Monday, September 28, 2009
Tuesday, September 15, 2009
Thursday, April 23, 2009
Servile Dog Syndrome
In a pack of dogs, there is an alpha dog, who leads the pack and remainder are followers.
Alpha dog retains its place by intimidating the remaining dogs. The more he can intimidate, either by growling or by attacking physically, the more the follower dogs respect him.
Result: What is the effect of this constant intimidation on the psyche of follower dogs? They lose self esteem completely and become mental slaves. Physically they may not be inferior to alpha dog, but they lose the confidence of ever reaching there. So the more they are intimidated, the more keen they become to appease their master.
SHIFT OF SCENE:
Humans also suffer from this problem. In my experience i have seen this problem more in women than men but i don't have the numbers to support it. But both sexes suffer from it.
In women, this tends to take a rather strange shape. Instead of presenting the appearance first, i shall attempt to talk about the way it happens.
Children, especially female, with a childhood that did not instill the sense of self-worth in them, tend to suffer more from this. They have low self esteem, which they tend to cover and protect by being loud, materialistic, appear over-confident (even flamboyant, bindass, chutzpah). The behaviour is usually to win public approval or to gain appreciation, if not attention.
These children, when they become adults, have the servile streak in them. This streak remains buried under layers of external behaviour. But in women i found that it gets exposed in the form that when men ill treat them, they accept the ill treatment. And then, to please their alpha male, they tend to become even more servile, only to be ill treated even more.
This becomes cyclic.
The man ill treats the woman >> Woman with low sense of self-worth cowers and tends to please him more and seek his approval >> Man realises that she can take this much ill treatment >> serves even worse treatment to her >> the woman accepts this too and tries to please him even more >> cycle continues...
Usually these cases land up in my clinic as marital discord in which the woman is being battered. It may be physical battery or mental but either way, it's maltreatment being dished out.
The surprising part comes only now. And that is, that the woman usually does not have an insight into this problem. She does not complain of being treated badly. She usually seeks help because she feels "whatever i do, i cannot please him. So doctor, what should i do so that he becomes happy with me?"
And i am usually happy to tell that all she has to do is to stop trying to please him and stop caring whether he gets pleased by her or not. And he shall be pleased.
Alpha dog retains its place by intimidating the remaining dogs. The more he can intimidate, either by growling or by attacking physically, the more the follower dogs respect him.
Result: What is the effect of this constant intimidation on the psyche of follower dogs? They lose self esteem completely and become mental slaves. Physically they may not be inferior to alpha dog, but they lose the confidence of ever reaching there. So the more they are intimidated, the more keen they become to appease their master.
SHIFT OF SCENE:
Humans also suffer from this problem. In my experience i have seen this problem more in women than men but i don't have the numbers to support it. But both sexes suffer from it.
In women, this tends to take a rather strange shape. Instead of presenting the appearance first, i shall attempt to talk about the way it happens.
Children, especially female, with a childhood that did not instill the sense of self-worth in them, tend to suffer more from this. They have low self esteem, which they tend to cover and protect by being loud, materialistic, appear over-confident (even flamboyant, bindass, chutzpah). The behaviour is usually to win public approval or to gain appreciation, if not attention.
These children, when they become adults, have the servile streak in them. This streak remains buried under layers of external behaviour. But in women i found that it gets exposed in the form that when men ill treat them, they accept the ill treatment. And then, to please their alpha male, they tend to become even more servile, only to be ill treated even more.
This becomes cyclic.
The man ill treats the woman >> Woman with low sense of self-worth cowers and tends to please him more and seek his approval >> Man realises that she can take this much ill treatment >> serves even worse treatment to her >> the woman accepts this too and tries to please him even more >> cycle continues...
Usually these cases land up in my clinic as marital discord in which the woman is being battered. It may be physical battery or mental but either way, it's maltreatment being dished out.
The surprising part comes only now. And that is, that the woman usually does not have an insight into this problem. She does not complain of being treated badly. She usually seeks help because she feels "whatever i do, i cannot please him. So doctor, what should i do so that he becomes happy with me?"
And i am usually happy to tell that all she has to do is to stop trying to please him and stop caring whether he gets pleased by her or not. And he shall be pleased.
Tuesday, March 31, 2009
The desiness of desis
I had written a post in past regarding 'Indian behaviour'. It came back to me recently because of two incidents on the same journey.
I was travelling on Amritsar Shatabdi from Delhi.
One: I met a man in the train who was a PIO (Person of Indian Origin) but settled in England for last 3 generations. He did not know Hindi. The moment the waiters in the train discovered this, they started flocking around him. Most assumed that i was accompanying him coz i was talking to him. Every two minutes he was asked if he'd like something to eat. He was offered black tea which he refused. After 60 secs, he was offered coffee. Which he again refused. Another few minutes later he was asked 'Non-veg'? Since he was an ISKCON follower, he refused meat. This significantly deflated the waiters coz this was perhaps their last chance of earning a hefty bakhshish. Finally i had to intervene and tell the staff to lay off the Indian firang.
...WHY?
Two: Now this is reverse Indianism. There was this family, which was obviously back from US. (How do I know? Well!! The man of the house was wearing ray-bans at 9 pm; they carried 4 suitcases of obnoxious size [All Indians returning from US carry HUGE suitcases coz the airlines restrict the number of baggages... so obviously, they cannot imagine carrying 'less' baggage... but they carry vulgar sized suitcases instead which give coronary attack to ordinary indian coolies]; The kids spoke only in english while the parents conversed on mobile in crass Punjabi; ... need more evidence?)
So all was well till it was 15 mins to Jallandher where the train stops precisely for 120 secs. What this family decides to do is to lug all their giant suitcases and jam them into the coach's gate. Logic: train stops for only 2 mins and we can't offload all of this...
Of course, it never occurred to them that there are other passengers also who might like to disembark within the same 2 mins. It included a 70+ yrs old lady.
I wanted to ask that if you can't offload this, why the fuck don't you carry less baggage?
The very same guy would have behaved himself socially in US perhaps, but the very act of repatriation re-kindles the spark of desiness, is it?
And there they are, back to square one.
I was travelling on Amritsar Shatabdi from Delhi.
One: I met a man in the train who was a PIO (Person of Indian Origin) but settled in England for last 3 generations. He did not know Hindi. The moment the waiters in the train discovered this, they started flocking around him. Most assumed that i was accompanying him coz i was talking to him. Every two minutes he was asked if he'd like something to eat. He was offered black tea which he refused. After 60 secs, he was offered coffee. Which he again refused. Another few minutes later he was asked 'Non-veg'? Since he was an ISKCON follower, he refused meat. This significantly deflated the waiters coz this was perhaps their last chance of earning a hefty bakhshish. Finally i had to intervene and tell the staff to lay off the Indian firang.
...WHY?
Two: Now this is reverse Indianism. There was this family, which was obviously back from US. (How do I know? Well!! The man of the house was wearing ray-bans at 9 pm; they carried 4 suitcases of obnoxious size [All Indians returning from US carry HUGE suitcases coz the airlines restrict the number of baggages... so obviously, they cannot imagine carrying 'less' baggage... but they carry vulgar sized suitcases instead which give coronary attack to ordinary indian coolies]; The kids spoke only in english while the parents conversed on mobile in crass Punjabi; ... need more evidence?)
So all was well till it was 15 mins to Jallandher where the train stops precisely for 120 secs. What this family decides to do is to lug all their giant suitcases and jam them into the coach's gate. Logic: train stops for only 2 mins and we can't offload all of this...
Of course, it never occurred to them that there are other passengers also who might like to disembark within the same 2 mins. It included a 70+ yrs old lady.
I wanted to ask that if you can't offload this, why the fuck don't you carry less baggage?
The very same guy would have behaved himself socially in US perhaps, but the very act of repatriation re-kindles the spark of desiness, is it?
And there they are, back to square one.
Wednesday, January 14, 2009
Mama said "Don't do MLM"
Mama said "Don't do MLM"
MLM is a dirty word in our house.
Multi-level marketing.
Another dirty word is network marketing; which is essentially same wine in different bottle.
It all started with my cousin becoming an AMWAY marketeer. Amway is Ok. I once bought a car shampoo and it was pretty good. But the people who market it are a pain in the ass. So was my cousin.
First they came to my house and showed us pics of their annual convention and how everyone there was filthy rich and how they were enjoying life selling amway products. Then they told me that I could also be rich by doing the same.
Unfortunately, my bringing up says that any method in which you get rich without working hard has to have a catch. SO i was skeptic right from the beginning. But they kept inviting us to their breakfast sessions or this n that and tempt us with it. I stayed away all the time from either buying the product or becoming one of them.
Ten years later, a dear friend of mine walked into my apartment with a "business proposal". The proposal was to start by buying a gold coin whose net worth today was INR 7000/- but i was expected to shell out INR 35,000/- for it. Five times the amount upfront. Daylight robbery? I asked.
No, he replies, this is just a notional cost because this coin will eventually have numismatic value. Then i can sell it for million bucks or whatever. Now i have been a small time collector of coins myself though i don't do it anymore (too expensive a hobby for me) but i have some knowledge all the same. Just coz an asshole decides to buy a coin moulder and smelts some 18-20 K gold into it, the coin does not become a numismatic orgasm for collectors. Not even 100 years later. Not even 1000 years, believe me. So i threw his numismatic theory outta the window. Then he came to business.
I could start my own "network" by selling coins further. For each coin i sell, i get commission. For each coin my client sells, i get even more commission and so on.
Now is it very difficult to comprehend who is the sucker when he shells out 35K for a 7K coin?
The remaining 28K is going as commission to those suckers who are in line above me.
So i say thanks, but no thanks. I cannot earn my living perpetuating this stupidity in the name of numismatics and network marketing.
But he says this will earn me money without hard work.
Oh! said I. How many people have you contacted as yet to sell this coin, dear friend?
About 30-35, he replied.
ANd how many bought it? I asked
You'd be the second one, he told me; to which i shook my head horizontally and with max amplitude.
So you are selling to about 3-4 of every 100 people you contact. Ain't this hard work?
But the return are great... he shot back. Not like selling some cheap scheme, you know.
DO you know what's the cost of this marketing? I asked him
He said just the cost of 3-4 fone calls and 1-2 visits per person before they join.
I smiled.
I told him he'd realise the cost much later.
Today, i avoid taking calls from him (and that cousin of mine). I never meet them socially coz they invariably ask me "So what did you think about it?". I even avoid them on Orkut etc.
This is the cost i was trying to make my friend understand.
He didn't.
He is paying it now by losing one friend after another.
I do not know how much easy money has he made till now.
But in my house, Mama said, don't do MLM.
MLM is a dirty word in our house.
Multi-level marketing.
Another dirty word is network marketing; which is essentially same wine in different bottle.
It all started with my cousin becoming an AMWAY marketeer. Amway is Ok. I once bought a car shampoo and it was pretty good. But the people who market it are a pain in the ass. So was my cousin.
First they came to my house and showed us pics of their annual convention and how everyone there was filthy rich and how they were enjoying life selling amway products. Then they told me that I could also be rich by doing the same.
Unfortunately, my bringing up says that any method in which you get rich without working hard has to have a catch. SO i was skeptic right from the beginning. But they kept inviting us to their breakfast sessions or this n that and tempt us with it. I stayed away all the time from either buying the product or becoming one of them.
Ten years later, a dear friend of mine walked into my apartment with a "business proposal". The proposal was to start by buying a gold coin whose net worth today was INR 7000/- but i was expected to shell out INR 35,000/- for it. Five times the amount upfront. Daylight robbery? I asked.
No, he replies, this is just a notional cost because this coin will eventually have numismatic value. Then i can sell it for million bucks or whatever. Now i have been a small time collector of coins myself though i don't do it anymore (too expensive a hobby for me) but i have some knowledge all the same. Just coz an asshole decides to buy a coin moulder and smelts some 18-20 K gold into it, the coin does not become a numismatic orgasm for collectors. Not even 100 years later. Not even 1000 years, believe me. So i threw his numismatic theory outta the window. Then he came to business.
I could start my own "network" by selling coins further. For each coin i sell, i get commission. For each coin my client sells, i get even more commission and so on.
Now is it very difficult to comprehend who is the sucker when he shells out 35K for a 7K coin?
The remaining 28K is going as commission to those suckers who are in line above me.
So i say thanks, but no thanks. I cannot earn my living perpetuating this stupidity in the name of numismatics and network marketing.
But he says this will earn me money without hard work.
Oh! said I. How many people have you contacted as yet to sell this coin, dear friend?
About 30-35, he replied.
ANd how many bought it? I asked
You'd be the second one, he told me; to which i shook my head horizontally and with max amplitude.
So you are selling to about 3-4 of every 100 people you contact. Ain't this hard work?
But the return are great... he shot back. Not like selling some cheap scheme, you know.
DO you know what's the cost of this marketing? I asked him
He said just the cost of 3-4 fone calls and 1-2 visits per person before they join.
I smiled.
I told him he'd realise the cost much later.
Today, i avoid taking calls from him (and that cousin of mine). I never meet them socially coz they invariably ask me "So what did you think about it?". I even avoid them on Orkut etc.
This is the cost i was trying to make my friend understand.
He didn't.
He is paying it now by losing one friend after another.
I do not know how much easy money has he made till now.
But in my house, Mama said, don't do MLM.
God is the eighteenth elephant
I do not wish to take any credit for this story. It's a folklore, narrated to me by a wise man. Only the conclusions are mine.
It happened once that a King was told by his astrologer to divide his belongings between his two sons in a certain proportion. This will, the astrologer said, ensure recovery from the problems that the kingdom was facing. The king decided to conform.
However he got stuck while dividing his elephants. The ratio of division was:
Give 50% to elder son
Give 2/3 of remaining to younger son.
And after this, the King needed at least one for himself and one for the Queen, too.
The problem was that the King had 17 elephants and there was no way he could give 50% to his elder son. The king resorted to calling upon the help of his wise man (aka Birbal, tenaliraman, etc). Faced by the problem, the wise man said:
"Out of respect for you my lord, let me gift you one elephant." And he proceeded to merge his own elephant into the herd thus making a total of eighteen elephants.
He now proceeded to divide them thus:
50% to elder son: 9 given to elder son
2/3 of remianing to younger son: The younger son was given 6 out of remaining 9
This left three elephants, out of which the wise man gave one to the King and Queen each. Thus left was the eighteenth elephant.
"And now my lord" said the wise man, "I see that since everyone's requirement has been taken care of, I would humbly like to take back this eighteenth elephant for it is of no further use to you."
Thus the eighteenth elephant was duly returned to its owner.
I feel that God is this eighteenth elephant. I you think it exists, it can help you solve some problems. If you don't, well you can still solve your problems albeit with a little difficulty and some help. It anyway is a notional concept.
It happened once that a King was told by his astrologer to divide his belongings between his two sons in a certain proportion. This will, the astrologer said, ensure recovery from the problems that the kingdom was facing. The king decided to conform.
However he got stuck while dividing his elephants. The ratio of division was:
Give 50% to elder son
Give 2/3 of remaining to younger son.
And after this, the King needed at least one for himself and one for the Queen, too.
The problem was that the King had 17 elephants and there was no way he could give 50% to his elder son. The king resorted to calling upon the help of his wise man (aka Birbal, tenaliraman, etc). Faced by the problem, the wise man said:
"Out of respect for you my lord, let me gift you one elephant." And he proceeded to merge his own elephant into the herd thus making a total of eighteen elephants.
He now proceeded to divide them thus:
50% to elder son: 9 given to elder son
2/3 of remianing to younger son: The younger son was given 6 out of remaining 9
This left three elephants, out of which the wise man gave one to the King and Queen each. Thus left was the eighteenth elephant.
"And now my lord" said the wise man, "I see that since everyone's requirement has been taken care of, I would humbly like to take back this eighteenth elephant for it is of no further use to you."
Thus the eighteenth elephant was duly returned to its owner.
I feel that God is this eighteenth elephant. I you think it exists, it can help you solve some problems. If you don't, well you can still solve your problems albeit with a little difficulty and some help. It anyway is a notional concept.
Saturday, January 10, 2009
Review: The mistake that was Ghajini
Saw Ghajini today
Of course the story is baseless and oh-so-stereotype where bad man kills good guy's girl and the good guy wants revenge... but what killed me were some glaring mistakes which do not usually creep up in Aamir's movie's
Let's start from the mildest one and graduate to serious one
Of course the story is baseless and oh-so-stereotype where bad man kills good guy's girl and the good guy wants revenge... but what killed me were some glaring mistakes which do not usually creep up in Aamir's movie's
Let's start from the mildest one and graduate to serious one
- The medical record of Aamir shows the degrees of the doctor as "MBBS, MD(Nuero)"... So what's the mistake? Mistake is the degree for neuro comes after MD and is called DM. Moreover, Neuro is not spelt as Nuero... :-)
- This is big and looks odd: Aamir was out of control and was given a tranquilising injection and was therefore unconscious. but when the policemen moved his body from one bed to another, nobody supported his neck; which, surprisingly, maintained its position as ramrod straight. Ludicrous , i say. Neck is never supported by itslef in unconscious people and we always need one person while lifting the patient to support the neck... AAmir appeared to be in ophisthotonus or was he poisoned with strychnine.... the 2 possible conditions where the neck could remain straight with such rigidity...
- This was GROSS... the medical students got hold of AAmir's diary and were going thru the TEXT, reliving his earlier life. They then decide to look for KALPANA, who's foto they have never seen... only read about her in diary. They decide to search newspaper archives in library and in one newspaper, Kalpana's foto was printed with headlines that did not contain her name; but KUDOS... these girls saw the pic, recognised it was kalpana and then they were able to trace the remaining part of story. LOONY TALE man... What a fucking joke!!!
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