Different countries, similar strokes
From Delhi to NYC, we experience a similarly cleaved world
“Avoid Trump Towers!” Udai told me over the phone yesterday as we coordinated our whereabouts on New York’s 5th Avenue. “There’s a little crowd there that doesn’t look pleasant.”
We are in the Big Apple at a historic time. For the first time ever, a US President has been tried and convicted of crimes. Donald Trump is his usual dramatic self after the dramatic verdict from a NY court that found him guilty on 34 counts of falsifying business records to hide payments made to a porn actress to buy her silence about a sexual encounter. On verdict day, Rahul and I derived much amusement from watching Trump make expectedly bizarre statements on TV, talking about “record levels of terrorists, the highest level we’ve ever seen of terrorists” …pouring into our country,” about NYC having “violent crime all over this city at levels that nobody’s ever seen before” while the courts focused on his trial.
As Indians, this series of dog whistles to his support base felt exceedingly familiar. Back home, voting in a seven-phase general election characterised by hate speeches and bizarre statements ended today. Minutes before we had turned on the TV, we had sniggered at the incumbent Prime Minister’s claims of being unnaturally born and about the world not knowing Gandhi before Attenborough’s eponymous film.
In the US, immigrants, terrorists and bleeding heart liberals are the ‘other’; back home in India, it is Muslims and Hindu-hating liberals.
No strangers to violence instigated by rabble-rousing right-wingers, we heeded Udai’s advice and steered clear of Trump Towers! While meeting friends later yesterday, we heard a story about how Trump employees had been asked to go and gather in the street to put up a show of support. Like college students in India were made to appear at events organised to cheer on a certain political party’s leaders during this election.
Halfway across the world, the world looks frighteningly similar, full of fissures, fake claims, counter-claims, and hardened positions.
I carry on living my life as fully as I can, even as I mourn how these political cleavages - and the drama they draw us into - distract the world from real and visceral problems. For example, right now, India’s best minds should pour energies into devising immediate and long-term solutions to protect the vulnerable from extreme heat.
But that is my simple, solution-oriented brain at work! Many friends in India have recently reminded me that policy priorities do not shift radically with political power. Among the elite in India, alongside absolute pride in India’s achievements, especially on the global stage, is a deep-seated cynicism and mistrust for the government. This is probably the same across the world.
Still, idealists like me hopefully hold on to the idea that political sensibilities and orientations matter. So, we try to support those who intend to serve the most vulnerable and needy, which I believe must be the core purpose of public service.
It’s not just me, though! I do believe that voters take both self-interest and public interest into consideration. In large democracies like the US and India, how people construct opinions is as much a function of the quality of information available as the vibrancy of public debate and dialogue. And how we engage with it!
In the age of excess information, we have all become too quick to take sides. We fail to chew on and truly process the information we receive. It is much less effort to stick to pre-decided positions than it is to engage with a variety of perspectives.
I am as guilty as anyone else in this regard. Like the venerated cow, we should all learn to chew the cud before regurgitating and relaying information to those around us. Not just in a political context but generally, too.
Last evening, as Rahul and I caught up with a dear and wise friend we have known since high school, we collectively arrived at the idea of intelligence as thoughtfulness, the tendency to listen and give pause, and the ability to process and responsibly relay information. I liked how we had delinked intelligence from education and skill, and reframed it as innate, accessible to anyone who chooses to. I mentally filed this idea of intelligence carefully. Perhaps it can emerge as an appropriate practice for an increasingly fraught world?
Wise words indeed, Mukta!
To think with compassion, from the heart, is the need of our times.
Thank you for this. Also read your Substack on the Indian Elections. The Hindu today has exit polls projecting 360 seats for NDA. So does look like we are set for another 5 years of much the same. But keen to know your thoughts on the exit polls.