From: udcrusd@meaddata.com (Sylvia D'Cruz)
Subject: Re: More About India
Keywords: Human rights or Womyn rights
Organization: Mead Data Central, Dayton OH
Date: Fri, 9 Oct 1992 14:08:35 GMT
Distribution: soc.culture.indian

In article <1992Oct9.010911.16972@massey.ac.nz>, J.Ainikkal@massey.ac.nz (J. Ainikkal) writes:
|> Ms D'Cruz writes:
|> 
|> >The statistics and stuff that you have provided here is very
|> >misleading.
|> >In your futile attempt to compare, you have highlighted all the
|> >plus points 
|> >in the Indian situation and the minus in the US.
|> 
|> Not taking her own advice she goes on to give umpteen examples of
|> atrocities against womyn in India.

The thread started off with eve teasing in India and the women in the 
workplace in India. When I referred to the above aspects of the life of
an Indian women, I mentioned I would not go back, to India, life is 
definitely much better for me, in my case here. Maybe it is different for
other Indian women who are here. Each one is free to make their choices.
Maybe, I should have highlighted the fact that these are my views. 

Then, some of you took it upon yourselves to compare and contrast India
and the US, on more issues than the working women and eve teasing. Some
of you tried to bring out the fears facing the working women here. Basically,
you did your level best to convince me that my choice is wrong. There are
no absolutes, right or wrong, we go through life weighing the pros and cons,
which are different in each case and make our choices. 

Maybe, I did not get the message across clear enough, that is my mistake.
I also, made some generalizations, as pointed out by atleast two nettors,
with respect to the Indian male. Indian men who know me personally, will
know that it is not what I meant. I have associated with a lot of Indian
men over here and in India over the years, both professionally and socially.
Many have molded and shaped my life and I respect and cherish the friendship
of quite a few.

I don't need to get hate mail. I don't need to be labelled a "feminist" and
I don't need to be considered an "India hater". As children, we grow up with
images of some person who is our model, or someone we look upto. Mine was
"Indira Gandhi". Some of you may have had a sportsman or something. It was
a joke around my home "Here comes the prime minister". I had dreams for
shaping and changing, India. Maybe I conceeded defeat early. I am guilty of
that. Yes, I had visions for India, and Bombay, Bandra will always be my home. 

My only purpose in posting some of the negatives facing Indian women, is to
generate awareness, and maybe change some Indian male thinking and 
perspectives. I would like to see Indian women treated as individuals with
rights and desires, both over here and there. I have tried in small ways to 
better my lot.  Is that wrong ?

|> >Do you have any statistics for missing children and women in India
|> >? Where
|> >do you think they have disappeared ?  The number of open files
|> >languishing
|> >in the police departments throught out the country speaks volumes.
|> >There
|> >are millions of cases opened, compared to the ones closed.
|> 
|> Don't U think that these are a human rights issues - not just womyn
|> problems. You seem to be arguing for human rights rather than womyn
|> being mistreated in India. Do U know that homosexuality has its
|> place in India and little boys get abducted too. I DO not seem to
|> understand your argument. If U pull out statistics from ghettos in
|> the U.S. U will get alike figures. India has lesser resources than
|> the U.S. to battle all 'evil'. 
|> 
|> So what do we do here - bash them(Indians in India) because they
|> have more important things to do - as in trying to feed themselves
|> - than spend endless resources curbing crime.
|> 
|> The greatest crime at home is not 'poor womyn rights', or 'poor
|> human rights' or the murders, rapes etc. etc. The greatest crime at
|> home is POVERTY. If U can fight poverty U will see a decrease (up
|> to the highly evolved American standards- as someone put it) in
|> crime at home.

I wish that what you said was true. And, that the Indian government and
people were really as hard working as you portray them to be, and fighting
poverty. The only fighting that is going on to a large scale is communal
strifes and voilence. Most of the people in India, who even come close to 
putting in real work is the labor force and people in private companies.

I better make it clear, the above is my perspective. 

|> >On a different note:-
|> >There is no value for life itself. 40 killed in a train accident,
|> >50 killed
|> >in torrential rain, 43 die of liquor poisoning, 55 get drowned in
|> >marriage
|> >celebration, 12 die in a cold wave, 10 die of heat stroke and on
|> >and on....
|> >How many times day after day, you keep reading, seeing hearing the
|> >above ?
|> >I think we have become, so heartless and selfish that it does not
|> >bother or
|> >touch us anymore ?
|> 
|> When one is born to such stuff and lives with it daily - it loses
|> importance. All U 'high and mighty' people with hearts - what are
|> you'll doing in the U.S..You'll should be helping the poor
|> destitute in India. I left India to get away from one and only one
|> thing - Poverty. I am not denying my selfish desires. I am not
|> denying my fear of poverty.
|> BUT I AM NOT SITTING HERE AND PITYING THOSE AT HOME. I AM IN NO WAY
|> SAYING THAT THEY ARE LESS HAPPIER THAN I AM. NOR ARE THEY LESS
|> EVOLVED THAN ME OR MY NEW FOUND COUNTRYPEOPLE.

Just as you made your choice to get away from poverty in India, I made
mine to get a better life professionally here. And, no pity does not do
anyone anygood. I did not see anyone on this thread mention, that they
pittied the people in India, or thought they were less happy.

I have friends and family, who are quite happy with their lifestyle there.
I respect their choice and they respect mine. We are happy maybe in 
different ways. 

|> I can accept that they(Indians in India) might find happiness in
|> what I would consider 'pathetic conditions'. 
|> Can you do that?
|> When we go overseas we use all these new values that we acquire to
|> 'measure' how happy people at home are. That is definitely foolish.

I never tried to measure how happy people are at home, I provided a
viewpoint. The fact is that conditions are pathetic with respect to alot of
social aspects of the Indian society. Also, there is a lot that needs to be 
done.

|> >I received personal mail from some women, who taught life was
|> >better in India.
|> >The main reason given was their kids are safe there. I agree with
|> >that. They
|> >are relatively safer there today, but it won't be for long. 
|> 
|> I preferred you biased statistics to your conjecture on 'it won't
|> be for long'.

I am being a realist. Whatever happens here, (socially) takes a certain 
number of years to reach India. I am going by the trends of the past.

|> >I think distance makes us have selective memory. We tend to
|> >remember the good only. 
|> 
|> Is that so? Well I do not think it happened in your case.
|> 
|> >Sylvia D. D'Cruz                                
|> 
|> While we are with this 'womyn thing' - Through personal experience
|> I have observed that the female gender of Indians seem to pick up
|> the 'foreign' accent faster than males. It would be nice to get
|> some conjecture on this.

That is because they spend more time listening and observing, than talking. 
I wish some of the Indian men did just that, maybe they would get to know an 
Indian women better.

|> John Ainikkal
|> 'Aotearoa' - Land of the long white cloud
|> A Bandstand Boy for 20 years:)

I remember the things, I like about India, growing up in Bombay, but that
was not the topic that was being discussed; Is there any good that comes
from Eve Teasing ? From my perspective there is none, maybe from your's.
If there was, you can be sure, I would have mentioned it.
-- 
Sylvia D. D'Cruz                                
Newsgroups: soc.culture.indian