Culture

Culture means the complete lifestyle of a person, including but not limited to occupation, types of food consumed, how the food is cooked, language, dress style, laws, values, beliefs, religion, travel, construction methods, the materials used in the construction and so on.

The above definition encompasses all the various definitions that there are on culture.

Why am I stressing on the definition of culture? Because, so many people seem to use this word without knowing what the word stands for.

Especially, Indians seem to use this word more than the people from any other nationalities. They use it to raise a hue and cry about the changing dressing styles, the changing values, and generally for everything which is not to their taste. [I have used the word they when referring to Indians, even though I am a naturalized citizen of India because: I being the Emperor of the Universe, am a citizen of the Universe at large and cannot be categorized as a citizen of any one particular region.]

When someone wears jeans, people say it is not Indian culture to wear jeans. My question is what is Indian culture? Which point in India’s history, would you use as the benchmark for defining “Indian Culture”? Culture changes with time. The practices and beliefs practices today were not followed hundred years ago. And the practices that were followed a hundred years ago were not followed three hundred years ago and it goes on. So, which would be “Indian Culture”? The practices followed today? Or the one’s practiced hundred years ago?

The answer, I mostly get is that we are following the same practices that were followed a hundred years ago. Really? You didn’t have IT companies back then. So, working in an IT company is against “Indian Culture”. We didn’t have automobiles back then or cell phones, or television, or credit cards… and the list is endless. All these things are against the “Indian Culture”. Yet how many people do you see protesting against these? Not a single person!!!! Yet, you have people protesting that English should not be used in official documents, food chains should not open, and some stuff like that.

I was watching a program were two group of people were debating over whether not wearing dhoti is against “Indian Culture”. The whole thing left a bad taste in mouth. Little did the Pro-dhoti group or for that matter anyone else did not notice was that the medium (television) through which they were airing their views by itself is not “Indian Culture”.

Democracy as practiced now is also not an “Indian Culture” (The idea of democracy is from the Ancient Rome.). India since it’s inception by the great Chandragupta Maurya with the assistance of the even greater Chanakya (Who’s idea it was to create a large empire in the subcontinent.) was always ruled by a king in its long history until British Raj and became a true democracy only after the independence (In some ways, India is still not a democracy.). Yet, Indians never tire of shouting their throats hoarse that India is the largest democracy.

Show some consistency people!!!!!!!!

I end by saying that Culture is not permanent. It is unfixed, and ever-changing. It must change with time or will stagnate, decay and decompose everything that it touches. Culture absorbs new things, both modifying itself and that which it absorbs into a new entity constantly.

The idea of this post is not to say that you have to accept everything that is new and reject everything that is old. The idea is learn to accept change and do not stand in the way of progress saying something is not culture just because it is not to your taste.

Marriage

Marriages are made in heavens goes a saying. You can find some version of this in almost all cultures (More about cultures in a later blog.). Since, scientific evidence for the “heavens” is lacking, I as a rationale being cannot accept the first statement. (I am too good….. ain’t I?)

I have quite a few arguments for taking the active stance, which I have taken, against Marriage.
These have been listed below:


Reasoning 1:

Marriage is the social institution under which a man and woman establish their decision to live as husband and wife by legal commitments, religious ceremonies

The above is the definition I got from dictionary.com. It is also very close to the meaning given in my copy of the oxford dictionary.

Let me make it clear that I am not against love or more specifically romance. All I am against is the institution that is marriage.

Most of you may ask what is the difference. There is and it is quite simple, at least to me.
You have friends, right? You don’t have a ceremony to declare that this is my friend. Nor do you have a ceremony to say; my friend and I are parting ways, we are no longer friends.

See the logic? So, why have a ceremony to declare someone is your husband or wife?


Reasoning 2:

I have been asking the question “Why should one necessarily get married?” to almost everyone I know. The answer is get is “To share my life.” Or “ Imagine, when you are 50-60 yrs old. You will want someone to love and be close with.”

These answers all point to one thing: Fear. Yeah, yeah, I know. Most of you, will not agree with me. Some of you are probably thinking of some nice juicy words and lines for the comments. But people, sadly the truth is that it is true. It is fear of being alone that drives most people to marriage.

So, if you are really strong you will not have fear of being alone. Hence, you need not marry at all. This is not to say that all married people are weak, but most are.


Reasoning 3:

This is a reasoning to which great person (read, my elder sister) awakened me. I did a little research of my own and the finding did corroborate the conclusion to which I had already arrived.

This is again another major reason why many people in India marry. They want to have sex. I can hear the boos and nay’s. But people it is the sad truth about our culture. It is indeed a sad insight into our culture. We Indians push the entire topic of sex under the carpet. Have you seen any family (read, parents and children) having an open conversation about this topic? No, I have till date not come across such a situation. The result is a country full of sex-obsessed individuals. And, this is the country where marriage is considered sacred. Pathetic.

There is another reason why many men marry. They just want a unpaid house keeper who will also double up as their emotional support. A person who will put up with them no matter what they do.

Neither are the woman any more pious than men. What else does a woman want from a husband? They want a free meal. A person who will jump up to defend them, even for the most stupidest thing they do. And, the social status associated with marriage. Most women also follow the social norm that the better your spouse is (financially and socially), the better for you.


Conclusion:

I do not oppose marriage, when the people involved know each other, love each other and more importantly have respect for each other. But I do oppose people getting married for the sake of getting married.

I have not spoken about the survival of the species/procreation argument for marriage as it is a non-issue. We do not have any responsibility to increase our numbers.