What it means to be me in Corporate America?

To paraphrase Churchill, when he said, democracy is not a flawless system, but a system that is better than all others that have been tried in the past and have failed, he is just as right even today. Yet, I can’t help but wonder what the combination of democracy and a free market economy produces? (Not in Adam Smith’s free market, for Chomsky claims it was a different vision) America’s mechanics of governing seems to pave a permanent way embossed with sacred literature of, “either with or without us”. And now democracy synonymous with free market.

What is religion if it isn’t a way of life? If the traits of religion include self-righteousness, a model of economy and the thesaurus of good and evil, then Corporate America is a religion within itself. And yes it is better than all those others that have tried and failed. Failed to create security for the greatest number and failed to ensure personal freedom for its citizens and failed to be a smooth sailing federal system and failed to blend permanence with change. Needless to say the countries closer to America’s holy dictionary of good and evil, are the better ones. These countries have not tried and failed, yet. These countries include, Israel and India before all others. A friend from India emailed and said, “Israel has made it. India is moving fast in this polar world. Pakistan is nowhere in the race. Don’t go back to Pakistan.”

Image-conjuring phrases are the weapons in the wars of this century. The Crusaders and the Pritvis are being replaced by, fighting-for-freedom-and-justice. Consequently, failed-state, Pakistan-funded-Taliban and crime-prone-Karachi are bad image-conjuring weapons. So are terrorists who kill within Pakistan in the name of a God forsaken religion not even close to Islam.

What does one do when they know they do not sell in Corporate America, despite being from an ally country: When you know you’re worse than marijuana, worse than pot, worse than Viagra? This loneliness is the worst of its kind. It’s the unrepresentative ethnicity in all the top hundred best product target-demographics. You then don’t feature on any Viacom or Clear-Channel billboard. You get so desperate that you think of organizing to latch onto the Gay rights movement to promote your ethnicity. You become so desperate that you wear a Junoon T-shirt to an upscale San Francisco workplace. So desperate to avoid the, which-part-of-India-are-you-from question, you always carry the book, “Pakistan: the long view”. So desperate that you spell out India with chewing gum on the bus, hoping some old Anglo-Saxon can get annoyed at India.

Desperation ebbing away at my vision, and I don’t know what to do. There are days when I think I know the tricks to media trade. When I know that the key is to make parallels between there and here. The key is to go for the average American mind. They key is to speak common denominator language. Then there are days that there seem to be too many people willing to hack into the governments resources and cloud any entry of a Pakistani view on mainstream media.

I too will use the world failed for Pakistan, but I would call it a failed democracy, not a failed state. A failed state is an economy worse than Argentina’s, a failed state has infrastructure worse than Afghanistan’s and a failed state has a head of state worse than Zimbabwe’s. Yet, none of these countries have had the failed-state label. A failed state doesn’t have 1.5 million people in the US, a failed state doesn’t successfully battle the worlds most capable and dangerous terrorist group. A failed state doesn’t produce kids who top the Cambridge board of Examination. A failed state doesn’t produce a city like Karachi: the lights and the tolerance, all things its come to be known as the opposite of, just as Sumit Ganguly has been known to be an impartial expert on Kashmir.

A failed individual, however, is that who lets hate consume him or her. Of all those pseudo intellectuals who are called on a TV show for an impartial opinion, and deny their Indian origin despite the South Indian sun on their face; those people who say Pakistan’s never produced anything worthy in 54 years; those who make the moderator laugh about the joke Kashmir is, and those who love the spotlight so much they forget there will eventually be an energy crisis. All those people, I’ll be a fool to get my heart strained for.

Tomorrow someone else will lie, that more than 80% of Karachi is a slum. Baffling me if they know what 80% of 14 million is? And if their definition of slum includes a dish to watch Indian movies. A week latter some high level delegate will insist the UN resolutions are invalid. A month latter some other world leader will be forced to backtrack he isn’t sure if Al-Qaida is in Kashmir. A year latter, I will still be talking to the computer and TV screen, and life will go on. Pakistan will remain. As a great friend of mine said, Pakistan doesn’t need us, we need Pakistan. I’ll keep hanging on.