Translator Reporting 1 – Aalkoottam and being 27

I bought my copy of Aalkoottam this year. And thatz ’cause the copy I had, that of my dad had started to disintegrate. Was arranging books again a few days ago when I noticed the dates on that old one.

Both of us bought it when we were 27.
And the book is by and large a bunch of random musings from people around that age.

Truth is stranger. etc.etc.

Searching ‘originality’ in the past

There is a picture drawn by a German artist in the 15th century. The context is Alexander’s India attack and he is making a brave attempt to draw an animal unknown to him. The picture shows an elephant and an infantryman. The elephant is drawn having half the height of the infantryman, with a tusk shaped like a trumpet and legs with hooves like those of a bull . The courage of this painter should indeed be admired. He tried bravely to move beyond the boundaries of the corner of the world known and accessible to him.

Man’s imagination has always wanted to soar as further as it could – in his art, in his philosophy, in his worldview. He never wanted to stay still at someplace or be to be restricted to some state of being. In fact, man’s moralities, his art was always indifferent to boundaries. Of course, he had his limitations of his times imposed on him – limitations of geography, limitations of his medium, the customs and practices he may have had to adopt in particular circumstances and particular occasions.

But to celebrate these as nationalities and cultural and social ‘identities’ would be to forget the aspirations and imaginations of those forefathers and to celebrate their limitations and misfortunes. It is a double turning back. We are not even idealizing the limitations of our times but idealizing the limitations of our forefathers who did not have our possibilities.

Long time back and under some circumstances a people grew their hair long and always carried their swords with them. When their descendants today, generations later, ignoring the reality of the times they live in, still do the same, is it a move forward or back? What about those who begin movements announcing that those rituals and ceremonies and their symbols and practices which began when an old culture began to decay, are all the which brings us national identity in the modern world. Man’s urge is to spread beyond borders and move forward with the times. To retreat from that, to make small places, to try to stand still is retrogressive – whether it is in politics, culture or art.

Protest movements have always happened in history. But they can appear as a result of both progress and retrogression. Whether they support or oppose the natural and progressive movement of history should be the criteria of understanding them and indeed, judging them. All which come wearing new colors need not show growth, many in fact show decay.

Philosophies and revisions

Marxism is a philosophy. Communism is a political system based on Marxism or so say its creators. Philosophies can have good and bad sides. They may have relevance or lack thereof at different times. But no successes or failures. In other words, it is not right to subject them to the criterion of success and failure – because they are some understandings which occur to man at some stage of evolution of mankind.

When a political system originates inspired by a philosophy the first possibility that we should think of is that this particular inspiration need not be a successful translation.

It would be more right to characterize the communism of today in the name of Lenin, rather than that of Marx. Lenin was a politician, not a philosopher. To the question whether Marxian thought could have inspired any other model other than this, the only possible answer is that of course it was possible. But for that too victory or defeat could have happened. It is also possible that a new political system inspired by Marxism could develop, revised based on the new circumstances.

The use of the word revision is conscious. Revision is necessary and to an extent inevitable for any philosophy. In a way, aren’t the philosophies that we see, largely revisions of the ones of the past? It is also not necessary for a political system to develop after a philosophy. It can go on as a philosophy living on by affecting human minds in some way, ignoring the final fates of victory and defeat which is bound to happen for its translation.

Break 3 – George Carlin on ‘it all’

I have as much authority as the Pope. I just don’t have as many people who believe it.

Frisbeetarianism is the belief that when you die, your soul goes up on the roof and gets stuck.

Here’s another question I have. How come when it’s us, it’s an abortion, and when it’s a chicken, it’s an omelette? Are we so much better than chickens all of a sudden? When did this happen; that we passed chickens in goodness? Name six ways we’re better than chickens. [brief pause] See, nobody can do it! You know why? ‘Cause chickens are decent people. You don’t see chickens hanging around in drug gangs, do you? No. You don’t see a chicken strapping some guy into a chair and hooking up his nuts to a car battery, do you? When’s the last chicken you heard about came home from work and beat the shit out of his hen, huh? Doesn’t happen… ’cause chickens are decent people.

Religion has actually convinced people … that there’s an invisible man … living in the sky … who watches everything you do, every minute of every day. And the invisible man has a special list of 10 things he does not want you to do! And if you do any of these 10 things, he has a special place, full of fire and smoke and burning and torture and anguish, where he will send you to live and suffer and burn and choke and scream and cry, forever and ever, ’til the end of time! … But he loves you! … He loves you. He loves you and he needs money! He always needs money! He’s all-powerful, all-perfect, all-knowing, all-wise, but somehow – just can’t handle money!

Try explaining Hitler to a kid.

I love and treasure individuals as I meet them, I loathe and despise the groups they identify with and belong to.

Just when I discovered the meaning of life, they changed it.

Head counts and Democracy

The history of Greece and Rome teaches us that not just monarchy but even majority rule can hinder human freedom. It was democratic Greece which ruled against Socrates. It is not necessary that a system in which, instead of one person, the majority takes decisions will be less intolerant and less cruel. If the elected representatives have supreme and unquestioned authority, they can use the same system of ‘democracy’, which brought them to power, to keep it aside.

They can bring in oligarchy and autocracy.

That is why the history of the growth of human freedom has been intolerant of not just the autocracy of the king but also of the autocracy of the majority. Ideas and institutions evolved throughout history to fight against all kinds of autocracy – Courts, Universities, Academies, the concepts of Natural Justice, Morality and Ethics, all products of wisdom and enlightenment.

Which dictator has not said that he took over power as per the wishes of the people and to fulfill their needs? In fact Hitler, Mussolini, Franco and Stalin may all have won majorities during much of their reigns. But an autocrat does not become a democrat just because he has the support of the majority. What makes democracy is the special place that minorities have in them. It is very dangerous to think that when elected representatives take over the absolute powers previously vested with kings or colonial powers, the system automatically becomes a free and democratic one. If people can be reduced to their representatives, then their representatives can also be reduced to an autocrat.

Head counting and electing representatives does exist in democracy. But democracy is much more than that. It is a realization of the values that civilization has been shaping for centuries.