The pigeon-fool principle though intended to look funny on the outside, is much more than a mere extrapolation of a funny incident. It is, like a lot of funny things, reality at a higher level. The results of the poll are compiled and as of now, there were over 100 hundred people who read the blog entry but only 36 have decided to vote with almost 90% (31/36) of them preferring pigeon poop over the fool’s mucus on their shirts. The result though hardly surprising made me ask myself, Why the difference?
If you look at the situation objectively, both pigeon poop and fool's mucus have very similar outcomes when they fall on our shirt. Both are equally unfortunate and equally disgusting things to happen to anyone, they take the same amount of effort to wipe and wash the stain etc. But still people are biased towards one of the options! This proves my notion that, given a choice between two equally bad options, people choose the familiar one.
The beauty of the whole argument lies in the parallel we can draw with the elections in India. In most of the constituencies, people are forced to choose between pigeon poop (congress) and fool’s mucus (BJP and allies) and people choose the familiar pigeon poop. And not surprisingly, a lot of people choose not to vote at all (Voter turnout was 43% in Mumbai and 35% for my poll, which is good enough considering that TATA Tea did not sponsor a “Jaago Re” campaign for my blog). Hence even after 5 years of dismal governance, the congress party is back to power in Maharashtra.
Unless we figure out a way where deserving people can rise up to the leadership level, India will always remain a flawed democracy that is more of a “Deeply-Hippocratic-Cheaply-Oligarchic-Republic” as opposed to the “Sovereign-Socialist-Secular-Democratic-Republic” we are supposed to be going by my 7th class civics text book.
P.S: the content of this blog turned out to be much more serious than intended by the author (me) but what the hell!
P.P.S: The artist (me again) intended the bird to look like a pigeon and the guy like he has a cold and he is not sure how successful he is.
Interesting read!
ReplyDeletejust a little comment : rather than trying to "explain" the joke ...
ReplyDeleteyou should have explained the pigeon incident and BAM !!! cut to the chase ...
i.e. the poll could just be pigeon poop (a.k.a. congress party) vs. The gentleman's mucous (a.k.a whatever) ... or disclose the association after they vote !!!
@ J... : Thanks
ReplyDelete@ flawsophy: I never thought of the parallel when I was writing the original.
The parallel drawn is a stretch. The reason people chose poop over mucus is because we have an aversion towards other persos' mucus and not so much towards pigeon poop. Also, we are more familiar with mucus than poop (though may not be of their dropping on us). As to why we are more averse to mucus, the reasons are not so easily seen. They may have to do something with inter-human relations. Like why straight men are averse to other men licking them and not women?
ReplyDeleteAgain, the environment. Comparing this to the current political parties is, to say the least, deliberate.
I have not and never even tried to explain why people chose the pigeon poop. All I said was that a majority of them chose it and then drew an analogy.
ReplyDeleteBtw. Big reader of this Blog.
ReplyDeletehehe...did u know there is a superstition that pigeon droppings are considered to bring good luck!!!
ReplyDeleteand go thru this.... pigeon droppings directly on u may bring luck... but other times may prove fatal
http://blooklynheightsblog.com/archives/1266
awesome, awesome post man! :D loved it :D (both of them :D)
ReplyDeleteI love the dilemma and the hypothesis, and its extrapolation :D
Here's a possible point to note : "I know the old shit that happens with the congress, but if I vote for those other guys, god knows what new shit will happen". So in one case, you know the new shit (mucus), and in the other case you fear the new shit, without really knowing it (you just have your imagination, and the newspaper to tell you how bad it can get).
The point is people fear any kind of new shit. Be it known or unknown. This all agrees with your theory, but just a distinction on the kinds of shit tht u mentioned :D
thanks ;)
ReplyDeletethe mucus may sound H1N1 in the current environment forcing some to choose the shit to clean :). But hey what abt bird flu? hopefully that does not get to you through shit :))
ReplyDelete