text: I was watching a trailer from ‘The world before Her’ where a lady chastises young girls for being interested in careers and then asks a resounding question ‘Have we become that western?’ Is having a career or leaving the hearth something the western culture has taught us? When someone talks about western culture, how much do they understand what the west stands for?
  Do they know that there are enough zealots in the west who want to ‘shelter’ their women from the bad world outside? Puritans who are more conservative than the Indian pundits who ostracize the west. Well I am not trying to weigh who is more conservative. The western civilization has their own culture, ideas and problems. Anything that is deemed bad or has to be proved bad is from the western culture. The so called problem of homosexuality is western culture because Indians were ‘never homosexuals’. Scoff! We have been influenced by the west as much as we have been influenced by the Arabs, Mughals, Chinese and all other civilizations that we have traded, interacted or been ruled by and they have been influenced by us in equal measure.
  I recently saw a movie where the film hero has to choose between an Indian girl and his western girlfriend. Can you guess which girl would cheat on him leave him so that he is free to make the ‘right’ choice? Of course its the the western woman, because that’s all they do. They cheat and get divorced. While the proper Indian girl would wear a salwar and occasionally jeans when she has to be modern. She would also worship said hero and fast for him.
  If the ideas about the west are all fueled from the movies that Hollywood churns out. Can you imagine the ridiculous ideas the west or the east would get by watching Bollywood movies or TV shows. They would think that all Indian women are dressed in shining glitter when they sleep, cook or plot revenge. They would believe that Indians react a minimum of three times to any mildly shocking incident since the camera pans the actors face at least three times with a background music of dish… dish… dish. They would think that ‘all’ Indian women have no other goal in life than get married and wear make up and jewelery. They would be led to believe that all of India breaks into dance and song at the drop of the hat or dandiya for that matter. The girl who would be covered from head to toe in the hot Indian city would suddenly be dancing wearing skimpy clothes in Switzerland. How she got there would be a great Indian mystery.
  There are people in the west that stereotype Indians and we would scream racism but what about when we stereotype the west. I have seen blatant racism in India or racist attitudes sometimes within our race under the guise of caste. So what is this culture that we uphold or is it just an excuse to maintain status quo? The western women dress in skimpy outfits and Indians women are covered. But did you know that the idea of the blouse comes from the west? We were pretty much blouse less under the saree and clothes back then was a more practical idea than an instrument for upholding one’s virtue.
  Here is a thought, let us stop blaming the west or for that matter blindly aping the west. It is not about being rigid and thinking that our own way of life is above all else. Indian culture is inclusive and has always been changing and been in constant flux. If we think something is the problem let us not look at external entities as the cause, we are ourselves to blame and when we realize that a lot of the problems that plague India like rape, child abuse, casteism are Indian problems and require Indian solutions. Blaming the west or any other part of world will not solve it for us.
  Then, only we can act & solve the problems. Blame-game never sorts any issues, rather makes success/progress tough…
  Its ridiculous when they say that rape has increased because of western culture?? You pointed an apt problem……..
  Domestic violence, rape….are acts that are purely the worst of human action. In the anger of the moment, a person isn’t thinking on anything else but what they themselves think.
  I find India really interesting though..still in the 21st century: such extremes of highly educated, entrepreneurial and creative folks vs. people..who still operate according to caste system, very extreme (hopefully increasingly minority) patriarchical attitudes concerning marriage based on the honour system, etc.
  Unfortunately I think the Internet which can help educate, can also debase understanding of innocent people because of porn, defamation, etc.
  We have become “Westernized”. Don’t you think that’s a fact that cannot be denied? Not blaming them for our problems, but we have gone ahead with selective adoption and have been left confused. We need to change ourselves, solve our indigenous issues and get out of the rut we seem to be in.
  We are a confused lot, that is for sure. I am not sure if what we are is western almost the entire world seems to be becoming more homogenized. All of us looking and thinking similarly with our own characteristic and nationalistic differences.
  At one end we have us and the coming generations who think this is so normal. And the other end we have insane politicos who still think communicating in english is so damn western! Sigh!
  There is one group of people that think that they need to ape. But there is this other group who thinks otherwise and its time for this group to emerge. The awakening.
  The only reason that the ape group was prominent was that the other group thought it best to stay in the shadows. Ape group is a dying breed.
  We always like to blame somebody else for our own problems. Whether it is a major problem or a minor problem, our focus is not on solving the problem, but on finding a scapegoat other than ourselves.
  A very good post Anju. Gender inequality is another demon we need to fight back home, I like how you have written about Indians conveniently blaming the west for anything we find evil or simply don’t understand and the bit on west getting bizzare ideas about Indians based on bollywood is hilarious.
  Thanks Jyoti. I agree but I find gender inequality in varying degrees almost everywhere in the world.
  
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  We along with a few teachers at school bought tickets to see Riverdance from Ireland recently. The narration, naturally, was in Chinese which made for an unusual combination of Celtic singing and dancing with Mandarin narration. It felt a little like the 1990’s but was impressively state of the art for the Chinese audience.
  
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