Monday, August 22, 2011

Arundhati roy

"Is corruption just a matter of legality, of financial irregularity and bribery, or is it the currency of a social transaction in an egregiously unequal society, in which power continues to be concentrated in the hands of a smaller and smaller minority? Imagine, for example, a city of shopping malls, on whose streets hawking has been banned. A hawker pays the local beat cop and the man from the municipality a small bribe to break the law and sell her wares to those who cannot afford the prices in the malls. Is that such a terrible thing? In future will she have to pay the Lokpal representative too?"
- Arundhati roy in an article she wrote in "The Hindu"  dissing Anna Hazare's protest.  

That in a nutshell is prototype of all the argument Arundhati Roy has put forward. Devoid of logic, an abundant use of the different words meaning poor people without suggesting even remotely good to them and  the Anti India statement -though this time the last bit might not be true. Just this time.

What she essential says bribery is a great leveler in our unequal society because hawkers can pay bribe  and like most sentences from Ms. Roy it doesnt even involve convoluted logic to break her argument -  the big shopping mall owner can pay much larger amounts than the hawkers so corruption will ensure the hawkers get bull dozed out. 

Infact, that would be the problem with corruption. That it ensures an "egregiously unequal society" remains so. 

But Roy writes and has been writing with this sort of lack of logic for a decade and half and thinks she can get away by just including the word minority, people and a bucket load of flowery language and What more - She does get away.

Now, I dont know where I stand regarding Anna Hazare's protest for the Lokpal bill and I havent had time to even scrap through wiki entry but this piece makes me think may be it should be supported. You know the logic there? Anything Arundhati roy supports would be anti- India and reverse might also be true. If she rejects an idea it must be good for India. 

That logic.

6 comments:

  1. I stopped reading the article after that particular argument of hers.

    The sad thing is the govt of the day in not much brighter than the dumbwit (with exceptional language skills) that Arundhati is.

    The latest from the politicians is that they are considering a strong anti-corruption bill for the lower reaches of the system (the police wallah at the street corner) while making it easier for the Kalmadi's to siphon off millions.

    This is what is going to happen if people are going to vote for protectors of their OBC status, NREGA money, Mecca subsidy etc.

    Much worse than the Indian Cricket team in England :(

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  2. Yeah, I thought it was a skewed argument (if you can call it that) too. I sometimes pity Hazare..He not only has to deal with the actual issue of corruption and the bull-headed Government, but also nitwits.

    Kaushik, exceptional language skills? The woman relies, not on her language skils, but on shock value to sell her wares - including the quoted (il)logic.

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  3. Kaushik: "The latest from the politicians is that they are considering a strong anti-corruption bill for the lower reaches of the system (the police wallah at the street corner) while making it easier for the Kalmadi's to siphon off millions.
    " - something is better than nothing no :)

    LG: Pity us the people too, no? i mean arundhati is the bane of freedom of speech - something we need to tolerate with great difficulty.

    And I am not 100% sure abt Arundhati Roy's motivation - Publicity? Book Sales? real love for communism? or is she an agent of China?

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  4. As far as Anna or the general public is concerned, lets see how long this entire facade of fight against corruption lasts. If the execution of the lokpal bill being agreed to is good, it would be awesome. But we have not exactly set the trail blazing with our executions have we?

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  5. she will soon write a cliff's notes book: 'the bribe (not) of small things' ;-)

    - s.b.

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  6. Viswajith.k.n:
    Some have doubts that the current form of 'jan' lokpal bill even executed well would lead to some random people getting loads of power -> more corruption.

    otherwise, RTI which I was utterly skeptical of has yielded good results inspite of every step by govt to make RTI useless, so ...

    S.B: book? i thought these days she only blogs and writes articles in guardian!

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