I have been writing about the downward slide of our politics, economics and society since Bush’s ascension to the throne.So, I was in for a rude wake up when I visited a friend’s house three weeks ago for dinner.His guest for the occassion was a businessman from India who had worked with my friend for the past twenty odd years in manufacturing related businesses. They seem to have developed quite a rapport and have managed to prosper together.
During our dinner, conversation was mostly about what outsourcing is doing to U.S. employment in IT and manufacturing.On this issue, both my friend and his guest said that they have devised a strategy for their companies that preserves the high end jobs in design, marketing and sales in the U.S. while India provides the day to day support in back office work, accounting and manufaturing.This kind of a division of labor, they feel makes them more efficient and responsive to their customers.Because they have been doing it for more than two decades quite successfully, I could not raise any objections. As to its universal applicability, I do not have the faintest.
After our dinner,our talk naturally turned to politics and here is where the Indian gentleman surprised me.He said that Bush is probably the most popular foreign leader in India right now followed by ( get this!) Sharon. This is because the Indian people who have been targets of terror for a long time have gravitated to their natural allies against the terrorists who are mainly Muslims.He also said that the kind of deceptions Bush has practised are necessary if one wants to succeed against the terrorists.
If this is any indication of how the world is going to be aligned, I think both India and China are going to line up against the Islamic countries on the U.S. side.For good or ill, this seems to be the new world order, if you will.
What a surprise it is that someone actually likes Bush!
The new world order: Hindu vs Muslim, Jew vs Muslim, Christian vs non-Christian. Capitalists uber alles.
I will not start the debate on which percentage are Muslims, but I can state without reservation that the dinner guest does not speak for all the Hindus. Or the Jains, or the Parsis or Jews or Christians or Buddhists or Zoroasterians, Animists, oh my fingers are tired.
Go have dinner with more people from South Asia. Odds are you will be in for a pleasant surprise 😉
I would like to make a small correction.India has 1 billion people 80% of which are Hindus,nearly 10% Muslims,5% Christians and the rest are distributed among Buddhists, Jains, Parsis,Sikhs etc.
From what the guest at my friends told me it seems that the Hindus are now seeing Bush and Sharon as their allies against Muslims.Part of the histroy of India has been that it was invaded for many centuries by Muslims and ruled by the Mogul dynasties.That is the root of the resentment against Muslims. Now when the Hindus see that many Arabs, including the Palestinian Hamas movement are sending Jihadists to create terror in kashmir, the old historic resentments are coming to the surface.It is no secret that the Hindus in India are seeing the iron hand of Sharon as the correct way of dealing with Muslims and India’s growing alliance with Israel militarily and economically are a result of that feeling.
I am not an expert in these matters but am just relaying the very strong feelings this particular gentleman conveyed to me about both Bush and Sharon.
I think this is worth knowing simply because of India’s potential as a future economic power and quite possibly a military power along with China.
But I was writing for an afternoon audience.
And I would rather argue about whether coffee came from Yemen or Ethiopia than how many Indians are Muslims versus Hindus.
Yes there are some Hindus who are as pro-crusade as any American politican could wish for, however the population of India, even those who are Hindus, are not a monolith.
Indian society, Indian anything, regardless of religion, takes complexity to an art form not dreamed of in Washington’s philosophy. The opinions of US politicians of the Raj will have some differences with those of its victims, both Muslim and Hindu, even those who may outwardly yearn for the good old days of Holocaust (yes, the east had one. It is called Partition, and I promise you that you do not want to get me started on any of these subjects.)
with a few observations from someone who is not Indian, nor Hindi, nor Muslim, but has a deep appreciation for Indian culture and… agrees with Ductape that one wealthy businessman does not a “trend” make.
First of all, most of the Hindu’s in India practice yoga as a path to enlightened spirituality. The practice of yoga and the tenets contained therein do not jive with hating Muslims and appreciating killers like Sharon and Bush. Sure, some people, most likely those from a higher caste (a whole other discussion about why views in India are not monolithic) who have much to defend monetarily by close relations with the US corporations, may indeed hold hatred for Muslims, but it rarely as simple as we would like it to be.
For a bit of background on religion in India, from the Library of Congress:
There is a hell of a lot more going on in India than just “Muslims are bad and terrorists”.
Hey, I know a Canadian who likes Bush too… does that mean that ALL 33 million of us feel the same way? Nope. Take it for what it’s worth. This guy seems to be, not so much religious, as corporatist. Same as Bush.
Since my dinner at my friend’s I have done some legwork on this.I have learnt that in an opinion survey of Indians,more than 65% strongly favor Bush’s policies in the Middle East and nearly 70% favor those of Sharon.That cannot be true if only a few corporate bigwigs are supporters of Bush and Sharon.
We cannot ignore the centuries-old enmity between Hindus and Muslims.Even a man as erudite and expatriate as V.S.Naipaul has talked about the Muslim Middle East as an Area of Darkness.
( See for example, V.S.Naipaul:”Among the Believers”, an Islamic Journey)
China and Russia also have problems with their domestic Islamic minorities, the Uighurs and Chechens.I expect them to form a coalition with Bush and Sharon in a worldwide “crusade” against Muslims.
Naipaul himself has called it “expanding the boundaries of civilization against barbarism”.
I want to make it clear that I do not share the views of the gentleman from India or those of Naipaul.I am simply stating what to me is irrefutable evidence that we are in the middle of a war of civilizations, as Prof.Huntington has called it,with the Islamic world on one side and the Christian, Hindu , Judaic and Sinic civilizations on the other.Bush and Sharon are the recipients of admiration from their Hindu and Sinic counterparts.This may very well lead to armageddon unless wise counsel prevails.
There is a clash of civilizations, and it will lead to “Armageddon” simply because the world has treated the US like a diabetic in denial treats a foot ulcer.
Now Huntington and ilk like to define it as Muslims vs the rest of the world, but it is more complicated than that.
I am as fond as anybody, fonder than anybody here, certainly, of slinging around phrases like the “unslakable American thirst for Muslim blood” but I do not deceive myself that if (insert deity that believes in you here) had put Hindus or Jews or Reformed Primitive Shinto-Episcopalians on top of the sand under which said deity had placed Amrika’s oil, it would be unslakable thirst for RPSE, Jew or Hindu blood.
So that is a big factor there.
Another giant: Nations recovering (or trying to) from colonization. That covers quite a swath of earth.
Those interested can read up on the Raj and Hindu-Muslim conflict.
And another big factor. Quite independent and at the same time interdependent, go figure, of all this are those gentle twin zephyrs of Mendel and Math. When we see evidence of the demographic transitions in the west, occurring, as it does, just as the sun is setting on the last few centuries’ fluke of western military domination, that is going to be good for a few explosions, too.
Now consider the fact that even this morning, when the population of India alone was a scant 1 billion, China and the Indian subcontinent now account for over half the people on earth, and both enjoy rising economic stars, and while US may have made an art form of greed as Asia has of civilization, do not think that Asians are greed-free.
The poster who applied the “c” word was right on. Even if we accept your poll, for the sake of argument, and agree to the preposterous notion that 65% of Indian Hindus think Ariel Sharon is da bomb, this has more to do with money and a moment than ideology.
People read of the Gujarat massacres and think oh India is all like that, and they read of the Shiv Senas and Bajrang Dals tearing up Valentine displays and they go to the Kashmir boards and for the first time learn what a flame war really is, and they read a poll of businessmen running call centers in Chennai and the last thing that they think of are 100 year old twin brothers who have been feuding for eighty years.
I am not explaining this very well, probably because it cannot be explained, but you will notice that so far the combined efforts of militant Hindus and Washington have been unsuccessful in purchasing the Indian army in order to deploy them as expendables in the crusade lands.
Your knowledge of India far surpasses mine but I would like to point out one thing.The Indian Government and the Israeli Government are spending vast sums of money to combat what they perceive as a common menace.Vladimir Putin has joined the fray by calling for increased cooperation with the U.S.,China, India and Israel in combating terrorism. And the more closely India becomes allied with the U.S. economically, the more closely its policies will resemble those of a genuine U.S. satellite.In fact, like our own Southern Strategy, Hindus do not need anyone to tell them how to hate the Muslims.They do it by reflex.
I,for one, am not surprised by the high regard Indians hold for Sharon.It is called pragmatic survival instinct.
on general principle and for security reasons.
Yes, they are happy to have US (Sharon’s piggybank cum Sugar Daddy) stuff RAW’s coffers and wreak more havoc in Occupied Kashmir, and Romania et al are happy to host Amrika’s torture chambers, and Juan Lopez, recently of outer Oaxaca, is happy to wash dishes in Joe Chang’s restaurant for $4 an hour, what I am saying is that these things, added to all the factors in previous post, do not add up to good news and lasting partnerships with US.
They add up to as you say, in politer language, fear and dollahoism in the short term, and in the long term, well, Mr. Danger has decreed that in the future we will all be dead.
He, of course, has bunker access. He just meant you and me. And the Indian dinner guest.