TRADITION AND TABOO

Another stupid article from the so called News paper The Hindu
http://www.thehindu.com/arts/music/sober-dress-for-soulful-music/article4277165.ece
Everything in life is contextual. If our 4 million odd years of evolution has not taught us to look into only the intrinsic and essential aspects and instead resort to painting something as taboo it shows pure lack of maturity.
Culture develops only by change, developments etc. If we had all to stick to traditions strictly then we must be either moving around nakedly or with bare minimum leaves covering certain parts of the body as that was the most ancient tradition of human race.
While analyzing anything we must explore only the relevant facts and while doing that we must desist getting distracted from the following major traps:-
1] Mutilating the facts,
2] Analyzing them with preconceived notions or prejudices,
3] Generalizing the particular and particularizing the general,
4] Approaching facts with unloving criticism or uncritical love,
5] Evaluating facts with our pet isms or philosophies,
6] Resorting to statistical justifications,
7] Unleashing unworkable utopia,
8] Mask them with logical fallacies,
9] Bury them in pleasant jargons, and
10] Give historical justifications or passing judgements based on traditions which are contextually not suitable or valid or hold water or which in no way contribute or affect the essence of what we are analyzing.
In this specific context I would like to ask the critic SUSHILA KRISHNAMURTHI with all due respects to her whether as per the tradition in Markhazhi she adorned the floor of the facade of her house with kolam in Arisi mavu[ rice flour] bordered it with kavi [red paint] and kept a ball of cow dung at the centre and erected a pumpkin flower [paruthi poo] in the middle of that cow dung ball. Had she bathed before doing all these and draped 9 yards madisaru saree.
Applying and analyzing with irrelevant yardsticks is the result of both fallibility of human perceptionhttp://contentwriteups.blogspot.in/2010/02/real-perception.htmland fallacy of illogicality.
This hypocrisy of criticising women’s attire is itself a very trite and tedious tradition. In fact I wrote some 15+ years back in column titled as Adam’s View in a women’s magazine about this hypocrisy. Those interested may read the article in the following link
http://contentwriteups.blogspot.in/2010/11/what-is-wrong-with-fashion-parades-how.html
In fact such reviews have nothing to do with music and it has become a trend with news papers like Hindu to write such nonsense on almost every subject because people reviewing music do not have adequate musical knowledge. Let us place such newspapers and such articles in the correct place i.e. dustbins.
I would indeed welcome a day when boys and girls sing nicely with proper sruthi and bhavam wearing jeans on the stage. After all what matters in a music concert is music not what the artist wears. Are sabhas , organizers and these media sponsoring for the dress of the musicians like they do in the west. They do not and hence they have no business to talk about these things. Instead let the organizers, media etc help promote classical music by paying enough money to ensure the younger generation take up and continue with music as a profession. Let them criticize about the state of pathetic acoustics in most places. Let them criticize about the politics in music organizations which act like BCCI. Let them make music a 365 day profession which feeds the audience with both money and popularity rather than make it a December industry. Let the sabhas and media treat artist with dignity as they do in the west. Let the media respect the artists’ privacy and personal tastes.