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A Dust Over India

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Re: A Dust Over India

#81

Post by PakG1 »

pdeuchler wrote: post #67
grandalf wrote: post #31

Because India is close to the equator, the environment has a greater carrying capacity than the kinds of first-world, northern nations that the author is used to. Thus, for this reason alone, India is likely to have a different ratio of people to development, since less development is required to sustain one person's resource utilization. Contrast this to the US where much of the country is snow covered for 1/3 of th…

"Yes India's government is corrupt, but not all that much more corrupt than the US government." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corruption_in_India http://www.nytimes.com/2011/08/18/world/asia/18iht-letter18.... http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,2091100,00.htm... People are holding hunger strikes to stand up against the corruption. When was the last time that happened in the US? You are rationalizing away al…

I agreed with most of your post except for this point:

Doesn't mean it's alright for people to live in a shelter of NEWSPAPER.

Why isn't it alright? Honestly, if it's adequate shelter, why isn't it alright? I'm trying to think of some reasons, and I figure it has to do with inability to withstand rain and wind, effects of rot and mold, lack of security, or who knows what. But then I keep going back to the word "adequate". What does this mean? Does adequate mean these problems actually don't exist, and therefore it's adequate? Or is there a different level of what is considered adequate in the gp, compared to what I think is adequate?

You can't just come out and say that it's not alright for people to live in a shelter of newspaper just because it's newspaper. You need to have reasons for it. And if it is indeed adequate, I can't think of any reasons why I would dislike living in a shelter of newspapers. In the same manner, I cannot think of any reasons why I would dislike caves in western China, huts in the Amazon, or igloos in the Yukon. If it's a matter of getting proper Internet, well, let's just assume that if I'm living there, I must have chosen to forgo some luxuries. For example, many missionaries throughout history easily decided to go native and live like the people they were trying to reach.

I need to understand the details behind your point.

Re: A Dust Over India

#83

Post by ravivyas »

suprgeek wrote: post #7

This is a fairly honest unflinching piece. A visit to India can induce severe "Cognitive Dissonance" in the unprepared. There is obscene display of super affluence right next to shocking Poverty. I see this every single day - A beggar & her naked child begging at the window of an Audi R8. The salesman in a high-end TV shop taking the bus to work. The Marriot main-gate where super high priced cars drive out to be gree…

If you shot every corrupt person in the country , their would not be many men left. We have become a nation of people who would rather pay someone a little money than wait for our turn in a queue.

Corruption is a two handed process , one hand gives and the other takes. Both should be stopped.

Re: A Dust Over India

#84

Post by jagira »

crag wrote: post #76
pirate_is_back wrote: post #38

I am an Indian and I find this piece quite authentic. However, the OP and most of the other foreigners who visit India, visit places or deal with people that are known to be hostile. I, as an Indian, will be utterly shocked if I visit a ghetto in downtown Detroit. Heck, there are more chances of getting mugged or shot in such ghetto. However, I will not visit such places as they are known to be hostile. India is a we…

"I, as an Indian, will be utterly shocked if I visit a ghetto in downtown Detroit." Compared to what the OP described, a "ghetto" in old Detroit would be a paradise. Also, just to point out, don't talk trash about a town unless you've been there. Detroit is finally bringing itself out of the pit. Lots of new energy running around. It's on the rise. Maybe you should visit?

Don't be defensive. I am not picking any particular place. What I am trying to say is there are places everywhere which violate the perception of a particular nation. The OP had some wrong perceptions about places like Agra or Gaya.

And, I am not talking trash.

My sister lives in Troy. When she was new to Detroit, she chose a wrong route while driving to downtown Detroit. While passing through a certain area (don't remember the name, will call her and ask) some gangsters tried to stop her car and rob her. Luckily she escaped.

My sister didn't crib about it like the OP did. She accepted the reality, changed her driving directions thereafter and moved on. Like thousands of her fellow Americans do. Likewise millions of Indians accept the harsh realities, change their driving directions and move on.

>> Compared to what the OP described, a "ghetto" in old Detroit would be a paradise.

Also, just to point out, don't base your comparisons on a blog post. People, here, may try to trick you but will not shoot you. Things are improving here as well. Though, at a slower place.

Update: The area where my sister faced gangsters was Highland Park.

Re: A Dust Over India

#85

Post by ravivyas »

I have not read the article yet but I am saddened by the fact that the discussion , yet again,has become a US vs Them discussion. Getting mugged in Detroit does not justify any behavior here in India. Just because the US has poor people does not mean we can too.

The problem with Indians is we will say "I am proud to be a Indian" one moment and litter the next. We believe we are perfect thus do not work to achieve more. Yes as Individuals we would have done a lot for the country but we as a people need to be more patriotic and literally uplift the nation.

Re: A Dust Over India

#86

Post by vacri »

tmbsundar wrote: post #64
maddalab wrote: post #32

Exaggerations abound. While I agree with aspects of poor governance and garbage accumulation and many other observations, I realized the author was out to represent a preconceived notion of a nation, when I read, "homeless people sleeping on the tarmac, the city is so crowded and disgusting that people decide they’d rather sleep on the airport runway." I will pick on that lie to state my point. If you have been to an…

I agree. May be he was confused and mistook people sleeping on the side ways of the bus route. Another glaring bias in the observation sequence is that all negative experiences have been told in a detailed, pictorial manner. And all the good experiences, on Sanjay cooking the meal, another guy refusing 50 Rs and the taxi driver being tearfully happy at the 50% tip etc., have been cramped into single liners or a coupl…

Westerners can easily relate to a home-cooked meal or vendors refusing overpayment. They don't really relate so well the the stuff about overpopulation, so given the intended audience, it's not surprising that there's more detail there.

Re: A Dust Over India

#87

Post by JumpCrisscross »

grandalf wrote: post #80
asto wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because India is close to the equator, the environment has a greater carrying capacity than the kinds of first-world, northern nations that the author is used to. Citation? The same applies to shelter. In India, a hut made of newspaper is adequate shelter year round. Try that in the Northern US and you'll freeze. If a newspaper is enough in India, why are so many people dying of being cold year after year? https://ww…

asto wrote: WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU EVEN SAYING? My point was about carrying capacity. Hot or cold snaps do not significantly alter the base carrying capacity of the environment w/o infrastructure. In the US things like parking tickets, DMV fees, etc. are levied with abandon. Why use this approach to generate funds to pay for municipal workers rather than just having them extract bribes? Because the US has the infrastr…

Why are bribes inferior to levying fees, fines, and penalties? Seriously?

The latter involves due process. It also accrues funds to a democratic body instead of to random servants of the state. This removes conflicts of interest, e.g. I'm going to require a billion licences because each licence means I get a bribe.

Empirically, corruption hurts the economy and political system. An IIE paper showed that "a one-standard deviation (2.38 point) improvement in the corruption index is associated with over a 4-percentage-point increase in a country's investment rate and over a 1/2-percentage-point increase in the per capita [GDP] growth rate" [1]. Further, Campos and Giovannoni show in their paper Lobbying, Corruption, and Political Influence that while "lobbying and corruption are substitutes...lobbying seems to be a much more effective instrument for political influence than corruption, even in poorer, less developed countries" [2].

[1] http://www.adelinotorres.com/economia/Os%20efeitos%20da%20co...

[2] http://www.econstor.eu/dspace/bitstream/10419/33990/1/518050...

Re: A Dust Over India

#88

Post by jonchris »

grandalf wrote: post #31

Because India is close to the equator, the environment has a greater carrying capacity than the kinds of first-world, northern nations that the author is used to. Thus, for this reason alone, India is likely to have a different ratio of people to development, since less development is required to sustain one person's resource utilization. Contrast this to the US where much of the country is snow covered for 1/3 of th…

Totally agree!

Re: A Dust Over India

#89

Post by vacri »

jeisenberg wrote: post #65

As they say: "travel to a place for a day, write a novel. Travel there for a month, write an essay. Travel there for a year, write nothing." This post, while certainly an honest account, is rife with generalizations and does not acknowledge the author's own cultural biases in the slightest.

What nonsense - he's constantly referring to his own cultural biases, including finishing on exactly that.

Re: A Dust Over India

#90

Post by frasertimo »

Hey guys, I work for Postmasculine and just wanted to jump in quickly. First, thanks for sharing this Arun2009. I've been reading HN daily for the last 9 months and love it. Amazing to open up my computer today and see us as the number one link. I believe my reaction was something like this: http://www.reactiongifs.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/excit...

Anyway, I mainly wanted to ask what people thought of the site apart from that article. Did you read anything else and did you like it or dislike it? If so, what articles did you read?

Thanks!

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