Why do we hate each other so much?

When the captain of the Pakistani cricket team, Shahid Afridi, arrived at Karachi after losing to India in the World Cup semifinal, in a reply to mediapersons he said,

"Mujhe yahan ke logo ki soch samajh nahi ati. (...) Hum kyun India ke itne khilaf hain? Hum kyun India se itni nafrat leke baithte hain?"

(I cannot comprehend the mentality of people here. Why are we against India so much.  Why do have so much of hatred for India.)

Then he gave a couple of examples of some things that Pakistanis like about India, like TV serials and Movies. The mediapersons were obviously disappointed since they were hoping for a typical "Insha'Allah hum agli baar India ko dho denge.." type response. But Afridi raised a question that no Indian or Pakistani raised for the past half century. Why do we hate each other so much? Afridi's comment made me think about the core cause of the so called nafrat or traditional rivalry between the general public of the two nations when it comes to things like cricket matches border flag ceremonies. 

As it is very obvious, there are far more similarities between Indians and Pakistanis than there are differences.  Language, culture, faces, food, races are all the same, and maybe there is more similarity between Amritsar and Lahore than between Lahore and Karachi. We understand when they curse us, and so do they when we curse them.  And it is due to these similarities that people of both countries find perfect rivals in each other. We can hate them because they are not us, but just like us, which apparently makes hating them easy and meaningful.

People try to explain this rivalry by giving references to incidents like the Kargil War, War of 1971, or to terrorism, but we did not feel the rivalry in the T20 World Cup in 2010 when India played Afghanistan, which has been the hub of Al-Qaeda and terrorism. We do not feel the same kind of rivalry when our team plays against the English, who ruled over India(and present Pakistan) with brutality from 1613–1947. This is because they are too different to relate to.

I guess It is easier to find a reason to hate your brother than to hate the guy across the street. There is a saying about sibling rivalry,

"Me against my brother; my brother and me against my cousin; Me, my brother, and my cousin against the stranger"

I feel it is true in case of Indians and Pakistanis too, and we have the ability to stand together if situation demands.

Jai Hind.

Do not forget to share your views.

Please Recommend this post if you liked it.
 |
\ /
 V

Why is Google's new +1 button Destined to Fail

Today Google launched a +1 button, which most are hailing as a rival to the Facebook like button and even Twitter’s retweet button, but for search results. Limited to your Google contacts and chat friends, Google hints at connecting +1 with Twitter, but noticeably doesn’t mention Facebook. 

Will it be successful in bringing Google into the Social Networking club?

Google says,

 The +1 button is shorthand for "this is pretty cool" or "you should check this out."

I say its destined to fail. 

I think the point is that we use facebook only for social networking. We can safely assume that interaction on facebook is generally informal. But since google's services are widely used for (semi?) professional purposes, it becomes a mess when Google tries to incorporate social networking into its existing services. This was what Google did with Buzz. 

Unless our friends at Google devise some way of completely separating the personal contacts from the professional ones, the social networking ventures will have a high probability of failing. One of the key factors in the success of facebook might have been the fact that it can be completely separated from other forms of communication, not tied up to an existing service.

Again, Google says,

The next time you’re trying to remember that bed and breakfast your buddy was raving about, or find a great charity to support, a +1 could help you out. Just make sure you're signed in to your Google Account.

How many of us want to see their boss's +1's while searching? Or worse, how many want our boss's to see what we have been +1'ing on google search?

Another thing that comes to mind is that people will generally "Like"/"+1" once they have visited and viewed the page. Liking a search result based on page title and 3 lines of extract is senseless, and the correct procedure for +1ing would be :

1. Search on Google.com

2. Click on a result

3. If u like it, come back to results page and click +1.

Which is obviously very unproductive and time consuming. I know that Google wants to spread this on web pages too, but i guess it is a matter of one simple fact:

"My friends are already on facebook." 

It might seem very childish, but it is a very important point. Since +1 will obviously be incompatible(?) with Like, people will not shift unless everyone else they know shifts, and everyone else will not shift until everyone else shifts, which is the classical chicken-egg problem!

Website owners would not shift to a clone of facebook's Like button, unless Google comes up with something drastically new.

To get the button for your web site, use this Page. To enable it in your searches use this

PS: I want to believe that this is another one of those Google's April Fool's Jokes.

Please take time to "Recommend" this post if you liked it.
 | 

\|/
 V