One
is the “trained sociologist and clinical psychologist” Ashis Nandy and the
other is Niall Ferguson, the “historian and an author” and professor at Harvard.
One is an Indian and rooted there and the other is a Scot, transplanted to the
US. One is NOT a Dalit-basher and the other is NOT a homophobe; he is also NOT
against people choosing a child-free life. One spoke at Jaipur Literature Festival
(JLF) and the other at the Altegris conference in California. The audience at JLF
must have been the literati and at Altegris, investors and financial analysts
[1].
Even
given the above long list of parallels and perpendiculars, what is most
relevant to note is that both seemed to be genetically predisposed to the foot-in-the-mouth disease. Indeed, it gets more relevant than
this, if we note the difference in the treatment the two administered to
themselves.
No,
I do not want to go through what happened in the aftermath of the Nandian
pronouncements at JLF except to note that the horse’s mouth fell silent and the
defense brigade took over. Did Nandy issue even a meaningless, insincere
apology? I do not know for sure, but I do not think he did. Any which way, we
can be definitely sure that Nandy sticks to his guns:
“It
is a fact that most of the corrupt come from OBCs and Scheduled Castes and now
increasingly the Scheduled Tribes. I will
give an example (my emphasis, all through). One of the states with the
least amount of corruption is state of West Bengal when the CPI(M) was there. And I must draw
attention to the fact that in the last 100 years, nobody from OBC, SC and ST
has come anywhere near to power. It is an absolutely
clean state.” [2]
My
continued focus is less sharp on OBCs, SC and ST than on the highlighted certificate
given to CPI(M). That was the bigger of the two feet he put into his mouth, the
way I read what he had said.
From
Jaipur to California. Ferguson, by his own admission, suggested “Keynes was
indifferent to the long run because
he had no children, [and] that he had no children because he was gay.” Oops, he
had managed to “offend” two groups in one sentence, the child-free and
homosexuals. Ferguson, to my knowledge, is not an economist, not a sociologist.
Yet, he endorsed, purely from the perspective of economics, people having
children.
There
is a background to “the long run” – “In the long run we are all dead” is a
phrase attributed to Keynes who promoted counter-cyclical fiscal policy for a
short term, to let government deficit grow and create aggregate demand. Ferguson
made the point, as he explained subsequently, “[I]n the long run our children,
grandchildren and great-grandchildren are alive and will have to deal with the
consequences of our economic actions.” Now that Keynes did not have children
and was probably a gay, he could not have cared about future generations and
hence his economic prescriptions, the argument went in Ferguson’s head.
Now,
this statement of Ferguson is a font of a series of posts that I have in mind,
but if and when they would come about is not clear to me. But, the immediate
one is Ferguson’s reaction to his own stupidity.
Ferguson
did not gather his army of defenders; instead, he was on the uptake in a flash
and issued an apology, which in fact defines the adjective “abject” by
including – “deeply and unreservedly”, “stupid and tactless”, “insensitive”, “doubly
stupid”, “My colleagues, students and friends – straight and gay – have every
right to be disappointed in me, as I am in myself.”
Perhaps,
I felt, Nandy, if he had had the inclination to issue a statement, could have
at least included the “insensitive” part. I am not sure he would have done that
even then.
This
is where Niall Ferguson differentiated himself, obviously for the better, from
Nandy. The Scot had the sense to take the bitter pill and not let the wound
fester. Not to mix metaphors, he swallowed his feet while Nandy is still
chewing/sucking on it.
Raghuram
Ekambaram
References
1.
Niall
Ferguson apologises for remarks about ‘gay and childless’ Keynes,
Paul Harris, The Guardian, May 4,
2013
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