One more very Indian thing perhaps also is we like to gladly flog ourselves and jump at the chance of discrediting our people. We will start with "As an Indian" but end with "They" instead of "We"
I'm frankly kind of sick of the constant denigration and apologies being written slavishly to foreigners on behalf of all Indians by Indians. As an Indian, I accept there's a lot of cultural problems and crap in the country but to the degree that people will prostrate before the Western elite reminds me of our colonial days. Like, literally everything in that paragraph could be written about literally any part of the world cause humans are just that shitty. In this particular case, the person making the video made it in Hindi so it very specifically created a spike from Indian users
I wish my fellow Indians would stop this constant self flagellation and appeasement and have some goddamn pride
yeah, man. I tried to convince my Japanese wife not to pay off her predatory student loans when she moved to the US, and it was like I was talking about burning down a building or something.
> I wish my fellow Indians would stop this constant self flagellation and appeasement and have some goddamn pride
I don’t see it as an Indian thing (or a Greece thing as someone else replied). It’s a failing of all of global humanity that anything you can get away with is “ok” to 10-49% of the world’s population (have no concrete source, but I “feel” it’s below 50%, but still a significant number). The US President got up on stage just this week and essentially answered the question “why did you pay so little taxes in 2016-2017?” with the response “because I could! Don’t like the tax laws? BLAME JOE!”, taking zero responsibility for his own actions.
It's something you'll see in pretty much every disfavored group: people will attempt to push themselves up by pushing the others down. They'll say "I'm not like other X", reinforcing the idea that X actually does whatever bad things you imagine they do, and deserves to be looked down on.
They usually don't even recognize that that's what they're implying. They merely want to set themselves up as worthwhile and ask not to be pre-judged. But collectively, you get "crab mentality" (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crab_mentality).
The social motivations for saying sth should not be conflated with the truth of that thing. In my experience, usually people shitting on their own group tell the truth.
On another note, I find Western, affluent self-flagellation much more pervasive and deceptive.
I disagree. As an Indian, our pride is one of the biggest problems. Not achieving much but taking a lot of credit for it. We even take pride in Indians that leave for abroad and do exceptionally well - CEOs of Google, Microsoft, Adobe, MasterCard are not Indians in terms of their citizenship. They're of Indian ethnicity.
To the foreigners (especially Americans) - I cannot make this up. When I was in 6th standard, we had a teacher that said without flinching, or perhaps completely deluded that - 90% of NASA employees are Indians. We knew this is bullshit even when in the 90's when there was no internet.
Currently, we've got the Indian media tied up with taking pride in the fact that Kamala Harris is Indian.
It's frankly embarrassing how much undeserved pride we constantly seek.
Slavishly? Eh? The comments also constantly remind how few talented people get lost in the haystack because of the noise. They are stating the reality.
> have some goddamn pride
We have seen how much damage pride has brought. If you still want to see
1) people without science knowledge claiming religious rituals have scientific reasons
2) people who don't know what linguistics is claiming Sanskrit is the first language
3) people without any knowledge of medicine heralding superiority of Ayurveda
> Like, literally everything in that paragraph could be written about literally any part of the world
Oh come on. If we are able to mentally swap out cultures in the OP to see how ridiculous your claim is, then you are too. And we have to think you did.
Do you think it could be a cultural artifact beaten into the Indian subcontinent by the British? Sort of a collective, areawide PTSD?
Tangentially, I personally wish people would stop using the "culture" excuse for a group's bad behavior. Culture doesn't develop in a vacuum. Certain cultural practices could potentially come from really problematic sources. Changing one's culture isn't an insult to anyone if you're changing it for the better. And in this case, even if Indian culture is to prostrate before those you see as your superior, I don't think that's an element of the culture that needs preserving.
I trust people who talk negatively about their own culture more than I trust people who talk positively. Every culture has lots of dumb stuff, and people who are willing to talk negatively about it strike me as more open-minded.
I can understand and relate to the point you raise. Constructive criticism and self retrospection is a key marker of any progressive society. The slight caveat is that each society is in a varying state at any given time. India has gone through a full circle from peak, to trough to hopefully a rising future. At this stage of the society, confidence is very fragile and mindset conflicted across the glorious to the defeated to the hopeful. This why you see the spectrum of emotions. As with personal image and attitude being sculpted for success, a nation's image and attitude need to be sculpted for success too.
I wish my fellow Indians would stop this constant self flagellation and appeasement and have some goddamn pride