Happiness is quite a subjective matter. What makes some people happy may be displeasing for others. What is a significant source for happiness for some may mean nothing for others. If the society has evolved core -quite complex and is achieved with much effort through various factors, percolated through benign culture and humanistic traditions and valued through institutions, then it will be reflected in all aspects of dealing including art, science and daily interactions. Crass is always a presence but varies in different societies. A primitive society will have crass as its core and will be reflected in every aspect of life (for instance societies that normalize caste cannibals, monster mullahs, or evil evangelicals will find misery percolating in proportionate to degree of influence of crass). Such spaces cannot be happy on any parameters except maybe those of the perverse kind that sustains the worst of sadistic possibilities – the benign sinister exist among those posing as civilized through feudal institutions, patriarchal concerns, systems of control so on, that wait for fertile grounds to wrench the world back into cave setting and jolly world of hunter gatherers.
Kahneman (in Thinking Fast and
Slow) comes out with a unique take on happiness -essentially wellness, that of the experiencing
self and the remembering self. Our recollection of an event is anchored on remembering
self and not all that what we experience. It is difficult to study happiness
and to quantify it. The bias in evaluation and narrow parameters of undertaking within
geographical entity of a nation is problematic. There are, ofcourse, some basic
parameters on basis of which you can attempt to approximate level of happiness in a society.
World Happiness Report is such a venture that was released on March 20th
-the World Happiness Day, adopted by UNGA. Indians (increasingly proud citizens
of Bharat), it seems, are not a happy lot. Placed at lowly 118 out of 147 countries
(with barbarian ruled Afghanistan rightly at the bottom) sharing happiness with the likes of Chad and Burkina Faso. That 1.4 billion people, approximately 18% of
world population, are not at all happy is a serious concern. And when you
thought this is the worst possibility comes the expected revelation that
Indians rank 128th in ‘social support’, expected since a society
that doesn’t even have a basic understanding of community is incapacitated to provide
social support to its fellow citizens. Indeed, every misery is an opportunity to
elucidate lessons of fate and blessing to herd, to demarcate normal days into auspicious
times, to create crowds as illustration of power of control hence faith, which
then falls into the fate of incompetence and characteristic apathy to orchestrate
stampede thus ultimate fate of gruesome deaths while blessings for survivors.
India also ranks 118th in ‘inequality’ – which too is on expected lines,
authenticated by happy squatters, consolidated by snarling self-obsessed politicians
dividing herd with all kind of distractions for easy grab for power. Despite dubious
claims of spiritual, and spiritual gurus in every street corner, Indians rank 117 for harboring ‘negative emotion’ -indeed the most literate state with high HDI index
comparable to best in the world, Kerala, finds itself in worst of situation with
high suicide rate and increasing violence among youngsters (conveniently blamed on
drugs -as if these are not available anywhere else in the country) due to crass
nature of society incapacitated to self-reflect. What is redeeming, atleast in
relative sense, is the high sense of ‘freedom’ (ranked 21) that people enjoy compared
to hellholes around the world as also ‘generosity’ (51) -at personal level
people can be quite nice despite trapped in worst of society. Ranked 16 in ‘volunteering’
cannot be taken seriously since these are mostly for gaining blessing and generally
within the putrid pit -the study seems to have failed to factor in unique
nature of depravity. Incidentally, tribes are very few spaces in society that
show some remnants of egalitarian value systems.
Mediocrity seeks power: it is but
natural that mediocre people in whatever field they are posing in, whether as
artist, journalists, writers, scientists so on, will seek power and influence
-social media has added to ease in attention seeking. Greed is never satiated
by money, there is always existential crave for more in beggar minded society. Squatter
value system has cleverly worked these depravities as successful signs of
blessedness for the herd to emulate. As noted from above example writing is just
another means to control narration while data points to serious truth deficit. Since
the core is rotten it is also expressed through Indian writers (very rarely you
have Indian writers -in whatever language, standing up to critical scrutiny;
mediocre and insipid). The reason why word defecating vermin come in different
shapes and sizes to fill up all the gaps in high end manipulation. More assured
they are of their special place in universe prodigious is the output, thicker
the feculence/books.