain brand of gingely oil because the
American Heart Association somehow endorses its goodness? Why isn't
there an Indian Heart Association? Maybe we are heartless?

Why are there white people in suits on most of our corporate websites?
Why is it always a white man telling me what underwear to buy and
what shirt to wear? And yet, why is it okay in the same industries
for white people to wear shorts to their jobs while we follow dress
codes like we're going to jail?

What DO we really care about and do well? Everything that foreigners
tell us how to do. Aviation, for example! How we maintain our
aircraft, the standards we set for selecting pilots - all foreign,
since we don't make planes, and we don't trust the ones we do end up
making once in a while. The big fear guiding us here is not even that
people will die if standards are not adhered to, but because planes
are expensive and aren't worth much when they fall from the sky, even
once.

How much of a price are we paying for keeping our faces in the mud?