An Analogy of Socialism

An economics professor at a local college made a statement that he had never failed a single student before but had once failed an entire class.

That class had insisted that socialism worked and that no one would be poor and no one would be rich, a great equalizer. The professor then said, "OK, we will have an experiment in this class on socialism. All grades would be averaged and everyone would receive the same grade so no one would fail and no one would receive an A.

After the first test, the grades were averaged and everyone got a B. The students who studied hard were upset an d the students who studied little were happy.

As the second test rolled around, the students who studied little had studied even less and the ones who studied hard decided they wanted a free ride too so they studied little. The second test average was a D! No one was happy.

When the 3rd test rolled around, the average was an F. The scores never increased as bickering, blame and name-calling all resulted in hard feelings and no one would study for the benefit of anyone else.

All failed, to their great surprise, and the professor told them that socialism would also ultimately fail because when the reward is great, the effort to succeed is great but when government takes the reward away, no one will try or want to succeed.
It could not be any simpler than that.

"You cannot legislate the poor into freedom by legislating the wealthy out of freedom. What one person receives without working for, another person must work for without receiving. The government cannot give to anybody anything that the government does not first take from somebody else. When half of the people get the idea that they do not have to work because the other half is going to take care of them, and when the other half gets the idea that it does no good to work because somebody else is going to get what they work for,that my dear friend, is about the end of any nation. You cannot multiply wealth by dividing it."

The Choas That We Are

It is getting harder and harder to fathom what is happening in our country or where we are headed. There is not one … but multiple fundamental issues ongoing and none of them seem to be addressed by anyone. The nation is at war (apparently we weren’t at one before since the interior minister just said we are like a couple of days back. perhaps the previous operations in the north were …. i dont know not worthy of the word war). There is an ongoing sugar crisis. Power and electricity are always a fundamental problem. Security threats are increasingly getting higher. Our sense of civil liberties are becoming desentisized. We as a people are absolutely not discplined in anything. We don’t have the basic civic sense that we should. And overall… more and more …people are becoming cynical in this country. Oh and of course.. the economy.. the Kerry – Lugar bill … the unemployment and lack of jobs…. etc etc etc. I could continue this list … but I am sure you get the point by now.

People.. and mostly I am talking about the high and mighty ‘political’ analysts in our country are still stuck on Musharaff. ‘He did this’ ‘He did that’ ‘He brought him’ ‘He authorized’ blah blah blah. All happened. All done. All in the past. What is happening right now is now? We simply cannot afford to continue sitting and discussing and debating and blaming people for what happened in the past. We cannot afford to stay caught up in that.

The security threat has become so horrific that schools and universities are being targetted. The twin blasts which took place in the IIUI yesterday … was beyond sad. 6 Students died. Students. The future of Pakistan. This is what is happening now. People who are concerned are getting more and more fed up with living in this country, and not out of mere whim of irritation, but this is actually getting too much. I don’t blame them. For anyone their childred are everything. And if their children are not safe…. then they will do what is necessary to protect them. The schools across the nation are closed. The federal ones are to remain closed till Sunday if I am not mistaken. Inititially the Universities and Institutes were also going to be closed .. however the decision was changed for them to remain closed on Wednesday (today) and reopen on Thursday.

The very idea of our children not being able to attend school because of a terror threat of a suicide bomber is … horrible. It goes against the idea of a ‘free’ and ’sovereign’ state. Something that we are ‘apparently’ so much concerned about for bashing the Kerry Lugar bill. (I shall not comment on the bill itself and whether we should or shouldn’t be opposed to it. I will refrain for now). But the point is … this is not the sign of a state which is Free or Sovereign.

Yesterday as I was driving home in the evening, I was listening to a show on one of the FM channels and the RJ’s were at that moment discussing this ongoing crisis only. One of them was saying  “The security which has been put in place.. the added security … is not at all a measure of suring up security. All this is doing is adding to our hassels. I was going to drop my kid to school today… and the guy who is their to protect me… started frisking me. I mean …he wasn’t even trained to do that … properly. And all he had on him was a metal detector. This is not security at all. It is in fact a lack of it.” Completely agreed. The other one was however adding that “we shouldn’t give in to the Taliban or the militants behind these threats because this is exactly what they want. They want us to stop functioning as a nation. After the schools they will say the work places will be targetted and then our offices will be closed for the same reasons.”  

While I agree with him in principal… I think it is easier said then done. Especially given the state of security measures in place as pointed out by the other RJ. We are not equipped to stand tall (shamefully) in the face of such threats.

We are in a grave situation. I am sorry to say but with this latest terror wave we’ve simply gone beyond rock bottom. Our leadership is full of corrupt incompetent puppets who have no sincerety towards the country in their hearts. Our entire political leadership .. not just the one in the centre… is horde of corrupt animals.

The idea of … a shut down of the education system …. I mean its become so bad that it is affecting the lives of our children. I mean before this ..with the terrorist attacks and all we were still able to protect their lives. Yes parents got more strict with timings and safety concerns for their children on their plans and everything. But the schools … its too much. I am right now in a state of being beyond anger actually.

We need to get rid of the old guard of our leadership and politics…and generally the people in places of doing something for this country. Our supreme court should take notice of things as they are going on in the country. And our country .. which so aggressively came out on the streets for the entire Judicial crisis… needs to raise their voice against … against … where the current leaders are taking this country…..oblivion.

Change the entire system. Put rules in place. I think the only body capable of doing this is the National Assembly and perhaps the Judiciary. But there you go…more problems here. The national assembly is also full of F******* yes men who absolutely do not have any morals or goodwill of the people in their hearts or sights. (I am talking about the majority… there are a rare few who are actually genuinely representing their electoral seats). And the Supreme Court….well … I think the current benches are already too politisized after the ..and actually the entire March 9th, 2007 incident.

And no…. I won’t merely say God Help Us. We need to help ourselves. We can only pray for mercy.  

Why Obama won the Nobel Peace Prize

 

Honestly speaking, I am still puzzled as to why he won. I really am. And I would love to read the doctored and un-doctored reasoning.

The Alienation of Us Humans

“ In sociology and critical social theory, alienation refers to an individual’s estrangement from traditional community and others in general. It is considered by many that the atomism of modern society means that individuals have shallower relations with other people than they would normally. This, it is argued, leads to difficulties in understanding and adapting to each other’s uniqueness (see normlessness) “

                        – Wikipedia, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_alienation

 

We have become so caught up in our lives, the materialistic part of our lives especially, that we are missing it altogether. The essence of life is life itself. And we are just speeding by it like a ferrari on a motorway. I know, not the best of metaphors, but I am sure you will live. Anyway.. back to the post.

 

We worry about careers, about money, about saving money, about the kind of cars we drive, about ‘staying connected online all the time’. But that’s the thing …even though we have come up with so many ways to stay connected with each other….we still don’t. We proudly put forward the banner of developing ways to bring family and friends who are geographically far apart closer together, but yet ..we don’t really practice it in kind that much. Facebook, Skype, Blackberry, other smartphones, other social networks, MSN Messenger, Yahoo Messenger, Email etc etc. (the latter ones being a little old on this modern list)

We are still so busy and caught up with ourselves only. Constantly worrying, constantly scheming, constantly materializing plans and big ticket business items or career growth paths. By doing all this we so easily alienate ourselves from the human side, the emotional and compassionate side. Even if we are not materialistic, or money minded, we are still so caught up in our self made complications that we would rather slip into isolation then anything else. What is left in the end is just man…. not human. A flesh and blood robot.

See while we will still be creatures who have feelings, soon these feelings will become benign. And its not just feelings linked to relationships, its the entire possible universe I am talking about.

Plus there are so many of those ‘I love you’s’ around out there that the three words have actually lost value. Its become something akin to the side side cheek kiss done in fictional movies by models who are just being sociable by doing so. I mean they don’t even actually kiss on the cheek… they just go to one side and take out the sound and then the other side and the sound again!

What is supposed to be one of those foremost genuine feelings from the heart has been turned into redundant social norm …. its outrageous, but a fact of what is / has happened.

We have alienated ourselves from being humans and just gone into the routine of being men. We move or try to move at such a fast pace… that we just get lost. In mind and spirit.

We are emotional beings at the end of the day and if we don’t get enough emotional fodder let alone the really vital ones: compassion, affection, companionship, and the all important of being human; we will continue to reduce interactions and supposed emotional exchanges to something which has no meaning whatsoever. Just cheap change changing hands.

 

*NOTE : If you didn’t get the point of this blog…. welcome to the club… I didn’t either…. is it a sign of alienating ourselves ? Think about it. Nothing says it more then something which so obviously says it being completely off our radar of understanding.