Sides.

Are you confused? Are you living with the guilt of misplaced opinions compared to masses? Are you finding it difficult to make sense of conflicting truths you’re presented upon?

If you’re feeling any of the above, toh zinda ho tum!

While activism has reached the last man due to the platform provided by social media, it has also opened gates for misinformation, rumors, fear mongering and propaganda. This very dark effect of social media is why you must be careful before getting influenced by news feed and before you act stupid and strain real relationships with people over difference of opinion.

One must remember that all the content you absorb daily is a result of an algorithm that make you read similar stories of the impression you left on the internet with your surfing, activities, subscriptions and sometimes conversations. The other important aspect is that political parties at either end of the political spectrum will try to create a crises in order to spring back into the power or retain itself at that position as suites the best to their interests.

And hence, it becomes increasingly important for one to indulge in dialogue and prevent acting all egoistic, jingoistic and hyperventilating to every question challenging your morals and social understanding of the issues in the media. To tackle this, you just need to follow few basic guidelines —

#1 You are entitled to change your stand. Irrespective of how you started, with more information and clarity or understanding on the issue, you definitely can have a different stand and it doesn’t matter if someone calls you out for it. Agitation shouldn’t be watertight that it weighs you down to follow only one principle blindly. If you happen to do that, you are playing into the hands of the powerful who are trying to achieve their ends through your means.

#2 Read both sides of the opinions to understand the reaction better. You may not have had enough experiences in life to be sensitive to a certain aspect that someone else understands much better and with greater clarity. You must also remember that a lot of times, people are fighting fears of different time, era and source. For e.g. Someone is fighting to prevent the country from repeating third reich whereas someone is fighting to protect the country from the lense of direct action day. In this age of name-calling and coloring individuals from their opinion, the dialogue has been done away with and everything that people cling on to is giving labels, threats and marking the next person as ‘the other’

#3 Indulge in dialogue. Agree to disagree over certain matters but refrain from getting personal over matters that are discussed in media. You don’t need have the same opinions at your family dinner table, does it mean you abandon your family?

#4 Lastly, be constructive in your dissent. Do not play into violence that some groups try to ignite over every protest. If you happen to do that, the real reasons are lost and all that is concentrated on is violence. Distraction is an essential tool to divert attention onto things of no importance so one can move swiftly in implementing the other. Be alert, be aware and be woke, but by careful reading of for and against opinions and not letting yourself stumble into blind following. Be careful before your choose your Sides.

The Purge.

Last week, my friend gave me a DVD of the first movie in Purge series. The concept was horrendous. This apparently a ‘social science fiction horror‘ film is a story where the new founding fathers of America sanctions a national civic tradition called ‘The Purge’ during which all police, fire and medical emergency services will be suspended. The movie spoke that this concept has been successful plummeting employment rates to 1%, lower crime and a strong economy. However, there are some rules; restrictions prohibit government officials ‘ranking 10’ from being disturbed, as well as the use of weapons above class 4 such as rocket launchers and bazookas. What you will notice in the movie and is repeated too quite a lot of times that the only victims to this purge are the poor, the vulnerable ones who cannot protect themselves. Come to think of it, I am sure you will be thanking your stars that such a thing is not in reality.

But is it so? Open a newspaper and you will see Purge happening day and night, each day at different corners of the world. Everyday some new shooting, beheading or bombing. Who is the victim? The homeless ones, the poor and vulnerable people who cannot protect themselves. Who doesn’t get disturbed? The high ranking officials. Hardly anyone gets punished for half the world sides with one type of terrorism where other half condemns it. Terms of Good Terrorism and Bad Terrorism is in force. After every attack when someone starts a social media trend of #PrayForTheVictim, there is other side which rejoices in the cold blooded murder and term they deserved it. It is a sick mentality which sanctions or justifies murder.

“There are perhaps many causes worth dying for, but to me, certainly, there are none worth killing for.”   ― Albert Dietrich, Army GI, Pacifist CO: The World War II Letters of Frank and Albert Dietrich

I wonder when will this world realize the results of what is happening. When will there be a stop to all of this. When will this world consider killing an innocent to be a crime, for whatsoever reasons or whatever nationality or culture or tradition that person belongs to.

And for those who find this movie’s concept interesting, read about Direct Action Day and Great Calcutta Killings or The week of long knives. It was no less than a Purge as shown in the movie. Violence never serves the purpose, it only destroys. Most of the countries that justified or reasoned a terrorist attack in Asian countries for last many years are facing the same monsters in their homeland today but sadly, maturity still appears to be light years away.

A Syrian said, “We pray 6 prayers a day now; Fajr, Dhuhr, Asr, Maghrib, Isha and Janazah [Funerals].

Really, when will this stop?

Shall not be washed away

“Despite its growing scarcity and preciousness to life, ironically, water is also man’s most misgoverned, inefficiently allocated and profligately wasted natural resource.”
― Steven Solomon, Water : the epic struggle for wealth, power, and civilization

Monsoon arrives! This year has been the most vocal year in my memory regarding conservation of water. Over 10 states in India were under severe drought. Cash-rich IPL matches were shifted, donations poured in from all sides and festivals were celebrated without much wastage of water. The department predicts that Monsoon shall be better this year in India. Whatever the future holds for us, let us hope that the rising awareness doesn’t get washed away until next drought surfaces.

There’s plenty to learn. The state we are living in today is because of continuous abandonment of sense of responsibility, lack of will and ‘not my problem’ attitude of people and politicians. Last week, I came across an article about Israel’s water management technologies. The statistics will blow you apart. Israel is World’s number one water recycler with 85% recycling rate followed by Spain who is at 12%. Look at the gap! Israel is situated in an area where water shortage is inevitable, a place where 60% is desert area and yet exports high value farm produce.

Where are we going wrong? It is simple. Besides lack of technology, it is the behavioral aspect too. It is high time we consider this an alarming problem and move towards importing technologies and ideas of water conservation. Today, Israel’s 60% water comes from the sea, 80% of waste water is used in agriculture. Desalination technology is becoming cost effective and is going to be cheaper in coming years. With Maharashtra being a state with a long coast line, I wonder why don’t we start adopting state of the art recycling technologies. The authorities has to step up and fix the leakage problems with conveniently wasted more than 30% of our water. Education Department has to introduce lectures and practices and inculcate knowledge about importance of water resources to young minds who are quicker to adapt and change. A simple transformation from Shower bathing to Bucket bathing can save so much of our water. Introduce rain water harvesting techniques, make people aware, involve religious institutions for I believe in India, if you need a quicker push, start from religious place.

Israel is home to the world’s largest Seawater Reverse Osmosis desalination plant, annually producing 100 million cubic meters at the low cost of approximately $0.52 per cubic meter of water – the most cost-efficient of its kind in the world. India is the first country to send Mars Orbiter in first attempt. There is no doubt why India cannot continue improvising on such technologies. Heat is going to increase, so is population and water needs, if we do not wake up now, when will we?

Israel’s success arise from the continuous need for and support of innovative methods, technologies, holistic water resource management and strategies for sustainable provision for the nation’s water needs and I see no reason why India shouldn’t crave for that need desperately.

Feminism

Since quite some time, I have become less vocal on Twitter. Simply follow trolls for a good laugh on current controversies. However, many a times, I see jokes on Feminism. It makes me wonder, why a movement that is so important is being joked about? Surely, most of the jokes are on hypocrites or those brand of people who call themselves feminists and truthfully believe in the folly of Women is greater than men. Whereas a simple definition on Merriam Webster Dictionary defines feminism as ‘the belief that men and women should have equal rights and opportunities’.

EQUALITY! Nothing but equality. No one is greater to anyone but shall have equal treatment, opportunities and rights. It is sad that we have come to an age where the first thing we associate to feminism is that the person must be hating men or is a person who wants that women shall have extra privileges. We have constantly misinterpreted or wrongly reacted or selfishly tried to curb movements to bring justice to the shallow mindset that has developed over the years in order to retain power. Power was a thing of past where only might could succeed. However, we have evolved into a world where even weak can survive and in this evolution, I don’t see any reasons why we should let the opportunists or rather anyone let this word get corrupted because of some misguided people.

Last week, a post on Instagram prompted me to go and buy a book, “We should all be Feminists” by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, a Nigerian writer penning a small essay explaining why it is necessary for all to be feminists. She says, “Gender matters everywhere in the world and we should begin to dream about and plan a different world. A fairer world. A world of happier men and happier women who are truer to themselves. And this is how to start; we must raise our daughters differently. We must also raise our sons differently”. In one of the speeches, Indian PM Narendra Modi stresses on correcting your sons rather than questioning your daughters.

If we do something over and over again, it becomes normal. We are living in a world where everyone expects a male to be hard, a female to be soft. a male to bear the burden of family, a female to run the house. If roles are shifted, we shame them causing half the population of this world to be in constant inner state of turmoil and conflict. If a woman earns more than a man, he is shamed resulting a man to forcefully cut the ladder of a woman’s career growth for which she toiled so hard all her youth. Since this happens over and over again, we get used to it and move on. Many people simply say, but a woman can say No to all of this, but reality is different and more complex and the world won’t change if you won’t. It is appalling how we try to reason out rapes and molestation by questioning why a woman was at that particular place or why was she wearing that. It is like questioning a non smoking lung cancer patient, why did he step out of his house or why did he inhale smoke as if it was all in his control.

One of the most beautiful lines written by Adichie in her book is when she questions the point of culture. “Culture functions ultimately to ensure the preservation and continuity of people. Culture does not make people. People make culture. If it is true that the full humanity of women is not our culture, then we can and must make it our culture.”

Feminism is not a dirty word. We should all be feminists!

Okay.

Maybe because it is Saturday today or I was plain lucky to get a seat in Fast Mumbai Local in morning peak hours. Having nothing to do, I took to Facebook today and came across a really good post that kept my mind occupied, which read;

“People are settling everyday into okay relationships, okay jobs and an okay life. And do you know why? Because okay is comfortable. Okay pays the bills and gives you a warm bed at night. But do you know what okay is not? Okay isn’t thrilling, okay isn’t passion, it isn’t the reason you get up every day. Okay is not the reason you go to bed late and wake up early. Okay is not the reason you risk absolutely everything just for the smallest chance that something absolutely amazing could happen.”

This makes one feel so good, probably energized and I spent rest of my journey thinking about it, even wondering about how much ‘okay’ have I settled in. But then, as I was getting down of my train and walking towards my work place, I looked around but a different thought came to my mind. I really wondered if people are really settling for ‘okay’. Isn’t it that most of men around us in this whole wide world aren’t privileged enough to experience that ‘okay’. Probably people are risking absolutely everything just for the smallest chance that one day, that ‘okay’ would happen.

Aahhh !! This world is a complicated place and so is our minds. Maybe, being ‘okay’ is not okay but maybe reaching that ‘okay’ is a well-deserved feat too. 😉