Is happiness really an attainable state for the human mind? I recently read an article in the NYTimes, titled Enlightenment Therapy, about a professor who gave up a tenured position and decided to devote his life to meditation. He spent years practicing and teaching Zen meditation, yet he was never able to attain that elusive state of infinite happiness the eastern religions promise as the reward for such devotion. When Zen meditation failed, he turned to anti-depressants and psycho-therapy, but nothing seemed to work. And now he finds himself visiting a therapist like a regular white-collar American. He is doomed, it seems, to that familiar state of discontentment, loneliness and depression many of us suffer throughout our lives.

How many of us promise ourselves that we’ll be happy just as soon as we achieve this or that success and get this or that material possession? And for how many years have we been convincing ourselves that the watering hole is just on the other side of that sand dune? The eastern ascetics will tell us that we need only to detach ourselves from these fleeting pleasures in order to attain happiness. Yet I find it hard to believe that these lonely old men who have spent years in silent isolation are truly happy. On the contrary, many of them seem as consumed by the search for wealth and power as the most “attached” among us. The search for happiness through renunciation of everything human seems misguided somehow; happiness is after all a human condition, created by human impulses in a human brain. Everyone is different, but companionship is a pretty basic requirement for most humans to be happy.

But if there is no happiness to be found through participation in society, and none found through asceticism…then where the hell is it? Perhaps happiness does not exist at all, but is simply a mirage we create for ourselves so we can always strive for more. It is obvious why we might have evolved the propensity to seek happiness, as this unending desire incentivizes us to keep working for more money / status / progress, increasing our chances of survival as a species. Yet by that token it would seem maladaptive to ever actually attain a state of constant happiness, at least while one is capable of being a productive member of society. In that case maybe we should abandon the search for happiness altogether, and just resign ourselves to a life fraught with duality.

It might be true, but I just can’t accept it. I have to believe that I am capable of attaining infinite bliss, of sustaining that amazing sensation of ecstasy I glimpse every now and again while wrapped in my lovers arms or surfing a perfect wave in the pacific ocean. I must believe happiness is real, and that I am in fact getting closer to enlightenment every day of my life. If not, then what’s the point of it all? What is there to live if not for eternal sunshine? Or, perhaps, if not for the search of it.

Let the businessman seek it in money, the celebrity in fame and the swami in solitude. But I will not seek it thus. For I have found my happiness in simple pleasures and seek only to sustain my immersion in those. I live for love, food, music and natural sunshine.

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I have eaten a lot of meat in my life. Although my mom is vegetarian, she allowed us to eat meat and even bring it into the home. I’m not sure why she was so flexible on something that she felt so strongly about for herself. Perhaps she didn’t want to create yet another reason for us to feel different from our American friends, or perhaps it’s because the morality of vegetarianism is such a complex issue.

Even as I ate meat almost every day of my teenage life, I thought often about the question of whether eating meat is wrong. There were many aspects of meat that were unappealing to me. Meat preparation was unbearably morbid, and the more hardcore forms like steak and ribs were just plain gross. Yet somehow I was always able to convince myself that there was nothing immoral about eating meat. We are omnivores. We have evolved to eat meat. Killing animals for food is part of the natural cycle of life.

During my third year at Stanford, I was introduced to the ideas of Eric Schlosser, who wrote a book called Fast Food Nation: The Dark Side of the All-American Meal. Schlosser’s book sheds light on the disgusting practices of the meat industry in America, with vivid imagery of the torture inflicted on America’s factory farm animals. These ideas presented the most compelling argument I had heard against eating mass-produced meat. Animals raised in factory farms are not only killed, they are tortured. Yet I still ignored my gut feeling about the matter and continued consuming meat daily.

In the spring of my senior year at Stanford I took a trip to India, which was accompanied by a two-week vegetarian fast. Although I had done this many times before in my life (i never eat meat when i am in India), something about this trip changed me. When I returned to Stanford, meat suddenly started smelling and tasting like “flesh”. It became increasingly unappetizing to me. I had already stopped eating beef a few years earlier for health reasons, but now even chicken and fish seemed gross. Somehow, after years of justifying my meat-eating habits to myself, I realized that my body was not meant to consume flesh. And so I became a vegetarian. Not exactly for moral reasons. Perhaps it was for health reasons. But more than anything, it was just a feeling I had about what was right for me. I could no longer eat animals.

I have now been a strict vegetarian for nearly five years and have since developed a pretty strong moral feeling about it — i believe eating meat as it is produced today is wrong. My reasoning is based on my own moral beliefs, combined with some hard facts:

Beliefs

Belief #1:  inflicting pain and suffering on any conscious being is wrong. The greater the level of consciousness, the more wrong it is.

Belief #2: prematurely ending the life of any conscious being is wrong. The greater the level of consciousness, the more wrong it is.

Belief #3: humans who have the basic necessities of life (food, shelter, etc), should minimize their negative impact on the environment.

Belief #4: humans who do not have the basic necessities of life should be free to kill animals for food, but they should try to minimize the suffering of the animals they kill and treat the animals with respect while they are alive.

Facts

Fact #1: in order to eat meat, we must prematurely end the life of the animals we eat.

Fact #2: conventional meat production in modern society inflicts severe pain and suffering on animals throughout their lives.

Fact #3: conventional meat production causes severe strain on the environment by emitting massive amounts of methane.

Fact #4: conventional meat production creates “superbugs”, which are resistant to all existing forms of antibiotics, thereby endangering the lives of other humans.

And so, I do not eat meat, and I am encouraged by the growing interest in vegetarianism around the world. However, I still believe the morality of vegetarianism is a complex issue. First, there are a few nuances that raise questions about the beliefs I have stated above.

Nuances

Nuance #1: Professor and Author Michael Pollan raises an interesting question in his book, The Omnivore’s Dilemna: if you remove all the negative stuff that comes along with mass-production of meat (say, for example, by raising and killing meat yourself on a small family farm), then you are bringing animals into this world (i.e., giving them a life that they would not have had otherwise), giving them a luxurious existence (plenty of food and shelther), and killing them without any suffering. Is it still wrong to eat meat in this scenario?

Nuance #2: According to neuroscientist Joseph Ledoux, human awareness of emotion is a bi-product of our having such a large prefrontal cortex. In other words, we are aware of emotions like pain, suffering and anxiety because we have a large prefrontal cortex. So it is possible that animals without a comprable prefrontal cortex, such as cows, pigs and fish, do not experience such emotions at all.

The first nuance is not really relevant for most of us, who do not have easy access to “humane” meat. The second nuance is interesting, but highly speculative. Since science cannot tell us definitively whether or not animals are aware of emotions, I believe it makes sense for us to act based on our intuition. And my intuition tells me that animals can suffer.

My Own Moral Shortcomings

All this said, I must admit to a couple of my own moral shortcomings.

Shortcoming #1: although I have minimized my leather purchases considerably since I became vegetarian, I do still buy shoes that contain leather.

Shortcoming #2: according to everything I have said above, I also really should not consume conventionally produced dairy. While I try to buy organic dairy, I am definitely not strict about this, and dairy is a majory part of my diet.

Why do I continue to buy leather shoes and eat dairy? Because these are part of a happy life that I am not willing to give up. I like to wear leather shoes to my business meetings, and I like to eat low-fat dairy as part of a balanced diet. Each of us has our own limit for self-sacrifice. For most, that limit allows for eating meat. But I hope that every person is made aware of the facts and makes a conscious choice about the amount of pain and suffering they are willing to inflict on others.

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There seems to be a strong nationalistic sentiment amongst many of you, often accompanied by a fear that India is being subsumed by Western culture. Slumdog Millionaire, some insist, won international accolades only because it was a movie made by a Western director, from a white man’s perspective. The Pink Chaddi movement is a symbol of the contamination of Indian culture by Western modernization. Perhaps there is some truth to these claims, but if so then we have only ourselves to blame. We are the ones who continue to worship white skin.

I grew up in a small town in Oklahoma, at a time when racism was still openly expressed in the “heartland” of the United States. From preschool through high school, I was the victim of racial persecution in varying degrees, and from many sources (teachers, coaches, dance instructors, white kids, black kids, and even red kids). I was brown and nerdy, and the oldest daughter of a relatively wealthy, conservative, immigrant household, giving almost any native of this barren Bible Belt town plenty of fodder for derision. But as I began to establish my identity in the community, I felt most of the explicit racism slowly melt away. The white people began to accept me, and even respect me for my differences. By the end of high school, I was considered beautiful by many of my peers, and I was even nominated as a Football Homecoming candidate my senior year (this is essentially a school-sanctioned popularity contest; the other two candidates were white girls, and a white girl won). That year, I was also voted “Most Likely to Succeed” and “Prettiest Smile” by my classmates. I had crossed racial barriers and proven my worth as a brown girl in the white man’s world.

Since high school, I have felt quite comfortable assimilating into white communities and have made friends of all skin tones with whom I share a very natural, unprejudiced kinship. Yet there are certain times when I still feel that my beauty is under-appreciated because of my dark skin — when I am around Indians. I am always a bit taken aback when I see a commercial for Fair and Lovely, or when an auntie advises me to avoid the sun. As the rest of the world chases the exotic beauty of dark skin, Indians continue to  treat fair skin as the epitome of female beauty. Why?

This obsession with light skin is a relic from a time when light skin meant that you were wealthy, because you didn’t have to work outside all day in the sun. And I’m sure this bias was reinforced by the British occupation. The relationship between light skin and wealth continues to be unnaturally propagated in India today, because rich people still prefer to marry light. And so this baseless obsession feeds on itself. But this archaic distinction makes no sense in the modern economy, where a nice tan is likely to suggest that you have the leisure to go on beach vacations rather than wasting away all day in a cubicle under glaring fluorescent lights. I think it’s preposterous, and somewhat scary, that we are still brainwashed by these backwards notions of beauty.

Dark skin is beautiful. I hope we can start to see our own beauty, because we will never ascend to greatness until we embrace ourselves.

It is difficult to respond with calmness and dignity to comments that unjustly attack one’s moral character, support oppression and violence and are generally inane and baseless. It is disheartening to read these sorts of comments, as it shows how far we have yet to go. We are indeed two Indias, and the repressive India seems to be the larger. Perhaps blogging on these topics is pointless, as many of you have said to me, but I still feel that I must try. If even I cannot sustain the heart and courage to fight back, then who will?

So, let me respond, point by point, to the major themes of the verbal attacks directed towards me in my previous post:

[DISCLAIMER:  To those of you who do not agree with drinking but gave graciously tolerant remarks in support of women's rights, this response is not at all directed towards you. I appreciate your tolerance and respect your views.]

ATTACK 1: I am not fit to be an Indian woman

This line of attack smacks of the same mentality that drives Ram Sene to commit acts of violence against women. If a woman drinks, she is considered a whore. No questions asked. Doesn’t matter what the men are doing, of course, because men can do whatever the hell they want. But women must uphold our backwards ideals of chasteness and purity. And these archaic ideals of purity are tied to religion, so that is ALL the justification we need. And, in the name of RELIGION? Well, we can do whatever we god damn please. We can even kill women who dare to be unchaste and drink a beer with the boys…sound familiar to you? Sounds a lot like religious terrorism to me.

When I said I don’t have shame drinking in front of my aunts and uncles, it is because I do not think it is fair that my uncles are allowed to drink, but my aunts are not. Why should I feel shame for demanding gender equality? I do not. If my husband drinks, I drink. If I do not drink, he does not drink either.

ATTACK 2: I am harming my body and brain by drinking

Of course no one bothered to ask how often / much do I drink.  People just assumed that if I drink I must be abusing alcohol like a dirty old man who gets drunk every night and comes home and beats his wife. For your information, I drink very moderately and quite infrequently (much less than the recommended amount of one glass per day).

Maybe you haven’t heard the news, but studies have repeatedly shown that drinking moderate amounts of alcohol is GOOD for your health. So, sorry to disappoint, but the ‘not good for you’ argument is just plain wrong.

Note that I haven’t said to you, “you are harming your health by not drinking, so please start drinking.”

ATTACK 3: Women should not dress provocatively, because it will incite men’s animal instincts

How many of the people who made this comment have seen a Bollywood movie in the past year? My guess is the answer is 100%. When you watch Priyanka bounce around in a tight dress, do you not feel your so-called animal instincts being stimulated? If you don’t, then you certainly wouldn’t be stimulated by me doing the same thing, because I am not more attractive than she. And, if you do, then why do you voluntarily go watch her? No one is forcing you. Or, is it Priyanka’s fault for doing it? Yes, that must be it. Priyanka is a manipulative whore who forces all Indian men to be “stimulated” against their will.

You might be wondering why, if I myself dress like Priyanka, did I make my post about Bollywood Porn below? The reason is that I think Bollywood is an outgrowth of our sexual repression. Men like you will excoriate me for wearing a revealing dress, but will go in hoards to watch Priyanka do it. Moreover, many of you won’t appreciate a movie that does not showcase a well-endowed woman bouncing around half-naked (see comments to my post about Slumdog). Bollywood has become pornographic because there is DEMAND for it. It is the hypocracy that bothers me, not Priyanka’s dress.

Note that only a small fraction of Hollywood movies have the same level of soft porn that 99% of Bollywood movies do. Why? I thought American culture is profligate and Indian culture is chaste…

ATTACK 4: Drinking and sex are not Indian

Read, my friends. Read the tales from our ancient texts. You are deluding yourselves. Sex is CELEBRATED in our traditions. I pity the repressed fools who think sex is not Indian. You will also find references to Ram and Sita drinking wine together (before having sex). And, as one of our more astute commentors, Nadeem Khan, noted:

“Can you tell me how many Ram Sena and other Sena group members don’t drink alcohol. My dear, do you know the percentage of consumption of alcohol in Indian Army and other departments? Grow up.. stop behaving as kid.
To respect elders there is no specific dress code, we can respect elders in wearing jeans/shorts and as well as in wearing shalwar kurta.
Personally I am in favor of preserving culture and against drinking BUT I can’t dictate anyone.”

Btw, did you know that pornography is one of the largest sources of Internet revenue in India? I’m sure many of you know that from personal experience…

ATTACK 5: Pink Chaddis are vulgar

You mean, pink chaddis make you feel uncomfortable? Yes, that’s because you are sexually repressed. And I’m sure Ms. Nisha took that into account when she planned her ingenious protest. Making an oppressor feel uncomfortable is the point of a peaceful protest.

ATTACK 6: I must be a Muslim in disguise

This is actually an older attack in response to my call for unity. I am assuming by now you are all sufficiently convinced that I do not have any hidden religious agendas, as I do not imagine any Muslim fundamentalist would advocate a woman drinking and going to pubs (please correct me if I am wrong, and I will be happy to provide further proof of my secularism).

p.s. for those who were wondering, the picture of the white chaddis with pink polka dots is not me. it’s a Victoria’s Secret model.

Congrats to Slumdog Millionaire for winning 8 Oscars! And a special congrats to A.R. Rehman for his 2 Oscars. Wow!!! I wonder how the naysayers will change their tune now…

Btw, here is an interesting article that was published in the New York Times just before the Oscars, which asks three famous Indians their opinion of the controversy:  http://roomfordebate.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/02/20/the-real-roots-of-the-slumdog-protests/?scp=6&sq=slumdog%20millionaire&st=cse

About the photo: The friends and neighbors of “Slumdog Millionaire” child actor Mohammed Azharuddin Ismail cheer while watching the Oscars award ceremony on television outside his shanty, in Mumbai, India.

I am a proud supporter of the pink chaddi movement and a recent member of their fb group. Obviously, the purports and actions of the Sri Ram Sene group are abhorrent, and we should all applaud the Pink Chaddi ladies for their innovative form of protest.

I have been going out to pubs since I was a teenager, and I have no qualms about wearing a skimpy cocktail dress when I’m in the party mood. I do believe that women should be free to dress as they please, drink alcohol, celebrate Valentine’s Day, and enjoy any and all freedoms that are afforded to us as citizens of a democratic society. I dress the same at clubs in Delhi and Mumbai as I do in New York or LA, and I will drink in front of aunts and uncles without shame. I admire the women in India who are taking a stand against pigheaded conservatism.

But some, such as Ms. Sagarika Ghose, fear that we are getting so carried away with our westernized partying that we may be leaving any real opportunity for widespread cultural progress behind. Ms. Ghose’s point is simple — there is an increasing divide between the modern elite and the uneducated masses in India. And, by engaging in morally loose actions that politicians can scapegoat, we ‘modern elite’ are providing perfect fodder to help rouse the masses against us. Moral depravity is easier to rally against than economic progress. They can’t fault us for getting an education and earning money, but they can admonish us for going against centuries of religious tradition. There is real danger in what is happening, because these fundamentalists — just like the religious terrorists — are not just grumpy old men…they are recruiting youth to their movements also.

Indian modernization is an interesting beast, because it is happening incredibly fast and incredibly unevenly. We should certainly embrace it, but we should be more mindful of what modernization really means, and what we are giving up in return for our freedom. When we flaunt our bodies and seize male freedoms, we are sacrificing a demure self-confidence which we can never regain. When we celebrate love openly and eschew arranged marriages, we are risking divorce and disappointment. If we approach modernism with greater awareness, we will be less effective targets for fundamentalist backlash.

Go Pink Chaddis!!!

My mother never told me to get an arranged marriage. She simply wanted me to choose someone who fit her ideal of a husband for me. And one of the most important criteria was of course: how much money is he going to make?

There is something deeply disturbing to me about the idea of love being tied to money. An arranged marriage is, without much disguise, a transaction between two families. The more beautiful the girl or the more influential her family, the higher the suitor’s net worth. The girl gets a lavish, secure life and the boy gets a pretty girl who promises to bare bear and raise pretty kids. And while our modernized Indian parents might pretend that they want us to choose our own mates, the reality is that they still view romantic relationships through a lens of pragmatism. Love is a nice side effect that should come eventually from a proper marriage, but it is not a requirement.

This is sad to me. Why must I defend the value of love against money? I personally don’t see any point to a life of grandeur without love. There are an infinity of moments to be lived between the time you are married and the time you die, thousands of nights to be spent in the same bed, and all the money in the world won’t take the misery of loneliness out of them. Perhaps I too think of marriage as a matter of pragmatism – I would rather spend those nights on a modest bed with a passionate lover than a bed made of gold with a man who sleeps next to me only so he may fulfill his duty to his mother.

It’s not that I think arranged marriages are all horrible. My parents have a good marriage. They love each other, and they are wonderful parents. I admire them for finding a way to make things work for so many years, even though they are so different from each other. I can’t imagine such an unlikely couple staying together successfully in any situation other than an Indian arranged marriage.

But I just don’t think a marriage should be something that we have to ‘make work’, or that a life partner should be someone with whom we ‘make due’…this is love we’re talking about for God’s sake! LOVE. It is the one thing beyond food, water and shelter that we all need from the moment of birth. And it is something that is celebrated and adorned in our ancient traditions (poems, scriptures, music, dance, sculptures, paintings…and the list goes on). So to continue to treat it as a second-hand emotion is tragic, and completely distorts the true meaning and purpose of life.

I seek riches only so that I may have the freedom to spend more time with my love. Happy Valentine’s Day.

UPDATE: incidentally, the marrying for money phenomenon is not just confined to Indian arranged marriages. It happens in Western ‘love’ societies too. And, when rich people lose their fortunes, what do you suppose happens to their marriages? A recent article in the Economist discusses the effect of the recession on marriage…

I was amazed by the passionate responses this post elicited. Reading through your comments was much more interesting than reading my own post =) There was so much brought up through the various comments that I’d like to continue this discussion by highlighting some of the responses and giving you all a chance to react to them.

I’ve been conflicted about whether or not to showcase this particular comment, but I decided that it’s better for us to address it upfront rather than run away from harsh words. So, here it is – straight from the horse’s mouth – a response by a Hindu fundamentalist [not appropriate for children]:

JAI BAJRANGI Wrote:
January 22nd, 2009 at 10:48 am

You are a bloody bitch which was borned out of a cross between a swine and a dog you must be a secular bastard which is being F****D by MANY Katalas and now you are addicted to being F****D by those BASTARDS and that is why you are saying these things otherwise how can any PURE HINDU because HINDUS were slaves to Muslims & English for many centuries and were being F****D by these BASTARDS they have become IMPOTENT and ready to give their Daughters & Sisters to these MUSLIM BASTARDS like SHAHRUKH KHAN, SAIF ALI KHAN, MANSOOR ALI KHAN PATODI, AMIR KHAN etc.

What stands out most to me about this comment is the sexual insecurity this poor fellow seems to be suffering from. According to him, the only way I – a Hindu – could possibly be saying something like ‘let’s all unite and why the f*** do we need to fight’ is if I myself am having sex with a Muslim. For the record, I’m not having sex with a Muslim and never have (not that I think there’s anything wrong with inter-religious sex). But that’s besides the point. This obsession with sex betrays, in my opinion, the baseness of the fundamentalist psyche. They are being completely driven by prehistoric evolutionary impulses and have lost all ability to control these impulses through rational thought. The fundamentalist says “they steal me women, me kill them dead”.

Where is the religion in all this? Well, I think the “religion” comes into play when these folks meet in groups. There’s something very powerful about a herd of angry men chanting and raving together. An orgy of anger can be perhaps even more intoxicating than one of love.

And, so, to answer some of you who think I am naive….I am not naive. I know what hatred and anger exists in the world. Here you can see it directed towards me. But I refuse to believe that we cannot evolve beyond this baseness. I would choose an orgy of love any day, and I believe there are more people in the world like us, than like them. Gandhi fought with love, and I believe so can we.

For years, every Bollywood film has been a variation on the same, tired old theme:  hot girl and charming guy, while dancing fall in love, their love is threatened by: parents / another lover / accident / disease / magic, more dancing , fight scene / melodrama, charming guy saves the day…and everyone lives happily ever after. Hundreds of movies are produced in India each year that follow this exact formula.

After nearly a century, someone has finally come into India and made a film with the type of grit and artistry that many of us have been craving to see in Indian form for years. And, not surprisingly, it took a white dude to make it happen. I am referring of course to Slumdog Millionaire, which was nominated last week for 10 Oscars and has the international film community abuzz.

The question is, why did it take a foreigner to make a proper Bollywood film?

Many Indians are embracing Slumdog with hesitation, or perhaps not at all, because of its stark portrayal of poverty and corruption in India. It lacks, they say, the fantasy, hope and beauty that we have all become accustomed to as Bollywood fans, and instead focuses on the harsh realities we seek to ignore. There has even been a controversy over Amitabh Bachchan’s biting remarks about the film’s popularity and speculation over his bruised ego. Big B wrote recently about the film:

“If SM projects India as Third World dirty underbelly developing nation and causes pain and disgust among nationalists and patriots, let it be known that a murky underbelly exists and thrives even in the most developed nations. It’s just that the SM idea authored by an Indian and conceived and cinematically put together by a Westerner, gets creative Globe recognition. The other would perhaps not.”

Wake up Big B! There have been myriad movies made about the ‘underbelly’ of Western societies. In fact, the rest of the world has been making gritty films for years. It’s just that India has been addicted to its decades-old formula and hasn’t noticed. Big B’s remark, in my opinion, is quite naive and completely misses the beauty of this film.

I – and everyone I know that’s seen it – think Slumdog rates amongst the best films of the year. I walked out of the theater with a greater satisfaction than after most of my recent Bollywood watching episodes, thankful that someone had finally come along and modernized Bollywood. Not with nude women booty-shaking to club beats. No. This was modernization in a deeper sense — one that took the art of Indian film making to a higher level.

All the essential Bollywood elements are there in full tact: cute boy and girl, unrequited love, trials and tribulations, fights, an underlying sense of hope…and even a dance thrown in for good measure.

Yet Director Danny Boyle takes this basic formula and transforms it into a moving depiction of the hardships faced by an oft ignored people in India, with the sort of realism that truly brings a fictional story to life. And even in these hardships, there was ample beauty to be found — the brilliant colors of the Mumbai landfills, the sacred bonds of brotherhood, the sensuality of a young dancer, and the undying pursuit of the hopeless romantic for his only love. All this woven into an engaging, tight-knit story.

I hope this marks the beginning of a new era in Bollywood, and many more Oscars to come.

A few hours before Barack Obama’s inauguration, I sit and reflect on what this moment means for South Asians across the world. On the one hand, we have before us an undeniable proof that our society has taken a huge step forward, towards not only racial tolerance, but racial indifference. With the support engendered for Obama around the world, the human race has shown that we have evolved to such a level that we can appreciate an individual’s strengths and weaknesses, race / gender / citizenship notwithstanding; indeed, we can love someone who looks and talks and acts differently from us, as our own.

Yet the dust is still only settling from the demoralizing Mumbai attacks. And what does that say about us? How can we still be suffering these attrocities? Why do we still kill in the “holy” name of salvation, enlightenment and universal love? Perhaps we have not yet evolved that much.

I am Indian. I am also American. I was raised Hindu, but I have a deep admiration for and sense of kinship with Muslim culture. The sweet music of Ali Akbar Khan, the awe-inspiring Mughal architecture in Delhi and Rajasthan, the beautiful Urdu language which I can hardly distinguish from that spoken in my own home — how can I not consider these my own? I have often thought how I would love to give my future children Muslim names. And, why shouldn’t I? Shahana, Saif…Shahrukh. Aren’t these names Indian also?

And so this fighting makes me sad. Really really sad. I believe it is up to us — the younger Guptas and Khans of the world — to stop this madness. And I hope that connecting on social networks like Yaari will help us come together.

Perhaps, a few years from now, when the first female president is being inaugurated in Washington DC, we will be able to celebrate as one, human race.