Altering the Equilibrium

The statistical verification of Nepal’s demographic data shows that we are in the best status when it comes to male to female ratio compared to other countries in the world. This scenario is, however, changing with the legalization of abortion in Nepal since 2002. And, since then Nepal has seen the shifting male to female ratio which shows that from 2007 to 2010, the CSR for second-order births where the first-born was a girl was found to be 742 girls per 1000 boys.

To be more precise, we can say that Nepal’s male to female ratio is 0.92 between the age of 15-65-years-old while it is 1.04 during the time of birth, as of July 5, 2013 consensus data on human population. I am not a preacher of a particular belief and I respect all religion. So, basically, whatever religion you follow, it must be true that you believe in your god — your god. And, god has set its own parameter to maintain the world’s population and check it from wiping out of the history.

But, since the last decade we have seen some heinous crimes of female-infanticide going unpunished. So, now the question is, who is to be blamed for this? — the perpetrator, our system which fails to protect the fetus from being killed or we who are reticent to most of the things going around us?

There is a saying, which means that the biggest culprit is not the one who commits crimes but the one who abets it and/or fails to stop it by acting against it. There is another one such saying which says something like this: “If injustice is happening to your neighbor and you can see, then wait for your turn because you are the next.”

And, I guess, this dictums can’t be more precisely applied to anyone else but us. So far, we were pointing fingers to India and China — one of the two major fostering states of world which is growing by leaps and bounds (where China is already a second biggest economy of the world), for female-infanticide. They were the leaders responsible for shifting the godly-equilibrium towards an grotesque image of society having more boys than girls. And, so far, we have been more reticent on these issues rather than bringing into the discussion and bringing it into the world’s attention in more aggressive manner than it has already been.

Ironically, the trend of sex-selection has been seen to be increasingly more popular in more educated family and has been more prevalent in the urban region than anywhere else in the country. And, probably it is because of the availability of instruments and tests necessary to determine sex before birth.

Like in most of the South East Asian countries, Nepal values male more than female and it is quite infectious and prevalent. And, males are the ones who get more attention than female in our society. The escalation in choosing male over female and going through the process of abortion for male child is because of the family pressure in most of the urban families. Moreover, there are families who use to blame their daughter-in-law for not being male child, which is nothing more than a sheer stupidity.

Nepal has been so far one of the most modest society in South East Asia particularly in case of female and female has been revered as a goddess in this society. And, for that reason they are being prayed in certain occasions and festivals. We are the country of living goddess — popularly known as “Kumari”. However, the way are slipping in the world’s trend seems that we are not far from annihilating our own revered culture.

The skewness in male to female ratio might have severe repercussion on the society and this is something which will turn the society in complete chaos. History has proved that scarcity of female in any society turns society violent.

There are several driving factors which might be motivating the Asian society to follow their self-doomed way through female infanticide such as: earning power and dowry system. Our society is more infested with the deep-rooted culture of dowry system and it is hard to get rid of it. With the modernity of the society this dowry system is getting even more infectious and this is what getting the situation even more difficult and it is even exacerbating rather than ameliorating the problem even a bit.

Science has shown that female immunity is more stronger than male’s immunity and therefore, they live longer than their male counterpart. Additionally, female are getting academically stronger and going stronger in the performance wise as well as they use left brain rather than the right brain unlike their male counterpart.

Therefore, this is the high time to change our perception towards women and female and view them as superior in the human kind. It is just our perception which will bring the change and to bring the change you have to change yourself first. So, be the change to bring the change! ■

What religion do you belong to?

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Since my childhood I have been brought up in a middle class family that believe in suavity and respect of all sorts: respect to your teacher, respect to your elders, respect to the intellect. And, my family has always taught me that doesn’t matter what happens to you, you should never forget to respect to your elders – even those who have ever tried to or have done harm to you personally. Because this is your responsibility and your duty as a good person, and this reflects from what kind of family I have been brought up in.

It is not just confined to me, it reflects my entire family history. For those of you who are familiar to my situation – particularly when I was in my masters level – you all know that I had very honestly and truthfully continued with my responsibility as a good person – of respecting  to those who ever had ill intention towards me. And, I think it is useless to bring this all up again. But, the thing that I want to bring up here is that I did what I have to do and never got fomented with it.

My family has always asked me not to question somebody’s faith, their family history, and always warned me against knowing a lot about somebody – specially, when it is not a matter of my concern – until and unless not knowing it will not affect my own integrity. And, I never did.

I think, most important thing is that we should never forget from where we come and to where we belong. Assimilating things and changing your ways of life at the cost of your faith or your principle will not take you anywhere. Achieve whatever you want because no body is going to stop you from doing that, but just don’t forget that, you have reached to this position to what you have been believing and you should not jeopardize it at any cost – because that is what ultimately going to take you where you want to be.

We all have our own faith, our believes and our God and we usually stick to it till we die. This is kind of something that is inherited, however, we are free to choose what we believe in, later in our life and there is no restriction on it – at least on the human-right ground. And, I think it is not prudent to ask somebody what religion they belong to. For example, if you are studying in a school where there are students filled with from well-to-do family and you are the one from not-so-well-to-do family. Do you think that somebody asking you what your dad do for living offends you? If it is so, though it is not tantamount in context to religion, it will equally offend somebody when they are asked to which religion do they belong to.

Religion is something that guide us from choosing the wrong path and this is something like a bridle. Basically, all religion in one way or other have more or less same basic principle: love other, sway away from malevolence. Nonetheless, it can’t be discounted that there are always some badger element in every society and thus, it can’t be used as an element of excuse to generalize rest of those who are indifferent to those kind of malevolence.

I think it is not good to compare things, but even if we see the similarity in all the religion, almost all religion have some form of cap to cover their head and kind of lose garment to don before they enter into the shrine. In Hindu, we call guru or priest or mahatma to those who are devoted to God – they all have form of lose cloth. Similar is the case with other religion – any religion you can think of. The system of veil is common in most of the religion and Hinduism is not an exception – this practice is still being followed in most of the rural country side which is a sign of feminist.

People use to say that in old days anklet were used as a shackle for women – not literal shackle but in a way that women wearing it walking in the house will give a sign to their brothers, husband and son that they are still in house and they have no gone somewhere else – which is a kind of shackling, right? But, these days, the perception and the meaning of it has changed. Now, if you give an anklet to a girl, they will be more delighted, because now no body thinks that it is a gesture of shacking them, but in more sense it is beautifying them.

Similar is the case with with the veil in most of the religions – including Hinduism and Islam. In Hinduism when a girl were got married, they were not allowed to be seen to the future groom and the marriages were held impartial, and it was good for both men and women – specially women. Because if they are in veil they are not being allowed to be judged and thus, even the girl who is not comparatively more beautiful than others use to get married to a descent guy.

I am not here to defend the right of society to veil women, but if we think in another way, it is just about even protecting them from being judged by the way they look. If that would not have been the case, then I think President Obama would not have to apologize for his comment, though there is no question that I revere him so much and he is one of the best persons I feel to deserve to be reelected to be the president of US.

Secondly, I am not here to judge the people by their look, their way of life and what they do. What I am trying to say is that everybody has equal right to enjoy what they believe is good for them and what they believe is right thing to do. It’s just our perception and way of thinking that makes things ugly.

This is in context to an article in “The Economist” entitled, “Vive la différence” dated April 04, 2013. Follow the link for the very article: http://www.economist.com/blogs/erasmus/2013/04/britain-france-and-secularism?fsrc=scn/fb/wl/bl/viveladifference

Thanks for stopping by to read. Hope to see you in next post.

Money can buy happiness!

It might just be another one of those co-incidences that I have just finished watching movie “INTO THE WILD” and just recently and in parallel finished watching a TED talk by Michael Norton on about “Money Can Buy Happiness”. In fact, both of these things have just one thing in common – exploring the true nature, beauty and the meaning of being happy and finding the source of happiness. But, what is uncommon in these two things is the source of happiness.

It is really difficult to define the true meaning of happiness precisely and understandably, because the meaning changes with the situation, perception of the people and their individual circumstances. Mr. Norton believes that the true happiness lies in helping others and being philanthropic in our attitude and our deeds. Helping others will make us feel more good then helping ourself for some motley  and insignificant things. An act of selfless attitude is the one simple gateway to ultimate feeling of pleasure and salvation. And, this fact concedes with the theological understanding in almost all cultures, religions of the world – “What you give is what you will get in return”.

I am hereby just summarizing the main points from these two sources. So, finally, the true meaning of happiness is about helping others with what you have, but not at the cost of your own life or shavings. Share what you can without hampering your and your family life, share things with the people who really understands what its mean to be sharing and being happy, make less friends and stay tight depending on the situation and in the environment you are.

Spend money wisely and not like a spendthrift. Being spendthrift might be a momentarily pleasure, but after that you will have some real tough time – this is where money buys happiness. There is saying, “If earning bring happiness, then saving is an earning”. Money has fettered us all somehow. People say that its our stomach that we earn for, but what I say is that if it would have been just for the stomach, how would a fat-wealth just accumulates with somebody. Why aren’t they like just some other ordinary people? Earning too much and accumulating too much wealth brings misfortunes than fortunes while spending too much also does the same thing.

If we say that money buys happiness means its not about giving a gift to your loves one but to buy a new life for someone who is not your loved ones. The meaning of bigger happiness is not just being confined within our family making each other happy, but to share your fortunes with somebody who are completely destitute. Sometimes, I wonder, and get lost in my own world of imagination that what would be this world like when we would not have to shut our doors for safety, no money to buy foods, no thieves and no wealth to loose, no feeling of envy and no traces of enmity – just like a Kingdom of Heaven. We created money over gold and silver and those things over the things older civilization use to use to exchange things. We have made it valuable.

Share things with whom you think are your real honest friends who knows nothing more than your friendship – so be choosy and be parsimonious in this case because this is where you will cost more if you fail to choose things that you are suppose to over what you are not supposed to. The gist is people these days don’t listen to you, they just hear you. They will never listen what you really mean but they will listen what they want to hear – this is very dangerous situation.

When we were young, we use to hear that the then scientists have that huge salary that they do not have to think about their family and the money they will need to meet their basic needs. In fact, their salary are something that will deter them from even thinking about their family so that they can concentrate more on their research work then something else for better productive results. This is where we can say that money can buy happiness.

So, what we can summarize from all these is that money can truly buy happiness, but the essence of happiness lies on what we choose to do with the money – are we going to spend on ourself or we would like to spend it on somebody else, do charity work and help the needy who will understand the true value of that money and the happiness it brings to their life. 

 

 

Honor Killing & Freedom of Life

When I was trying to garner all my things (from my printed research papers to be reviewed to my computer and its accessories) this morning before leaving for my college, for which I was already late, I got stumbled by the news being broadcasted from the Aljazeera English News Channel. It was another “Honor Killing” by what the sources believe was orchestrated by their own family members. The incident took place in Kingston, Ontario Canada.

In 1000 of incidences of killing, torcher, murder, mutilation, today there was another similar news that has dominated all form of media sources since early this morning. From CNN, Guardian, Huffington Post, BBC, Aljazeera, New York Times to the Asian journals, magazine and news media are all galvanized by the most horrific cold-blooded murder of three ten age girls along with their so-called aunty.

The practice of honor killing is highly prevalent in most societies in the world, and sadly enough very little has been done in this regard by the concerned organizations and the persons in the authorities. In the society where honor killing is being practiced, the law safeguards the perpetrators which is why and where even the human-right activists falls short-hand in curbing the brutal social culture. 

The world’s data on human right shows that more than 5000 men and women are subjected to the honor killing, and there is not doubt that sometimes even the innocents falls victim of this intractable way of punishment. In this killing spree game of the vicious societies, women are more vulnerable than men though the punishment is applied to all gender, cast and credits from all walks of life in the society. Though the rules are always meant to be fair in any society and in any circumstances, in this case – when it comes to honor killing , it appears as if the rule has been especially designed for the women against their freedom of life.

When the world is developing and when there has been trend of changing patter of women involvement in all sectors of society from social to political, the way in which this culture (honor killing) is being incorporated, being viral and engrossing in the societies where it never had a platform is simply utterly disturbing and ironical.

In 2011, United Arab of Emirates government has announced that their constitutions is going to be amended and in the new form of constitution they underscored the fact that women will be given chance to run for the election. This is where I don’t really understand that whether we are playing a mere game of balancing act or have we really started becoming a responsible citizen of our society – making rooms for the women involvement in one side, whereas taking another step of suppressing them with the brutal force that they will not even dare to make their voice against it or even claim what has already been amended in the constitutions.

Nepal is also one of the conservative societies in Asian region where eloping with someone or inter-cast marriage is discouraged. But even then, the trend of honor killing is below negligible, or better say I have not yet heard any such event in my 27-years of life time till now. However, there are still some incidence of murder by the family members which is also more limited to the society which has culture of dowry system where daughter-in-law is the sole victim of these incidence. This is a different story! But, still, again another way of applying killing-spree-game on women of another society with some other reason. Whatever the reason is, KILLING IS ANYWAY KILLING!, and it can never be justifiable in any society, any culture or any region for whatever reason.

Our society lacks in this step – the step of bringing up their kids with their set of beliefs and what they truly believe as their society and their culture. Violence can never be a good standing point in bringing up the kids, because over time this starts fading and the teenagers starts overcoming it. I think changing the way we believe if imparted to the kids will work better on them, because already engraved set of believes can never be erased and never be over come which is unlike fear.  Engraving their heart and mind with your ideas, your set of belief and making them responsible for their actions will help them never sever or vacillate from what you believe even if you take them to some other completely different society. But, this requires more sacrifice and dedication by the head of the family as dad and mom, which is one of the most uneasy step one dares to take and this is why this is why happening and is going on and on. 

If you want to teach somebody a lesson, the best way is to make them feel guilty of their action – they will never dare to do that again. If you can do that, you will never have to kill your kids by yourself – THE MOST SHAMEFUL ACT!