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The Short Answer is that Indians have Privilege and Pakistanis do not. Omar has a tweet to that effect that I couldn’t find but explained it very well.
I was inspired to write this by VijayVan‘s important comment:
When people like Audrey Truschke are denied visas instead of being called to festivals, then the coloniser will be reticent .
Vidhi and I were listening to Arundhati Roy the other day. She was so spectacular and brilliant in her eloquence; I genuinely began to believe that India was simply one large casteocracry.
Then clarity hit me and I asked Vidhi that why hadn’t Arundhati said anything about Pakistan. The greatest moral question in the Subcontinent is the near martyrdom of Hazrat Asia by Holy Pedophile’s orc armies. I didn’t hear Arundhati preface her comments about Pakistan and its evil treatment of minorities, which is substantially worse than anything happening in India. At least in the eyes of the law India battles the Casteocracy whereas Pakistan enshrined the second class nature of all non-Muslim citizens.
Pankaj Mishra, Ms. Roy, William Dalyrymple and Audrey Truschke love to glamorise the Islamicate world without having to actually go there or live there or even speak there.
Remember Pakistan was specifically created to glorify that neo-Mughal Islamicate culture that my ilk & I hold so close to heart. I could barely contain my excitement when in the Indian Numismatics Podcast Mohit Kapoor was extolling the Mughals; Pak Deep State conditioning runs true and deep in me.
At any rate the above 4 intellectuals love to glorify this culture from the opulence and dignity of India because they can’t really stand going to the shithole that Pakistan has unfortunately become.
V&I went to a wonderful lecture late last year (V suggested I get the speaker on a Browncast when he’s back in Cam) and the speaker spoke about how the Conference he had attended in Lahore actually took place in the host’s living room. Vidhi smirked at me when she heard that and I had to agree with her that is simply shameful.
It just shows how far Pakistan has fallen and whatever India’s (alleged) sins are; in one aspects upper caste Indians have become “white” that they need to constantly atone for their privilege.
As an aside I find this hypocrisy in the Trans-Movement. The lowest hanging fruit of global Trans Rights is to be found in the Subcontinent. If the uber-glamorous Caitlyn Jenner descended on India & Pak advocating for the Economic & Social Rights of Hijras, it would advance the world far more than whether who uses which bathrooms.
But the lives of Hijra Dalits will never matter until a Brahmin Patriarch oppresses one of them..
Pakistan also treats Dalits badly, who are mainly Hindu and Christian (Churas/sewage workers etc), and who have a higher aboriginal DNA component (many look more like south Indians).
Casteism is also endemic in Pakistani Muslims, despite it going against the tenets of Islam. It is just hidden underneath a sectarian garb.
Who the hell cares? Arundhathi Roy is from India.
This nonsense about Pakistan treating their people better or worse has no meaning for the billion Indians today. Telling them to talk about Pakistan is nonsense.
Vijay, India abandoned the minorities inside Pakistan and Bangladesh by agreeing to partition. Many still feel betrayed by India today. Many Pakistani minorities are pleading with India for help. Why can’t India help them? Similar to the way Jatayu helped Sita–dying in the process. Sita didn’t ask Jatayu to fight Ravana, only asking him to inform Lakshman and Rama. However her heart asked for help. And Jatayu answered the unspoken call of her heart.
Do Indians no longer have a heart?
It is long, long past time for India to allow persecuted Pakistani minorities to move to India and have a pathway to Indian citizenship (with massive vetting of course). Tarek Fatah has long spoken eloquently on the moral imperative for India to do this. And directly asked PM Modi about it. India’s conscience requires India to do this, I believe.
India cannot be isolated from the world. India’s future is globalization and leading the world to advance the human condition. India has to further liberalize, further globalize, further open up, and to encourage foreigners to move to India and become Indian. India needs to encourage cross border product development R&D collaboration.
Arundhati Roy frequently gets in every other countries business. She gets in Pakistan’s business too. On the side of the Islamists and against the minorities and against Afghanistan. What is wrong with calling her out.
Of course India has to help her own people too. But these two issues are not linked.
>Pakistan also treats Dalits badly, who are mainly Hindu and Christian (Churas/sewage workers etc), and who have a higher aboriginal DNA component (many look more like south Indians).
I have known three Christian Pakistanis (while in the US). They looked like the average Sri Lankan. One was married to my wifes friend.
More surprisingly their English accent was closer to the Sri Lankan English accent. That is compared to the avg Indian/Pakistani English accent.
Arundhati Roy is not a Pakistani and as such is not obligated to talk about Pakistan. She is an Indian and speaks about the ills of her own country. Constantly saying how Pakistan is so much worse than India is a species of whataboutery.
Not in Arundhati Roy’s case. She has a long record going back to the 1990s of backing Islamist extremists against moderate muslims. Including moderate Indian muslims. Arundhati Roy portrays herself as an international activitists and continually insults and criticizes other countries and international institutions all around the world. I remember her nonsensical ab hominan attacks against the Iraqi establishment, Iraqi government and Iraqi army circa 2003-2006. What about the way Arundhati Roy criticizes any politician in any country in the world that isn’t a marxist or post modernist? They way she dislikes Colombia?
Arundhati Roy gives the impression that she is partial to Pakistan and the Taliban against Afghanistan. In the 51 months ending 12/2018, over 45,000 brave Afghan National Security Forces martyrs were killed in combat by Pakistan, Taliban, Daesh, and the entire alphabet soup of Pakistani Army ISI backed groups.
When does Arundhati Roy speak out on behalf of Pakistani Zaidis (fivers), sixers, twelvers, Sufis, Pashtuns, Balochis, Sindhis, Christians, Sikhs, Hindus, Kashmiris, liberal Sunni Punjabis? At what point will enough of them have been slaughtered for Arundhati Roy to say something?
Arundhati Roy must be held to account.
Others who rarely comment on anything or anyone outside of India can be held to a lower standard.
What account? This is driving me insane!
Arundhathi is private person. She can support Taliban, USSR oppose Iraq, India, USA. All you can do is not buy her book. You are spouting 24/7, and can I say you should not talk? If you do not like what she says, ignore her, not read her speeches, and not buy her book. There is nothing you can do that will make her stop talking, not withstanding 295A.
Vijay, I am not understanding you.
Of course Arundhati Roy can say whatever she wants. That is what freedom means. Everyone else can say what they want about what Arundhati Roy chooses to do.
Maybe we actually agree with each other and are talking past each other?
I think India should amend the constitution to introduce complete freedom of art, speech and thought.
Arundhati Roy implicitly appearing to support groups that seek to conquer India and add India to the global caliphate is not irrelevant. Which is why Pakistani minorities, Afghans, Iranians, Iraqis, Venezuelans and many others have criticized her. [Most Venezuelans oppose Maduro, who Arundhati Roy backs.]
I think in globalized human species terms to some degree. I think over time more and more humans will identify this way.
Exactly. This prescribing what an intellectual should talk about is bizarre. Arundhati Roy is free to be a “marxist” or a “postmodernist” (people should really stop throwing those terms around when they don’t properly understand them). She is free to criticize Hindu nationalism and the situation in the Kashmir Valley. She has no obligation to say anything about Pakistan. This whole “move to Pakistan” thing is a right-wing tactic and frankly quite foolish.
This is an odd sort of comment. By the same token, if you don’t like comments critical of Roy, don’t read them. There is nothing you can do to stop them either.
Criticising Roy will not help India’s dalits. true. What makes you think her activism will help them ?
Arjun, Roy’s policy recommendations would greatly harm Indians as a whole–including OBCs, SCs and STs.
The way to socio-economically empower people is to facilitate them surging their own capacity, competence and merit. Or facilitate them improving their physical health, mental health and intelligence.
Roy’s policies would hurt OBCs, SCs and STs by impeding their capacity, competence, merit, physical health, mental health and intelligence.
Being an Indian citizen doesnt seem to stop Ms Roy from holding forth on US, UK and a host of other countries. During the terrorist attacks she had a lot to say about Indian media, Indian state and all sorts of other things. Somehow she omitted to say anything about the people doing the actual killing and those who enabled them.
She has the right as a public intellectual to speak about whatever she wants. There is no rule that says that you must criticize Pakistan prior to criticizing India.
[…] Why doesn’t Arundhati Roy move to Pakistan? […]
Freedom of speech does not include lies, unethical, irrational, anti-national, nonsense. People should show responsibility when they are aware that others are listening. Think in terms of what you want your child to hear. Don’t you censure some things? We should be confident enough to confront such people and say, this is where we draw the line.
“Freedom of speech does not include lies, unethical, irrational, anti-national, nonsense.”
A. Kumar, yes it does. The best way to deal with bad speech is with better speech.
Your response is something many Hindus have warned me about. They call it the Abrahamization of Hinduism.
In Eastern philosophy everyone has freedom of art and thought, even bad people. This is part of what makes eastern philosophy great. Why change one of the greatest features of eastern philosophy?
Everyone has the right to disrespect me, be racist towards me, be bigoted/prejudiced/sectarian/oppressive/exploitative/imperialistic/communal towards me. Everyone has the freedom to make their own choices. And we have the right to respond based on the choices of others.
In the eastern frame, others can hate, disrespect and harm us. Others can be our enemy. But “WE” can choose to love and respect them anyway. We can choose to love and respect them with all our hearts (devotion), soul (wisdom), might (service) and all our mind (raja yoga). This is our right. And on this we will not budge.
Of course we sometimes have to fight our enemy. But we choose to do so while greatly respecting and loving her. And while respecting her right to make her own choices and her own mistakes.
A great mentor once put it like this, “do not put your hand in the wheel of karma.”
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If you want proof about how eastern philosophy respects freedom of art and thought, look at the life of Krishna. Krishna endured 100 terrible crimes and insults at the hands of Shishupala without retaliating. A young 8 year old kid (Shankaracharya) was allowed to debate and seemingly strongly disagree with the heads of many of the top sampradayas of Sanathana Dharma.
Anyone can discuss and debate with the heads of the many great and ancient organizations of eastern philosophy. Why should this change?
The greatest sin was committed by Hiranyakashipu. He had to ability to read and monitor thought. His sin was to regulate thoughts.