World as I Think

I scaled totally into a new high of disdain after watching the recent episode of the talk show "Neeya Naana". The fabric of the discussion was to bring into "limelight" the perfect recipe for a complete man and women. That’s when the magic formula unfolded, the group of women had the following commandments to identify the male's fitness to marry them

- Rs 50,000 salary per month (mostly everybody agreed on it)
- A double bedroom flat with centralized AC
- Car and other accessories

I was really amazed, as to how, not even a single women wanted to affirm that they wanted a self-confident dude or a person who is aiming for a success in his career. They never stated that they wanted a male who had a good character; at least i wanted to assume that it was implicit in the whole argument, because i believe that our society has not become so progressive in morality.

If this is the clad our women are willing to adore, i feel ashamed of living in such a society where materialistic benchmarks are woven in a relationship which is to be build out of love, care and trust. To be true, let me acknowledge that i have been a feminist in most of my arguments and advocated them to be a better gene. Now i feel bitter, in an era when women are equally empowered as men in the current urban setup, they manage to come up with such disgusting fitness tests which could only impair happiness.

The reasons they give are quite substantial; they seek a high yielding fixed income generating securitiy not for themselves but for the well being of the family. The higher premium (100%) for men compared to their salary is to avoid unwarranted ego clashes. They believe that happiness can be derived from the higher level of income.

The complete complexion of the society changes when monetary benchmarks become a strict barrier. The males in our Indian society obviously want to get married to the opposite sex; we have not progressed to a point where marriage becomes an option. Let me be blatant, free sex or dating or gayly life or live-in is not yet a fad in India, you can't get married in late thirties like the western society. So the only limited solution for the males who wanna get married is to chase money, losing track of their career.

I can see people around me who get themselves blinded to money, get into a jobs which only shows the ugly face of incompetence. They end up as nincompoops who can't shift their career when they realize that the existing job doesn't suit them. When they leap out to find their passion, they are outcast due to the existing branding about them, they can't take a salary cut, they have enough burdens in the form of home loans and car EMI's. This is perfect prescription for unhappiness. We are creating a situation where we gonna face a serious midlife crisis where people would have money and no sense of achievement in their jobs because they lack competence or just that the job doesn't provide enough opportunities to exhibit them.

I was looking at this documentary in BBC last Saturday, which kind of outlines how marginal increase in economic prosperity does not contribute the happiness quotient. In a world of consumerism, happiness short lives as we have new versions of the existing product coming into the market every other day. A consumer who buys a N93 is unhappy when the prices slash in the near term and there is another XYZ 78, which comes to the market with better features. Consumerism is just the great grand daddy maneuvering the developed world, which have higher economic prosperity. It is a myth that economic prosperity beyond a level leads to happiness. The entire western world is caught with this disease; happiness-economist and sociologist are pleading governments to curtail advertisements, which provoke the game of consumerism and ultimately making people unhappy.

The erstwhile society had ugliness in the name of dowry that kind of sold the bride grooms to the brides. Now, are the women seeking revenge? I feel, this would do any good. I can't understand the premium issue that their counterpart should be earning higher. When we were are in a framework where women are fighting for equal status, why is there a disparity in seeking a partner with higher income. Are they treating themselves as unequal or inferior, have they lost the battle before it has begun, I never thought they were masters in meeky submission. If they feel that higher salary solves the problem, they have lost the battle because they agree even then. Please don’t tell me that women don't have egos!

Lets assume that the 100% premium is right to live a happy life. I atleast assume that they are cognizant of the fact that every company gives equal salary for men and women who are employed in every sector. Then how does their fantasy accept that a male can have a 100% higher salary for a male who is just elder to them? We can expect more bogus salary slips to entice women to marry them and many more versions of "Naan Aavan Illai".

Let us not sell and buy each other; we are not commodities who cater to supply, demand and market conditions!

I had some interesting comments for my previous post and of course heaps of offline conversations on ego and the "ego-leads-to-kid" theory.

The argument, which I was trying to put forth, was that kids are nothing but a natural outcome of every living organism. The ego theory could be a recently social constructed hypothesis, which could be true, but they are not a necessary condition for the underlying action. I certainly believe that people would have kids irrespective of whether they have or don't have egos or even managed to relinquish them one day.

Let me draw an analogy. If somebody asks us the purpose of sugarcane, it might be true that it is to make sugar in the current context. It’s purely incidental that we use sugar to sweeten our pastries, confectionaries and desserts. The entire gene pools of sugarcane would continue to persist till their gene pools have enough fitness to scrape through. The sugarcane is there not because we have grown them, its there because they are part of the entire natural evolutionary process.

It's the same case with kids, might be that people have found a use to them by identifying their egos with them. Some even go the extent of gratifying their ego's by begetting. This is just a case for utilizing the resource and exercising controlling resources, which are near and close to them. I feel that individuals with such egos without a kid would find a scapegoat by identifying and creating a homogeneous group, which helps to identify their egos.

I feel that intelligence which is the basis for rationality and ego is a tool, self-developed by the human species to solve the more fundamental problem of quest for survival. The single cell organisms that have little intelligence (No sixth sense at least) procreate because it’s how the chromosome is coded. The chromosome coding is of course due to the natural inheritance or the nurture phenomenon (environmental). It certainly influences the behavior, may be the cognitive ability to have kids to replicate their egos but the more fundamental characteristics of any species is to grow, adapt, mutate and evolve to survive!!!

I was waiting with anguish to write this post. I am writing this post after my L2 CFA exam, as usual the exam proved that ignorance is not blissful at all. It is the drama which unfolded for the past two weeks that has irritated me. They ruined the sleep and productive time of 6500 students who were slated to give their exams in India.

The CFA (Charter Financial Analyst) is the charter awarded by the CFA Institute based in the US. The exams were recently ordered to be cancelled and asked to cease it operations in India by an interim order passed by the Agartala Bench of the Guwahati High Court about two weeks back.

The verdict was based on the appeal by the AICTE stating that the institute did not get the approval for conducting its operations in India which is necessary for a foreign body providing "technical education" in India. All seems fair, I am not going to sanctity of this case where a globally recognized organization in the Investment body was being challenged by the Indian version "ICFAI".Everybody is same under the law and I am not questioning the merits of the regulation.

In my opinion, I would want to put forth the ulterior motive in this case.ICFAI was earlier challenged by the CFA Institute for awarding the CFA charter. Now you would know what interest ICFAI has in providing quality technical education to Indian students. Why don't institutions compete in providing great education to us in spite of blocking each other? A brand is not built by the charter; it is the competence of the students which builds the brand.

The CFA institute seeked an interim stay to allow the exams to be conducted in India, believe me or not, it took about three hearings by a Delhi High Court Judge to stay it. An 12th grade student would have given this verdict in an interim judgment to an institute which was seeking the court to allow it to conduct at least the exams which were scheduled to happen in about two weeks.

The exam has been conducted in the country for the past 20 years and oh my god it is a globally renowned prestigious institute which provides a self-study course. Common sense for a prudent man, allow the exam and ask the institute to withhold the result before the final verdict comes out. I am not demeaning their intelligence or their authority in law, I am furiated by the inertia the judicial system in our country is caught up with.

Interia which does not value time, money, people welfare and is happily addicted to bribery and power. No wonder I heard somewhere that there are 30 million cases pending in this country. The decisions in the lower courts morphs to the whims and fancies of the people who want to puppet it.Sathyam may jathae in the long tem but who has the patience to be with it with confidence.Nice it that it would eventually succed, not everybody has the money, power and awareness to do...

Oh Pity. I have only one question.How does the different courts give different decisions interpreting by prudent who have mastered law. Then why at all we need lower courts!!