57. MODERNITY AND INDIVIDUALITY
MODERNITY imposes a dead uniformity on nations and individuals alike, even as people talk loud about various freedoms. The irony is that most so called educated people are not even aware that they do not have any real freedom in most things. It is because this loss of freedom is enforced through invisible channels or impersonal forces which one cannot easily identify and with which one cannot fight. It is as if a huge orchestra is playing but the conductor is not visible.
Are our freedoms real?
If a child is admitted to a formal school, the prescribed uniform knocks off its freedom to dress. The school ends even its freedom to play as it pleases! The govt. prescribed syllabus and the government controlled textbook removes your freedom to learn, or teach. Does a student today have the freedom "not" to learn computers till he chooses? If you read a newspaper like The Hindu or The Times of India, you lose your freedom to know objective news, as they project only the distorted leftist view.The news and views are so mixed that it is easier to separate sugar from sand. In the TV channels, the over-bloated interviewers would not allow a person to express his views fully, if they run against the official line. Yet we pat ourselves about the virtues of our democracy and freedom of expression.
Appropriate behaviour
Every society has some notion about what is appropriate in a situation. They do differ among themselves, but there is a shared feeling within a society. Some things are not questioned. However modern the Westerner may be, he would not dress the same way for a funeral and a wedding reception or a party. The devout Christians used to attend the Church service on Sundays in full suit, and the ladies would wear a scarf over the head. Surely, God is not going to get offended even if one goes naked- after all that is how He in His Wisdom sent us into this world! Yet we feel we show Him due respect only when we go 'properly' dressed. And a congregation of such men and women creates its own dignified and solemn atmosphere. It is always amusing to see an Alfred Hitchcock in full suit, while he directed semi-nude scenes! Or how officials appeared before Gandhi, the half-naked fakir, in their suits!
From: edition.cnn.com
When we entered college 60 years ago, we shed our shorts( called half-pants or knickers or trousers) and started wearing full pants. There was just one boy in the whole college who could not afford a full pant.His parents were that poor. The Principal- a Salesian father -was a kind and thoughtful man. He kept this boy next to him in the prayer meeting before commencement of class; thereafter, no one dared to make fun of him. Can we think of such a situation today? Many of us boys from the rural areas used to come to class wearing our dhoti. Can we think of this today anywhere in India? It is only the Muslims who still have this freedom to dress, in the name of minority rights! It seems the so called majority has no rights, except to submit to the mass and media dictates!
Globalisation
" What is globalisation? Is it the integration of economic, political, and cultural systems across the globe? Or is it Americanisation and United States dominance of world affairs? Is globalisation a force for economic growth, prosperity, and democratic freedom? Or is it a force for environmental devastation, exploitation of the developing world, and suppression of human rights? "
Globalisation has imposed its own system of uniformity. After the collapse of the Soviet Union, it means the imposition of American views in academics, and American ways in economic organisation and generally the American way
of life. When the US president visits abroad, he acts as the spokesman for the American economic interests, while his retinue takes care of their intricate political (military) interests. American brands are everywhere, and at American prices! This process is edging out many local economic communities all over the world, especially in the third world.
Most people are not aware how this is ending our freedom of choice. Take our automobiles. Before the so called liberalisation, when foreign companies were allowed to enter and loot India, the Indian automobile industry spawned a huge network of local parts, workshops and repair shops, where almost anything could be fixed anywhere in India, even in remote corners. There were mechanics with little or no formal schooling. Today, companies have a network of dealers and 'service' facilities where all they do is replace a part by a new part of the same make- there is no question of local manufacture or adjustment.
A situation like this was described in that cult book " Zen And the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance" by Robert M.Pirsig in the 70s!
Cover of the book from 1979 edition. Shown here for educational purpose. There is a recent 40th anniversary edition.
Most things made today are 'use and throw' stuff. The sturdy fountain pen is displaced by the cheap plastic ball pen; if the sole of the shoe is worn out, it cannot be fixed, but has to be discarded; the most expensive TV set cannot be fixed after 5 years- it would have been replaced by a newer model and the old part would simply not be available. Your solid old wrist watch cannot be fixed now!
We know what this entails- enormous waste of resources and our inability to properly dispose of them- there is not even enough place to dump them ! Yet, this is the global standard that our people are induced to emulate! The American standard where 5% of the world population mindlessly consumes 35% of the world's resources, and where America has started policing the world to guarantee its supply of resources! This is an impossibility for the whole world to adopt, yet it is what the nations are asked to emulate in the name of economic progress.
There is a more serious problem that globalisation has created. Manufacture of most things that deplete natural resources and pollute the environment, and depend on labour are now shifted to the so called third world. The more glamorous information, or knowledge and skill based enterprises are located in the West. The exchange between them is always in favour of the latter.
Globalisation or Americanisation?
But there is a catch. The American model of economy is based on expenditure (consumption)- not saving. This is true both at individual and national levels. America as a nation is sitting and working on huge debt- but it survives because, those who have a surplus with it -like China- cannot use those damn dollars except by investing in the US! Had there been gold standard as in the 18th century, Fort Knox would have been emptied long ago- as the Vietnam war once threatened to do. But in real terms China too suffers- it faces enormous pollution, and the gradual Americanisation of their lifestyles! China successfully resisted all attempts by the West to colonise it, but finally succumbed to the economic pressure. If Americans become sensible about their consumption,and start saving, [big if, this] the Chinese dragon will go to the dogs.
Who are real Americans?
There is yet another serious problem. Just who are the Americans? Is America (the US) a nation proper? This is a serious question vexing the Americans. Americans are White Christian- mainly Anglo-Saxon immigrants who duped and subjugated the Native people, and brought the Blacks to slave for them. While Americans talk of freedom, will they grant that freedom fully to the Natives and the Blacks and the Hispanics- as they desire it, and not as the Whites deem it ? This question is at the base of their national debates, often indirectly. Samuel Huntington said that the basic identity of the American is White Anglo-Saxon Protestant. How people of different ethnicities fare and the problems they face in getting absorbed into the American "mass" were detailed in the 1963 book 'Beyond the Melting Pot' by Nathan Glazer and Daniel P.Moynihan. This is still a classic, and continues to be relevant after half a century.[ American history is just a story of eight such half-centuries!] America is like a vast military camp, run by the Anglo-Saxon core!
National identity in Europe
This question of national identity is beginning to haunt Europe due to a different reason: the presence of the Muslims, who come as immigrants and remain as a threat.They refuse to integrate with the local society, and obey their secular laws. Major countries like Germany, France , Spain and England are grappling with this question. David Cameron, the British Prime Minister was provoked to remind his people that England was basically a Christian nation!
Now he seems to think it more important to talk about British identity not just in terms of culture but in terms of faith, which might seem rather intriguing given the general decline in church attendance. But he clearly thinks it’s a point worth making, even if stating that Britain is a Christian country inevitably attracts grumbles, even at Christmas.
The picture is from the official 10, Downing Street website.
The report is from blogs spectator.co.uk. 24 December,2015.
These European countries were not subject to forced cultural or political authority of other nations. But there were many voluntary exchanges among them at many levels. Though we may regard them as one bloc as Europeans, each nation is highly evolved and cultured, and has distinct and distinguished marks that clearly separate the one from the others. And Eastern Europe is distinct from Western Europe. The EU is only a convenient political and economic arrangement, designed to withstand American pressure. But it does not represent a cultural unity- except that all are nominally Christians, but even then following different denominations.
There are interesting cases of two other countries- Russia and India.
The Russian Experience: War And Peace
Russia has had a distinct character. Though Christian, it was neither subject to Rome, nor was it Protestant. The Russian Orthodox church was different and independent, counted among one of the Eastern Orthodox churches. As a nation, it had faced a problem: was it to be distinct or was it to follow Western Europe? Peter the Great (1682-1725) "modernised" Russia in dress, manners, army and government. The upper classes gradually became Europeanised in manners. Speaking French was considered a sign of cultural superiority. It was the defeat of Napoleon on Russian soil that finally induced in the people a sense of cultural independence. Tolstoy's great novel "War and Peace" deals with this important question of the Russian national identity or Russian national consciousness. Orlando Figes writes:
The war of 1812 is portrayed as a national liberation from the cultural domination of the French- a moment when Russian noblemen...struggled to break free from the foreign conventions of their society and began new lives on Russian principles. In Tolstoy's text the novel opens in the French language of the Petersburg salon- a language that Tolstoy gradually reveals to be false and artificial. Tolstoy shows the aristocracy renouncing haute cuisine for Spartan lunches of rye bread and cabbage soup, adopting national dress, settling as farmers on the land and rediscovering their country's native culture.....
On this reading, War and Peace appears as a national epic- the revelation of a 'Russian consciousness' in the inner life of the characters.
From: Afterword. War and Peace, Translated by Anthony Briggs. Penguin edition, 2007.
[Nearly a century later, tiny Japan defeated the mighty Russia in the Russo-Japanese War in 1905- the first time an Asian nation had defeated an European power and stopped its expansion. This in turn boosted Japan's own feeling of self worth and identity.]
The Bolshevik bloodbath
The Bolshevik revolution represented another bout of intellectual and cultural domination by alien systems. The brand of communism that Lenin and Stalin imposed was not germane to the Russian situation. In fact, Marx had spoken of Communism as the dialectical culmination of capitalism in the inevitable march of history, but Russia was not capitalist in 1917 by any stretch of imagination! Also, this brand of communism sought to destroy the very bases of Russian culture by openly attacking religion as state policy, and ending all the freedoms of the various ethnic groups.
Disintegration of USSR
The end of the communist regime has meant another round of alien domination- this time by the American economic model or ideal. The Russian bear is chained by the dirty American dollar!
The collapse of the USSR gave rise to 15 independent countries, including Russia, the largest of them showing that ethnicity cannot be erased by force. In today's globalised environment, it will be next to impossible for them to survive as independent economic entities for long. The real problem facing them is how to keep their cultural freedoms in the face of growing loss of economic freedom.If you sup with the devil, you will have to sup on its terms!
From:commons.wikimedia.org CC BY-SA 3.0
Does India exist?
India presents the most tragic case. Hindu India resisted the Muslim onslaught for nearly 1000 years. Muslims were open enemies, as declared by themselves. The only alternatives open to people conquered by them are either to convert or die. Yet, Hindus resisted the Muslims. But when the British came, they used Hindus and Muslims to fight each other, and entrenched themselves. They used the administration, education and the missionaries to de-Hinduise the Indian consciousness. They rewrote Indian history to suit their aims. Though India became politically free, it did not shake off the British legacy in administration, education and the general view of our own History. Our children are still taught what the British wrote to suit their purposes!
With the rise of American power through both direct military means and indirect economic pressures, manipulating even international institutions like the World Bank, IMF and WTO, India has completely lost its economic independence. We have an army of brain-washed pseudo-intellectuals asking us to globalise- ie give up our economic independence, even faster!. The younger generation has taken to the American way of living, especially copying its more vulgar elements. There is no idea what constitutes Indianness!
Even a quick survey of world history would show that what constitutes national consciousness is not a piece of paper, like the Constitution, or some political arrangement like the parliamentary system and periodic elections. All these can change and have changed. But it is the national consciousness- the core individuality of the people- which triumphs. England the mother of parliaments is just reminding itself that it is after all a Christian nation! Westernising Indians have no idea what is that core, and what we are losing.
NOTE:
Many people cite the example of Singapore as the symbol of successful globalisation. This is pure bullshit. Singapore has a population of about 5.7 million- less than the Indian cities of Chennai, Bangalore, Mumbai, Kolkata, Delhi- each! It has no industry, agriculture- no anything of its own! Yet, economic idiots compare such meaningless numbers as the GDP! Yet, Singapore has a basic identity problem, because of its multi-ethnic population. (Chinese: 74%; Malay: 13%; Indian: 9%. There can be little doubt that the Chinese will assert themselves in the long run, depending on the fortunes of the mainland. Let there be some prolonged economic slowdown or stagnation, and we will know the real Singapore!) A river in spate will easily wash away the elephant! Let the floods recede, and we will know how it stinks!
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