I know that I may seem especially guilty of this, but one of the things required of a democratic nation is for everyone to assume some responsibility and NOT continue to blame the other side for the ills within a country. Hopefully, all Indian citizens will pull together toward a common goal beyond a simple vote.

--
You ain't so bad your self.
I see a resemblace of H.R. Giger as well as R.S Connett
Peter S Sibrin

It is interesting. I feel the same way about democracy in my country. Really, no affective change takes place, no matter who gets elected. I live in an extremely privileged country, where, really, I have no gripes or complaints, no matter who gets elected. But the lack of any change from election to election is a bit unsettling. It makes my single vote feel a bit insignificant. It's that during some elections in this country we have as little as a 35% voting rate. If everyone felt this insignificant, we could go from being a democracy to being pawns of the state.
I think democracy as we know it needs to change.

Thanks for quite a thought-provoking comment, Dawn.

We, meaning two of us, come from societies situated at polar opposites in material well-being and still have the same conclusion, arising out of voter apathy at your end and over-reliance on electoral process at the Indian end.
Paradoxically, democracy seems stuck in both the worlds.It is not bringing about 'change'. While it has , may be reached its limit in bringing any material change about in a developed country [food, shelter, clothing, health,education asured at a minimum standard to every citizen - then where do go you from here?], it has conspicuously failed in providing these basic material needs of its cititzens in India.

That is what worried me too - has democracy just been an instrument of material change? And having served that purpose the West has lost its interest in sustaining it? Then is it not upto the privileged citizens to strive to make lot of those less privileged elsewhere better?
And if it is inadequate as an instrument of material change, is it not, again, to citizens to take initiative and strive towards it in the third world?

You can't win, like! Human indiference sets in when prosperity is assured.Human inertia engulfs the masses when it is nowhere in sight too.

--
ckp
discontent always
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I don't know if 'human indifference' is entirely to blame. I have talked to some hard-core capitalists whose attitude is, 'if I can afford to pay for it, then I deserve it more than someone who can't afford it'. Basically, if I work hard, and raise my children with the best of what I can afford, then I DESERVE it and my kids DESERVE it.
What I keep trying to hit home is that some people do not have a privileged base from which to begin to dig themselves out of the poverty they were born into. They have been hardwired to accept some norms and fight others, so they really don't begin from the same set of standards that my capitalist friends start from.
It's wonderful to think that all you have to do is work hard, and be good, and go to church, and enrole in clubs and sports and community groups, send cupcakes to school for the appropriate occations in order to DESERVE to live better than someone who came from an alcoholic, uneducated, povery-stricken family.
Not indifference. Shear blindness, self absorbtion and ignorance.

Yes,I agree. What I meant by indifference was mainly the indifference of the large section of what-appears-to-us-from-the-the-third-world 'middle class' here. I did not mean the rich here. They are the same everywhere. With the same 'entitlement' philosophy glorifying greed as a virtue and deliberate blindness [as you put it] to it not being a level field in the world at all.
What it comes down, practically, is how we, the consumers of the products/services of the rich make them behave. That project we have given up. That is indifference.
People who never were potential of the capitalist products are out of the capitalists' purview anyway. Like the poor in say, Darfur. Anyway they are not going to buy a McDonald burger in their life-time, so capitalists can afford to be indifferent to them.But that indifference pales into shadow compared with our [commoners'] indifference which makes them thrive.And the ignorance of these 'middle-clsses' here leaves me aghast everytime I come across it afresh.

I'll give only two examples.
I remember a conversation with a vey senior educational psychologist here - a man supposedly well-read and obviously well-travelled. He asked me if it is so hot in India for most of the year, with such a large population, how many air-conditioners would be damaging the environment. I still bridle at the insolence based on ignorance. People do not have enough to EAT there throughout their lives, and this epitome of british establishment talks of air-conditioners! Even the middle class there can not afford it.And he is , as you say, a church-goer, an almost vegetarian and all.
Another guy, a medical doctor, spnsors an animal,each year in the name of each of his children as their birth-day present. He sponsored a few goats this year in Africa. I can not describe how furious I feel at this cosmetic charity.

Then we compress the space of manouvrability of 2 billion poor to get out of the straitjacket by non-violent means. Then some of them resort to ideological violence against the establishment as ultra-leftists in India, or, recently in Nepal; or muslim terrorists.

--
ckp
discontent always
[link]
My Print Account

Does your 'well travelled psycholgist' friend know anything about the lifestyle of the less-fortunate? It is interesting how ignorant and self-absorbed a person is if they feel that something like air-conditioning is such a necessity that they wonder how others live without it. Or in the case you've mentioned... How can a person assume that such a necessity can be consumed by such an impoverished country as to sustain it realistically? The very fact that there are real issues such as starvation and lack of basic medical care... these issues are lost on a population of people who rely on 'necessities' such as air-conditioning and internal heating and driving a vehicle...