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PaperclipPerfector  11mo ago (text post)   27236 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of December 11, 2023

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The difficulty I have always had with this theory, as I say below, is that it doesn’t explain why the high IQ minority in India - which, after all, would be larger than the population of most first-world nations - doesn’t at least create a developed-tier society for itself.

There are plenty of gated communities and upscale neighborhoods. They might not be as pretty as their European counterparts, but they're safe, clean and quiet. And some cities are certainly far nicer to live in, Varanasi is notorious even to Indians as being a hive of scum and villainy.

But the Brahmins, as you say, just give up, or don’t seem to care. And I’ve had this conversation with many Indians, and they all agree (often they bring up the topic; I’m not inviting my own cancellation) that India’s beyond hope and there’s little use even trying to clean it up, it just is what it is, as if both the space program and garbage piling up in a street where traffic is intermittently blocked by a wandering cow are immutable realities of Indian life.

We've been used to that kind of bullshit, pun intended, well before the floodgates on emigration opened up. It might act as a relief valve for the perfect combination of talented and discontent, but there are millions of us who could make it in the West yet are mostly content to remain, even if they grumble about conditions. I know plenty of doctors more talented than me who decide to remain. It's the default decision.

Humans can adjust to a great deal indeed. It's not that they don't care at all about cleanliness, it's that they don't care enough for that to be their raison d'être. Hell, that's true enough for me, I certainly appreciate Western cities, but them being cleaner is not in my top 5 reasons for emigrating. The other concerns are far more prosaic.

The coordination problem is insurmountable, it's a country of 1.3 billion people, I assure you that some have tried.

When it comes to projects like cleaning up the Ganges, the government doesn't bother because the electorate doesn't care. Not enough to swing an election, which is all that matters. The Ganga is sacred and pure even when the coliform count makes the rectum of the last patient I saw with faecal impaction seem like a sterile field.

There are plenty of gated communities and upscale neighborhoods.

What are the best examples?

Uh.. I don't want to doxx my precise geographical neighborhood by naming only the ones I've been in.

I'm sure a quick Google search for "high end gated communities" in a bunch of random cities would suffice. I am at least certain of the fact that they exist, even if I can't point out which ones are the "best".

Also that living in a rich community in a poor country gives you access to cheap servants without needing to learn Spanish or Tagalog and commit a felony.

"Ugly rich" Brits are happy to admit that this is the best aspect of living an expat lifestyle, and I assume it works even better if you are a upper-caste local.

Sure, but that doesn’t stop the Brazilian or South African elite from building gated communities that are difficult to get to- servants just have to take motorbikes in or whatever.

Agreed - I was answering the question about "Why do Indian elites stay in a literal shithole rather than moving to a country which has discovered the lost art of street-sweeping?"

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