Monday 18 December 2017
Thursday 14 December 2017
Facts do not matter
Amit Varma in The Hindu
The most surprising thing about these Gujarat elections is that people are so surprised at the Prime Minister’s rhetoric. Narendra Modi has eschewed all talk of development, and has played to the worst impulses of the Gujarati people. His main tool is Hindu-Muslim polarisation, which is reflected in the language he uses for his opponents. The Congress has a “Mughlai” mentality, they are ushering in an “Aurangzeb Raj”, and their top leaders are conspiring with Pakistan to make sure Mr. Modi loses. A Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) spokesperson has also launched a scathing attack on Congress president-elect Rahul Gandhi. None of this is new.
Mr. Modi’s rhetoric in the heat of campaigning has always come from below. From his references to “Mian Musharraf” over a decade ago to the “kabristan-shamshaan” comments of the recent elections in Uttar Pradesh, it has been clear that the otherness of Muslims is central to the BJP playbook. Hate drives more people to the polling booth than warm, fuzzy feelings of pluralism. But, the question is, are the Congress leaders really conspiring with Pakistan to make sure the BJP lose?
Answer: It doesn’t matter.
No care for truth
In 1986, the philosopher Harry G. Frankfurt wrote an essay named “On Bullshit”, which was published as a book in 2005 and became a surprise bestseller. The book attempts to arrive at “a theoretical understanding of bullshit”. The key difference between a liar and a , ‘bullshitter’, Frankfurt tells us, is that the liar knows the truth and aims to deceive. The ‘bullshitter’, on the other hand, doesn’t care about the truth. He is “neither on the side of the true nor on the side of the false,” in Frankfurt’s words. “His eye is not on the facts at all, as the eyes of the honest man and of the liar are, except insofar as they may be pertinent to his interest in getting away with what he says.”
The ‘bullshitter’ is wise, for he has cottoned on to an important truth that has become more and more glaring in these modern times: that facts don’t matter. And to understand why, I ask you to go back with me in time to another seminal book, this one published in 1922.
The first chapter of “Public Opinion”, by the American journalist, Walter Lippmann, is titled “The World Outside and the Pictures in Our Heads”. In it, Lippmann makes the point that all of us have a version of the world inside our heads that resembles, but is not identical to, the world as it is. “The real environment,” he writes, “is altogether too big, too complex, and too fleeting for direct acquaintance.”
We construct a version of the world in our heads, and feed that version, for modifying it too much will require too much effort. If facts conflict with it, we ignore those facts, and accept only those that conform to our worldview. (Cognitive psychologists call this the “Confirmation Bias”.)
Lippmann sees this as a challenge for democracy, for how are we to elect our leaders if we cannot comprehend the impact they will have on the world?
Fragmented media
I would argue that this is a far greater problem today than it was in Lippmann’s time. Back then, and until a couple of decades ago, there was a broad consensus on the truth. There were gatekeepers to information and knowledge. Even accounting for biases, the mainstream media agreed on some basic facts. That has changed. The media is fragmented, there are no barriers to entry, and the mainstream media no longer has a monopoly of the dissemination of information. This is a good thing, with one worrying side effect: whatever beliefs or impulses we might have — the earth is flat, the Jews carried out 9/11, India is a Hindu nation — we can find plenty of “evidence” for it online, and connect with like-minded people. Finding others who share our beliefs makes us more strident, and soon we form multiple echo chambers that become more and more extreme. Polarisation increases. The space in the middle disappears. And the world inside our heads, shared by so many other, becomes impervious to facts.
This also means that impulses we would otherwise not express in polite society find validation, and a voice. Here’s another book you should read: in 1997, the sociologist, Timur Kuran, wrote “Private Truths, Public Lies” in which he coined the term “Preference Falsification”. There are many things we feel or believe but do not express because we fear social approbation. But as soon as we realise that others share our views, we are emboldened to express ourselves. This leads to a “Preference Cascade”: Kuran gives the example of the collapse of the Soviet Union, but an equally apt modern illustration is the rise of right-wing populists everywhere. I believe — and I apologise if this is too depressing to contemplate — that the majority of us are bigots, misogynists, racists, and tribal in our thinking. We have always been this way, but because liberal elites ran the media, and a liberal consensus seemed to prevail, we did not express these feelings. Social media showed us that we were not alone, and gave us the courage to express ourselves.
That’s where Donald Trump comes from. That’s where Mr. Modi comes from. Our masses vote for these fine gentlemen not in spite of their bigotry and misogyny, but because of it. Mr. Trump and Mr. Modi provide them a narrative that feeds the world inside their heads. Mexicans are rapists, foreigners are bad, Muslims are stealing our girls, gaumutra cures cancer — and so on. The truth is irrelevant. Facts. Don’t. Matter.
Think about the implication of this. This means that the men and women who wrote the Constitution were an out-of-touch elite, and the values they embedded in it were not shared by most of the nation. (As a libertarian, I think the Constitution was deeply flawed because it did not do enough to protect individual rights, but our society’s consensus would probably be that it did too much.) The “Idea of India” that these elites spoke of was never India’s Idea of India. These “liberal” values were imposed on an unwilling nation — and is such imposition, ironically, not deeply illiberal itself? This is what I call The Liberal Paradox.
All the ugliness in our politics today is the ugliness of the human condition. This is how we are. This is not a perversion of democracy but an expression of it. Those of us who are saddened by it — the liberal elites, libertarians like me — have to stop feeling entitled, and get down to work. The alt-right guru Andrew Breitbart once said something I never get tired of quoting: “Politics is downstream from Culture.” A political victory will now not come until there is a social revolution. Where will it begin?
Mr. Modi’s rhetoric in the heat of campaigning has always come from below. From his references to “Mian Musharraf” over a decade ago to the “kabristan-shamshaan” comments of the recent elections in Uttar Pradesh, it has been clear that the otherness of Muslims is central to the BJP playbook. Hate drives more people to the polling booth than warm, fuzzy feelings of pluralism. But, the question is, are the Congress leaders really conspiring with Pakistan to make sure the BJP lose?
Answer: It doesn’t matter.
No care for truth
In 1986, the philosopher Harry G. Frankfurt wrote an essay named “On Bullshit”, which was published as a book in 2005 and became a surprise bestseller. The book attempts to arrive at “a theoretical understanding of bullshit”. The key difference between a liar and a , ‘bullshitter’, Frankfurt tells us, is that the liar knows the truth and aims to deceive. The ‘bullshitter’, on the other hand, doesn’t care about the truth. He is “neither on the side of the true nor on the side of the false,” in Frankfurt’s words. “His eye is not on the facts at all, as the eyes of the honest man and of the liar are, except insofar as they may be pertinent to his interest in getting away with what he says.”
The ‘bullshitter’ is wise, for he has cottoned on to an important truth that has become more and more glaring in these modern times: that facts don’t matter. And to understand why, I ask you to go back with me in time to another seminal book, this one published in 1922.
The first chapter of “Public Opinion”, by the American journalist, Walter Lippmann, is titled “The World Outside and the Pictures in Our Heads”. In it, Lippmann makes the point that all of us have a version of the world inside our heads that resembles, but is not identical to, the world as it is. “The real environment,” he writes, “is altogether too big, too complex, and too fleeting for direct acquaintance.”
We construct a version of the world in our heads, and feed that version, for modifying it too much will require too much effort. If facts conflict with it, we ignore those facts, and accept only those that conform to our worldview. (Cognitive psychologists call this the “Confirmation Bias”.)
Lippmann sees this as a challenge for democracy, for how are we to elect our leaders if we cannot comprehend the impact they will have on the world?
Fragmented media
I would argue that this is a far greater problem today than it was in Lippmann’s time. Back then, and until a couple of decades ago, there was a broad consensus on the truth. There were gatekeepers to information and knowledge. Even accounting for biases, the mainstream media agreed on some basic facts. That has changed. The media is fragmented, there are no barriers to entry, and the mainstream media no longer has a monopoly of the dissemination of information. This is a good thing, with one worrying side effect: whatever beliefs or impulses we might have — the earth is flat, the Jews carried out 9/11, India is a Hindu nation — we can find plenty of “evidence” for it online, and connect with like-minded people. Finding others who share our beliefs makes us more strident, and soon we form multiple echo chambers that become more and more extreme. Polarisation increases. The space in the middle disappears. And the world inside our heads, shared by so many other, becomes impervious to facts.
This also means that impulses we would otherwise not express in polite society find validation, and a voice. Here’s another book you should read: in 1997, the sociologist, Timur Kuran, wrote “Private Truths, Public Lies” in which he coined the term “Preference Falsification”. There are many things we feel or believe but do not express because we fear social approbation. But as soon as we realise that others share our views, we are emboldened to express ourselves. This leads to a “Preference Cascade”: Kuran gives the example of the collapse of the Soviet Union, but an equally apt modern illustration is the rise of right-wing populists everywhere. I believe — and I apologise if this is too depressing to contemplate — that the majority of us are bigots, misogynists, racists, and tribal in our thinking. We have always been this way, but because liberal elites ran the media, and a liberal consensus seemed to prevail, we did not express these feelings. Social media showed us that we were not alone, and gave us the courage to express ourselves.
That’s where Donald Trump comes from. That’s where Mr. Modi comes from. Our masses vote for these fine gentlemen not in spite of their bigotry and misogyny, but because of it. Mr. Trump and Mr. Modi provide them a narrative that feeds the world inside their heads. Mexicans are rapists, foreigners are bad, Muslims are stealing our girls, gaumutra cures cancer — and so on. The truth is irrelevant. Facts. Don’t. Matter.
Think about the implication of this. This means that the men and women who wrote the Constitution were an out-of-touch elite, and the values they embedded in it were not shared by most of the nation. (As a libertarian, I think the Constitution was deeply flawed because it did not do enough to protect individual rights, but our society’s consensus would probably be that it did too much.) The “Idea of India” that these elites spoke of was never India’s Idea of India. These “liberal” values were imposed on an unwilling nation — and is such imposition, ironically, not deeply illiberal itself? This is what I call The Liberal Paradox.
All the ugliness in our politics today is the ugliness of the human condition. This is how we are. This is not a perversion of democracy but an expression of it. Those of us who are saddened by it — the liberal elites, libertarians like me — have to stop feeling entitled, and get down to work. The alt-right guru Andrew Breitbart once said something I never get tired of quoting: “Politics is downstream from Culture.” A political victory will now not come until there is a social revolution. Where will it begin?
Sunday 10 December 2017
Words that are emptied of meaning - 'Hinduism is a tolerant religion and 'Islam is a religion of peace'.
Tabish Khair in The Hindu
“Suit the action to the word, the word to the action,” says Hamlet in William Shakespeare’s play. Hamlet’s advice is given to actors rehearsing a play within the play, but it is advice all of us can take. Words not suited to action are considered empty or hollow. We do not trust people whose words have little or nothing to do with their actions.
And yet, as communities, we tend to fall into this trap. We repeat some words, almost as if they were mantras, blithely ignoring the fact that our actions often do not vindicate such words.
The two most common sets of words that I hear these days come from Hindus and Muslims, all of them well meaning. Hindus in India keep telling me that “Hinduism is an inclusive, tolerant religion” and Muslims all over the world keep telling me that “Islam is a religion of peace.” Now, no doubt, they are largely right. There is much in history to suggest that Hinduism is an inclusive and tolerant religion, and that Islam puts a lot of stress on peace: the basic greeting of Islam, salaam-alai-kum, means ‘peace be on you.’
And yet, if we stop with these words, we are either being wilfully blind or displaying a remarkable lack of awareness and self-criticism. Because, very often, these words are not redeemed by action. Anyone who reads the newspapers today can see that not all Hindus are inclusive and not all Muslims are peace-loving.
The religion of Rahul Gandhi
One cannot help noticing that if Hinduism was always inclusive and tolerant, then the recent controversy over Rahul Gandhi’s religious beliefs would not have occurred. One also cannot help noticing that if Islam was equated solely with peace, groups of Muslims would not be shooting at each other in almost every third Muslim country in the world.
Let’s face it: why should the fact of Rahul Gandhi’s religious beliefs — or, for that matter, Jawaharlal Nehru’s agnosticism — become a matter of discussion in an India full of inclusive and tolerant Hindus? Let alone the fact that the oldest community of Christians in India can be dated back to 2,000 years, a truly inclusive and tolerant Hindu would not expect other Indians to obtain a ‘Hindu’ religious certificate in order to run for office. Similarly, surely, such a Hindu would be able to accept not just Indian Muslims, who have contributed to India for about 1,500 years, but also monuments, such as the Taj Mahal, associated with the so-called Muslim period of India. I must say that I was surrounded by really tolerant and inclusive Hindus in the India in which I grew up, and I must add that their numbers seem to be greatly reduced today.
Violence instead of protest
Similarly, the Muslim claim that Islam is a religion of peace seems hollow not just when one looks at what some Muslims are doing to other Muslims, but also when one hears religious discourses about the supposed ‘moral victory’ of Islam over other faiths. I will not even talk of Islamist terrorism, mostly because it is often discussed in excess to its reality, but surely some other people would bring it up, and who can say that their fears are totally unjustified? Islam might be a religion of peace, but too many Muslims seem to take recourse to violence instead of peaceful and democratic modes of protest and action.
Once again, this is a tendency that has increased in Muslim communities — where there is increasing impatience with those Muslims who do not kowtow to fundamentalist prescriptions.
In such a context, when Hindus say that Hinduism is an inclusive and tolerant religion, and Muslims say that Islam is a religion of peace, there can be only two explanations. First, and positively, what they mean is that the essence of Hinduism is inclusive and the essence of Islam is peaceful, and hence intolerant Hindus or violent Muslims are going against the essence of their own religions. If this is the intention, the statements are at least partly justified.
But, often, this is not the intention. The intention is not to critique wrong tendencies within Hinduism or Islam but to dismiss criticisms — from within or outside. Often, Hindus who beat the drum of the inclusiveness of Hinduism do so in order to dismiss contrary evidence, and so do Muslims who beat the drum of the peacefulness of Islam. In such cases, what they utter are empty words. Or worse: inclusiveness becomes a weapon to exclude, peace becomes a justification of violence.
The statements “Hinduism is an inclusive, tolerant religion” and “Islam is a religion of peace” contain much truth — but this truth has to be regularly vindicated by action. There seems to be an increasing failure to do so on the part of many Hindus and Muslims. Each one of us has to face up to this failure. Every time we use such words, we need to ask ourselves: do we really mean it, and does the evidence around us sustain such claims? We have to ask ourselves: are we using these words as ideals or as excuses?
Because, finally, words only mean what we put into them — by our daily acts. And when we use words that are being emptied of meaning, we simultaneously hollow out the rich and wonderful realities of our world.
“Suit the action to the word, the word to the action,” says Hamlet in William Shakespeare’s play. Hamlet’s advice is given to actors rehearsing a play within the play, but it is advice all of us can take. Words not suited to action are considered empty or hollow. We do not trust people whose words have little or nothing to do with their actions.
And yet, as communities, we tend to fall into this trap. We repeat some words, almost as if they were mantras, blithely ignoring the fact that our actions often do not vindicate such words.
The two most common sets of words that I hear these days come from Hindus and Muslims, all of them well meaning. Hindus in India keep telling me that “Hinduism is an inclusive, tolerant religion” and Muslims all over the world keep telling me that “Islam is a religion of peace.” Now, no doubt, they are largely right. There is much in history to suggest that Hinduism is an inclusive and tolerant religion, and that Islam puts a lot of stress on peace: the basic greeting of Islam, salaam-alai-kum, means ‘peace be on you.’
And yet, if we stop with these words, we are either being wilfully blind or displaying a remarkable lack of awareness and self-criticism. Because, very often, these words are not redeemed by action. Anyone who reads the newspapers today can see that not all Hindus are inclusive and not all Muslims are peace-loving.
The religion of Rahul Gandhi
One cannot help noticing that if Hinduism was always inclusive and tolerant, then the recent controversy over Rahul Gandhi’s religious beliefs would not have occurred. One also cannot help noticing that if Islam was equated solely with peace, groups of Muslims would not be shooting at each other in almost every third Muslim country in the world.
Let’s face it: why should the fact of Rahul Gandhi’s religious beliefs — or, for that matter, Jawaharlal Nehru’s agnosticism — become a matter of discussion in an India full of inclusive and tolerant Hindus? Let alone the fact that the oldest community of Christians in India can be dated back to 2,000 years, a truly inclusive and tolerant Hindu would not expect other Indians to obtain a ‘Hindu’ religious certificate in order to run for office. Similarly, surely, such a Hindu would be able to accept not just Indian Muslims, who have contributed to India for about 1,500 years, but also monuments, such as the Taj Mahal, associated with the so-called Muslim period of India. I must say that I was surrounded by really tolerant and inclusive Hindus in the India in which I grew up, and I must add that their numbers seem to be greatly reduced today.
Violence instead of protest
Similarly, the Muslim claim that Islam is a religion of peace seems hollow not just when one looks at what some Muslims are doing to other Muslims, but also when one hears religious discourses about the supposed ‘moral victory’ of Islam over other faiths. I will not even talk of Islamist terrorism, mostly because it is often discussed in excess to its reality, but surely some other people would bring it up, and who can say that their fears are totally unjustified? Islam might be a religion of peace, but too many Muslims seem to take recourse to violence instead of peaceful and democratic modes of protest and action.
Once again, this is a tendency that has increased in Muslim communities — where there is increasing impatience with those Muslims who do not kowtow to fundamentalist prescriptions.
In such a context, when Hindus say that Hinduism is an inclusive and tolerant religion, and Muslims say that Islam is a religion of peace, there can be only two explanations. First, and positively, what they mean is that the essence of Hinduism is inclusive and the essence of Islam is peaceful, and hence intolerant Hindus or violent Muslims are going against the essence of their own religions. If this is the intention, the statements are at least partly justified.
But, often, this is not the intention. The intention is not to critique wrong tendencies within Hinduism or Islam but to dismiss criticisms — from within or outside. Often, Hindus who beat the drum of the inclusiveness of Hinduism do so in order to dismiss contrary evidence, and so do Muslims who beat the drum of the peacefulness of Islam. In such cases, what they utter are empty words. Or worse: inclusiveness becomes a weapon to exclude, peace becomes a justification of violence.
The statements “Hinduism is an inclusive, tolerant religion” and “Islam is a religion of peace” contain much truth — but this truth has to be regularly vindicated by action. There seems to be an increasing failure to do so on the part of many Hindus and Muslims. Each one of us has to face up to this failure. Every time we use such words, we need to ask ourselves: do we really mean it, and does the evidence around us sustain such claims? We have to ask ourselves: are we using these words as ideals or as excuses?
Because, finally, words only mean what we put into them — by our daily acts. And when we use words that are being emptied of meaning, we simultaneously hollow out the rich and wonderful realities of our world.
Is polyamory finally ready to become an open secret in India?
Jayanthi Madhukar in The Hindu
She is 27 and lives in Bengaluru. Let’s call her Radhika. Radhika says she was 18 when she became “conscious” that she wanted to be intimate with multiple partners. In other words, that she was polyamorous. She has come out to a few friends and reactions have been mixed.
“Some are accepting, but some are sceptical, and tell me that I am being foolish and polyamory will never work.” She hasn’t told her parents yet simply because they will not understand. Even more difficult has been to find partners willing to accept polyamory. Radhika says she has been practising polyamory for only two years now, when she finally began to find the first few partners open to the idea.
The dictionary defines polyamory as ‘the practice of engaging in multiple sexual relationships with the consent of all the people involved.’ Its definition is often expanded as ‘consensual, ethical, and responsible non-monogamy’ to differentiate it from what it is often misunderstood for — a committed couple in an open relationship where each is allowed to experiment outside the relationship every now and then. In polyamory, however, there is no single committed couple — the polyamorous group is committed to every one of its members, mentally and physically.
In hushed tones
As definitions of relationships and sexualities morph dramatically across the world, India is no exception. Polyamory India is a Facebook group formed about eight years ago by the San Diego-based Rohit Juneja and has as its background image the words, ‘The capacity for human love is unlimited.’ And about a year ago, Bangalore Polycules was formed, a ‘hush-hush’ community of people who are polyamorous and meet occasionally in private spaces.
Members have come together through an underground network. In a departure from their fool-proof privacy, the group organised a public event, a screening of a French film Lutine on polyamory, in order to educate more people about it. And when earlier this year, they announced the event at the city’s famous art space, 1 Shanthiroad Studio, it led also to their name cropping up on search engines.
That is how I found them. And perhaps that’s how Basit Manham found them. At 24, Manham says he is dealing with depression. Outwardly, his lean frame exudes confidence, showing no signs of the inner turmoil. Manham, a college dropout, moved to Bengaluru from Pune about a year ago as the senior community manager of Stay Abode. He comes from an orthodox Muslim family and in 2014, when he declared himself as ‘agnostic’ on social media, he was immediately disowned by his family and has had to support himself since. A few months later, he used social media again to declare that he was polyamorous.
Two major public declarations in quick succession, and their fallout, have clearly affected him deeply. “Probably,” he says. Alone in a new place, all Manham wanted was to be with people who would not question him or judge his choices. And then he stumbled upon Bangalore Polycules.
Not polygamy
The film screening of Lutine was open to all, polyamorous or otherwise, and it was followed by a Skype Q&A with the film’s director Isabelle Broué. When asked who had organised the screening and Q&A session, the gallery representatives would only say that they got a request for the event via email and that there was a good turnout of people. A city-based filmmaker who attended it says he could not figure out who the founders of the group were.
I spoke to Broué in an email interview, and she recollected her experience of talking to audience members. One of the questions asked of her was a common one that vexes most Polycules members. Is polyamory the same as polygamy? “I gave the usual answer: that polygamy is about being ‘officially’ in an union (from the Greek word gamos) with someone, whereas in polyamory, we’re talking about intimate relationships without social recognition,” says Broué, who is polyamorous herself.
Polyamory is about equity and egality: any person in a relationship has the same rights, no matter her or his gender, sexual orientation or age. But what Broué remembers most is seeing so many women in the audience, mostly “young women”. It reaffirmed her belief that polyamory is a way to assert yourself as a free person. “It is both personal and political,” she says, “a feminist way of living your relationships.”
On the evening of the event, one of the audience members, who had attended out of curiosity, got the feeling that the “whole thing was about kids wanting to have a good time”. Otherwise why wouldn’t they be in a monogamous relationship? Radhika doesn’t agree. “I am polyamorous,” she says. “I don’t think I have a choice in the matter. Whenever I’ve been in monogamous relationships, I have resented the fact that wanting a relationship with someone else is considered taboo (unless it’s within the framework of friendship). And that has been very stifling.”
Coming out as polyamorous in today’s society is obviously still difficult, despite the growing openness. What makes it easier are groups like the Polycules. As one of its members says in an email interview, the “primary purpose of this group is to be a place where people can share and support each other.”
For Manham, it was pure serendipity that he found a local community. He has been to a few of their meet-ups and finds the members are on his wavelength. He cannot give more details — the group has requested him not to volunteer more information about it. He says, “Idea-wise, we are connected and that’s enough for me.”
A polyamorous person can choose to be in a hierarchal or non-hierarchal relationship, which, simply put, means they could have a primary partner or all partners can be of equal relevance. In Manham’s case, his first relationship broke up because his girlfriend was not okay with him seeing others. “Each of my relationships satisfies a different emotional need. I can’t satisfy someone in all ways and vice versa,” he explains.
In a monogamous relationship, one either makes do with the partner, warts and all, or tries to change the partner. “Most poly people do not change anything about a partner,” Manham says. “It is cruel to try and change someone.”
Polyamorous people are also quick to point out that their proclivity for more than one partner does not make them simply promiscuous or disloyal.
A survey conducted of the Bangalore Polycules members found that 72% inform their partners of other relationships. About 85% said they would continue with a satisfying relationship even when sex dwindles or isn’t in the equation. They cite this to indicate that their ethics overrule the assumptions of promiscuity labelled on them. The Polyamory India group says on its Facebook page: ‘It is not about free sex, casual sex, extramarital affairs and nor is it a way to make friends or pick up sex partners. If you are looking for any of these please go elsewhere.’
The Bangalore Polycules community has people of diverse gender identity: male, female and other genders. Their sexual orientations range from heterosexuals at 35%, bisexual 35% and 30% homosexuals and others. But no matter what, all of them listed understanding and communication as the most important aspects in each of their relationships. “Communication is important because there is no standard protocol as there is in monogamy,” says Radhika. “Being receptive to each other’s needs, desires and preferences is crucial.” One of the Polycules members, who identified as demi-sexual, stressed on “honest communication” as being the key to satisfying polyamorous relationships.
Still, jealousy rears its ugly head. Sitting in a crowded restaurant and eating a piping hot vada and sambar, Manham is dealing with a few issues himself. “I still feel uncomfortable when my primary partner tells me about her other relationships,” he confesses. Only uncomfortable? “No, make that jealous,” he says, after a moment of silence. “So, I tell her it is okay if she doesn’t tell me about her relationships.” But omission is not honest communication. And that is a troubling issue.
It is not that polyamorous people do not feel jealousy. “We try to handle it differently,” as Radhika says. Some of it, according to her, is about thinking from a different perspective; people conventionally are not jealous if one friend seeks other friendships. “Often, jealousy stems from unmet needs in a current relationship, so figuring out what those are could be helpful,” she says. For Manham, acknowledging the emotion and reasoning it out is a step forward. As he says, “No matter what, I will support my primary partner, even when she has any issues with her other relationships.”
Questions of fidelity
Most members of Bangalore Polycules said that sex is not the key factor driving them to polyamory. In fact, for Manham, he broke off two relationships when he realised the partners were in it for sex only. “I thought we were in a relationship,” he says. One respondent said that even though he was not in a relationship at the moment, for him, platonic love transcends sex. He calls himself ‘asexual’, and he thinks it is possible to be connected only emotionally.
When questioned about what happens at the meet-ups, Manham retorts, “Just because we resonated idea-wise, doesn’t mean that I was sexually attracted to them.” Orgies are not the point of the meet-ups, a myth most non-poly people conjure. And in sexual relations, it is unwritten convention that the onus of safe sex is on all the partners. As Manham tells me, he and his partners (there are currently three), inform each other if they have had unprotected sex.
The expectations of emotional fidelity, on the other hand, are divided among members. Exactly half the respondents said they expected it, while the other half said they did not.
One issue that has yet to come up for most of them — given that the majority are in the 26-40 years age bracket — is the question of children. Will anything change then? Manham isn’t sure. And neither were some of the others. One of them, a young computer engineer in his early 30s, who guards his privacy ferociously as he is unsure of his workplace’s reactions, says he is now under pressure from his family to get married, settle down, have children.
“They look at my polyamory relationships as a ‘macho’ thing and want me to commit to one girl and have children,” he says. “But none of my partners are ready to be married and, frankly, neither am I. And having children out of wedlock will bring in other issues.”
For now, the issues facing the group are privacy related. As they grow older, there will no doubt be new issues. But the challenge at any age will be getting the right to live their lives the way they want, without society telling them how to live.
She is 27 and lives in Bengaluru. Let’s call her Radhika. Radhika says she was 18 when she became “conscious” that she wanted to be intimate with multiple partners. In other words, that she was polyamorous. She has come out to a few friends and reactions have been mixed.
“Some are accepting, but some are sceptical, and tell me that I am being foolish and polyamory will never work.” She hasn’t told her parents yet simply because they will not understand. Even more difficult has been to find partners willing to accept polyamory. Radhika says she has been practising polyamory for only two years now, when she finally began to find the first few partners open to the idea.
The dictionary defines polyamory as ‘the practice of engaging in multiple sexual relationships with the consent of all the people involved.’ Its definition is often expanded as ‘consensual, ethical, and responsible non-monogamy’ to differentiate it from what it is often misunderstood for — a committed couple in an open relationship where each is allowed to experiment outside the relationship every now and then. In polyamory, however, there is no single committed couple — the polyamorous group is committed to every one of its members, mentally and physically.
In hushed tones
As definitions of relationships and sexualities morph dramatically across the world, India is no exception. Polyamory India is a Facebook group formed about eight years ago by the San Diego-based Rohit Juneja and has as its background image the words, ‘The capacity for human love is unlimited.’ And about a year ago, Bangalore Polycules was formed, a ‘hush-hush’ community of people who are polyamorous and meet occasionally in private spaces.
Members have come together through an underground network. In a departure from their fool-proof privacy, the group organised a public event, a screening of a French film Lutine on polyamory, in order to educate more people about it. And when earlier this year, they announced the event at the city’s famous art space, 1 Shanthiroad Studio, it led also to their name cropping up on search engines.
That is how I found them. And perhaps that’s how Basit Manham found them. At 24, Manham says he is dealing with depression. Outwardly, his lean frame exudes confidence, showing no signs of the inner turmoil. Manham, a college dropout, moved to Bengaluru from Pune about a year ago as the senior community manager of Stay Abode. He comes from an orthodox Muslim family and in 2014, when he declared himself as ‘agnostic’ on social media, he was immediately disowned by his family and has had to support himself since. A few months later, he used social media again to declare that he was polyamorous.
Two major public declarations in quick succession, and their fallout, have clearly affected him deeply. “Probably,” he says. Alone in a new place, all Manham wanted was to be with people who would not question him or judge his choices. And then he stumbled upon Bangalore Polycules.
Not polygamy
The film screening of Lutine was open to all, polyamorous or otherwise, and it was followed by a Skype Q&A with the film’s director Isabelle Broué. When asked who had organised the screening and Q&A session, the gallery representatives would only say that they got a request for the event via email and that there was a good turnout of people. A city-based filmmaker who attended it says he could not figure out who the founders of the group were.
I spoke to Broué in an email interview, and she recollected her experience of talking to audience members. One of the questions asked of her was a common one that vexes most Polycules members. Is polyamory the same as polygamy? “I gave the usual answer: that polygamy is about being ‘officially’ in an union (from the Greek word gamos) with someone, whereas in polyamory, we’re talking about intimate relationships without social recognition,” says Broué, who is polyamorous herself.
Polyamory is about equity and egality: any person in a relationship has the same rights, no matter her or his gender, sexual orientation or age. But what Broué remembers most is seeing so many women in the audience, mostly “young women”. It reaffirmed her belief that polyamory is a way to assert yourself as a free person. “It is both personal and political,” she says, “a feminist way of living your relationships.”
On the evening of the event, one of the audience members, who had attended out of curiosity, got the feeling that the “whole thing was about kids wanting to have a good time”. Otherwise why wouldn’t they be in a monogamous relationship? Radhika doesn’t agree. “I am polyamorous,” she says. “I don’t think I have a choice in the matter. Whenever I’ve been in monogamous relationships, I have resented the fact that wanting a relationship with someone else is considered taboo (unless it’s within the framework of friendship). And that has been very stifling.”
Coming out as polyamorous in today’s society is obviously still difficult, despite the growing openness. What makes it easier are groups like the Polycules. As one of its members says in an email interview, the “primary purpose of this group is to be a place where people can share and support each other.”
For Manham, it was pure serendipity that he found a local community. He has been to a few of their meet-ups and finds the members are on his wavelength. He cannot give more details — the group has requested him not to volunteer more information about it. He says, “Idea-wise, we are connected and that’s enough for me.”
A polyamorous person can choose to be in a hierarchal or non-hierarchal relationship, which, simply put, means they could have a primary partner or all partners can be of equal relevance. In Manham’s case, his first relationship broke up because his girlfriend was not okay with him seeing others. “Each of my relationships satisfies a different emotional need. I can’t satisfy someone in all ways and vice versa,” he explains.
In a monogamous relationship, one either makes do with the partner, warts and all, or tries to change the partner. “Most poly people do not change anything about a partner,” Manham says. “It is cruel to try and change someone.”
Polyamorous people are also quick to point out that their proclivity for more than one partner does not make them simply promiscuous or disloyal.
A survey conducted of the Bangalore Polycules members found that 72% inform their partners of other relationships. About 85% said they would continue with a satisfying relationship even when sex dwindles or isn’t in the equation. They cite this to indicate that their ethics overrule the assumptions of promiscuity labelled on them. The Polyamory India group says on its Facebook page: ‘It is not about free sex, casual sex, extramarital affairs and nor is it a way to make friends or pick up sex partners. If you are looking for any of these please go elsewhere.’
The Bangalore Polycules community has people of diverse gender identity: male, female and other genders. Their sexual orientations range from heterosexuals at 35%, bisexual 35% and 30% homosexuals and others. But no matter what, all of them listed understanding and communication as the most important aspects in each of their relationships. “Communication is important because there is no standard protocol as there is in monogamy,” says Radhika. “Being receptive to each other’s needs, desires and preferences is crucial.” One of the Polycules members, who identified as demi-sexual, stressed on “honest communication” as being the key to satisfying polyamorous relationships.
Still, jealousy rears its ugly head. Sitting in a crowded restaurant and eating a piping hot vada and sambar, Manham is dealing with a few issues himself. “I still feel uncomfortable when my primary partner tells me about her other relationships,” he confesses. Only uncomfortable? “No, make that jealous,” he says, after a moment of silence. “So, I tell her it is okay if she doesn’t tell me about her relationships.” But omission is not honest communication. And that is a troubling issue.
It is not that polyamorous people do not feel jealousy. “We try to handle it differently,” as Radhika says. Some of it, according to her, is about thinking from a different perspective; people conventionally are not jealous if one friend seeks other friendships. “Often, jealousy stems from unmet needs in a current relationship, so figuring out what those are could be helpful,” she says. For Manham, acknowledging the emotion and reasoning it out is a step forward. As he says, “No matter what, I will support my primary partner, even when she has any issues with her other relationships.”
Questions of fidelity
Most members of Bangalore Polycules said that sex is not the key factor driving them to polyamory. In fact, for Manham, he broke off two relationships when he realised the partners were in it for sex only. “I thought we were in a relationship,” he says. One respondent said that even though he was not in a relationship at the moment, for him, platonic love transcends sex. He calls himself ‘asexual’, and he thinks it is possible to be connected only emotionally.
When questioned about what happens at the meet-ups, Manham retorts, “Just because we resonated idea-wise, doesn’t mean that I was sexually attracted to them.” Orgies are not the point of the meet-ups, a myth most non-poly people conjure. And in sexual relations, it is unwritten convention that the onus of safe sex is on all the partners. As Manham tells me, he and his partners (there are currently three), inform each other if they have had unprotected sex.
The expectations of emotional fidelity, on the other hand, are divided among members. Exactly half the respondents said they expected it, while the other half said they did not.
One issue that has yet to come up for most of them — given that the majority are in the 26-40 years age bracket — is the question of children. Will anything change then? Manham isn’t sure. And neither were some of the others. One of them, a young computer engineer in his early 30s, who guards his privacy ferociously as he is unsure of his workplace’s reactions, says he is now under pressure from his family to get married, settle down, have children.
“They look at my polyamory relationships as a ‘macho’ thing and want me to commit to one girl and have children,” he says. “But none of my partners are ready to be married and, frankly, neither am I. And having children out of wedlock will bring in other issues.”
For now, the issues facing the group are privacy related. As they grow older, there will no doubt be new issues. But the challenge at any age will be getting the right to live their lives the way they want, without society telling them how to live.
Saturday 9 December 2017
Friday 8 December 2017
Dekh lee Teri Khudai
Movie: Kinare Kinare -1963 Singer: Talat Mehmood Music Director: Jaidev Lyricist: Nyay Sharma
The Brexit monomania built on blind faith
Tim Harford in The FT
For Christmas reading, the British political establishment might pick up something by William Golding, winner of the Nobel Prize for literature in 1983. Lord of the Flies is his most famous work, with its grim suggestion that the line between innocent children and murderers is thin. For an insight into Brexit Britain’s current predicament after a week of chaos, however, I recommend The Spire.
The book is a study of monomania. Dean Jocelin has visions of adding to his cathedral a 400-foot steeple, an expression of human prayers reaching into the heavens. But the intensity of his ambition blinds him to his other duties and threatens both the cathedral and the community around it. As Jocelin himself admits, “at the moment of vision, the eyes see nothing”.
For Christmas reading, the British political establishment might pick up something by William Golding, winner of the Nobel Prize for literature in 1983. Lord of the Flies is his most famous work, with its grim suggestion that the line between innocent children and murderers is thin. For an insight into Brexit Britain’s current predicament after a week of chaos, however, I recommend The Spire.
The book is a study of monomania. Dean Jocelin has visions of adding to his cathedral a 400-foot steeple, an expression of human prayers reaching into the heavens. But the intensity of his ambition blinds him to his other duties and threatens both the cathedral and the community around it. As Jocelin himself admits, “at the moment of vision, the eyes see nothing”.
It is impossible to miss the analogy. The UK is being driven by visionary enthusiasts for Brexit just as surely as Jocelin’s attendants had to bend to his will. Whether their visions are realistic is quite another question. Last summer David Davis, the man charged with delivering Brexit, predicted that the UK would be able to negotiate a free trade area “massively larger than the EU” within two years. That was 17 months ago. Whatever Mr Davis was gazing at back then, it wasn’t reality.
Then there are those wretched experts, who tell Jocelin that his spire is impossible. The master builder, Roger Mason, confronts him with an inescapable dilemma: if the spire’s structure is too lightweight, the next storm will blow it down; a sturdier structure will warp the cathedral beneath it, or sink into the swamp.
Jocelin berates him for lack of faith; the dean wants to have his cake and eat it. Nor can evidence dissuade him. When Mason digs into the cathedral’s non-existent foundations, showing Jocelin the soft earth writhing under the weight of the building, the zealot’s faith is strengthened. If the current cathedral stands on foundations of mud, isn’t that proof that miracles are possible?
Brexit, of course, is not only possible but almost inevitable. But the promises that have been made cannot be fulfilled any more than Jocelin’s spire could safely be built. We cannot “have access” to the single market (that is, remain in it) while also ending freedom of movement; we cannot leave the customs union without introducing a customs border. The discovery of the week — surprising to nobody who has been paying attention — is that this customs border can be located on neither land nor sea.
Jocelin ignores the experts. “I thought it would be simple,” he says. “I had to build in faith, against advice. That’s the only way.” And it proves all too easy to ignore those who might restrain him. One faithful priest, “Father Anonymous”, is too boring to notice. In another life, perhaps he would have been an economist. Others, Jocelin remarks sharply, would profit if the project was thwarted. It is true that sometimes the experts have an eye on their own finances. They may nonetheless be right.
Admittedly, pure determination sometimes finds a way. Monomaniacs change the world, sometimes for the better. One recalls the description of Steve Jobs in his early years at Apple, generating a “reality distortion field” that could redefine what was possible by “sheer mental force”.
Even The Spire was inspired not by folly, but by a triumph. For more than 15 years Golding was a teacher in the shadow of Salisbury Cathedral, whose 404-foot spire has been the tallest in the country for nearly five centuries. Perhaps long-forgotten experts once warned that it could never be built.
Whether Brexit eventually turns into something worth admiring will be for future historians to judge. For now, Golding invites us to ponder the cost. Jocelin’s ambition requires an army of builders to deliver it; that army murders an innocent person.
“Let it be so,” says Jocelin to the heavens. “Cost what you like.”
The project takes a toll in ways that blinkered Jocelin did not consider and takes too long to notice. Letters from allies go unanswered. Urgent business is postponed. The cathedral starts to die; the congregation leaves.
Observers of British politics will not find the parallel hard to discern: the centre ground has been hollowed out, the economy is faltering, respect for basic norms of truth-telling are in tatters, and the union itself is under strain.
Jocelin slowly realises the toll his project is taking on those around him, but since he is doing the work of God, any price must be worth paying. British politicians obey the will not of God, but of the British people as expressed in a referendum. It seems to amount to the same thing.
In the end, Jocelin is stripped of his job and his dignity. The long-predicted storm comes. Reality asserts itself. The vision, the visionary and the spire itself crack under the strain.
“I thought I was doing a great work,” Jocelin confesses. “And all I was doing was bringing ruin and breeding hate.”
And yet the spire does not fall. That is where Golding leaves us: the project cannot go on, but it cannot be undone. Disaster hangs in the air. “Has it fallen yet?” asks the stricken Jocelin. Not yet.
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