7 ms·

You're 100% correct. However, the poor in India are truly trapped, almost like slaves to their own poverty (http://thecnnfreedomproject.blogs.cnn.com/2011/03/08

by ashray 14y ago

You're 100% correct. However, the poor in India are truly trapped, almost like slaves to their own poverty (http://thecnnfreedomproject.blogs.cnn.com/2011/03/08/generations-pay-off-debts-through-slavery/ http://thecnnfreedomproject.blogs.cnn.com/2011/03/08/generat...). By comparison those who have acquired sufficient wealth are free to do whatever they please! With that freedom comes a responsibility to acknowledge it and to not act like complete idiots. Unfortunately, even the rich to a large extent aren't aware of how rich they truly are.

kamaal 14y ago
>>You're 100% correct. However, the poor in India are truly trapped, almost like slaves to their own poverty Sorry I refuse to believe in this victim hood mentality. We seriously need to get out of this 'Somebody needs to do it for me' ideology. Nobody is going to help you and shouldn't. Because frankly no matter whom you can speak to is going through a little battle of their own. I am working hard here pushing 19 hour schedules to ensure I have a good life. Somebody else is all welcome to do so. I can understand if the person is ill or is physically disabled. But a healthy person who doesn't work hard deserves his condition. And in a country like India, expecting somebody to come and help is not a unrealistic expectation but a 'unjust' expectation. >>By comparison those who have acquired sufficient wealth are free to do whatever they please! You make acquiring wealth sound like somebody just woke up one day and found a sack of gold biscuits at their door step. >>With that freedom comes a responsibility to acknowledge it and to not act like complete idiots Exactly. There by each man for his own and shall deserve net result of his own work. >>Unfortunately, even the rich to a large extent aren't aware of how rich they truly are. Because nothing is really enough but that's a totally different discussion altogether.
- jlarocco 14y ago
  >Sorry I refuse to believe in this victim hood mentality. We seriously need to get out of this 'Somebody needs to do it for me' ideology. Nobody is going to help you and shouldn't. Because frankly no matter whom you can speak to is going through a little battle of their own. > I am working hard here pushing 19 hour schedules to ensure I have a good life. Somebody else is all welcome to do so. I can understand if the person is ill or is physically disabled. But a healthy person who doesn't work hard deserves his condition. > And in a country like India, expecting somebody to come and help is not a unrealistic expectation but a 'unjust' expectation. I think you misunderstood what he's talking about. India isn't the United States. Until recently India had a rigid caste system where it was simply impossible for people to move outside of their caste. If a person's parents were laborers, they became laborers - that was their caste. It had nothing to do with how hard they worked or if other people helped them. Their caste was "laborer," so that's the only job they'd be able to get. It's not as strict as it used to be, and it's slowly dying out, but it does still exist.
  - kamaal 14y ago
    I am an Indian and I have never been to any other country so far. But I wrote stands true for India. Caste system is a option, you can either associate yourself to it or leave it. This is true at least in modern day India and has been the the case for nearly 20 years now. You can easily ditch your caste, just like atheists ditch their religion. The fact is caste system offers a comfortable cushion of victim hood and gives you enough reasons to justify failure or even not trying. These days belonging to a lower caste is a gift because you get reservations nearly every where. There are protests by many communities to include them in back ward communities because of the reservations. People are fighting to be backward, Read: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2008_Gurjar_unrest_in_Rajasthan http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2008_Gurjar_unrest_in_Rajasthan The situation is such that people want to belong to backward communities and castes. True freedom is dangerous, many people know it, and they don't even want it.
    - arjie 14y ago
      Kamaal, this is not true. Your name (often an indicator of caste) alone influences how likely you are to be hired. And not everyone knows that. http://www.jstor.org/stable/40276548 http://www.jstor.org/stable/40276548
    - deleted 14y ago
      [deleted]
    - intended 14y ago
      Perhaps true in some metros but even as of 5-6 years ago I know of caste based discrimination in villages. People weren't allowed to drink from the village well because of caste and I recall something on the lines of not being allowed to let their shadows touch others.
    - efuquen 14y ago
      In the US slavery was outlawed over 200 years ago and we still suffer with the socioeconomic consequences of it to this day, and for many days to come. To say the caste system was done away with 20 years ago and think it doesn't have a strong influence today I think is folly. I say that having no experience with India but knowing precedence strongly implies this to be the case.
- sgpl 14y ago
  There are people (more often than not children) in the world that work 20 hours a day in small crowded rooms and make less than living wage. They don't really know another way of life. That is all they have ever been exposed to. They don't know about Apple/Google/iPhone or Steve Jobs or what a computer is because their village is so fucking remote that the Government of India decided it would be a hassle to provide electricity, and their parents decided to make additional income by renting out a few kids to make ends meet. These people don't really consider themselves victims, because they don't think they have been wronged. They were mostly unlucky in the lottery of life and born in poor circumstances. You can refuse to believe whatever you want but the fact is that you were extremely lucky in life to be either born in a relatively well to do family or in circumstances that exposed you technology, educational experiences over the course of your life. Having an internet connection can be a life changing effect, because of the access to information it provides. >> Nobody is going to help you and shouldn't. >> But a healthy person who doesn't work hard deserves his condition. >> expecting somebody to come and help is not a unrealistic expectation but a 'unjust' expectation. >> There by each man for his own and shall deserve net result of his own work. ^^ I am glad that everyone doesn't think like you because the world truly would be an awful place if they did.
  - kamaal 14y ago
    >>They were mostly unlucky in the lottery of life and born in poor circumstances. I never denied that. My whole point was, now that you are- What next? If you think you are happy with poverty then the story ends there. If you aren't then, the government can do little, Sorry but there are simply too many people in our country. The ordinary citizen will not and can't do anything about you. It will be your and your problem alone. It will be difficult, hard and a tiring lifelong worth of work. Just like it is for everybody else. What else were you thinking?
    - Volpe 14y ago
      Your callousness and (what seems to be a) lack of empathy to those less fortunate is quite confronting to read.
- deleted 14y ago
  [deleted]
- kragen 14y ago
  (a) working 19 hours a day will ensure you do not have a good life. (b) to recognize the caste system, you have to go somewhere it doesn't exist. Right now you know as much about it as a typical fish knows about water. (c) we're human beings, and none of us gets ahead alone; we all have people to help us. We can't even survive infancy without help from other people. The people a kilometer from you who have expensive SUVs without having to work 19-hour days? That's mostly because they got a lot of help from other people, such as their parents, and only partly because they worked hard — in some cases, not at all. Working hard is really, really important, but far from enough.

by ashray 14y ago

kamaal 14y ago

>>You're 100% correct. However, the poor in India are truly trapped, almost like slaves to their own poverty Sorry I refuse to believe in this victim hood mentality. We seriously need to get out of this 'Somebody needs to do it for me' ideology. Nobody is going to help you and shouldn't. Because frankly no matter whom you can speak to is going through a little battle of their own. I am working hard here pushing 19 hour schedules to ensure I have a good life. Somebody else is all welcome to do so. I can understand if the person is ill or is physically disabled. But a healthy person who doesn't work hard deserves his condition. And in a country like India, expecting somebody to come and help is not a unrealistic expectation but a 'unjust' expectation. >>By comparison those who have acquired sufficient wealth are free to do whatever they please! You make acquiring wealth sound like somebody just woke up one day and found a sack of gold biscuits at their door step. >>With that freedom comes a responsibility to acknowledge it and to not act like complete idiots Exactly. There by each man for his own and shall deserve net result of his own work. >>Unfortunately, even the rich to a large extent aren't aware of how rich they truly are. Because nothing is really enough but that's a totally different discussion altogether.

jlarocco 14y ago
>Sorry I refuse to believe in this victim hood mentality. We seriously need to get out of this 'Somebody needs to do it for me' ideology. Nobody is going to help you and shouldn't. Because frankly no matter whom you can speak to is going through a little battle of their own. > I am working hard here pushing 19 hour schedules to ensure I have a good life. Somebody else is all welcome to do so. I can understand if the person is ill or is physically disabled. But a healthy person who doesn't work hard deserves his condition. > And in a country like India, expecting somebody to come and help is not a unrealistic expectation but a 'unjust' expectation. I think you misunderstood what he's talking about. India isn't the United States. Until recently India had a rigid caste system where it was simply impossible for people to move outside of their caste. If a person's parents were laborers, they became laborers - that was their caste. It had nothing to do with how hard they worked or if other people helped them. Their caste was "laborer," so that's the only job they'd be able to get. It's not as strict as it used to be, and it's slowly dying out, but it does still exist.
- kamaal 14y ago
  I am an Indian and I have never been to any other country so far. But I wrote stands true for India. Caste system is a option, you can either associate yourself to it or leave it. This is true at least in modern day India and has been the the case for nearly 20 years now. You can easily ditch your caste, just like atheists ditch their religion. The fact is caste system offers a comfortable cushion of victim hood and gives you enough reasons to justify failure or even not trying. These days belonging to a lower caste is a gift because you get reservations nearly every where. There are protests by many communities to include them in back ward communities because of the reservations. People are fighting to be backward, Read: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2008_Gurjar_unrest_in_Rajasthan http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2008_Gurjar_unrest_in_Rajasthan The situation is such that people want to belong to backward communities and castes. True freedom is dangerous, many people know it, and they don't even want it.
  - arjie 14y ago
    Kamaal, this is not true. Your name (often an indicator of caste) alone influences how likely you are to be hired. And not everyone knows that. http://www.jstor.org/stable/40276548 http://www.jstor.org/stable/40276548
  - deleted 14y ago
    [deleted]
  - intended 14y ago
    Perhaps true in some metros but even as of 5-6 years ago I know of caste based discrimination in villages. People weren't allowed to drink from the village well because of caste and I recall something on the lines of not being allowed to let their shadows touch others.
  - efuquen 14y ago
    In the US slavery was outlawed over 200 years ago and we still suffer with the socioeconomic consequences of it to this day, and for many days to come. To say the caste system was done away with 20 years ago and think it doesn't have a strong influence today I think is folly. I say that having no experience with India but knowing precedence strongly implies this to be the case.
sgpl 14y ago
There are people (more often than not children) in the world that work 20 hours a day in small crowded rooms and make less than living wage. They don't really know another way of life. That is all they have ever been exposed to. They don't know about Apple/Google/iPhone or Steve Jobs or what a computer is because their village is so fucking remote that the Government of India decided it would be a hassle to provide electricity, and their parents decided to make additional income by renting out a few kids to make ends meet. These people don't really consider themselves victims, because they don't think they have been wronged. They were mostly unlucky in the lottery of life and born in poor circumstances. You can refuse to believe whatever you want but the fact is that you were extremely lucky in life to be either born in a relatively well to do family or in circumstances that exposed you technology, educational experiences over the course of your life. Having an internet connection can be a life changing effect, because of the access to information it provides. >> Nobody is going to help you and shouldn't. >> But a healthy person who doesn't work hard deserves his condition. >> expecting somebody to come and help is not a unrealistic expectation but a 'unjust' expectation. >> There by each man for his own and shall deserve net result of his own work. ^^ I am glad that everyone doesn't think like you because the world truly would be an awful place if they did.
- kamaal 14y ago
  >>They were mostly unlucky in the lottery of life and born in poor circumstances. I never denied that. My whole point was, now that you are- What next? If you think you are happy with poverty then the story ends there. If you aren't then, the government can do little, Sorry but there are simply too many people in our country. The ordinary citizen will not and can't do anything about you. It will be your and your problem alone. It will be difficult, hard and a tiring lifelong worth of work. Just like it is for everybody else. What else were you thinking?
  - Volpe 14y ago
    Your callousness and (what seems to be a) lack of empathy to those less fortunate is quite confronting to read.
deleted 14y ago
[deleted]
kragen 14y ago
(a) working 19 hours a day will ensure you do not have a good life. (b) to recognize the caste system, you have to go somewhere it doesn't exist. Right now you know as much about it as a typical fish knows about water. (c) we're human beings, and none of us gets ahead alone; we all have people to help us. We can't even survive infancy without help from other people. The people a kilometer from you who have expensive SUVs without having to work 19-hour days? That's mostly because they got a lot of help from other people, such as their parents, and only partly because they worked hard — in some cases, not at all. Working hard is really, really important, but far from enough.