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India’s elites have a ferocious sense of entitlement

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Re: India’s elites have a ferocious sense of entitlement

#201

Post by vacri »

javert wrote: post #82
not_that_noob wrote: post #71

Humans are apes. It happens right here in Silicon Valley too. Atherton has nice little yellow signs that say 'No Through Traffic'. Why? They don't want the poor people from Redwood City coming through. In fact, one Atherton gentleman went to a RWC City Council meeting complaining about it and asking RWC to put up signs on their side too. The folks at RWC apparently told him to go stuff himself, that those little yell…

Humans are not apes. Neither literally, nor figuratively. That's not only incorrect, but it's a vicious thing to say, and it has dangerous implications.

I loathe pop sci interpretations of animal behaviour applied against human behaviour (which includes the context of the parent of your comment) but humans are apes. The 'Great Apes' are chimps, gorillas, orangs, and humans.

Re: India’s elites have a ferocious sense of entitlement

#203

Post by bradleyjg »

hkmurakami wrote: post #50
ashray wrote: post #6

Ooh, no comments, I'll bite. The last time I said something negative about Indian society I had my personal details thrown all over HN. Wonder what's going to happen this time. So here's the thing. This article is pretty spot on. We, the privileged of India, do indeed feel entitled. There's absolutely no doubt about that. My theory is that the population pressure in India is so very high that you're always fighting f…

>These people struggle (or think that they do..) for so long in the rat race that they forget that they have risen above it and gone far beyond that. If these are people who have "made" the money themselves in their own generation, I can see why/how they still view themselves as middle class. It's a mindset. I have had the fortune of getting to know many SV millionaires who grew up in modesty/poverty, and still buy s…

> Give it one or two generations though. Their kids and grandkids will probably behave and believe that they're upper class.

I don't know about India, but in the US there is a bizzare cultural phenomenon where everyone wants to see himself as middle class. Being identified as rich is somehow faintly embarrassing.

You see all kinds of strange verbal gymnastics in trying to justify middle class status. Heck there is plenty of it in this thread!

So I suspect that is going on with your wealthy friends, and that it will continue in thier kids and grandkids (unless the overall culture shifts).

Re: India’s elites have a ferocious sense of entitlement

#204

Post by javert »

vacri wrote: post #201
javert wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Humans are not apes. Neither literally, nor figuratively. That's not only incorrect, but it's a vicious thing to say, and it has dangerous implications.

I loathe pop sci interpretations of animal behaviour applied against human behaviour (which includes the context of the parent of your comment) but humans are apes. The 'Great Apes' are chimps, gorillas, orangs, and humans.

Thanks for the correction, I guess I was wrong on that point, though hopefully the actual intended meaning of my statement remains intact.

EDIT: Well, according to Wikipedia, "Great Ape" is a common name, not a taxonomic label, and is only sometimes used to include humans. I, personally, would advocate not equating the term "great ape" with the hominidae family.

Re: India’s elites have a ferocious sense of entitlement

#205

Post by vacri »

frankzinger wrote: post #191
Volpe wrote: post #181

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your callousness and (what seems to be a) lack of empathy to those less fortunate is quite confronting to read.

Kamaal makes a valid point. He is simply stating things from the perspective of a poor person, and is describing reality. It would be a big mistake for a poor person to rely on somebody else to improve his situation. The situation is very similar in South Africa. The poor makes up such a large proportion of the population that their situation cannot be improved significantly without major wealth redistribution (combi…

Half of the problem of being poor is even being aware that you are able to change your status. It's intellectually lazy to pull the 'just work hard' line, when most of what gets you wealth is what you know, not how hard you work.

Not to mention that in the end, even if everyone did 'just work hard', there isn't enough wealth to go around. The civilised thing is at least to give people basic services and let themselves work to higher wealth from there.

Re: India’s elites have a ferocious sense of entitlement

#206

Post by gaurav_bubna »

maddalab wrote: post #156
ashray wrote: post #6

Ooh, no comments, I'll bite. The last time I said something negative about Indian society I had my personal details thrown all over HN. Wonder what's going to happen this time. So here's the thing. This article is pretty spot on. We, the privileged of India, do indeed feel entitled. There's absolutely no doubt about that. My theory is that the population pressure in India is so very high that you're always fighting f…

Quote from the article "Let me tell you another story: my neighbour in the upper-middle-class area where I live is a man who owns luxury hotels. His house is huge, but no sooner had he moved in than he appropriated about half of the pavement space to the front and side of his house, claiming it for his own. This means less parking for others, less pavement for children, less walking space for everyone. Of the 400-odd…

"Most people do not have a need to hire 3-4 people. Growing up it was common to have a maid who helped with household chores due to the absence of amenities like a dish washer or washing machine. As these services become available there is no need to hire folks to do such work."

I completely agree with this. When I was living in New York, I rarely felt a need to "hire" someone to do stuff for me. Apartment didn't get dirty so easily. Clothes didn't get dirty so easily. Very easy and convenient access to laundromats. Dish washer at home. Easy access to fairly high quality groceries. Lots of places to eat around which had healthy food options at reasonable prices (relative to your salary). Anything you wanted could be ordered online.

If on top of all this, you just hired a maid by the hour, for a couple of hours, to come clean your house like once in two weeks, you didn't need anything else.

Here in India, it's hard to get by without a maid. Clothes get dirty fast, house gets dirty fast, no laundromats, no dishwasher, no space to keep a washing machine at home, poor availability of healthy food options, groceries sellers have bad quality of food and vegetables so you need to spend time picking them out, supermarkets have massive checkout lines etc.

Re: India’s elites have a ferocious sense of entitlement

#207

Post by gaurav_bubna »

ashray wrote: post #6

Ooh, no comments, I'll bite. The last time I said something negative about Indian society I had my personal details thrown all over HN. Wonder what's going to happen this time. So here's the thing. This article is pretty spot on. We, the privileged of India, do indeed feel entitled. There's absolutely no doubt about that. My theory is that the population pressure in India is so very high that you're always fighting f…

> These people struggle (or think that they do..) for so long in the rat race that they forget that they have risen above it and gone far beyond that.

India definitely makes you feel this. I know this one senior guy who lived for a very long time in New York (~10 years) after his grad school and moved a few years back to Mumbai. He is very rich but he says that he feels poorer in Mumbai than he ever felt in New York, even compared with the time when he working in his first job, fresh out of grad school.

Re: India’s elites have a ferocious sense of entitlement

#208

Post by smartwater »

thrownaway2424 wrote: post #110
hkmurakami wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Many SV millionaires still consider themselves to be "upper middle class" (rather than say, lower upper class), and while it may be a bit inaccurate in an absolute monetary sense, the sentiment may actually be somewhat justifiable considering their relatively lack of influence/status/connections that really drive the country (the "old money", for instance). In that sense, even the SV millionaires are outsiders to the…

That's because a million bucks in the Bay Area will only buy you a 900 sq. ft. bungalow on the brink of collapse. A millionaire stopped being remarkable quite a while back.

People make a million by accident these days!

Re: India’s elites have a ferocious sense of entitlement

#209

Post by frankzinger »

vacri wrote: post #205
frankzinger wrote: post #191

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Kamaal makes a valid point. He is simply stating things from the perspective of a poor person, and is describing reality. It would be a big mistake for a poor person to rely on somebody else to improve his situation. The situation is very similar in South Africa. The poor makes up such a large proportion of the population that their situation cannot be improved significantly without major wealth redistribution (combi…

Half of the problem of being poor is even being aware that you are able to change your status. It's intellectually lazy to pull the 'just work hard' line, when most of what gets you wealth is what you know , not how hard you work. Not to mention that in the end, even if everyone did 'just work hard', there isn't enough wealth to go around. The civilised thing is at least to give people basic services and let themselv…

I never said "just working hard" will solve the poor's problems. All I said was that it's better to do all you can than to expect help to come from the government or charity because that is unrealistic in countries with such a large poor population and would most likely only get you a lifetime of false hope.

And I am not saying that most poor people expect handouts. If anything I would guess that most of them are hard-working. I only brought it up because of the parent post. I realise I owe my own middle-class status to the fact that my parents are middle-class.

And I am all for the well-off helping the poor. I only wish the (South African, in my case) government would do their part.

Re: India’s elites have a ferocious sense of entitlement

#210

Post by dopkew »

vacri wrote: post #205
frankzinger wrote: post #191

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Kamaal makes a valid point. He is simply stating things from the perspective of a poor person, and is describing reality. It would be a big mistake for a poor person to rely on somebody else to improve his situation. The situation is very similar in South Africa. The poor makes up such a large proportion of the population that their situation cannot be improved significantly without major wealth redistribution (combi…

Half of the problem of being poor is even being aware that you are able to change your status. It's intellectually lazy to pull the 'just work hard' line, when most of what gets you wealth is what you know , not how hard you work. Not to mention that in the end, even if everyone did 'just work hard', there isn't enough wealth to go around. The civilised thing is at least to give people basic services and let themselv…

> there isn't enough wealth to go around.

Though one often reads that acquiring/making wealth isn't a zero sum game.

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