Blame it on Darwin

Sometimes, thoughts really need not reflect what is going on in your mind. This is one of those times. Being in the “eligible for beginning a shared life” zone, certain observations do come across. These may not be personal experiences but milestones which define the road I take. I am in that phase of my life where people around me are getting into, getting out of or desperately seeking relationshipsJ. Every conversation with a friend, family or relative hints at, “So, whats going in your personal life?”. Just to clear the air so that we can get on with the main reason for this article, nothing is going on in my life.

A couple of things that I would like shed light upon. We often say that the Western Culture (getting to realize its true expanse) is far different from our Indian Culture. Firstly, the culture which we have been brought up in, or at least my generation cannot be classified as Indian culture, in its true sense. Indian culture is now a compromise between what parts of the western culture can be integrated whilst drawing the “lakshman rekha” on absolute no-no’s. Live-in Relationships and inter-caste marriages are some of these outer bounds. However, the traditional Indian families have become a little more forgiving towards pre-marital relationships.

I hope my friend’s friend forgives me for stealing his line but he put it very succinctly. In his own words, “The Indian Population today is stuck in a limbo between the Indian and the American Culture. They all want to be in a relationship but cannot handle break-ups”. Indian values can be sacrificed when it comes to getting involved. But when things go wrong, it takes merely minutes to transform in to “Sati Savitri (or her male counterpart)”. You see that in our movies, our TV serials too. From being dominated in the household, women now have the liberty to fiddle around with their social lives. Only when the world comes crashing down, suddenly everyone around them would take the “You have shamed our name. Is this what we taught you?” defense. You very well gave the liberty to fool around in the first place, didn’t you? What is the point in crying over spilt milk? One thing I would like to note is that the doer is equally faulty in this.

But we need somebody to blame for all this, so I figured out who is the culprit. Its Charles Darwin. A common wildebeest will never graze at the same place, he will move to greener lands. This is the sole reason why people with different cultures tried to mix and match and got the recipe dreadfully wrong. We could not be satisfied with what we have, we thought we must move forward with the time, and now we have a problem with it. And in this entire “khichadi” of cultures, couples blame each other over break-ups. You don’t mind if your partner bends the rules for you, but he/she should not for anybody else. All that your partner did was follow Darwin. He/She did not do anything wrong to be honest, just that, “It’s not morally right to do so. It’s just not in my culture that anyone can do such a thing. How can he/she do this to me?”. Do what? Try to evolve into a better human being (not every action has to be just, instinct can lead to mistakes. Only in our case, unlike animals, are not fatal)?. As I said, blame it on Darwin. J