Anti- NATO protests

 The common man finally put together a show of strength against the top decision making countries of the world to voice their unhappiness.
The protestors obviously want NATO to be a thing of the past and want the leaders of the respected countries to concentrate on something more constructive than deciding which country to target after current military operations are over.
It is no surprise that Nicolas Sarkozy, France's former president lost the elections due to prioritizing his friendship with America and NATO over the the present conditions in France.
If the other leaders will take a hint, they can still be around after elections in their respective countries.
Else they'll have to warm the opposition bench rather than represent their countries at NATO and G8 the next  time round. 
Anti- NATO protests

 Peaceful protests

False charges against protesters

And the protests go on 

A good start

In the first month of my blog, viewership has just touched the 50 mark.

I believe this is a good beginning, garnering such an audience without any mass publicity.
I will be taking a break, a pretty long one.
When I come back I will be more active and post more articles that will have an effect on the way our views of the world are shaped and methods of making the world a safer place to live in.

Till then happy blogging.

An army which has no right to attack

I was unaware that a country has mentioned in its constitution that its army does not have the right to be on the offensive, to attack countries and the army cannot be used to settle international disputes.

The question that arises now is which country has adopted such tight regulations for its army. Definitely not the US, who are happy to send their boys to war so the weapon manufacturers can have a continuous supply, as long as the wars make sure that there is demand.And the US has made sure that has happened. For the last decade at least, the US has made sure that there is no dearth in the demand of weapons and this has kept their sponsors happy.

It could be a country of the EU. Post World War 2 they have had no military engagements except for the Yugoslav war, Britain's love for Falkland islands leading a short term war and Russia's wars with neighbors/ former republics Chechenya and Georgia. Definitely not Africa, where peace is a crime and slaughter, ethnic cleansing and multiple crimes against humanity are the norm, except for the Mediterranean countries and South Africa. In Asia the middle East, thanks to Iran's rhetorics against Israel and Israel always banking on big daddy USA, (not to mention the emotional blackmail they do by referring to them as survivors of the holocaust, while all they do is insult the memory of those who perished in it), and the Arab uprising and Syria committing mass murders, none of these countries would know how to use an army in times of peace. India, which only uses army in peace time no matter how much its neighbors violate their boundaries and no matter how many times their neighbors stab them in the back, does qualify as the country which could have adopted the afore mentioned policy. Except that it unleashes its army on people of Kashmir and North East states while it in reality it should have the guts to face China and Pakistan.

Japan's peaceful army

Japan, on e of the Axis powers which committed mass atrocities against the Chinese and other neighboring countries during the Second World War before being forced to surrender under the threat of the atom bomb, is the country which forbids its army for war. The army is used for peace time civilian rehabilitation purposes and this could not have been more visible that after the earthquake last year, when you had soldiers all over the devastated areas trying to bring a sense of order in time of chaos. After the Second World War, till date, Japan has not participated in any form of military aggression and the laws formed make sure that it cant happen. They must be commended on their turnaround on use of military, from being as devastating as in Pearl Harbor, to as constructive as after earth quake and rehabilitation.

We pray that other countries have the courage, guts and most importantly BALLS to follow Japan's example and try to make better and peaceful use of military and try to make the world a safer place to live, than like The Americans, Europeans and people of Middle East and Africa, who cant seem to think of other uses of military except for slaughter of civilians.

India's injustice on its women

India's unwanted girls

The above link is to an article by the BBC which analyzes the problems women in rural parts of the country face in India. It also tries to zero in on the cause and tries to find a solution.

But the fact is the odds are against women in India, the world's largest democracy.

And where in many parts, mothers prefer having a male child, forgetting that once they too were in dire circumstances when they were young. They just choose not to remember it.

This goes on to show how dominant the male is in the Indian society. That a woman in her young age had to face injustice, does not speak against the wrongdoing of others, but rather supports them, when she has the power to prevent crimes against innocents. This clearly shows that in India, maybe only rural India, the woman still has to do a lot to be considered equal to men or to get her right to live with dignity at least.

Price of a life

What is the price of a life? What does it mean to replace somebody? What does it mean to put a price tag on ones, our your head?
Is money ultimately everything in life? Compensation in a lot of cases, is done in cash. Be it road traffic accidents, where the victim holds the offender guilty of committing a crime and responsible for covering his expenses and replacing the income he cannot earn after the accident due to the disability incurred as a result of the accident. In most cases of road traffic accidents, the employer of the victim compensates the victim. In aircraft crashes, the airline compensates for the accident victims. It might have been the pilot's fault, a crew member may not have performed a routine check properly, a machine part may have malfunctioned at the last minute, the plane could have been forced to fly to keep the schedule and necessary repairs ignored,or worst of all, unexpected bad weather putting all efforts of a safe flight in jeopardy.

In any case, the compensation for aircraft crashes come from the airlines, in the form of money. So we come to the original question, what is the price of a life? Or rather, should a price be put on life in the first place.

In the ancient and medieval times, when a murder occurred by accident or by purpose, the death of the guilty was mandatory to say that justice has been done. Over due course of time, this practice was renounced as barbaric and hence a different form of justice had to take its place. Life sentences were introduced. 15 years, 20 years, jail for life. Death sentences exist even today but are almost not applied these days. A number of masterminds of terrorist attacks either languish in jails or roam freely in havens of terror. But the death penalty for them is hardly applied. A good example is the Pakistani  boy caught by the Indians during the 26/11 attacks. In spite of all the evidence, the law took its course, the murderer gets 5 star treatment and after the announcement of the verdict, the murderer appeals the verdict, making a mockery of the system. But what about all those people killed on that fateful day? What compensation was given to them? Did they ask for any? Did the government take troubles to address the problem and make the quality of life better for those people?

In case of loss of life, the best thing to do is to accept the bitter truth of injustice done and move one, because clearly, no compensation is enough to replace the life of a loved one. Compensating with money is no different from buying an animal at a department store or meat from market. It just reduces life to a commodity. Andrew Gilchrist, the Australian cricketer likened to his auctioning during his participation in The cash rich Indian Premier League to a cow being put at an auction. That is what money does to life. In many parts of the developing world, farmers unable to pay loans commit suicide. This becomes news and the media blames the government, giving the opposition some leverage against party in power. The government announces compensation in cash for its inability to prevent a farmer's death, announcing large sums of money to the surviving members of the family. The opposition makes a mockery saying this will lead to many to commit suicide as it is a short cut to getting rich.

No matter what intentions, what reasons, what the excuses, end result is that money cannot compensate for loss of life. It devalues life and reduces it to paper.

Price of life in Afghan war

This message is for the American and European soldiers killing civilians in battle, calling it collateral and believing the compensation in the form of cash should keep the rhetoric against the presence of their armies in foreign lands low.

Hope they get the message that value of life is not money. It is what right you have done in the time one had to utilise. Life is a race. But it is not a race against time. It is not a race of good versus evil. It is about doing the right things and avoiding and preventing the wrong things. And the winner is not the one who has done the maximum number of good deeds and prevented the maximum number of bad deeds.It is about doing the right things till the last second in life.

injustice to the mother

Consider the following. A mother takes care of the child for 9 months before it is born. During these 9 months, she has to modify her eating habits, bear the physical changes that take place due to increase in size of the uterus as the pregnancy progresses and take care care of herself if she develops high blood pressure, high blood sugars,excessive bleeding, bouts of unconsciousness and even seizures during the pregnancy. For those of you who think pregnancy cannot be associated with the above medical problems, consult your local doctor. If  the mother gets an infection during the pregnancy, it can effect the child and lead to malformation of body parts. And after all care has been taken a male child is delivered( the above complications can take place with a female fetus as well). That is followed by a couple of years of breastfeeding ( ideally 6 months, but practices vary all over the world), which is responsible for nourishing the child, providing immunity and helping the child grow properly. Only for the male child to grow up one day and say that he is superior to the female sex.
Wow. If the mother knew this was going to happen, she would have aborted the pregnancy, 100%. She takes the trouble of making sure the child comes out to this world without problems putting her life on the line and once her job is done, she has to undergo the torture of hearing her child say that her child of the opposite sex is superior than her!!!!
Take some time and think about the situation. the man dosent have any idea what the woman goes through pregnancy. And it is this ignorance which gives him the fake sense of superiority over women.