manifesto of a better babu.

It’s very blood-warming to hear someone with a world-view—literally a view of the world as a system, like a 3D graphic to be printed out in plastic and presented at a science fair— wittily put it out there.

For my part, I might manage an article or two, certainly not a whole book— before that warm dutch-courage feeling starts burning in my stomach: not so much the fire of revolution, more acidity. That’s probably why I should be a civil servant.

It isn’t that I disagree with how radical she’s being (and of course I can’t criticize the tense strength of that word-cascade); in fact, I wish I wish I had the courage. But I don’t, and I don’t, and the world as she paints it is both too real and not real enough. I can’t use it for bread and butter (and I prefer those to chapatis, sadly) and I can’t avoid it behind the editorials of my centre(-left) newspaper. In that world, not something but everything is wrong; and everyone, poor sods, is suggesting you speak to their manager, because they know the problem can’t be fixed but hope its only their own incompetence that says so. They have to have faith in their own incompetence. I can’t live with that.

I’m Christian, because I believe in Competence—though not my own. Also, because I believe in Justice, and a morally right way of doing every damned thing—which means each of those things matters, and I’m not shirking or shying by doing them. In fact, the boot is quite on the other foot. I’m doing Something by not shirking even them. And with my eyes firmly planted downwards once I get into the corridors of power, I’ll strategically tread on toes and unshine shoes: I’ll conduct my little revolution against the symbols of power in the washrooms of privilege. I’ll wriggle my way into the affections of the closed-circuit (cameras), and then do some leaks of my own out of a first-floor window.

I make myself sound a worse prospect than I am. But that’s from taking on her vocabulary—this firebrand stuff doesn’t suit me. For me, the positive program: healing the sick and comforting the dying. And that, in it’s turn, means I look death in the eyes—of one particular person— and tell it in my best hospital voice that it doesn’t win. That it can’t use its mirrors in glassy expressions the world over against me and mine. And I patiently explain that the group ‘mine’ involves a heck of a lot of people around here, so if he will excuse me, I must go and supervise the doorstep delivery of this month’s rational food supplies. And after that I go home at six-thirty and have a drink and a cuddle, and read Mills and Boons for an hour or three. I don’t have to live in the wrongness of this world full-time, but because I can not, I can go back to it at 9.30 am with less of a roaring hangover. It might be a less atrocious world with people who can face atrocities with composure, but it might be a more atrocious one too. And then, of course, they say it takes one to know one.

on being sexist

I recently watched an episode of Boston legal where Alan shore is (finally) accused of being sexist. Accepting the charge, he lays out a definition of sexism which applies to him: not objecting to any economic or political rights, or intellectual and emotional equality and even superiority, and yet seeing a sexual object first and primarily when faced with a woman.
The endless targeting of women as sex objects on this show has always bothered me. The women fence this talk with wit and knowledge of the complexity of these men, and there's no violence, so I haven't had to dislike the show for it. Yet those interactions would undoubtedly be sexual harrassment in contexts I inhabit, which of course don't rate high on those other parameters of not-chauvinism either.
There are two questions: is Shore sexism alright if it sees women as equals in every realm except the sexual? Because it's not just a TV show, there is a growing possibility of separating spheres, even if it's not so prevalent yet. Second, can nothing be done about this ridiculous 'I dig those human mittens that warm my cockles' brain-setting?
For a lot of women, women themselves being equally sexually active solves both problems. Then male sexual dominance is at best role play and at worst sad illusion. But I'm not sure, for all that, that equality in this matter is achieved until women can give up the tendency of seeing men as people: social, economic, political, intellectual entities, before seeing them as men. Partly because so many of those identities are still so bound up with being male. Businessmen and chairmen and so on. Places with high technical specialisations and a meritocratic, yet socially aware ethos may be one way to create a situation where sexualisation is not harrassment. Are there others? And is it possible to get men to stop thinking of themselves as sexual animals? That stuff is getting damned dull, and is bad marketing for heterosexuality too, for those who are concerned on that score. 

On Charlie Hebdo

Yesterday, January the 7th 2015, saw a mass summary execution enacted at the offices of the irreverent Parisian magazine, Charlie Hebdo. Journalism began the tale with the magazine's record of publishing material irreverent to Islam, which had previously resulted in a firebombing of their offices at the time of the Prophet cartoon scandal. As fate would have it, the story goes on, Charlie Hebdo tweeted a cartoon poking fun at Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi moments before the attack. The terrorists then entered the building with Kalashnikovs and a rocket launcher (?), called out the prominent staff by name while executing them, and exited shouting that Islam had been avenged. They left twelve dead (including two policemen) and ten seriously injured behind them.
International leaders have responded in solidarity with the freedoms of expression and the press; the French President has, again, described terror as 'barbaric'. Newspapers meanwhile carry quotes by the CH editorial team that represent their defiance of Islamic fanaticism, and their determination to 'fight intimidation with (more) controversy'.

       'Sometimes laughter can hurt, but humour and mockery are our only weapons.'
            -Jean Cabut, cartoonist.

  'I don't blame Muslims for not laughing at our drawings. I live under French law. Not Koranic law.'
           -Stephane Charbonnier, Editor-in-chief.

The use of violence, especially in a unilateral way in a civilian context (which is what terrorism is), is terribly wrong. It is wrong because its objective is to propagate fear by attacking innocents as proxy for ideas or institutions. This attack was also wrong because it was not so much terrorism as an act of execution for blasphemy, carried out under a law that proclaims itself universally applicable and undermines nation-states and their sovereignty. This is part of what Charb was pointing out—that he had a right not to care if people somewhere else were outraged at his perfectly legal insensitivity, and the law would protect it. Terror makes real the incapacity of the state to protect so completely; the efficiency of the state's reaction must ensure that the belief in protection is not undermined.

The above quotations encapsulate the two major defences for potentially offensive humour: that it is humour, and that it is legal. But speaking from what is no doubt a highly unpopular position, it seems to me that both of those defences require some interrogation.

The defence of humour as humour stands on two grounds: first, that its capacity to hurt is subjective and therefore a matter of choice, and secondly, that humour is not meant to be taken seriously. The implication is that humour is thus not comparable to violence and cannot be punished for hurting people (or intending to do so). However, the capacity of humour to be funny stems from a shared understanding, or lack of understanding, of the object of humour. The capacity of humour to hurt depends on how seriously you take, not the joke, but the humorist and the context in which he speaks.

I recall a video that went viral, considered hilarious because it had been subtitled with a transcription of what it sounded like to a person who didn't speak Tamil, but did speak English. I understand Tamil enough for my reaction to have been mild confusion at why it was funny and a desire to explain the lyrics. I didn't get to, because explaining a generic love song was not worth the trouble of having my friends roll their eyes at me for not getting the joke. If such representations—often deliberate misunderstandings—of culturally important things are piled on to an existing and deep-seated prejudice, the social implications may seem worth the trouble. Hurt may not be necessary, but it seems rather likely.

The second defence, of legality, is constrained by national (or ideological) boundaries, as well as by the limits of the law itself. In a globalised world, a joke on ISIS is funny because ISIS is a concern in the Twelfth Arrondissement, and hurtful because the CH office is a concern in al-Shams. Why? Because the Caliphate has world-imperialist ambitions, and because France has ambitiously universalist principles of liberty and tolerance, and not wearing hijab. And the ambitions exist because the potential is there. In such an inflammatory situation, the compulsory virtue is not to listen; not speaking is merely an optional one.

I am certainly not arguing that humour is the prerogative of the insider, or the highly knowledgable. But while tolerance to ignorance and misunderstanding is a necessary virtue, misunderstanding cannot be seen as a right. Jean Cabut had need of weapons because he lived and worked in a society in conflict—even within his democratic environs. Anything that looks like censorship in the aftermath of terrorism seems a product of fear. But sensitivity in the public word is an expression of respect, and as such could pave the way to a space that both Cabut and his assassin might have—with some discomfort—shared.

A point of morals

When we were doing the second World War in class twelve, one of the activities we did was to pick up  one of the characters mentioned in the textbook, do some research on what it was like to be them, and then present a sort of profile in the class. One of my favourites was when Sonia took off her shoes, kneeled in them, and explained in the most matter-of-fact way possible what it was like to be a dwarf during Hitler's reign. I, true to form, only read the entire chapter for research, and came up with an elocution piece. One of my better executions of the dramatic and crusading style that I used at every opportunity. A Professor's dilemma. That free thought, non-fascist thought, should be stifled because people were seduced by the prospect of 'Arbeit und Brot' (work and bread: I remember because at the crucial point when I was about to drop this nativism, I forgot the words and had to check my note, ruining the effect in my own opinion). A thoroughly classist and condescending intellectual position, but true-to-life frequently enough for all that. At the time, the point was to do something impressively anti-Nazi, and I couldn't think of another problem a professor would have with him other than degrading the quality of human thought to mundane considerations, and falsely at that.

Reading the jurists Hart and Fuller on Gustav Radbruch, another possible dilemma comes to light. Radbruch, a hearty legal positivist before the Nazi regime, did a volte-face on the main question: the separation of law from morality. The positivist saw law as law, to put it inconsequentially, meaning that law was a thing apart from moral value, that its validity was entirely independent on its perceived moral value. Moral value only came into play when an individual confronted the existing body of law, and considered his position with respect to it. If it appeared to him evil, he was free to disobey, and indeed it would be his duty to do so.

Afterwards, he noted the difficulty of individual conscientious objection to stem the effects of evil law—the Nazis' manipulation of the rhetoric of legality, and the German legal profession's entire capitulation to the system so put in place—and concluded that positivism contributed to the horrors of that time. 

This is Hart's formulation of the problem: that Radbruch didn't trust people enough (based on more or less an exceptional circumstance), and so got the law into dubious tangles like disguised retrospective legislation. Moreover, he reasserts that moral values are not so singular and harmonious. They might conflict in particular situations or people may hold entirely opposing ideas of what is moral. Things are not as simply good or evil as the Nazi circumstance would have us believe.

 Fuller, on the other hand, makes the point that Hart's clear distinction between 'law' and 'good law', or (that which it ensures) 'order' and 'good order', is not quite tenable. For one thing, 'order' in itself is not free from a 'moral element': meaning that the idea of what constitutes an orderly co-habitation in society derives validity and sustenance from moral principles. For instance, the success of a system of rules may be based in part on coercion, but more importantly is based on 'ethics' in the other sense: of working with discipline, of showing care with consistency, and so on. The other difficulty is where to draw the line between what is essential and what is changeable in the law, or if you prefer, how much change is a change of degree, and how much is a change in kind. In such a situation, positivism does not help: it says either agree or disobey, which is a static sort of idea, to say the least.

From this comes his disagreement with Hart: this polarity, in his words, 'never gives any coherent meaning to the moral obligation of fidelity to law'. In a sense, in seeking to uphold the inviolability of law, this view robs it of substance. Why is fidelity to law so important? Is it pretending to the status of a physical law, while at the same time requiring our consent for its continued operation? Fuller says no; it's a 'collaborative human achievement in need of constant renewal'.

For that professor in Berlin—now a professor of law, and not of history—the question would be how to say no under the condition of positivism, or else how to collaborate to produce better law without himself being contaminated, or endorsing the wrong that went on in the name of law in the meanwhile. Captain von Trapp ran away, but the armed forces never have as constructive a role to play, and especially in a time of war their powers are rarely vis-a-vis the home country, and much less freely exercised. When the soldiers come to take him—or me, in my narration—how shall I decide? Perhaps it is easier to decide and act well upon it, than to be certain that the action was the righter one.

A single day at Jantar Mantar Road. 4th March 2013.

The protest by the National Fishworkers Forum

The Pension Parishad dharna

The protest against the hanging of Afzal Guru

The protest demanding a 'Gorkhaland'

The protest against anti-Bahujan policies of the GoI

The single-member protest against a specific rape

The fast against sex crimes in general

A protest against land-grab in Bangalore

 and a protest by the main Opposition party which wound up before I arrived there. 

Each yelling their demands, plus gratis abuse of the government. Though it is the final resort, and its efficacy questionable to say the least, we have at least this final freedom. It gives me hope.

distance

"the fact that the general elections are still more than a year away means the Finance Minister has had to squarely balance the competing claims of economics and politics" —The Hindu, day after the Union Budget 2013-14 was presented.

Presumably they mean 'vote banks' versus business people. But which is economics and which politics? Meaning that the point economic sociologists have been arguing for some time—that economics distances the government from its people, turning them into 'consumption', 'production' and so on—is only reinforced by a democratic politics that distances them as 'vote banks'. 

The increasing disparity in incomes but also in concerns is one formulation of these troubles. When I told my mother of the movement to implement a two-thousand rupee universal old age pension, especially for NREGS workers, she immediately disagreed with it. Her view was that tax money should not be spent on giving dole in any form. Moreover, she doubted the work actually done by those registered with this scheme that merited giving pension 'when people actually doing work are not getting it'. Disagreeable as this seems to people who do not pay the stipulated thirty-three percent or so of their income to the government, as well as to those whose concerns are wider for other reasons, it must be dealt with.
My mother readily acceded to my protestations and counter-assertions about the need for pensions for old people, particularly those engaged in hard labour and in the unorganized sector, the difficulties inherent in the current pensions system—both in terms of insufficient amounts and difficult criteria. I didn't tell her about lowering the age to 55 years for men and 50 for women, while ensuring continued employment without discrimination arising from this assured income. I forgot. But chances are she would not, however deserving, have appreciated that pensions should accrue without the same conditions that the organized sector accepts as universal for it. I'm not certain of my own views on this last in any case.

To overcome these concerns, this sense of what is fair and unfair, appealing to individual interest is never going to work. The only reason parents are fine about them making money and their children spending it willy-nilly (when they are) is that they see their children as an extension of themselves, as an expression of a group-self-interest. Terms like 'vote bank' used on english news media about those who don't watch it—in effect— creates rifts in a population that is already internally distanced in material circumstances. We need a lot more national sentiment of the substantial and non-military variety—cultural and social particularly. 'National shame', 'national pride', etc about unemployment figures, agrarian distress, labour laws, public health and sanitation, and the rest. But how do we produce this? 

What is the role of anger?
I don't want to go into wordplay, but the question of degree is the first qualifier. There's productive discontent, and then there's the sort of rage against the machine, which is apparently anarchic and actually cynical and self-reinforcing. The former may sound rather wishy-washy, but the latter quite peters out when faced with personal settings or socially awkward situations.
My preference is evident; the distinction between the two, not so much. Self-analysis can hardly be the standard. Hypocrisy must be one, so that you don't advocate through your methods what you're opposing in principle. Another perhaps moderation: rape may be as black-and-white as crimes get, but rapists are not necessarily round-the-clock, dyed-in-the-wool criminals.
At the same time, the degree of a crime is an obfuscating question. The rape of a three-year-old by her father is not less of a rape than that of a resisting woman by her otherwise-loving husband (assuming such things can happen) but they certainly merit different reactions from other people, including courts. Gang-rape might have a higher tendency towards violence and mutual reassurance or encouragement among the aggressors, but that very excessiveness results in both, as aforementioned, a more extreme reaction from others, but also a different internal reaction for each rapist. The actual difference may be a greater defiance in some cases, but in others like the 16 December 2012 gang-rape, to more horror and shame for each. With such a high rate of repeated offenses, however, remorse as a corrective is both essential and unlikely.
The degree of anger generated by a crime, the mundane or shocking circumstances of its perpetration, cannot in any case affect the process of justice delivery. Besides the insufficiently discriminating need of anger for a target, anger is not the preserve of those in the right. (a pun! and in retrospect, intended) Nor does a violation of rights, or a crime, necessarily leave its trail of anger.  Justice, or rather the judiciary, is a process to which one has a right, and subsequent to its initiation, anger has no role. So online petitions and protests for capital punishment for all rapists are not just regressive and futile in terms of modern liberal paradigms, they are also against the logic of the state system all citizens endorse (or all the ones concerned here, in any case).
Anger provokes undeliberated opinionizing, as in the case of the columnist in today's ToI who suggests a judicial reform of no appeal in rape cases as one way in which the system not just can, but needs to tighten its belt. Or, of course, half the Indians on Facebook in the last five days. But this seems not to break through to the sort of police officer that the Tehelka expose (here) describes. Which is probably because these policemen know the most important weakness of anger and make their bread and butter off it- that all outrage has a deadline, and that it is too soon for 'justice' to ever be won before boredom strikes. But I don't want to be cynical. Public memory is no mystery, it is the responsibility of the media. Unfortunately, the current 'Breaking News' trend seems headed the other way, towards continuous forgetfulness. It is also the responsibility of the State machinery to provide both reasonable statutes and sensitive, efficient personnel. Both of these are definite bodies which can be held to account, at least in some measure.
But it is also the business of people to take care of themselves, to be sensitive to the contexts in which they live and work. To this extent, and this extent only, I take exception to the liberal campaigns that highlight women's rights to dress any which way and go anywhere and do anything—that as with other rights temporarily abrogated in the interest of safety, these rights should be self-limited, to prevent the occurrence. The attitude of objectification (even of one's self) is after all the primary wrong for which rapists, like other consumers of popular entertainment, are never punished, as opposed to the crime of violence for which they might be. I refuse, at this point, to join in the cynicism and proclaim that women are better off not living altogether, because all it does is discourage people. If we're going to make use of our anger, the least it needs to do is last out.