[grandalf]

Sanitation is important. I am happy that there are a variety of different efforts in India to increase awareness of germs and sanitation issues...

But an article about free hand sanitizer being given away at the grocery store (for example) is far less entertaining to Americans (who have a taste for stories about their cultural supremacy) than a story about men having their marriage proposals shot down unless they agree to purchase a toilet.

The story humiliates and emasculates Indian males, and puts the blame for a big public health problem on men, as if they need to be coerced to buy a toilet ... which in India is still more of a luxury good than a sanitation necessity.

Imagine a story about American men being denied marriage unless they purchased a car with front and side airbags, anti-lock brakes, and traction control, the cheapest of which costs $19K. Then the judgmental but bemused tone sounds a bit more annoying to those who don't sense it when it's about brown people... and coincidentally brown people are the ones we drop bombs on.