Saturday, April 28, 2012

We, the Neo-Imperialists


Abhinav Gupta
17 hours ago near New Delhi · 
  • Is there really any difference between us, who think we know the answer to the problems faced by the less privileged, and the missionaries of old who went around on a mission of civilizing the unruly, uneducated natives? Are we not the new imperialists, in garb of social workers, sirens of development and growth?
     ·  · 
    • Naveen Kumar V and Abhijeet Khinchi like this.
      • Arjun Dhaul I like your status updates :D, they make me think ! well I believe the answer to that is : you are an imperialist if you believe that you know the answer to problems of the less privileged :P
        16 hours ago · 
      • Abhinav Gupta Thanks.. At least someone is made to think :)
        And I so feel like an arrogant fool at times. Proud of my education and intellect. Total jackass I have become.
        16 hours ago ·  ·  1
      • Abhijeet Khinchi agree wid ur viewpoint partially.. becuz it assumes that people can solve their problems themselves.. sometimes they cant and dats when any solution is good enough..the social workers today or the missionaries of the old may not be a perfect solution but they are atleast a solution to the failing of the state. guess thats why people talk about empowerment.. make people able to solve their problems..
        16 hours ago · 
      • Karthik Chandragiri Venkata reminds me of the final quote from Cannibal Holocaust - ' who is the real savage ? '
        15 hours ago · 
      • Karthik Chandragiri Venkata Agreed with the jackass thingy !!! :) Amen :D
        15 hours ago · 
      • Atreyi Bose Oh you should have taken the Participatory Theatre waala course.
        13 hours ago · 
      • Abhinav Gupta I guess I should have! But I am busy doing similar stuff nowadays too :)
        11 hours ago · 
      • Abhinav Gupta ‎Khinchi, I was pointing more to the arrogance which we bring along with our energy when we offer help to people. We think what works for us will necessarily work for others too without realizing that what the others want could be very different from what we desire!
        11 hours ago · 
      • Rohit Chaudhary Yes, that's why we have democracy and federalism :)
        11 hours ago · 
      • Abhinav Gupta We certainly don't have democracy. It is as real as you being a communist!
        11 hours ago · 
      • Abhinav Gupta And federalism too is going for a toss with the center trying to usurp power from the state.. and federalism needs to have more layers. You will say that that will lead to policy paralysis. I will say that let's break our country down into manageable, smaller, more connected communities. Why have such a big country? Let's have smaller, better and more co-operative ones.
        11 hours ago · 
      • Abhinav Gupta India as a whole is doing no one any favors...
        11 hours ago · 
      • Abhinav Gupta And trade and commerce is hugely over-rated... Self sufficiency is a good goal to pursue, that is the only natural way to live. But we, as a society are light years away from that today.
        11 hours ago · 
      • Rohit Chaudhary Totally agree on more devolution of powers, into states and districts. Again it's the NAC which is trying to usurp power from states (a fascination with central planning of a socialist era). Not the country, but the states' size should matter.
        10 hours ago · 
      • Rohit Chaudhary Self sufficiency is neither good economics nor good logic. And surely, it is NOT the natural way to live. How do you define self sufficiency? At a country level, or state level, or district level, or family level, or personal level??
        10 hours ago · 
      • Abhinav Gupta It definitely starts from a personal level..! As with all robust things.
        10 hours ago · 
      • Abhinav Gupta 
        And trade and commerce, so far, has generally led to the perpetration of the philosophy of wanting more while needing less. And we are not separate from the things that surround us. If we keep on plundering the earth and its inhabitants the...See More
        9 hours ago · 
      • Abhinav Gupta 
        Money makes us go round and round.. it doesn't drive the world. And in that respect economics as the only indicator is painfully insufficient for decision making. It can't and doesn't take into account relationships, community benefits. It ...See More
        9 hours ago · 
      • Abhinav Gupta ‎Atreyi, can you elaborate a bit on your point on the Participatory Theatre?
        9 hours ago · 
      • Atreyi Bose Haha.. sure but it seems I am butting into a private argument.
        17 minutes ago · 
      • Atreyi Bose 
        One of the biggest takeaways for me from the course was how the educated elite think that they can solve problems of communities whose obstacles to success is something they have not experienced themselves, and hence since they do not know ...See More
        11 minutes ago · 
      • Abhinav Gupta Was that something that the instructors were trying to bring out or did this understanding come to you by yourself, through the interactions with the Budhan Theatre folks?
        9 minutes ago · 
      • Abhinav Gupta Just trying to understand how structured this message is.. :)
        9 minutes ago · 
      • Atreyi Bose extremely unstructured. It was a 5 day course. i think by the middle of the course i was tearing my hair out, and the brain would shutdown by eod since there would be long and seemingly pointless discussions.
        but yes, this was the point that the instructors guided us towards. The Budhan Theatre folks criticized us for our.. well arrogance is the best word for it.
        There were some readings which brought out the point, and on the last day the instructors shared some experiences about how this form of support worked in certain cases, and about the effectiveness of participatory theatre in particular.
        2 minutes ago · 
      • Abhinav Gupta Now it seems that I really really should have taken this course! Can you share the readings you got in this course?
        about a minute ago · 

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