Sunday, March 11, 2012
A Disarticulated Body
A disarticulated body was found in Dhaka, Bangladesh. That was nearly two days ago. In a civilised polity, this would have set off a nation-wide alarum. Nothing of this kind has happened. The incident has been quietly ignored.
Why?
Democracy unleashed violence on a massive scale: by now, we have become inured to decapitations and disrticulations. This is what democracy has done for us.
The nation is agog at the spectacle of the opposition laying 'siege' to the capital tomorrow: dismembered bodies? Who cares?
Yesterday, the decomposed body was found in Kushtia, a small city in Bangladesh. It was reported in the inside pages of a daily. It just barely made the news.
We have become desensitised: indifferent to murder, no matter how gruesome. I have lived through autocracy and democracy, and I have seen the change in human nature.
On Clothes and Modernity
(click above for article)
"For example, I prefer to wear jeans and T-shirt too. Because I need easily to use my legs and arms." My 'modern' Turkish friend pleads efficiency for her attire; oddly, though, efficient farm girls in Turkey wear the shalwar, as they do in Bangladesh, along with the saree. 'Modernity' comes in many covers, and this one conceals less of its sinister side than most.
Monday, January 9, 2012
Permanent News (poetry)
Permanent News
(click above for poems)
(click above for poems)
A great poet described poetry as news that stays news. I hope these 8 poems on political violence in post-democratic Bangladesh - especially the murder of young politicians by themselves - remain permanent memorials.
Saturday, December 31, 2011
Horace In the Hills
(click above)
dulce et decorum est pro patria mori: These words of Horace were drilled into European children so that they would die by the millions on the killing fields of France and Germany. One English poet, who had seen action, called it "the old lie". But the lie is alive and well (if that's the word). As reaction to Bengali nationalism, Chakma nationalism reared its head…. But the Franco-German export never travelled well here.
Tuesday, November 29, 2011
An Elegy For The News
An Elegy For The News
(click above for article)
Excerpt:
As far as I know, only one man has pointed out the holocaust—for that is what it surely is—and he is Norman Finkelstein. “As in the Nazi holocaust, a million children have likely perished,” he observes in his book ‘The Holocaust Industry, (London : Verso, 2000, p 148): “ . . . the United States and Britain forced murderous UN sanction on that hapless country [Iraq] in an attempt to depose him [Saddam Hussein]. As in the Holocaust, a million children have likely perished. [more than a million, as The Economist tells us].” Madeleine Albright, Clinton’s lackey, went on television to say that the ‘price is worth it.’ And his partner in murder, Al Gore, has been rewarded with a Nobel Peace Prize, a rapidly devaluing currency. Mass killers are anointed and beatified.
(click above for article)
The murder of 1.7 million Iraqi children through sanctions between 1991 and 2001 has been quietly overlooked by the media. This shows in the glorifying of its author, Bill Clinton. Other examples of media silence are also given.
Excerpt:
As far as I know, only one man has pointed out the holocaust—for that is what it surely is—and he is Norman Finkelstein. “As in the Nazi holocaust, a million children have likely perished,” he observes in his book ‘The Holocaust Industry, (London : Verso, 2000, p 148): “ . . . the United States and Britain forced murderous UN sanction on that hapless country [Iraq] in an attempt to depose him [Saddam Hussein]. As in the Holocaust, a million children have likely perished. [more than a million, as The Economist tells us].” Madeleine Albright, Clinton’s lackey, went on television to say that the ‘price is worth it.’ And his partner in murder, Al Gore, has been rewarded with a Nobel Peace Prize, a rapidly devaluing currency. Mass killers are anointed and beatified.
Sunday, October 9, 2011
urban shalish
While the press and others decry the actions of the rural shalish, nothing is being done to give voice to the victims of the urban shalish.
I refer here to the 'committees' formed in the new apartment buildings: give a person a gram of power, and they will exert a kilogram of force. They will usurp the legislative as well as the judicial function of the republic of Bangladesh, just like the rural shalish.
I refer to an ongoing battle of wills between a harmless provider of education to ten-to-eleven-year-old tykes in an apartment in Dhanmandi. It is a time-honoured practice to provide education to children. The poor man has neither used a signboard nor ever used the address of his residence for advertisement purposes. Needless to add, he and his wife do nothing illegal or immoral: they have been peacefully, and with the tacit consent of the community, been carrying on this activity for eight years.
It is to be observed that almost every other building in Dhanmandi has a transponder on its roof: a contract is signed between the all-powerful committee and the phone company and the commercial activity goes on unnoticed. Teaching (and health-care) are not commercial activities: neither a student nor a teacher is 'customer'. The entire ethics and economics of the sectors are different.
The omnipotent committee have, after eight years, suddenly decided that this harmless gentleman, who abides by all the rules, must leave the building, or refrain from the legitimate pursuit of earning his livelihood: this is a contravention of his fundamental rights as a citizen of Bangladesh - the rights to domicile and earning a legal livelihood.
Yet, alas, no NGO will come to his aid: they are focused on the villages. But I prophecy that the day will come when these committees will have to be dragged before the courts and forced to abide by the laws and the constitution of Bangladesh.
These committees will be poking their nose into whether you are married or not or merely 'cohabiting', whether you drink on the premisses, who your girlfriends are, whether you are mentally ill, and so on into your most intimate life.
John Stuart Mill observed that the tyranny of public opinion is as much tyrannical as the tyranny of a despot, and John Locke maintained that it matters little to the individual if he is tyrannized by a king or by the majority. I urge my compatriots to resist this new tyranny that threatens to stifle our liberty as surely as any action by any despotic power.
I refer here to the 'committees' formed in the new apartment buildings: give a person a gram of power, and they will exert a kilogram of force. They will usurp the legislative as well as the judicial function of the republic of Bangladesh, just like the rural shalish.
I refer to an ongoing battle of wills between a harmless provider of education to ten-to-eleven-year-old tykes in an apartment in Dhanmandi. It is a time-honoured practice to provide education to children. The poor man has neither used a signboard nor ever used the address of his residence for advertisement purposes. Needless to add, he and his wife do nothing illegal or immoral: they have been peacefully, and with the tacit consent of the community, been carrying on this activity for eight years.
It is to be observed that almost every other building in Dhanmandi has a transponder on its roof: a contract is signed between the all-powerful committee and the phone company and the commercial activity goes on unnoticed. Teaching (and health-care) are not commercial activities: neither a student nor a teacher is 'customer'. The entire ethics and economics of the sectors are different.
The omnipotent committee have, after eight years, suddenly decided that this harmless gentleman, who abides by all the rules, must leave the building, or refrain from the legitimate pursuit of earning his livelihood: this is a contravention of his fundamental rights as a citizen of Bangladesh - the rights to domicile and earning a legal livelihood.
Yet, alas, no NGO will come to his aid: they are focused on the villages. But I prophecy that the day will come when these committees will have to be dragged before the courts and forced to abide by the laws and the constitution of Bangladesh.
These committees will be poking their nose into whether you are married or not or merely 'cohabiting', whether you drink on the premisses, who your girlfriends are, whether you are mentally ill, and so on into your most intimate life.
John Stuart Mill observed that the tyranny of public opinion is as much tyrannical as the tyranny of a despot, and John Locke maintained that it matters little to the individual if he is tyrannized by a king or by the majority. I urge my compatriots to resist this new tyranny that threatens to stifle our liberty as surely as any action by any despotic power.
Friday, September 16, 2011
purpose in social science
Richard S. Rudner, in his book 'Philosophy of Social Science' takes as an example of a false teleology the statement 'Smith's goal, e.g., graduating with honours, explains or causes his present behaviour, e.g., studying hard' (Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice Hall, Inc., 1966, p 85).
Here, apparently, the cause (graduating with honours) comes after the effect (studying hard). This, he says, is clearly absurd; yet social explanations seem to rest on such statements.
He dissipates the problem by restating the statement: 'Smith's present hard work is explained or caused by his (present) desire to achieve the goal of graduating with honours (italics original)'.
He claims that this solves the problem: the cause no longer lies ahead of the effect.
But the cause and the effect are simultaneous: how can a cause be simultaneous with its effect? He has solved one problem by creating another.
Surely purpose or teleology plays an all-important role in the social science, and this role requires a separate methodology: suppose his mother comes to visit and tells him he shouldn't work so hard to graduate with honours.
Suppose he says: "But, Ma, I'm not working hard to graduate with honours; I'm working hard to learn the subject. I don't care whether I graduate with honours or not."
We won't know his motivation just by looking at his behaviour: we have to show empathy, put ourselves in his place (easily done by interviewing him) and then get the reason for his behaviour. We can't impose an hypothesis on his behaviour.
Here, apparently, the cause (graduating with honours) comes after the effect (studying hard). This, he says, is clearly absurd; yet social explanations seem to rest on such statements.
He dissipates the problem by restating the statement: 'Smith's present hard work is explained or caused by his (present) desire to achieve the goal of graduating with honours (italics original)'.
He claims that this solves the problem: the cause no longer lies ahead of the effect.
But the cause and the effect are simultaneous: how can a cause be simultaneous with its effect? He has solved one problem by creating another.
Surely purpose or teleology plays an all-important role in the social science, and this role requires a separate methodology: suppose his mother comes to visit and tells him he shouldn't work so hard to graduate with honours.
Suppose he says: "But, Ma, I'm not working hard to graduate with honours; I'm working hard to learn the subject. I don't care whether I graduate with honours or not."
We won't know his motivation just by looking at his behaviour: we have to show empathy, put ourselves in his place (easily done by interviewing him) and then get the reason for his behaviour. We can't impose an hypothesis on his behaviour.
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