The Glass Room

Samuel had been bed ridden for the past month. His family was standing around him, struggling to smile with hopelessness in their eyes. Eyelids were pulling shut and Samuel drifted away from consciousness. It was suddenly peaceful, like flowing with a river current. Distant pulses were felt and Samuel heard shouts asking him to wake up. But he liked the river more and kept drifting away. Eventually he hit the shore and found himself in a dark place. It was pitch dark and he could not see anything.

Samuel moved ahead until he hit the wall. Passing his hand over, he found it was like glass. He followed the wall in one direction and kept going on. After a while, feeling dizzy, he sat down on the floor. Removing his shoes and placing them against the wall, he slowly went around the walls once more. Minutes passed before his legs hit the shoes. Now, Samuel was sure he was in a square shaped room with glass walls. He then went on to search the floor and found that it was made of glass too. After hours of futile searching and eventually giving up on means of escape, Samuel sat down and leaned against the wall.

He started recollecting his life on earth. The last year was the most painful. After being diagnosed with liver cancer, the chemotherapy sessions seemed endless and he hated treating hospitals as his home. The last year was very frustrating for two reasons – one being the disease itself and the other being the repercussions of diagnosis. As a positive person, weeks after diagnosis, he figured that he could live longer if he forgot he had a problem in the first place. But his wife, kids and parents went on consoling him with a look of pitiful mercy. As the news spread, more relatives and infinite consoling stretched time by so much that he wanted to die right then.

He liked it in here, this room, dark and silent, felt nice after so many moments of torture. He recalled other such moments, like the numerous fights with his wife when he couldn’t attend his own son’s graduation and his late hours at work. Suddenly he heard a sound and a clank of metal. The silence made the sound echo for a long time. Finally locating the source of sound, he found a plate of fruits. Moving aside the plate, he checked the floor for any trap doors. Finding none, he went on to enjoy his meal. He kept the clean plate near him lest the plate should disappear, he could escape too.

He picked up his thoughts from where he left off and drooled on his misfortunes. After his third meal, with three plates by his side, he remembered the first time he met Elle. He knew that she would be his wife once he laid his eyes on her that very first time. He recalled their wedding in California and their honeymoon in Austria. Then Stefan came along and Samuel still remembered those tiny fingers brushing against his rough palm. Every day that Stefan grew, Samuel grew with him. When Mathew was born five years later, the house was perfect and seemed too good a dream to live in.

Feeling the room less darker, Samuel woke up with a surprise. He told himself that this could be because his eyes have become adjusted to total darkness and then went back to his musings. As years rolled on, he remembered the day when Stefan came home with his job offer and how they all celebrated that night. Few years later, Mathew was awarded a scholarship to pursue his degree at Carnegie Melon University. The house had felt strange without all the noises. Samuel and Elle grew accustomed to the lonely house as time wore on. Then came Stefan’s wedding followed by Mathew’s six years later. A month before he was diagnosed with cancer, he had become a Granddad.

Scanning the room, Samuel was now pretty sure that the room was dimly lit. The glass panes on the floor, walls and the ceiling were radiating light. Now he could see a door in the opposite corner of the room from where he was standing. The door had no knob and the door frame was very thin, which made it impossible for him to detect the door during his initial scanning. Samuel pushed the door and a bright light hit on his face. Hearing a voice nearby, he could make out a figure standing next to him a few feet away. The figure introduced itself as Bob and handed Samuel a cooling glass.

“It will help you adjust to the bright sorroundings.”

“Where am I? And what was that room?”

“You are now in heaven. That room is called the Glass Room. It was installed a few years ago.”

“What for?”

“Mankind has advanced by leaps and bounds through the last century. While technology and everything else made life easier for man, it also reduced the effort required to earn an identity. The availability of ample free time led to increased dissatisfaction and frustration which in turn led people to focus more on their losses and their misfortunes than their gains and on their fortunes.

That room is made of special glass which echoes a soul’s feelings about his experience on earth. Once the soul starts recognising his past fortunes and starts appreciating the fact that he had lived on earth, the room will grow brighter and will reveal the door.”

“I was of the opinion that one’s actions are enough for getting an entrance pass to heaven.”

“They are very important. But tell me how will the heaven be if its full of disgruntled and dissatisfied people who are good at heart. The fuel source for the lights in heaven is the degree of contentment of the residing souls.”

“Interesting”

“Anyways, welcome to heaven and I will now give you a quick tour. After that I will take you to your friends and family.”

Looking all around like a kid in a candy store, Samuel silently followed Bob into the invisible palaces in the clouds. 

Thief in a Suit

“A Government is the most dangerous threat to man’s rights: it holds a legal monopoly on the use of physical force against legally disarmed victims.” – Ayn Rand

Story 1:

Ram is the father of two children and husband of a beautiful wife, Janaki. This family is the perfect example of an ordinary middle class family. Ram works as a Manager in a reputed construction firm while Janaki is a loyal house wife. Working 6 hours a week and 8 hours a day, Ram earns an average of Rs. 25,000 per month and the family stays in a rented flat.

Scenario 1:

One day, a robber visits the house, sees the family asleep, but Ram and Janaki are awake. Seeing the gun pointed at them, they plead to leave the family alone and that they will give whatever he wants. The robber asks Ram to hand in all the cash and the jewellery and put them all in a bag for him. After he got what he wanted, the thief left the house. Ram reports the incident and the description of the robber to the police. Luckily, he had insured the jewellery, but the cash was not.

Answer this question: Who is the bad guy?

Scenario 2:

One day, a man knocks on the door, dressed as a courier guy. Janaki opens the door, and the man enters. Also, 5-6 people who were hiding in the staircase entered while the courier fellow had a knife pointed at Janaki. The children are scared, but obey their father’s order to stay in the room. The courier fellow introduced himself as Mohan and said that he wanted to have a chat with the couple. He reveals that he controls this area, and he takes a share from all the area residents for their own protection. Mohan tells Hari that looking at the house and the family, he assumes that Ram will be earning around 30,000 per month and that 20% (Rs. 7,500) should be given to him, first week of every month. Once Hari handed the money over, Mohan tells him that “If you go to the police, lets just say that we know where your children are studying.” All the men leave the house.

Who is the bad guy?

Scenario 3:

Ram’s salary was reduced by 10%. Though his cost to the company figure remained the same, the amount that eventually reached Ram was reduced by 10%. The company explains that they handle their employees’ income tax, so that the employees need not worry about the income tax individually.

Who is the bad guy?

Income tax is the annual charge levied on an individual’s earned income. Behind any action, there should be a motive, which in turn is powered by an idea. If we simplify the concept of “income tax”, the Government tells Ram that he owes the Government a certain percentage of his income. Just imagine, that you earn 10,000 bucks on your own, for which you sweated so hard. And then someone comes to you and says that you have to give him 10% of your salary. What would your reaction be?

There are different types of taxation and taxation is one of the primary revenue streams for the Government. For example, property tax makes sense because you are using a piece of land on earth and you have to pay for the opportunity that you are depriving the other people of owning that particular piece of land. But, no one has the right / should have the right to your hard earned money. Income tax is synonymous for daylight robbery as it rests on this illogical premise.

Understanding

There are basically three ingredients for understanding – Intelligence, Knowledge and Wisdom. Intelligence is a man’s ability to process information. Intelligence is like a machine, a machine which can be sharpened or slackened at the control of man. However, for any machine to function, it needs some input. For this particular machine, the input is called knowledge. Knowledge is awareness of the things happening around a person. Knowledge and Intelligence are like yin and yang. One is not complete without the other. The machine is useless without the input and the input is useless without a machine to process the input. The output of this machine called Intelligence is Wisdom. Wisdom is generated when one possesses information regarding the events surrounding him and the intelligence used to process the information he gathers from surroundings. However, many are not aware of the interdependency between knowledge and intelligence, in many instances; they are misunderstood to be the same. Hence, in today’s age, everyone is under the impression that reading newspapers and watching news channels helps them gather wisdom. However, those are merely channels to gather knowledge. Only when one processes the world events and interconnects them on a global scale, does he actually gain wisdom.

Wisdom is a journey rather than a one stop gas station. It requires a certain amount of silent introspection to draw upon the knowledge and to intelligently connect the dots. One’s quest for life is to move from innocence to wisdom while earning one’s living. In todays fast pace world, can one slow down to complete this journey called wisdom, remains to be seen. 

Money - The root of all good

Here is an excerpt from the novel "Atlas Shrugged" written by Ayn Rand. The following speech is conveyed by a character called Francisco D'Anconia in the novel. I thought it to be an interesting read and wanted to share it with you.

"You think that money is the root of all evil?" said Francisco d'Anconia. "Have you ever asked what is the root of money? Money is a tool of exchange, which can't exist unless there are goods produced and men able to produce them. Money is the material shape of the principle that men who wish to deal with one another must deal by trade and give value for value. Money is not the tool of the moochers, who claim your product by tears, or of the looters, who take it from you by force. Money is made possible only by the men who produce. Is this what you consider evil?

"When you accept money in payment for your effort, you do so only on the conviction that you will exchange it for the product of the effort of others. It is not the moochers or the looters who give value to money. Not an ocean of tears not all the guns in the world can transform those pieces of paper in your wallet into the bread you will need to survive tomorrow. Those pieces of paper, which should have been gold, are a token of honor--your claim upon the energy of the men who produce. Your wallet is your statement of hope that somewhere in the world around you there are men who will not default on that moral principle which is the root of money, Is this what you consider evil?

"Have you ever looked for the root of production? Take a look at an electric generator and dare tell yourself that it was created by the muscular effort of unthinking brutes. Try to grow a seed of wheat without the knowledge left to you by men who had to discover it for the first time. Try to obtain your food by means of nothing but physical motions--and you'll learn that man's mind is the root of all the goods produced and of all the wealth that has ever existed on earth.

"But you say that money is made by the strong at the expense of the weak? What strength do you mean? It is not the strength of guns or muscles. Wealth is the product of man's capacity to think. Then is money made by the man who invents a motor at the expense of those who did not invent it? Is money made by the intelligent at the expense of the fools? By the able at the expense of the incompetent? By the ambitious at the expense of the lazy? Money is made--before it can be looted or mooched--made by the effort of every honest man, each to the extent of his ability. An honest man is one who knows that he can't consume more than he has produced.'

"To trade by means of money is the code of the men of good will. Money rests on the axiom that every man is the owner of his mind and his effort. Money allows no power to prescribe the value of your effort except the voluntary choice of the man who is willing to trade you his effort in return. Money permits you to obtain for your goods and your labor that which they are worth to the men who buy them, but no more. Money permits no deals except those to mutual benefit by the unforced judgment of the traders. Money demands of you the recognition that men must work for their own benefit, not for their own injury, for their gain, not their loss--the recognition that they are not beasts of burden, born to carry the weight of your misery--that you must offer them values, not wounds--that the common bond among men is not the exchange of suffering, but the exchange of goods. Money demands that you sell, not your weakness to men's stupidity, but your talent to their reason; it demands that you buy, not the shoddiest they offer, but the best that your money can find. And when men live by trade--with reason, not force, as their final arbiter--it is the best product that wins, the best performance, the man of best judgment and highest ability--and the degree of a man's productiveness is the degree of his reward. This is the code of existence whose tool and symbol is money. Is this what you consider evil?

"But money is only a tool. It will take you wherever you wish, but it will not replace you as the driver. It will give you the means for the satisfaction of your desires, but it will not provide you with desires. Money is the scourge of the men who attempt to reverse the law of causality--the men who seek to replace the mind by seizing the products of the mind.

"Money will not purchase happiness for the man who has no concept of what he wants: money will not give him a code of values, if he's evaded the knowledge of what to value, and it will not provide him with a purpose, if he's evaded the choice of what to seek. Money will not buy intelligence for the fool, or admiration for the coward, or respect for the incompetent. The man who attempts to purchase the brains of his superiors to serve him, with his money replacing his judgment, ends up by becoming the victim of his inferiors. The men of intelligence desert him, but the cheats and the frauds come flocking to him, drawn by a law which he has not discovered: that no man may be smaller than his money. Is this the reason why you call it evil?

"Only the man who does not need it, is fit to inherit wealth--the man who would make his own fortune no matter where he started. If an heir is equal to his money, it serves him; if not, it destroys him. But you look on and you cry that money corrupted him. Did it? Or did he corrupt his money? Do not envy a worthless heir; his wealth is not yours and you would have done no better with it. Do not think that it should have been distributed among you; loading the world with fifty parasites instead of one, would not bring back the dead virtue which was the fortune. Money is a living power that dies without its root. Money will not serve the mind that cannot match it. Is this the reason why you call it evil?

"Money is your means of survival. The verdict you pronounce upon the source of your livelihood is the verdict you pronounce upon your life. If the source is corrupt, you have damned your own existence. Did you get your money by fraud? By pandering to men's vices or men's stupidity? By catering to fools, in the hope of getting more than your ability deserves? By lowering your standards? By doing work you despise for purchasers you scorn? If so, then your money will not give you a moment's or a penny's worth of joy. Then all the things you buy will become, not a tribute to you, but a reproach; not an achievement, but a reminder of shame. Then you'll scream that money is evil. Evil, because it would not pinch-hit for your self-respect? Evil, because it would not let you enjoy your depravity? Is this the root of your hatred of money?

"Money will always remain an effect and refuse to replace you as the cause. Money is the product of virtue, but it will not give you virtue and it will not redeem your vices. Money will not give you the unearned, neither in matter nor in spirit. Is this the root of your hatred of money?

"Or did you say it's the love of money that's the root of all evil? To love a thing is to know and love its nature. To love money is to know and love the fact that money is the creation of the best power within you, and your passkey to trade your effort for the effort of the best among men. It's the person who would sell his soul for a nickel, who is loudest in proclaiming his hatred of money--and he has good reason to hate it. The lovers of money are willing to work for it. They know they are able to deserve it.

"Let me give you a tip on a clue to men's characters: the man who damns money has obtained it dishonorably; the man who respects it has earned it.

"Run for your life from any man who tells you that money is evil. That sentence is the leper's bell of an approaching looter. So long as men live together on earth and need means to deal with one another--their only substitute, if they abandon money, is the muzzle of a gun.

"But money demands of you the highest virtues, if you wish to make it or to keep it. Men who have no courage, pride or self-esteem, men who have no moral sense of their right to their money and are not willing to defend it as they defend their life, men who apologize for being rich--will not remain rich for long. They are the natural bait for the swarms of looters that stay under rocks for centuries, but come crawling out at the first smell of a man who begs to be forgiven for the guilt of owning wealth. They will hasten to relieve him of the guilt--and of his life, as he deserves.

"Then you will see the rise of the men of the double standard--the men who live by force, yet count on those who live by trade to create the value of their looted money--the men who are the hitchhikers of virtue. In a moral society, these are the criminals, and the statutes are written to protect you against them. But when a society establishes criminals-by-right and looters-by-law--men who use force to seize the wealth of disarmed victims--then money becomes its creators' avenger. Such looters believe it safe to rob defenseless men, once they've passed a law to disarm them. But their loot becomes the magnet for other looters, who get it from them as they got it. Then the race goes, not to the ablest at production, but to those most ruthless at brutality. When force is the standard, the murderer wins over the pickpocket. And then that society vanishes, in a spread of ruins and slaughter.

"Do you wish to know whether that day is coming? Watch money. Money is the barometer of a society's virtue. When you see that trading is done, not by consent, but by compulsion--when you see that in order to produce, you need to obtain permission from men who produce nothing--when you see that money is flowing to those who deal, not in goods, but in favors--when you see that men get richer by graft and by pull than by work, and your laws don't protect you against them, but protect them against you--when you see corruption being rewarded and honesty becoming a self-sacrifice--you may know that your society is doomed. Money is so noble a medium that is does not compete with guns and it does not make terms with brutality. It will not permit a country to survive as half-property, half-loot.

"Whenever destroyers appear among men, they start by destroying money, for money is men's protection and the base of a moral existence. Destroyers seize gold and leave to its owners a counterfeit pile of paper. This kills all objective standards and delivers men into the arbitrary power of an arbitrary setter of values. Gold was an objective value, an equivalent of wealth produced. Paper is a mortgage on wealth that does not exist, backed by a gun aimed at those who are expected to produce it. Paper is a check drawn by legal looters upon an account which is not theirs: upon the virtue of the victims. Watch for the day when it bounces, marked, 'Account overdrawn.'

"When you have made evil the means of survival, do not expect men to remain good. Do not expect them to stay moral and lose their lives for the purpose of becoming the fodder of the immoral. Do not expect them to produce, when production is punished and looting rewarded. Do not ask, 'Who is destroying the world? You are.

"You stand in the midst of the greatest achievements of the greatest productive civilization and you wonder why it's crumbling around you, while you're damning its life-blood--money. You look upon money as the savages did before you, and you wonder why the jungle is creeping back to the edge of your cities. Throughout men's history, money was always seized by looters of one brand or another, whose names changed, but whose method remained the same: to seize wealth by force and to keep the producers bound, demeaned, defamed, deprived of honor. That phrase about the evil of money, which you mouth with such righteous recklessness, comes from a time when wealth was produced by the labor of slaves--slaves who repeated the motions once discovered by somebody's mind and left unimproved for centuries. So long as production was ruled by force, and wealth was obtained by conquest, there was little to conquer, Yet through all the centuries of stagnation and starvation, men exalted the looters, as aristocrats of the sword, as aristocrats of birth, as aristocrats of the bureau, and despised the producers, as slaves, as traders, as shopkeepers--as industrialists.

"To the glory of mankind, there was, for the first and only time in history, a country of money--and I have no higher, more reverent tribute to pay to America, for this means: a country of reason, justice, freedom, production, achievement. For the first time, man's mind and money were set free, and there were no fortunes-by-conquest, but only fortunes-by-work, and instead of swordsmen and slaves, there appeared the real maker of wealth, the greatest worker, the highest type of human being--the self-made man--the American industrialist.

"If you ask me to name the proudest distinction of Americans, I would choose--because it contains all the others--the fact that they were the people who created the phrase 'to makemoney.' No other language or nation had ever used these words before; men had always thought of wealth as a static quantity--to be seized, begged, inherited, shared, looted or obtained as a favor. Americans were the first to understand that wealth has to be created. The words 'to make money' hold the essence of human morality.

"Yet these were the words for which Americans were denounced by the rotted cultures of the looters' continents. Now the looters' credo has brought you to regard your proudest achievements as a hallmark of shame, your prosperity as guilt, your greatest men, the industrialists, as blackguards, and your magnificent factories as the product and property of muscular labor, the labor of whip-driven slaves, like the pyramids of Egypt. The rotter who simpers that he sees no difference between the power of the dollar and the power of the whip, ought to learn the difference on his own hide-- as, I think, he will.

"Until and unless you discover that money is the root of all good, you ask for your own destruction. When money ceases to be the tool by which men deal with one another, then men become the tools of men. Blood, whips and guns--or dollars. Take your choice--there is no other--and your time is running out."

Quota System - An Accelerator of Brain Drain

Brain Drain, also known as “The human capital fight”, is the migration of skilled people from one country to another. This can be due to many reasons such as a nation’s political instability and lack of opportunities. One of the primary countries experiencing brain drain is India. Even though, its high population growth reduces the impact of this brain drain on the country’s economy, nevertheless, there is no denying that this is not happening. The situation in India is like that of a reservoir, with its population growth filling from the top, while the tap at the bottom is wide open draining the country of intellectual ability. Let us first observe one of the primary factors causing this brain drain in India.

Indian Government provides for a quota system where a percentage of posts are reserved in public and private educational institutions. First, let me explain the pretext presented by the Government as a justification for the reservation. For this, I feel that the following excerpt from Wikipedia best describes this situation.

“The underlying theory is that the under-representation of the identifiable groups is a legacy of the Indian caste system. After India gained independence, the Constitution of India listed some erstwhile groups as Scheduled Castes (SC) and Scheduled Tribes (ST). The framers of the Constitution believed that, due to the caste system, SCs and the STs were historically oppressed and denied respect and equal opportunity in Indian society and were thus under-represented in nation-building activities. The Constitution laid down 15% and 7.5% of vacancies to government aided educational institutes and for jobs in the government/public sector, as reserved quota for the SC and ST candidates respectively for a period of five years, after which the situation was to be reviewed. This period was routinely extended by the succeeding governments.

Later, reservations were introduced for other sections as well. The Supreme Court ruling that reservations cannot exceed 50% (which it judged would violate equal access guaranteed by the Constitution) has put a cap on reservations. However, there are state laws that exceed this 50% limit and these are under litigation in the Supreme Court. For example, the caste-based reservation fraction stands at 69% and is applicable to about 87% of the population in the state of Tamil Nadu.”

Usually, Indian educational institutions require a cut off mark from entrance examinations, as entry requirements. Bribing in the form of donations, “influence” factors and recommendations play a role in educational institutions bending their requirements. What is not written in the above excerpt is that under this quota system, Government actively facilitates caste differentiation. SC and ST candidates are granted admission into colleges with lower cut off marks (about 60-70%), while candidates from FC (Forward Caste) have to attain a near impossible cut off (in 90s range) to get into reputable institutions.

While this may give rise to discussions like “Government misusing power”, “Inequality disguised as Equality”, “Caste System – A guide for controlling people”, my current essay is about the basic moral principles based on the rudimentary version of right and wrong.

 A man has to earn his living and his ability is his fuel to do so. The sensible thing to do is to let man create his own world, by leaving his ability alone. The basic function of the Government is to ensure justice, i.e. by making sure that he does not disturb others and others do not disturb him. It is the highly competent men who should be encouraged to perform.

Reverting back to the issue at hand, the Tamil Nadu Government currently is encouraging incompetency under the cover that it is actually increasing equality. Let me illustrate with an example. Sam and Paul studied in the same school till the 12^th Grade in Tamil Nadu. They both want to get into an engineering college for their undergraduate degree. Sam loves studying and is eager to become a researcher in the field of Communications technology. Paul does not like reading at all, and wants to become a politician. Apparently, his dad was a politician and they insisted that he finish an undergraduate degree at least. The most popular University in Tamil Nadu are IIT, NIT and Anna University in that order. Sam unfortunately does not get the required cut off marks in the respective entrance examinations of NIT and IIT. The next most popular university is the Tamil Nadu state’s Anna University. So, Sam and Paul ended up competing among thousand others for Anna University. Sam got 96.7% while Paul secured 65.6%. The cut off marks for Anna University read something like this:

FC (Forward Caste): 98%

BC/OBC (Backward Caste): 70%

SC/ST (Scheduled Caste / Tribe): 60%

So, Sam didn’t succeed and ended up in another college, while Paul continued his Bachelor’s from Anna University. Sam secured an aggregate of 92% over 4 years of Engineering and he went on to do Masters from Carnegie Melon University and ended up settling there in the US. Paul cleared his engineering during his third attempt and went on to become a politician.

The claim of Anna University is that students like Paul should be encouraged to study further. While the initiative to spread the importance of education is noble, the act of killing competency and punishing the ones who are good because they are talented lowers all such practicing institutions to the level of barbarians in the Medieval Ages. The funniest part is that after denying the intellectuals an opportunity to function in their homeland, they turn around and say “Shame on Non Returning Indians” (NRI’s new abbreviation). Well, what do you expect? The intellectuals should suffer for their virtues ?

It isn’t obvious to the law makers that quota system is in fact a form of discrimination, and law should prohibit discriminations of any kind. But then, let’s discuss about that in another article. I feel that the entire foundation of deciding cut off marks in educational institutions like those in Tamil Nadu should be based on percentiles and percentages which measure candidate’s ability rather than their caste.

India is one of the greatest countries in the world, practicing the largest democracy and home to such cultural diversity beyond one’s imagination. Once upon a time, this was the land where knowledge flowed and universities and civilizations existed predating any historical records in existence. India won its freedom from the British rule in 1947. Has it really won freedom ? I hope to live till the day it does win its freedom from those who believe in the word “Power”.

The Hollow Oak Trees

“The greatest sin in this world is the refusal to think” – Ayn Rand.

-          A story

Since the dawn of time, there was a huge forest called Gower. Gower was the most surviving forest and was loved by all the monsoons, especially Blitz. Blitz loved the centre of Gower, which was full of tall oak trees, for it was those trees that brought the most rain for the forest. Each oak tree was so strong and so self confident that the centre of the forest felt strangely alive. All the animals and the birds there felt it too, and they call that centre Oaky. Something about those trees suggested a quality of self control that seemed almost arrogant. The elders of the forest were called Mahaans and the young trees were called Bachus.

While the rest of the forest changed over the years, the oak patch in the centre remained the same, as a fulcrum, a reference to gauge the change over time. Part of the answer to the riddle was in the grooming of the young. But it was not the whole. The other half of the answer lied in the ability of the Bachus to understand the message of their parents.

With time, Bachus grew more rebellious. Their idea of rebellion was to just do things differently from their parents’ way. They questioned every aspect of their way of living to the Mahaans, but were impatient to fully listen to the answers. As they were impatient, they wanted the shortest version of the answer, and they got that from their parents. Wisdom gave way to rules, and Bachus hated the rules even more. The origin of this mindless rebellion was the refusal to think, and this drove a wedge between the young and parents. As time wore on, the rebelling population grew in size and they called themselves Mandus. The population of Mandus grew while that of Bachus fell with time.

Mandus trimmed their branches to beautify themselves. They were tired of standing in one place and they kept shifting and dancing around the forest floor. Gradually their roots became dry and the dry parts were cut off to make the feet look more beautiful. Mahaans were ashamed of their young, and nothing they did improved the situation. In the beginning, the parents worked harder to compensate for the loss in power to pull rain. Bachus also contributed to the elders’ efforts. But, as Mahaans grew older, they became weaker and Oaky grew hotter. Then, the young started wearing sandals made from their branches, to protect their feet. As a result, they felt the high temperature, but they could not do anything as they had not stored water in their roots.

Bachus who were properly groomed were ordered to leave the forest by the Mahaans. The sight of the groomed young parting ways from the dying elders in order to live was a hard sight to watch. Over time, the wise elders died out too, leaving Oaky to hollow oak trees who were struggling to survive. The oak trees which once lived over 150 years started dying at the age of 40-50. The ones which attempted to escape to another forest did not have enough water stored in them to do so. Eventually, the oak trees were wiped out and Oaky lay barren at the centre of Gower.

Blitz, the friendly monsoon, had such fond memories of its favourite place that it never passed through Oaky again. 

Countering Terrorism

Terrorism is.... well, I think you all know what it is. You all probably know some of the popular group names, like, for example, Al Qaeda will be known among many households. What prompted me to think regarding them was not their motive. Their funding.. Well... That would be like a chase down a gopher hole. No... Its much more than that. It is to see what their fuel is. It is actually ATTENTION. Let me elucidate.

The attack on United States twin towers on 11^th September is without doubt one of the most violent acts of terrorism. But just think how long the media kept the issue alive. In my opinion, the issue is constantly kept reminded in the minds of the public. Though it is true that disasters have to be reported as soon as possible to warn the public of those names. But lets take a step back and look at the issue objectively. What did they expect when they brought down those towers? They obviously want everyone to know about it and that they were the group responsible for it. They want everyone to curl in fear thinking of the chaos that they are capable of unleashing. And for that, it requires our sanction – the public’s sanction.

“An act of evil requires the moral sanction of the victim” – Ayn Rand

Terrorists are counting on our capacity to feel fear and let it suspend our rational thinking processes of the mind. They do not wish to live and they are ready to bring down others with them, others who desire to live. The fuel that lets them survive comes precisely from our desire to live.

Now, having recognised that we are, in some monstrous form, their fuel to live, the best way to cut down terrorism is to cut down its fuel. That does not mean we have to die. No, not at all. What I am suggesting is we have to unleash the most powerful weapon to counter terrorism – INDIFFERENCE. Let me clearly explain what I mean by that word.

It does not mean we should stop retaliating using military prowess of the country under attack. No, by all means that is necessary to stop them. Violence has to be used to counter violence. But, there is another thing that we can do, one which is in our control – in the control of every human. Let us take up an example. For the same 11^th September attacks, though it has to be conveyed to everyone, that news need not necessarily be the headlines in news channels and newspapers. The headlines can be something about the mysteries of a natural wildlife reserve while the disastrous issue can be moved to the inner pages. By doing so, we become indifferent to the acts of evil.

As of today, the battle is not fought between terrorism and the public. It is fought between different terrorist groups – a battle to see who captures the headlines for the longest time – and by extension, who haunts the minds of the public the longest. And in this meaningless and senseless game, the public becomes the pawn. If we remove their actions from the front pages, we are saying that they are not the most important. This will definitely be hard for the victims’ families. But, I think they will understand that if the victims’ families insist on their loved ones’ agony capturing the public attention by taking the headlines of the media, then they are siding with the terrorists.

The capacity to feel fear for irrational whims of mad men should not be the primary concern for a household. The primary concern for every household should be their survival and well-being. This article is just one of my thoughts to convey that it is the suspension of rational thinking for fear that drives terrorism. Please do not take part in terrorism and focus on living your life.