He meant, it could have been worse. They could have changed your details. The phone number associated with your account, for example. Or they could have added transactions.
9 karma · joined February 14, 2021
Your argument is incoherent so it's not clear if you're arguing for a common language other than English or no common language at all.
If it's the first one, that's a road that will lead to certain disaster. Requiring knowledge of a specific Indian language will automatically grant native speakers of that language advantage over other Indians. If tomorrow Gujarati or Bengali was chosen as the "national" language and every book was published in Gujarati, every movie and show was dubbed in it, every textbook was rewritten in it, every government form was written in it, wouldn't Gujaratis have an advantage over everyone else? Wouldn't everyone else implicitly become second class citizens?
That's not even hypothetical. This experiment of forcing a "national" language on population that never spoke it or understood has been tried before. It was a spectacular failure. Bangla speakers in East Pakistan didn't want to speak Urdu and didn't want to be treated as second class citizens because they couldn't. So they seceded. East Pakistan doesn't exist anymore.
No doubt you're thinking "no, not Gujarati/Bengali. Let's choose Hindi as the national language". Now understand this -> Hindi is a foreign language to me, though I am Indian. I studied it for 10 years so I'm reasonably fluent in it, but it is still a foreign language, as foreign as English. For that reason, states such as Tamil Nadu and Kerala will not accept the imposition of Hindi. This battle started in the 60s and continues today.
Of course, you might be arguing for no common language at all. Let's root out English and in it's place let's have ... nothing. I'm not sure what that would buy us, but sure.
English is a foreign language, but it is the only language is foreign to all Indians. That is why it is fair for it to remain an official language of the Indian Union.
FYI, you and I wouldn't be having this conversation if we didn't have English as common language.
Like GP said, this is a book review, not a scholarly article. It doesn't have citations because book reviews rarely do. It is reasonable to expect a book to have those citations, and presumably this book does.
> catered to a peak of appx. 0.02% of the population
I'm not sure if you understand that sex workers make up a disproportionate share of the population that has sex with multiple people, at least in India. Not only that, the prevalence of condom usage among sex workers (and the population in general) was low at that time. This led to a high share of sex workers suffering from HIV and then transmitting that to folks who would in turn transmit it to their long term partners.
Of course a lot of money was spent on campaigns for the general population too ("Puli Raja ki Aids vastunda?"), but it made a lot of sense to target this program at sex workers.
https://www.economist.com/china/2018/12/01/why-only-2-of-chi...
I'm from India where we have a similar term in the political lexicon - "vote-bank politics". It's means a policy that a plurality of voters (the "bank") like and want, but you don't. If you're within the vote bank, then it's no longer vote-bank politics, it's democracy in action.
This is not true of many people from South India. My last name is my father's first name. So my sibling, mother and I share a last name, but my father has a different one (his father's first name).
Shoutout to the consultant who was helping me fill a visa application and helpfully "fixed" my typo.
Typically when I file for visas I have to give detailed statements of all my bank accounts, all my investments, my income tax statements for the last 3 years, a list of all the places I’ve travelled, medical insurance, a letter from my employer guaranteeing that I’ll be back and god knows what else. This was for an Australian visa btw, that allows visa free travel if you’re American, Canadian or European.
That’s not even the half of it. A friend of mine applied for a Schenghen visa for a 6 day trip and got a 5 day visa. The border agent then harassed him on his way out for “overstaying” his visa.
Heaven forbid that people with privilege are subjected to the horrors of filling forms.
They do kidnap people. They've kidnapped people from Hong Kong, Vietnam, Myanmar, Australia and Canada. Some of these people confess to a series of crimes and in exchange pay fines or are sentenced to long prison sentences, or they are simply never heard from again.
They kidnapped a Swedish citizen from Thailand for having the audacity to publish a book critical of Xi Jinping.
Source - https://foreignpolicy.com/2018/03/29/the-disappeared-china-r...
That is true... but only 10% of Indians can speak English. It might appear higher because visitors are likely to remain in urban or tourist-y areas, where the percentage of English speakers is much higher.
* Pixelated nudity in shows like Californication and The Man In The High Castle and films like Watchmen and The Godfather
* The Grand Tour had an episode which involved animal carcasses. All of it was removed.
My $0.02 on this difference between Amazon and Netflix. This is Netflix's primary business, while Video is an afterthought for Amazon compared to the retail business. A boycott of their retail business would be catastrophic, whereas a few people canceling their subscription over self-censorship is a non-issue.
Amazon can also potentially be shaken down for protection money. It would work like this. "Hi, we're from this political party and we're considering making these videos a major issue. Meanwhile, would you consider making a donation to our election campaign?"
About these 4 books, are there any translations or Kindle versions you recommend?
As far as the stories themselves go, they’re pretty drab. The plot is predictable, dialogue is meh, characters (apart from 2) are more like caricatures than real people, the morals are as subtle as bludgeons, they drag on for no reason. I would not recommend them to anyone.
That’s not to say they’re not important books. They were and are influential. Today’s books might be better but they owe a debt of gratitude to the classics. So in some ways reading the Mahabharata today and complaining it isn’t great is similar to complaining that Seinfeld Isn’t Funny. Plus I will say, at least half a billion people love these stories and worship the characters as Gods. If that makes you curious, pick them up.
I just don't understand why mobile plans are so expensive in Israel. In India you can get 1.5GB per day plus unlimited text/calls for $6 a month. If I had to speculate, I'd say it has something to do with competition lowering prices.
Shockingly, people join networks that are used by people they know and their circle of friends is in their own country, for most part. If you think young Indian people are desperately trying to copy what's cool in America you'd have to explain why Whatsapp has been (and continues to be) the dominant network in India, despite being a minor player in America.
This is exactly what you pointed out - not keeping your promises and engaging in wanton butchery made future battles more difficult and yet there were men who did it anyway. Godfrey didn't do this, and neither did Saladin, and that meant they were a cut above the other men of that time. And that's not my 21st century opinion either, William of Tyre writing in the 12th century thought so too. There was a fundamental moral difference between Godfrey and his most of his fellow First Crusaders. _That_ is the point I'm trying to make, so when you say there was no fundamental moral difference, you're incorrect.
I have no interest in de-legitimizing any group apart from the far right. I do so by pointing out that they in 21st century, knowing all that I've pointed out, chose a battle cry used by butchers in the 12th century. I'm not Christian, I'm not Muslim, I'm not even remotely religious. I'm sorry you think I have an agenda against Christians in general, but that's just not true.
I think it would help discourse if you didn't immediately assume the worst possible intent when you see a comment by someone. Please consider doing that.
- By the standards of their time, the Crusaders were particularly barbaric. I'm not judging them by 21st century standards, I'm comparing them to their contemporaries in the 12th century, such as Saladin.
- 'Deus Vult' was their battle cry when they engaged in this barbaric slaughter in their successful bid to recapture the Holy Land. It is also used by members of the far right today. They do so because they advocate a similar stance towards Muslims.
Sadly, this has upset fans of Crusader Kings in this thread. I regret it, but I liken it to the Nazis' appropriation of the swastika, a Hindu religious symbol. It sucks that the far right has appropriated what's yours, but you just gotta accept it and move on.
Also, Saladin did not sell anyone into slavery as long as they paid a ransom - a measly 10 dinars. Anyone who paid was allowed to leave Jerusalem with all of their possessions. When the Patriarch of Jerusalem tried to leave the city weighed down with treasures, Saladin was advised to keep most of it but he took nothing except the 10 dinars and let the Patriarch leave with the rest of his wealth. Saladin did not want to break the promise he had made - that anyone who paid the ransom was free.
I request that you judge Saladin by the standards of his time, just as I judge the First Crusaders by the standards of their time. At a time when it was common to demonize your enemy for anything they did, Latin sources had an extremely high opinion of Saladin. Archbishop William of Tyre, the primary source for this period, spoke of him in glowing terms, especially of the mercy shown during the siege of Jerusalem.
I completely agree that the Crusades were filled with atrocities committed by every single person involved, regardless of religion. I was merely pointing out that even by the standards of the 12th century, those who used the battle cry "Deus Vult" during the sieges of Antioch and Jersalem were far worse than their contemporaries. When people today echo this battle cry, it is exactly this kind of behaviour that they are implicitly endorsing.
> The calm night air was shattered as the Franks screamed out their battle cry "God wills it! God wills it!" With resistance crumbling, the Crusaders poured into Antioch. Amid the gloom of the approaching dawn the chaotic slaughter began. One Latin contemporary noted that 'they were sparing no Muslim on the grounds on the age or sex, the ground was covered with blood and corpses and some of these were Christians Greeks, Syrians and Armenians...'. Afterwards one Crusader described how 'all the streets of the city on every side were full of corpses, so that no one could endure to be there because of the stench, nor could anyone walk along the narrow paths of the city, except over the corpses of the dead'.
And this was just the capture of Antioch. The scenes at the capture of Jerusalem were far worse, with the Crusaders indulging in butchery that's nauseating to read about. In contrast, when Sultan Saladin recaptured Jerusalem 90 years later, it was done peacefully.
When we see people today brandishing swastikas, we know exactly what kind of people they are and what they aspire to be, based on our knowledge of the crimes of the Nazis. Similarly, when you see a far right nut arguing against Islam and using this catchphrase, you know what kind of cloth they're cut from.
Source
- The Crusades: The Authoritative History of the War for the Holy Land by Thomas Asbridge
I'm sorry you think so. I agree that I could have made my case better, and normally I'd take a stab at it now that I have a full keyboard in front of me. But your ad hominem attack makes it not worth my time.