These guys are literally asking what “benefits” (to the rich) Meals on Wheels provides and since it doesn't give any benefits (to the rich) they should be dismantled.
This is the problem with the hypercapitalist mindset that good businessmen make good politicians, than government should run on business principles.
Because if you’re running a business, it’s entirely reasonable to ask “what’s the ROI for this program?” and to scale it back or abandon it if you’re not seeing good ROI.
But that’s because the aim of business is to make money. The aim of government is not about making money, it’s about responsible stewardship of shared resources and doing the best we can to take care of our people.
And yet here we are, living the plutocratic dream under the control of a bunch of businessmen who ask “are we making enough money off of this?” about programs to care for the poor.
Tldr eat the rich. It’s the only viable solution at this point. We’re too far gone for anything else.
In a curious turn of events, I can no longer write. I am too angry. All the words are wrong. I have, for a long time, found frustrating the tone of modern social justice. Everyone sounding angry, everyone yelling over everyone else. I am put off by the fact that few people want to make their points calmly, logically, consider more readily that there might be misunderstandings in their individual interpretation of events. I want to be thought of as an intellectual, you know? A thoughtful scholar, not a crazed rabble-rouser. I want to think about all the perspectives, and not speak until I feel adequately informed. I never feel adequately informed. So I mute my own intuition, out of reverence for careful nuance. Civilly, I keep a civil tongue. Stupidly, I have stayed silent when it mattered. In a curious turn of events, today I want to talk, and find that I still cannot. I cannot write. I am too angry. The words are all wrong. I am trying still, I think, to be patient, nuanced, logical. I don't want to shout. I don't want to turn away people whose ideas oppose my own, I want to engage in conversation. But it is fucking difficult to logically explain why people should to be nice to people. I don't have an answer. I want to say that democracy is not a spectator sport. I want to ask, Do you not see that the present currents are flowing backwards? That everything is not just wrong, but dramatically, hellishly wrong? That our blotted responses, our subtle shoulder-shrugs of dismay, are grossly, outrageously inadequate? How can I logically, calmly and with nuance, suggest that this is not the norm, not the usual, not okay? In all likelihood this, this unholy shitshow too, shall pass. But it will not pass without a bodycount. I know this - I do not presume this, I know this - because the counter is already ticking. Soon, you will see friends head home sooner from parties and dinners because there is reason to be wary of commuting after dark, on emptier roads. You will see friends unexpectedly pregnant, scared, forced into making dangerous, presently-unfathomable decisions. You will know close friends who can no longer meet their siblings, parents, aunts and uncles, who live in countries no longer welcome here. It will seem as though fewer friends fall on the LGBTQ+ spectrum - this will be strange, because remember when NYC was fucking rainbow capital? Hues will be more subdued. I expect that friends, or friends of friends, will disappear overnight, without fanfare - this has happened very recently to "anti-nationalist" students back home in India, and it will very, very likely happen here too. None of this might hurt you specifically, but it will hurt Us, as a collective. I do not know how to convince you that the present turn of events is not okay. It is fucking difficult to logically explain why we should be nice to people, do you see? I hope that you will find the need for compassion to be self-evident, and respond not in a way that is passive and muted, but respond actively, adequately. I hope you will fight to keep the casualties low, know that it does not have to be like this. Now is not the time for careful deliberation; now we rise. Now we act.
Since 2009, earthquake activity has increased throughout the central United States, specifically in areas employing new and emerging oil and gas production technologies. Join Dr. Justin Rubinstein, deputy chief of the Induced Seismicity Project at the United States Geological Survey, as he discusses this new breed of human-caused earthquakes.
This lecture took place at the Museum on November 10, 2016.
The Annual IRIS/SSA Lecture Series is presented in collaboration with the Incorporated Research Institutions for Seismology and the Seismological Society of America.
This post is about to be a long one. It describes an exhausting afternoon rife with stupid decisions and brilliant conversations, and I am particularly fond of these memories. So hear (read?) me out.
Pondy is essentially a sleepy seaside town. Esha and I wouldn’t be here if we hadn’t committed to learning surfing, and by committed, I do mean committed.
We’d wake up at the buttcrack of dawn (the snooze function on the phone well weary of our early-morning disdain), so we’re out the door at 6:30am, and in the water before 7.
This particular Wednesday began just like all the other mornings in Pondy. Up, out, and well into the water by sunrise, engaging in the usual rough-and-tumble of sand-scraped knees and ingested sea-water.
But given the disciplined consistency of our mornings, the sister and I decided it was time we looked to the anarchy of touristing through the afternoon. And so we scouted off to Auroville - “a universal city in the making in south-India dedicated to the ideal of human unity”. (Don't ask.)
Auroville is an idyllic community close to Pondy, dedicated to capital-T Truth, meditation and New Age Science, populated by the sort of Westerners who subsist on kale, birdseed, and the deep-breath-in-deep-breath-out variety of yoga.
It's your regular tourist pit-stop, right? You expect little of the location itself, but the aftermath of your visit promises a story for parties, another lengthy blog-post, a new Facebook album for friends, family, and distant almost-acquaintances to FOMO over.
And so our story begins.
We drive up to the Auro, as far as our Toyota Innova can take us before coming to a halt in a dusty parking lot outside the city walls. The rest of the exploring is to be conducted on foot.
It is ten o’ clock.
The entrance to the city is laid out with pretty lawns and fairy lights and lanterns swinging from the trees. Ambling crowds move through tree-lined avenues, stopping at cafes and at jewelry stores. Tadpoles wriggle restlessly in the sort of lotus ponds that are cleverly designed to look rugged and indigenous.
Esha and I spend the first hour and a half perusing the stores – classic tourist fare, with a hipster edge. Everything is ridiculously overpriced, so, logically, I end up buying a pack of eco-friendly panty-liners anyway. They are reusable and made of cotton. I have spontaneously decided that I want to reduce my carbon footprint. Or is it my waste-generation? Are they the same thing?
We amble. There is no hurry.
Esha-the-sibling and I each use the lavatories. Comment on the absence of soap. We then notice, accidentally, signs pointing to Matrimandir - a shrine of sorts that is located in the middle of the actual Auroville (we have realized that we are not yet in the “actual Auroville”).
Matrimandir is a goodish walk from the shops and from the toilets and from where we’re standing, but I leap to the challenge, enthusiastic at the prospect of more selfies. Esha, seventeen and anti-normcore, is less exuberant. Ugh, what’s the point? she asks, nihilistic as ever.
I coax her as only an older sister can, alternating threats with guilt-tripping.
Onward and forward.
We leave the alcoves and lawns to follow a marked path to the city. It’s essentially a desert. Thorn bushes line either side, and dust lies underfoot. But Matrimandir is should be close enough, around the corner, practically. We pass by sexagenarians and toddlers walking back down the way we’re walking up, the best indicator of geographical proximity to a scenic spot. I am optimistic.
The weather, though, is less cheerful. The sun is hot in a way that wasn’t as obvious when I was trying on hemp pantaloons in the climate-controlled changing-rooms. I can feel my face get greasy with humidity. My armpits feel mildly sticky, and I am reminded that I didn’t shower or deodorize after the morning’s surf.
Esha whimpers slightly.
Shade is sparse, and we stir up tiny sandstorms with every step. Dust weighs the air down in our wake. For some reason, there’s no one else walking towards the city, but several people walking back to the parking lot. Esha and I speculate on why that is.
- Perhaps the temples closed?
- Perhaps everyone behind us is dead.
- May be we’re walking so slowly everyone behind us is moving faster than the speed of light and we can’t see them.
I stop to consider this. Physics is not my strongest suit, but I make a stab.
- Then why can we see the people walking back from there?
Sanity is gradually escaping us.
Progress is slow. The path onwards is marked with large, irregularly interspersed boards bearing the names and images of local flora, accompanied by elaborations on the random (as far as we could tell) virtues these flora depict.
The Champa is for Honesty
The Lesser Jasmine is for Courage
The Elder Hibiscus is for Endurance
The Yellow Pond Lily is for Sufferance
I begin to suspect that the assigned attributes aren’t random virtues, but specific recommendations for elements of behavior I might benefit from on this journey to nowhere.
My armpits are, at this point, limpid pools nurturing some virtuous flora of their own. The sun is at high noon; I have begun to be able to smell myself.
- We should give up, says Esha.
- But we’ve come so faaaar, I insist.
- Quicker to leave now than later, she retorts.
I pause. Shit, I say. We have to walk the whole bloody way back.
This awareness has just struck on me.
We walk on regardless.
- Why are we even doing this?!
- Because, I say.
- I don’t want to go, and you don’t want to!
- We don’t even care about it!
- And it’s hot, and we can go back into the car, and it has air-conditioning!
Good points, all. Esha is wise beyond her years.
- But, I reply, We can’t tell people we failed!
My point is valid too. Esha is seventeen, I’m twenty-two. We are at the prime of our health. We cannot stop now, with grey-haired pilgrims and dragged-along rug-rats and kale-munching hippies making this walk as easily as I make my hourly trip from the couch to the refrigerator.
My ego is a tender flower! It is eggshells and butterfly wings. My ego is the frailest thistledown.
Esha rolls her eyes.
- I think I’m going to die, she says.
- Death by dehydration is the noblest death of all, I reply.
A pause, and then, Oh for fuckssake.
On the road ahead, there’s a lady sweeping the dust floor for no reason I can discern. Imagine this – imagine it with me - we’re walking on an endlessly dusty path, next-to-no-one around, and there’s a lady sweeping the dirt floor. The lady sweeps, dust flies up, dust settles down, the lady sweeps some more. It seems like a metaphor for this journey we’re making.
But next to the lady, a promising sign – an arrow pointing ahead, “Matrimandir” painted on its dusty side. Have I mentioned that there is a ridiculous amount of dust everywhere? And heat?
But – focus, Manasvi - the sign is here, right here, which evidences that we’re nearly there, almost there, it’s right around the corner, this big golden dome. This temple, this Matrimadir, this place of quiet solitude, glorious background for my facebook selfies, foreground for my Snapchat stories. I am so excited that even Esha is growing less indifferent.
I ask the lady sweeping how much farther we can expect to walk.
“Three kilometers,” she says.
Three kilometers? Three kilometers! Three kilometers! I’d expected something like Just two minutes, or Right around the corner, but three kilometers?! And, and, because X, therefore Y, reaching Matrimandir would involve walking three kilometers to the temple, and three kilometers back to this very spot.
I say to Esha, We have to walk the whole way back!
I say to Esha, OK, swear you won’t tell anyone we gave up.
I say to Esha, Three damn kilometers?!
I say to Esha, Tell no one. Tell. No. One.
I look around and Esha is already making her way back.
I trot over to catch up. No one, I reiterate.
- Fine, she says.
- We liked it, I say. It was pretty.
- Gold dome, she asserts.
- Yep. Great view. So nice.
- Peaceful. Green.
- Why don’t we have any pictures, then?
- … So peaceful. You can’t disturb the peaceful.
And just like that, we have an agreement. We intend on lying to everyone.
My admission of the fact, that I went all the way to Pondicherry and never once glimpsed Matrimandir, on this blog, is evidence that I don’t believe anyone actually reads this blog. Thank you for your time.
The next time we meet, ask me about my trip to Pondy.
In reading this essay—let’s be honest, this draft—to an audience aloud, I discovered myself as a character and myself as the author. I was able to hear what my essay wanted to be. It took me another year to finish it, but I got there.
For Catapult, Jaime Green writes about why she loves public readings.
How to Hug an Elephant
This is Laxmi. She likes biscuits and guava. She’s probably pleased to meet you.
(Arulmigu Manakula Vinayagar Temple Puducherry India )
I didn’t get pictures of us surfing the first day, but we did get a pretty spectacular collection of bruises. Here they are, photographed for posterity.
Day Two, Mahaballipuram. We stopped by here for noms on the way to Pondy, but lingered to get pants stitched at throwaway prices. Turns out, if you go to the source, you can pay the producer much more per piece than a wholesaler would, and that works out much better than the F21 economy does. Also featured: signage. The Indians vs The Others.
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This blog (and, deductively, I) have been to Mahaballipuram. It’s as beautiful as before. The Shore Temple is glorious – grey-ochre granite lithic pillars and statues poised theatrically against a wild blue horizon. Here’s a borrowed photo below:
It is, of course, the only thing that makes me want to have a wedding – who doesn’t want a marriage amongst elephants and carved gods, hair blown askew in the salty wind? I blame Bollywood for giving me ideas.
We wandered a considerable while amongst the clothes’ stores that line the streets to the temple. Every shop has a little tailoring store behind the scenes, where the store-owners are more than willing to make dhoti-pants and kurtas on order, within hours, at throwaway prices. “Support small-businesses, Madam,” they insist, and I obey. A quick lunch later (One Meals, please, at Adayar Ananda Bhavan) I’ve got two pants customized for Rs. 700, and we’re back on the road, headed for Pondy.
We’re already late, of course, and surf classes at Kallialay are scheduled for 4pm. So we skip checking in and make straight for Serenity Beach. Which, in true East Coast style, is all silver sand, frothy wave, and a cacophony of fishing-life.
Goats (at least, these goats) are horrible, bratty animals that won’t eat bananas they themselves carelessly dropped on the ground when they greedily tugged the fruit from your wonderful hands. They also won’t eat bananas other goats have sniffed at. Picky snobs.
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