First thing that springs to mind when I read all these news articles on cruelty towards kids is Russell Peters and his “somebody gonna get hurt real bad” jokes! Growing up in India, all of us have gone through the occasional (and I use that term loosely) whacking. And frankly, I don’t see a way around it! Being a rather difficult kid myself – to the extent of being nick-named ‘tension’ by my uncles, I wonder how my folks would’ve handled things differently. And it worked too - the fear did keep us in line, for sure. Am not saying that we didn’t have our share of fun, didn’t do things that the folks were called to school for, didn’t bunk school for that movie we just had to see etc. etc. etc. Just saying that the fear of getting caught did mean something back in the day, did make us think twice before we did something – it’s a different story that we did it anyway!
Growing up I had the fortune of having an elder sibling who was worse off than I was – basically, the benchmark wasn’t set too high! Problem was that I was brilliant as a kid – topped my class till around the 5th standard. Then began the descent. Well, it wasn’t my fault per se, I just ‘peaked too early’ – listening to sports commentary does have its advantages when you can come up with such lines! So, as I was saying, academically and otherwise, my sis didn’t quite set the bar too high. In comparison, besides the very early phase in life (aka, the ‘tension’ phase), I was a fairly timid and trouble-free child – or so I would like to think. My sis or even my parents might disagree, but, hey, this is my blog and I get to call the shots here :p Bottom line, I didn’t get whacked around that much. I do remember the Mathematics sessions with my dad though – again, that wasn’t really my fault entirely. Now, who the hell needs to know how old Ram and Shyam are based on the facts that Ram is 1/3rd the age of Shyam right now, and would be half his age in 10 years? Those questions were built to get the kids beaten up! I’m sure some sadistic nimrod came up with them just to find another reason to hammer his teenager! I’ll let the ‘if Boat A is moving downstream at 20 km/hr and Boat B is moving upstream at 10 km/hr and they are 50 kms apart, when will they cross each other?’ type of questions pass. Well, simply because Aamir Khan’s life probably depended on some nut-job using that to calculate if Aamir would live in the das-das ki daud in Ghulam. But, yeah, I do remember the wrath of Colonel Puri during those maths sessions. And I’m sure my sis remembers them even more vividly =) But, the point is, we did learn! By the time the exams came, I could find out exactly how old Ram and Shyam were!
What is the solution that a parent has in his/her armoury now? To me, ‘go to your room’ doesn’t qualify as punishment. I mean seriously, with the X-Box, 42” LCD TV, PSP, Wii and the likes, ‘go to your room’ should be more like a reward for something good that you did! I just don’t get it! The Americans are superpowers who possess weapons of mass destruction in their backyard, and they came up with such a lame-ass excuse for punishment? Are these the same people that did those awful things at the Abu Ghraib in Iraq? Now, now…don’t get all agitated. I don’t mean to imply that you should blindfold your kid and pee on him every time he swears, or breaks your favourite vase or something. Am just saying that the Americans could’ve surely come up with something better than ‘go to your room’!
Coming back to Russell Peters and his humble request to the white guy – ‘please, whack your kid once in a while’! It does help the other races around. The Mexicans do it, the blacks sure as hell do it, and the Indians are raised such that they wait for the day to do it to their own. Now imagine the plight of an Indian sitting in New Jersey, with his kid threatening to call the social services on him! What’s he supposed to do? Recession and all aside, I think that’s one of the major reasons why the Indians come back after the early years of their child’s life. When they state the reason for their return as ‘good primary education and the Indian value system’, they aren’t lying. The Indian value system is that they don’t need to deal with the mess of social services to straighten their brat!
And now, school teachers aren’t allowed to touch the kids either! So, with the parents not doing much, and the teachers not being able to use their trusted wooden rulers, the kids are free to wreak havoc all around. Its amazing to see parents around struggling to control their kids, and at the same time trying to tame that inner violent streak from giving way. If you’ve noticed, kids have become fussier, nosier and generally more irritating! I say the occasional whack goes a long way in controlling all that! Don’t be a doormat, I say, a little spanking never hurt anyone! =)
Or better yet, enjoy bachelorhood like I do :p
Tuesday, August 17, 2010
Saturday, August 07, 2010
Freedom of Speech
DISCLAIMER: All the contents mentioned below are fictional. Any resemblance, and I mean ANY RESEMBLANCE, however stark, is not intentional and purely coincidental.
India strongly believes in freedom of speech…as long as nobody can hear you, of course! Don’t believe me? When was the last time you actually voiced an opinion in a crowded restaurant without looking over your shoulder afraid that some fanatic from some political party or your neighbourhood goon, or well, that burly looking dude sitting in the corner of the room, might just come and whack the living daylights out of you? Come on, be honest!
Ok, let’s take a PURELY HYPOTHETICAL situation here. One of our mantris wakes up one fine day, somewhere in Bombay (whoops…I mean Mumbai!!!) and finds out that the daughter of his second cousin’s wife’s brother staying somewhere in the plush locales of Bandra has caught malaria. Ok, wait. Let me play it safe(r). Let’s just say she has the chicken pox! And coincidently, Mr. Mantri’s faithful servant, Muttu (hailing from sandy beaches of Kerala) calls in and wants leave. Reason for leave: His daughter has the chicken pox. Now, Mr. Mantri has excellent skills of deduction – he has practically read all the Sherlock Holmes books and seen most of the episodes of the carrot-chomping Karamchand on TV. So, Mr. Mantri calls his right hand man, Aditya Puntambekar. “Its elementary, my dear Puntya! These bloody south Indians have brought malariaaaaaaaaaa…I mean chicken pox to Mumbai!!! Get the news channels together, I want to make a public statement.” A public statement is duly made, and poor Muttu, and his entire clan come under the scanner once again!
Now, as an educated Indian, or why educated even – as an Indian, you feel for poor Muttu and his clan! You do love the little idli-sambhar joints that you frequent on Sunday mornings. Not that you’re betraying the wada-pav of Mumbai in any way, but you do need a change once in a while and kaande-pohe just wouldn’t cut it! So, you read the newspaper and come across this piece of news…”South Indians responsible for bringing chicken pox to Mumbai”…what do you do? Do you gather a crowd and go to Mr. Mantri’s house to hold a protest? Do you introduce him to the wonderful world of Google search where he can verify the causes of chicken pox before making a public statement? Do you sponsor his primary education? Hell No! You just utter a couple of profanities (in your head, mind you) and turn over to the Sports Section! Correct? That’s what I’d do, honestly! Of course, there’ll be public statements from the other party leaders tomorrow morning – let them deal with it! They do need a fresh new topic to come back in the news, don’t they?
Let’s get back to the topic of discussion now. I’m not professing anything here, far from it! I’m not saying that I would have done anything different. I’m just saying that this whole BS of freedom of speech is over-rated, and simply DOES NOT EXIST. According to me, you can speak your mind in only 5 cases:
A. Only your very close friends can hear you, and another condition that goes with this is that you know who your close friends are, of course!
B. You’re talking about something nobody would take offense to – say, football. Not if you’re talking about cricket, be warned, you might piss someone off!
C. Anonymity – if nobody knows who you are, you’re ok! Through your blog that nobody reads (pretty similar to this one right here), articles etc. etc. etc.
D. You’re clinically insane
E. You’re Tony Stark with a shit load of weapons and an Iron Man suit in your closet!
That’s about it! Anyone who tells you any different is either not being honest, or should get himself checked up for point D above.
Another thing I don’t get is how come we’ve become so sensitive all of a sudden? And to make things worse, India is a secular country, with a zillion type of people that you could so easily piss off by your actions or reactions! No, am not saying being secular is bad, I’m all for it – its one thing that defines India…all I’m just saying is that it adds to the whole confusion.
There was a forward I got some years back from a friend about 3 reasons why Jesus is a Parsi? You want to know why, don’t you?? J ah well, ok, let me just get that out of the way. 3 reasons why Jesus was a Parsi are:
1. He was 30 and lived with his parents (at the time I received this joke, I was 21-22…am turning 30 next yr and I am still staying with my parents…but that’s besides the point.)
2. He thought his mother was a virgin
3. His mother thought he was God!
For all my Christian pals, I know you’re laughing inside, so don’t act all smug! For the others who got offended by the joke, ah, screw you!
So getting back to the point – why have we suddenly become so damn sensitive about everything? An actress says pre-marital sex is not a big deal, and she is made to apologize publicly and comes up with “Oh! my statement was taken out of context!”. I really wonder what the context was, but we’ll save that for another day! A guy wants to smoke on screen, not possible any more, mister! An Indian sports icon says he’s an Indian first and then a Maharashtrian, no sir…nothing doing, we won’t have it!
Not far is the day when the Parsis will feel bad about bawa jokes, or even being referred to as ‘bawa’! I can already see it…they’ll turn into how the African Americans are in US, and how only they are allowed to address each other with the ‘N’ word! It’ll be like only Sharome can call Rhyzard a ‘bawa’…but lord help a Siddharth if he tries!
Its 2010, and India is one of the fastest growing economies in the world. One would think we’d all be too busy to give a crap! Right???
India strongly believes in freedom of speech…as long as nobody can hear you, of course! Don’t believe me? When was the last time you actually voiced an opinion in a crowded restaurant without looking over your shoulder afraid that some fanatic from some political party or your neighbourhood goon, or well, that burly looking dude sitting in the corner of the room, might just come and whack the living daylights out of you? Come on, be honest!
Ok, let’s take a PURELY HYPOTHETICAL situation here. One of our mantris wakes up one fine day, somewhere in Bombay (whoops…I mean Mumbai!!!) and finds out that the daughter of his second cousin’s wife’s brother staying somewhere in the plush locales of Bandra has caught malaria. Ok, wait. Let me play it safe(r). Let’s just say she has the chicken pox! And coincidently, Mr. Mantri’s faithful servant, Muttu (hailing from sandy beaches of Kerala) calls in and wants leave. Reason for leave: His daughter has the chicken pox. Now, Mr. Mantri has excellent skills of deduction – he has practically read all the Sherlock Holmes books and seen most of the episodes of the carrot-chomping Karamchand on TV. So, Mr. Mantri calls his right hand man, Aditya Puntambekar. “Its elementary, my dear Puntya! These bloody south Indians have brought malariaaaaaaaaaa…I mean chicken pox to Mumbai!!! Get the news channels together, I want to make a public statement.” A public statement is duly made, and poor Muttu, and his entire clan come under the scanner once again!
Now, as an educated Indian, or why educated even – as an Indian, you feel for poor Muttu and his clan! You do love the little idli-sambhar joints that you frequent on Sunday mornings. Not that you’re betraying the wada-pav of Mumbai in any way, but you do need a change once in a while and kaande-pohe just wouldn’t cut it! So, you read the newspaper and come across this piece of news…”South Indians responsible for bringing chicken pox to Mumbai”…what do you do? Do you gather a crowd and go to Mr. Mantri’s house to hold a protest? Do you introduce him to the wonderful world of Google search where he can verify the causes of chicken pox before making a public statement? Do you sponsor his primary education? Hell No! You just utter a couple of profanities (in your head, mind you) and turn over to the Sports Section! Correct? That’s what I’d do, honestly! Of course, there’ll be public statements from the other party leaders tomorrow morning – let them deal with it! They do need a fresh new topic to come back in the news, don’t they?
Let’s get back to the topic of discussion now. I’m not professing anything here, far from it! I’m not saying that I would have done anything different. I’m just saying that this whole BS of freedom of speech is over-rated, and simply DOES NOT EXIST. According to me, you can speak your mind in only 5 cases:
A. Only your very close friends can hear you, and another condition that goes with this is that you know who your close friends are, of course!
B. You’re talking about something nobody would take offense to – say, football. Not if you’re talking about cricket, be warned, you might piss someone off!
C. Anonymity – if nobody knows who you are, you’re ok! Through your blog that nobody reads (pretty similar to this one right here), articles etc. etc. etc.
D. You’re clinically insane
E. You’re Tony Stark with a shit load of weapons and an Iron Man suit in your closet!
That’s about it! Anyone who tells you any different is either not being honest, or should get himself checked up for point D above.
Another thing I don’t get is how come we’ve become so sensitive all of a sudden? And to make things worse, India is a secular country, with a zillion type of people that you could so easily piss off by your actions or reactions! No, am not saying being secular is bad, I’m all for it – its one thing that defines India…all I’m just saying is that it adds to the whole confusion.
There was a forward I got some years back from a friend about 3 reasons why Jesus is a Parsi? You want to know why, don’t you?? J ah well, ok, let me just get that out of the way. 3 reasons why Jesus was a Parsi are:
1. He was 30 and lived with his parents (at the time I received this joke, I was 21-22…am turning 30 next yr and I am still staying with my parents…but that’s besides the point.)
2. He thought his mother was a virgin
3. His mother thought he was God!
For all my Christian pals, I know you’re laughing inside, so don’t act all smug! For the others who got offended by the joke, ah, screw you!
So getting back to the point – why have we suddenly become so damn sensitive about everything? An actress says pre-marital sex is not a big deal, and she is made to apologize publicly and comes up with “Oh! my statement was taken out of context!”. I really wonder what the context was, but we’ll save that for another day! A guy wants to smoke on screen, not possible any more, mister! An Indian sports icon says he’s an Indian first and then a Maharashtrian, no sir…nothing doing, we won’t have it!
Not far is the day when the Parsis will feel bad about bawa jokes, or even being referred to as ‘bawa’! I can already see it…they’ll turn into how the African Americans are in US, and how only they are allowed to address each other with the ‘N’ word! It’ll be like only Sharome can call Rhyzard a ‘bawa’…but lord help a Siddharth if he tries!
Its 2010, and India is one of the fastest growing economies in the world. One would think we’d all be too busy to give a crap! Right???
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