Did you hear? Did you see? President APJ Abdul Kalam asks on Yahoo! Answers (and yes, it's really him) -
Human society ... has always been at war within and between groups and has [known] two World Wars. Presently, terrorism and low intensity warfare are affecting many parts of the world.
... When evil minds combine, good minds have to work together and combat [them]. In this context, what are [your] out-of-the-box solutions to free the planet earth from terrorism?
Dear Mr. President,
I am not an expert in foreign policy - or anything else, really. A 25 year old hardly ever is. And yet the terrorist force is made up mostly of people *younger* than me, so that makes it imperative for me to take you up on your call to... er... brains?
Here's the answer: an idle mind is the devil's workshop, and in this case, the devils are mullahs, ayatollahs and sect leaders who instil the ideals of violence in idle young people.
Give the people something to do, somewhere to work, something to study. There is in fact a viable way to achieve this: opening borders rather than closing them.
It sounds counterintuitive, but that is what needs to be done. The borders of *all* nations need to be open to foreign labour. Then you world leaders can sit back and watch an enormous middle-class scramble to create itself. Nobody juggling school, two jobs and a family has time to listen to old kooks rant.
You're probably not reading this. There's upwards of 11,000 responses here, and this one will probably get lost in the deluge. But it doesn't matter. What matters is that you asked for our thoughts and opinions. What a way to reach out to people! I congratulate you on taking this daring, amazing step. Certain other presidents have much to learn about the spirit behind your gesture.
Regards,
Nandini
Albany, NY
(formerly of Bangalore, India)
Nice observation But i'd beg to differ. What you are proposing may have an entirely opposite effect. Consider this : Lets say India opens its borders with Bangladesh and there is free movement of ppl across the borders. No prizes for guessing who would move where. And this would make the citizens of the host country start cribbing about the effect of 'outsiders' on their jobs. This will lead to more groupisms, more hatred etc. Much like the effect we are seeing on Americans on being 'Bangalored' but on a much bigger (and scarier) scale.
ReplyDeleteNice observation But i'd beg to differ. What you are proposing may have an entirely opposite effect. Consider this : Lets say India opens its borders with Bangladesh and there is free movement of ppl across the borders. No prizes for guessing who would move where. And this would make the citizens of the host country start cribbing about the effect of 'outsiders' on their jobs. This will lead to more groupisms, more hatred etc. Much like the effect we are seeing on Americans on being 'Bangalored' but on a much bigger (and scarier) scale.
ReplyDeleteCall me a cynic, but I think how people perceive a change depends almost entirely on how the government's PR machine spins it. And in this case, the 'spinning' won't even entail lying because the economic benefits of opening borders are unquestionable.
ReplyDeleteBut you're right, the migration is probably going to be one sided (for the first ten years) and it's going to incite large numbers of riots and protests and all sorts of headaches. Which could actually be handled by calling the opening of borders something else entirely - say, importing labour. And implement it in stages, putting quotas on the number of visas issued initially, and then increasing the quotas to infinity. :)
Boy if I was dictator of the world....
Also, the initial one-sided migration will have precisely the effect necessary to wipe out terrorism. Drain the brain-washing sinks, I say!
ReplyDelete