The war against Poverty should be waged like the war against Terrorism

Let us make no mistake, pace Arundhati Roy, in confronting the Naxal threat we are fighting two wars- a war against Terrorism for which we are eager and well armed as opposed to a war against Poverty for which we are unprepared and pusillanimous.

As Christopher Hitchens has pointed out, to truly fight Terrorism, we must regularly sodomise it and make fun of its penis. However, there are important cultural and historical reasons why, in the Indian context, fucking Poverty in the ass while saying 'you like that don't you, you little retard, say you like it you fucking retard bitch,' is felt to be transgressive of widely held social and religious norms.

Yet, it is a matter of common observation, that battling the evils of entrenched Casteism and institutionalized misogyny, has always involved fraternization between antagonists for recreational sex, drugs and rock & roll.

Why should this paradigm not be extended to the war against Poverty, Corporate Greed, and Jennifer Aniston coming on like time has stood still and she's still hot?

These are important questions- vital questions- which, as per usual, the pseudo secularists of the Media have no interest in raising.

Sita sings the blues

Surely the loveliest animation film in many a year, Nina Paley's 'Sita sings the blues' is available for free download here.
At the beginning of the film Nina has a husband and a cat- but no kids. Hubby gets a gig in India and flies away. Nina pines for him. Being a good feminist with a vast sense of victimhood, she immediately identifies with
1) Sita spurned by 'the Patriarchal warrior God' Ram, invented by post Babri Ram leftist careerists.
2) Honky tonk chanteuses wailing for their demon pimp variegated by more tender African American 'blues' lamenting relationships made fragile by the adverse economic and sociological consequences of the transmogrifications of slavery.

Now none would be so ungracious as to cavil at the axiomatic nature of the proposition that highly educated White American women face far graver institutionalized gynocide, if their husbands or boy-friends manage to escape them, than Iron Age Indian abductees, or African American women at the time of Jim Crow.

The lovely voice of Annette Hanshaw and Betty Boop type animation reinforces and makes compelling this depiction of a passive and infantile Sita. There are three Indian American voices- two male, one clearly South Indian, and female- who, in the shape of Indonesian shadow puppets, provide a demotic, ambiguous, emic/etic commentary often to hilarious effect. Once again, the effect is one of cool distancing, passivity, and reportage on an inevitable disaster, a genetically determined catastrophe. During the intermission, when Agni sells cinema snacks we hear an old woman saying in Hindi 'I thought this was a kid's movie- but it isn't for kids at all.
There is an ambitious dance sequence immediately following the intermission in Susheela Raman style non-native speaker Hindi which accurately mirrors the spicy pakoras made of shit that is the self-exoticising deracination of modern Indglish feminism.
In the movie Ram gets rid of Seeta after she becomes pregnant. This refers to the terrible gynocidal Hitlerism and all round wickedness and evilry of MEN leaving women who have a cat- except they then gave the cat away to go to India to be with the husband but then fly back to New York to take an important meeting and then the bastard fucking emails saying don't come back and so she like gets another cat and an apartment and like fucking reads the Ramayana- so there!
Pregnant Sita, can't even stand up. She just lies down by the side of a river and sings the blues till rescued by passing Rishis. This is in accordance with the fundamental theorem of Western Feminism- viz Women are worthless whining shites who can't do anything for themselves AT ALL so gimme tenure or a Guggenheim or a MacArthur already.
On first viewing this scene I thought maybe that was a chatak come to drink Sita's tears and I was going cool! this one step up from the cliche of the viyogini becoming the equal of the Yogi, Sita has gone a step further- SHE IS HER OWN RAVANA, THE VIRODHA BHAKTA GAINING LIBERATION FROM RAM- in other words, Devi, by a neat piece of theological jiu jitsu, wins the Tiruvudal, becoming both the chatak's Sky and the Earth's womb.
I was wrong. It wasn't a chatak, just a jazz trumpeting peacock. Infantile Sita-as-victim jumps into Bhu Devi's womb. Feminism has reached its barren apotheosis by turning into a resentful, parasitic, foetus.

Which isn't to say this aint a lovely film.

Also it goes one step further than Tom & Jerry in that it turns one's natural, male, distaste for cats into a blind, murderous, rage against the species.

This, it seems to me, is the film's abiding merit.

Iqbal vs. Tagore

Iqbal vs. Tagore? Is it a fair comparison? Tagore's family were rich, cultured, honoured and lived a sophisticated, cosmopolitan life.
Iqbal's grandfather was a Kashmiri Hindu given the choice of death or conversion to Islam after a charge of embezzlement was brought against him. Iqbal's father was a well to do tailor who did his best to enable his son to come up educationally. Thus, whatever his personal qualities, or however pious and upright the conduct of his father, Iqbal was not classed as 'Ashraf'- he was a mere plebeian from the point of view of the Muslim aristocrats of Punjab.
Unlike Faiz, for whom Persian was a family language, Iqbal did not learn elite diction from 'the old women' in his paternal house. Urdu purists claim to detect 'Punjabisms' in his language, while his Persian poetry- through praised by Iran's Supreme Guide- is not idiomatic and hence lacking in lyrical fervor.
Iqbal's English is very good- but it is the language of the academic- and Iqbal's philosophy, such as it is, more concerned with keeping up with current European fads and relating them, by no means critically, to Islamic thinkers- in other words, his work is simply an exercise in chauvinistic special pleading for a sectional interest within the British Empire.
However Iqbal, unlike Tagore, is very much a living force today. His characteristic confusion of ideas, grandiose diction, and sense of inferiority and injured racial pride are the hallmark of Post Colonial discourse. He was a true Prophet in that his works helped create, and now help sustain, a Nation which is nothing but his very own pathology writ large, poised to infect the whole world with its madness.
Tagore, on the other hand, after an early flirtation with the Revolutionaries, warned against chauvinistic nationalism, set his face against militarism, and preached a Humanistic Universalism at precisely the time when that message was most needed. Isaiah Berlin praises Tagore. E.M. Foster prefers Iqbal. India, for Foster, was nothing but muddle, confusion and noise. Iqbal, then, was Indian. Tagore merely High Victorian pi-jaw.

Googling Iqbal vs. Tagore, I found this- on a Pakistani discussion board-

'Now one of our notable research scholars M Ikram Chughtai, Director of the Urdu Science Board, has come up with a clear answer based on some new research. The current issue of the Lahore-based monthly Al-Ma'arif carries his revealing article on Iqbal and Tagore.

Chughtai has presented some interesting details. He tells us that despite being contemporaries and compatriots, the two poets never met each other. They did not even exchange letters. No written proof of a contact between them is traceable. However, it is said that once Tagore, while in Lahore, tried to meet Iqbal. He paid a visit to his Mayo Road residence but Iqbal was absent, gone to Bhopal for his medical treatment. Once back in Lahore, Iqbal perhaps could have written to Tagore and express his regrets. He did not. And there was a reason; Iqbal resented Tagore receiving the Nobel Prize. Chughtai says "Tagore's award had been hovering on Iqbal's mind throughout his life and he, directly or indirectly, could not free himself from this 'award complex'.

Chughtai has also made a detailed mention of the abortive efforts made by Iqbal and his well-wishers to get a Nobel for him. Soon another development was to take place which was to further sadden the Iqbal: King Raza Shah Pahlavi of Iran extended an invitation to Tagore to visit his country. He went there in 1932. As a royal guest, he was given tremendous welcome in many cities of Iran. While in Tehran, he received a similar invitation from the King of Iraq. In Baghdad, Tagore was received by King Faisal himself.

Chughtai assures us that Iqbal was greatly 'shocked' by these invitations and warm welcomes extended to a poet who he considered to be his rival. In one of his recently discovered letters, he wrote to Ghulam Abbas Akram, the then foreign minister of Iran, that Tagore was a non-Muslim and that "Tagore did an injustice to the Indian Muslims. He told the Muslims of Mesopotamia to persuade the Indian Muslims to cooperate with the Hindus for the freedom of India."

Tagore's attitude towards Iqbal was different. It can be felt in his two messages, one sent to Inter-collegiate Muslim Brotherhood of Lahore which celebrated Iqbal Day in January 1937 and the other of condolence on Iqbal's demise in 1938. In these messages the Bengali Nobel Laureate acknowledged Allama's greatness as a poet and universal value of his poetry.

Against this background, it is not surprising that the compilers and editors of the speeches and statements of Quaid-e-Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah have expurgated the Quaid's statement issued on Tagore's death. The Quaid had paid rich tributes to the Bengali writer, saying "I am certainly grieved to hear the sad news of the death of one of the greatest of India's poets, philosophers and social workers. I had the privilege of knowing him from my younger days and the last time I had the honour of meeting him was in London in 1929. His very frank and illuminating discussions were a great source of encouragement. Above all, he was a true patriot and was always ready to understand and appreciate the opposite point of view. In his convocation address to the Gurmukhi University he made very weighty and frank observations about the slogan 'India is one and indivisible' which should be studied by every Indian. "It is an irreparable loss to India. Poet Tagore will live through his works with us".

Was Firaq bumming Nehru till Gandhi stuck his nose in?

"Firaq Gorakhpuri was said to have been 'advised' by Mahatma Gandhi to put an end to his close friendship with Panditji – after which, it is said, Firaq never wrote another nationalistic ghazal or nazm. Even assuming the tattle about Gandhiji’s interference to be true, it’s possible that the friendship was just that. But then, it doesn’t fit into our profile of Gandhiji: Why would he proscribe a cordial relationship between his lieutenant and a national poet?"
Read more of Varsha Bhosle's (daughter of the great singer Asha) amazing revelations here.

Gandhi was also blamed for preventing Nehru's sister- Vijaylaxmi from marrying a Muslim- what's next? The revelation that his intervention prevented Lady Irwin from eloping with her horse? I begin to see something very sinister behind the Godse conspiracy.

Tamil love is different- mind it!

The funniest thing I've read in a long time can be found here.

The article takes issue with the following statement.
“In Northern Sri Lanka, the secessionist Tamil Tigers are feared and even respected, but seldom loved.” [Economist, London, Oct.7, 2000; pp.19-20]

But, it turns out, what the Economist doesn't realize is that Love is different for Tamils.
The author invokes the authority of Margaret Trawick's 'Notes on Love in a Tamil family' as follows-
for Tamils, anpu (as Tamils know ‘love’ in a broader sense) has the following nine properties.

1. containment (adakkam): Open expression of love is to be restrained, even if it is mother love. Tamils also do not express love among opposite sexes openly.

2. habit (pazhakkam): Attachment, or a sense of oneness with a person or thing or activity, grows slowly, by habituation.

3. harshness and cruelty (kadumai and kodumai): Physical affection for children is expressed not through caresses but roughly, in the form of painful pinches, slaps and tweaks. The movie song, ‘Adikkira kai thaan Anaikkum; Anaikkira kai thaan adikkum’ (Hitting hand will hold, and holding hand will hit) expresses this sentiment beautifully.

4. dirtiness (azhukku): ‘Defiance of rules or purity conveyed a message of union and equality and was a way of teaching children and onlookers where love was’, tells the author. This is exemplified by mother’s care of baby’s bodily excretions and the host’s cleaning of guest’s plate of food (echchil).

5. humility (panivu): Love is implicated in expressions of humility and patience (porumai, the strength to sustain and endure).

6. poverty and simplicity (ezhumai and elimai): Self renunciation of luxury (such as fancy clothes and jewellery) for the cause of a loved one, as expressed in sentiments like, ‘I don’t want new clothes…as long as you are sick’.

7. servitude (adimai): Illustrated as the servant of God, who receives the highest respect among the civilians. Elimination of the boastful ‘I’ (Naan) and substituting with the self deprecating ‘this slave’ (Adiyen), exemplified by Tamil saints of the past.

8. opposition and reversal (ethirttal and puratchi): Characterized by the use of very intimate suffix, -di (for girl) and –da (for boy) among family members and close pals. When these intimate forms of address are used by acquaintances or strangers, they become derogatory.

9. mingling and confusion (kalattal and mayakkam): Love erases distinction completely and mingle everyone, typified by the adage, ‘We are all one’ (Onrae kulam – Oruvane Thevan). In addition, love leads to dizziness, confusion, intoxication and delusion (mayakkam).

All these nine cultural markers of Tamil love are indicated in the love Tamils have shown for Pirabhakaran.

1. containment: One cannot ask a Tamil, like in Gallup-poll, to find out whether he or she loves Pirabhakaran or not. Prudent Tamils will not answer in the affirmative. It is a very private issue, like what the Americans consider the details of their individual paychecks.

2. habit: Remember that in the first 10 years of Tamil militancy (circa 1975-1985), there were many who competed for the leadership role with Pirabhakaran. Some who were even trained in the PLO camps and Israeli camps. They only turned out to be mercenaries (for the arms of Sri Lankan and Indian governments) and later metamorphosed into parliamentary seat-warmers. Tamils came to accept Pirabhakaran, only after he proved his mettle. Cynics may quip that Pirabhakaran physically eliminated his rivals to reach the pinnacle. But Eelam Tamils also came to be convinced that his rivals for leadership had self-destructed themselves by ill-judgments, and also by deviating from the path of ‘Eelam’ for which they had pledged to work. It is not an exaggeration to reiterate that among the 60 plus million Tamils living today, considering the impossibility of the aim of establishing an army, none had followed the Edison formula for success (constituting three simple elements: hard work, common sense and ‘stick-to-it’iveness spirit) diligently like Pirabhakaran for the past 25 years. Pirabhakaran also shares some of Edison’s peculiar background in that he was a ‘semi-literate’ in the fool’s world of literacy, boasting of prefixes ‘Oxford’, ‘Harvard’ and ‘Sorbonne’ linked by a hyphen to the word ‘educated’, or prefixes ‘Sandhurst’ and ‘West Point’ linked by a hyphen to the word ‘trained’.

3. harshness and cruelty: Loving Pirabhakaran was (and is) no bed of roses. The harshness and cruelty were absorbed as part of the package, for the pride his movement has delivered to the Tamils.

4. dirtiness: Of course, that Pirabhakaran was not from the dominant Hindu Vellala caste has been accepted by the Tamils. The ‘dirtiness’ in the Brahminical world view has been completely ignored.

5. humility: The pain of routine ridicule, delivered from the political pulpit and press desks in Colombo, Chennai, Washington DC and London, for loving Pirabhakaran is tolerated by Tamils with humility.

6. poverty and simplicity: With whatever scale one measures the quality of life in Eelam during the past two decades, an apparent economic poverty and simplicity is visible in the places where Pirabhakaran is loved. Still the Eelam Tamils endure this hardship for love of Pirabhakaran and his ideological goal.

7. servitude: His adversaries, like the operatives of the University Teachers for Human Rights (Jaffna), may ridicule the decorating terms such as ‘Suriyathevan’ and other word-plays, but Tamils who love Pirabhakaran serve him in various fronts – in his army, and as support cast under much hardship. Servitude is a cultural marker in Tamil love, which cannot be understood by culture-challenged academics, journalists and paid report-writers.

8. opposition and reversal: This cultural marker doesn’t need explanation, since there was opposition to Pirabhakaran for his methods, especially among the older generation. The opposition was mainly due to generational conflict, who were familiar with the Gandhian path of non-violence and couldn’t grasp the post-Gandhian scenario that gun holders dictate terms in global politics.

9. mingling and confusion: This cultural marker for love among Tamils, towards Pirabhakaran, is self-explanatory if one observes the existing pattern in Tamil Nadu.

Difficile est saturam non scribere, I suppose, is the moral we must draw from our erudite author, which is not to say he hasn't brilliantly taxonomized the emotional source springs of Fuhrerprinzip.

Intentionality can't be intensional- discuss.

There is an extended treatment of this here. 

The Will is beyond or before Words, just as the urge to fuck up my computer is prior and posterior to the apprehension of the tools that make it inviting to tinker to that end.
Tool usage can be parsed intensionally- generating an I-language, so to speak- and there are good didactic or organizational reasons for such behavior to evolve- however, Meaning is not in that use if individuals can have self generated intentionality and language is ultimately about individual interchange.

Update- click here for, Google brain-box, Norvig's takedown of Chomsky

Motto of the N.R.I

voh phuul sar chaRhaa jo chaman se nikal gayaa
izzat use milii jo vatan se nikal gayaa

(Mast Kalkattavi)

'That flower adorns Beauty's head which from the garden was plucked
Honored is that native who off slyly from his native land has fucked"

The motto of the N.R.I- all the more hilarious because the cunt is a weed not a flower.