I left Bombay the next morning, but not early as I slept in after my encounters with Geeta and Suchitra. I was lazy and just didn’t feel like getting out of bed. Instead, lying in and remembering the experience was all I wanted to do. Finally, I forced myself out of bed and hit the shower, dressed, and grabbed breakfast at the airport. Bombay to Madras was only 2:27 of flying time.
In the Corsair, I climbed out from the airport and headed across the middle of India. The terrain changed often as I flew southeast from one coast to the other. Most of the lands below were grasslands or scrub forests with scattered reminders of man’s presence, cleared lands for agriculture. There weren’t any big cities here in the interior.
I was thinking about the differences between Indian culture and my own and wondering which was better. Obviously, both had some advantages and drawbacks. Raised in the Western culture and as a child of the Enlightenment, I couldn’t help but have a bias towards the idea of progress as a good. But is it? And are we really progressing? Progress, not meaning change, but change for the better.
The problem was, flying along now over the land of the oldest religion we have record of, I was not so sure. Things change but are they for the better? I thought about sexual harassment laws. As a middle age man I am constantly on my guard against doing anything that might get me sued. The problem is, I don’t know what it is that might get me in trouble.
You have to remember that the sexual harassment law was written by the National Organization of Women, an organization which only represents a small minority of women, extremely liberal women, as their continued support of the misogynistic Ted Kennedy and Bill Clinton shows. Hell, after Clinton was accused of rape, NOW continued to support him. How is that for working for women’s rights?
I read a statement of one of the writers of the harassment law, ‘The law isn’t about sex, and it isn’t about harassment, it is about transferring power in the workplace from men to women.’ And it does that. The law allows any women to accuse any man of harassment just because she feels offended. There is no objective rule to go by, which is why we men have no idea what we can or can’t do or say anymore. We are at the mercy of any woman’s level of offence.
And where did this right, the right not to be offended, come from anyway? I’ve read the entire Bill of Rights and it isn’t there. Freedom of Religion, speech, assembly, and lots of others but no right not to be offended. This demand to be non-offensive was created because it is completely subjective and therefore, cannot be defended in the courtroom. “I was offended,” is all that is needed to ruin a man’s career. He’s done for. And that is how the power is transferred from men to women by that law.
Now the Politically Correct have glommed onto this new ‘right’ and expanded it to everything. All of this political correctness, 'I'm offended' bullshit is nothing less than an insidious attempt to undermine the First Amendment by the creation of a spurious new right, the right not to be offended, then giving this imaginary new right priority over freedom of speech. No one has the right not to be offended. I would argue that any important speech on controversial topics will offend someone. In fact, if you haven't offended someone you haven't really said anything important, politically. I hope I offend the whole lot of the politically correct mob. They can spend wonderful hours discussing how offended they are while sipping their organic chai.
Adults won't be offended by words or opinions contrary to their own. And if you really are offended by words and controversial topics, grow up. Any five-year-old knows enough to sing Sticks and Stones...
It is only by absolute commitment to protection of our Constitutional rights, especially the Bill of Rights, that we will be able to maintain these rights against the attempts to undermine them by people like Alberto Gonzalez on one side, and the politically correct crowd on the other. The aims of both extremes are the same: to steal our freedom as individuals and make us behave as they think we should. The only difference between the Right and Left is that one side wants us all in suits and ties and wingtips while the other wants us in Eco-friendly natural fibers and Birkenstocks. Both want to eliminate individuality and liberty for conformity to their ideals.
It was mid-day and hot as hell in the plane as I approached Madras on the east coast of the sub-continent. I was right on time as I called in on approach. It took me two and a half hours to cross an ancient land with seven thousand years of history.
Madras is the capital of the Tamil Nadu state in India. The Tamil and the Aryan north of India have been contesting against each other for thousands of years, sometimes friendly, sometimes not so friendly. Like most brother against brother rivalries, it can get out of hand. Luckily, Madras is fast becoming a modern metropolis and the backwards trouble makers are becoming the minority.
After landing and prepping the Corsair for the long flight across the Indian Ocean the next day, I grabbed a cab to the airport hotel. I wanted to take it easy and save my strength since I had a long flight the next day. I also needed to recover from Geeta and Suchitra. The hotel was quite modern. I napped away the hot afternoon, emerging in the evening.
I was looking forward to Madras cooking, known for chutneys, rice, and spices, served traditionally on a banana leaf. I told the waiter, who spoke English, I wanted to try traditional cooking. He smiled and started bringing different dishes. I kind of remember the names, but since I never saw them written I’m not going to try. All I can say is that they were savory and delicious. Several of the dishes reminded me of Indian fare I had in the US. One dish was a crepe that would have made a Frenchman proud except that the flavors inside were pure Indian. By the time I waved him to stop I could barely waddle back up to my room. In all, it was a fun stop in which I made a pig of myself.
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