Month: May 2022

Happy Mother’s Day

Happy Mother’s Day, all. May all beings be happy, may all beings be free of suffering, may all beings become enlightened.

With that benediction taken care of, I should get back to being a curmudgeon. First, I think the whole idea of one day in a year being dedicated to one’s mother is needlessly restrictive. If one values being born[1], then one must revere one’s mother every single day. Surely, marking only one day in a whole year to express one’s love and gratitude to the one person who was most directly involved in bringing one into being is not enough.

Second, I resent the MacDonaldization of the world, part of which is the adoption of American traditions as if one’s own tradition is somehow inadequate and inferior. It is undignified. To use an Americanism (I know, the irony), it is cringe-worthy. Continue reading “Happy Mother’s Day”

Democracy – Part 1

Democracy is a sacred word in India. As a concept, it is poorly understood (not just in India but across the world) but like people’s attitude towards their own religion, they uncritically subscribe to it without bothering to understand what it is, what it implies, what its premises are, whether or not those premises are true, whether it delivers what it promises, what its track record is, what the alternatives to it are, and whether or not they would be better off without it.

Democracy has a quasi-religious status in India (though not exclusively so) that places it beyond any scrutiny or criticism. The general attitude in India is that democracy and what’s the public good are synonymous. From that arises the comforting syllogism for Indians which says that since (1) democracy is good; and (2) India is the largest democracy; therefore (3) India is the best. QED.

In my view, democracy is not all that it’s cracked up to be. In fact, I think it is seriously flawed and, although in certain limited contexts it is better than the alternatives, people who get ecstatic at the mention of the word democracy are seriously deluded and what’s worse, their delusion is not harmless. That delusion has pernicious effects, the most serious of which is its negative impact on individual freedom. Democracy, as practiced, is contrary and antagonistic to freedom, and therefore inconsistent with human flourishing. Continue reading “Democracy – Part 1”

Money

Oscar Wilde in his play Lady Windermere’s Fan has Lord Darlington describe a cynic as “a man who knows the price of everything, and the value of nothing.”

Economists have frequently been accused of that character flaw, and that all that they care about is money. “For the love of money,” says the Christian bible, “is the root of all evil.” Unfortunately, many non-Christians also subscribe to that tripe.

Here’s a joke. An American and a Russian were boasting about their respective countries. The Russian says, “You Americans only care about money. We Soviets care about people.” The American says, “That’s true. That is why we lock up our money and you lock up your people.”

I am happy to note that ancient Indian tradition did not suffer from that delusion. See, for example, how the Panchatantra approached the matter of money in this post here. But people rarely understand what money actually represents, what it signifies and why. Ayn Rand provides a spirited defense of the importance of money in her book Atlas Shrugged. She had a character, Francisco, say:

“Let me give you a tip on a clue to men’s characters: the man who damns money has obtained it dishonorably; the man who respects it has earned it.

“Run for your life from any man who tells you that money is evil. That sentence is the leper’s bell of an approaching looter. So long as men live together on earth and need means to deal with one another – their only substitute, if they abandon money, is the muzzle of a gun.”

The extended excerpt follows. Continue reading “Money”