Cliques generally have their own respective cultures. All members share and act within a collective imagination. This is where the strength of the group lies. A clique shares common priorities, aspirations, and motivations. The members learn the same concepts in life and learn from the same mistakes. The mentality is of the pack. Members of a clique generally move in one direction, having the same mission, and bearing the same equal share of consequences to their actions.

Socialization is necessary if one were to co-exist productively and peacefully within his or her turf. It is a long and sequential process wherein one learns the characteristics of his society. It is a constant and consistent education and orientation on the part of the individual that comprises the process of socialization.
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Are working women more sought after as wives than those prospective full-time homemakers? Well, most men in the Indian metros seem to be in accordance with the former. Primarily because having a wife who works at an office like you do has a series of benefits.

Double income is a huge perk. The increasingly expensive lifestyle in a country like India makes it imperative for both partners to work. In fact, beyond a point it becomes difficult to survive on just one salary. Yep, the wish list is increasing and so should the monthly income too.

The feeling of empathy is on a completely different plane altogether from contributing financially, but again equally important. Working women understand their husbands better and the pressures of his job. Plus, a working wife gets a lot of exposure and meets different people on a regular basis; this increases her info bank and makes her rather more interesting than a wife who stays home 24X7, lacks company lest the saas bahu serials and fails to understand the demanding conditions of a job. C’mon, gone are the days when opinionated women were burnt on stakes. The Indian man prefers a financially independent life partner who has a mind of her own. And if she earns more than hubby dear, the deal couldn’t be better. The complete package is vavavoooom attractive!

Indeed a huge paradigm shift in a country that always looked at women as second class citizens, who were just meant to look after the house and bear children. Not anymore. Hmmm…at this extremely modern argument, can I share my apprehensions? Ok, here I go. Working women are a good, progressive sight and stand for women lib n all. But what about children? With more and more women preferring career over children, will India end up like a second Japan? Serious food for thought.
Via thetimesofindia

It makes me turn red with fury when I hear news such as this. A survey conducted in United Kingdom shockingly states that one in five teachers feel that students should be caned to discipline them. Not just that, closer home, four school children were severely beaten by their teachers at a Gurukul in Bhuj.  And in Delhi, another teacher caned a few students that resulted in one being admitted to a hospital with back injuries, while three others received minor injuries.
The United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child says NO to corporal punishment. In many places, hitting children has been completely banned such as in Sweden, Finland, Denmark, Norway, Austria, Cyprus, Croatia, Latvia, Germany, Italy, Israel etc. Yet, cases such as this come to light. My question is that some people seriously believe that they can benefit children by physical punishment. At the most, it will instill fear in the minds of young children which is not conducive to their growth. If hitting dogs is against ethics for many, fail to understand how can hitting children be acceptable?

What are the values do we want our children to learn- is it that powerful ones have a power and a right to hit the one in the subservient position. If violence is bad then there is no good violence. It might sound far fetched to many, but I would say that what our children learn in the early years of their lives goes a long way in building their personality, thoughts and way of life. Will these children not do violence, not plant bombs, and not murder people when they think they are on the right side? After all, their own teachers taught them that physical violence is not a bad thing if done for a good purpose.

Via

Once again the issue of violence and videogames has surfaced what with the Finnish authorities pulling off the gaming site for ‘Kindergarten Killer’. In this game the players roam around in a school and kill kindergarten students. This decision was taken a week after the shocking shooting incident in the country that had the 22 year-old Matti Saari kill 10 people at a vocational school. Not only this, Saari was far from guilt for his actions as he even posted boastful videos of his before the rampage on YouTube. Another student Pekka-Eric Auvinsen did the same before killing 6 fellow students, the school nurse and the principal. Both the killers shot themselves after the murders and died.

The contradictions may always remain regarding the influence of video games on human behavior, but it is not the first time a controversial game has been pulled back. In 1976, Death Race faced the same fate as it has players controlling cars that ran over ‘gremlins’.  Even the ever-so-popular Mortal Kombat has raised many eyebrows. Yet another frequently discussed example is Grand Theft Auto (GTA) in which the player is asked to commit crime one after another. The instructions may vary from carjacking to cold murder to running over pedestrians.

Sex is also a predominant theme. GTA and many Japanese video games explore sexuality, and not in a good taste. The Witcher includes full frontal nudity in the form of cards that you earn after completing sexual assignments. These are just a few examples out of many.

Agreed that smoking does not always cause lung cancer, similarly video games cannot blindly be attributed to behavioral as well as sexual violence.  But studies, researches and experts say that there is a correlation between games and the psychology. I am not saying that video games should be banned. But I do maintain that I will be very uncomfortable if my 9-year-old plays GTA. The young mind is meant to conditioned positively and the kind of video games that are being made today are nowhere close to that!
Via thoughts

Sharon Stone has been the daughter of controversy ever since she crossed or didn’t cross her legs in that notorious movie a couple of decades ago, which we all know. The smoking blonde has always managed to gain publicity whether negative or positive. This time however, she has gained a lot of negative publicity thanks to her bad mothering skills, which apparently are as much in mess as her. Californian officials have criticized and also rejected her request to change her child’s custody arrangements.

They have blamed her for overreacting to her son Roan’s medical issues. The court was especially infuriated with Stone’s suggestion that her son must be treated with botox as his feet were smelly. Now it has also come to notice that Bronstein will have complete custody over the boy and Stone may just have to worry endlessly if he would be taken care of by the jubilant father properly. The crux of the matter is not the custody of the child or Stone concern for her son’s health but the fact that celebrities usually end up over reacting to every tiny incident no matter what.

Probably, the entire attention and media glare showered and sometime forced upon them make them notice even small changes and worry about that endlessly. Probably the celebrities must be left alone and allowed to live a life in privacy. And the ones that like to be in the media glare are best avoided.

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Via: IMDB

Sometimes, a busy life and an equally attention providing lifestyle can make one seek solace in things that are more mundane and banal. Take the example of Leonardo DiCaprio. He recently admitted that he would like to settle down and take a break from it all. In fact, the guy has been so much under the spotlight that he probably needs to become a hermit. Leo is tired of traveling around the world and living on the movie sets and he feels that he has lost the meaning of life and what it is like to get married, have a family and settle down.

He has been dating the Israeli model Bar Rafaeli on and off and he has many a times spoken against marriages. However, the fact that now he is interested in settling down suggests something else about marriage and the institution of family. It could be a refuge where you take rest and relax, after having loads of fun elsewhere. In fact, it has been proven scientifically that those that have been professionally, sexually and socially active in their younger days look for the quiet and calm a marriage and family provides.

It must have something to do with our evolutionary process. Propagate the genes as much as possible when you are young, and once you get old, you will need to relax and be at home and make way for younger genes.

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Via: IMDB

Playing is an activity long forgotten by the current child generation of India. Yep, seeing kids play just like that is such a rare sight that now schools have started celebrating ‘Play Days’ only to encourage little pranksters to get back to their default settings and play!

But hey, no kid is willing to do that. Kyonki TV hai na? The growing influence of the idiot box on the progenies has been ignored for a long time by parents and the harm will be serious. Blame it on the work lives of the progenitors that they rely on leaving their kids with a TV program rather than a babysitter (who they always fear to be a paedophile). Or maybe it is the space crunch? Insufficient number of parks? Or perhaps, the kids are now just too lazy to stretch those muscles.
The lack of outdoor activity is leading to social, psychological and physiological problems in children. They are unable to pay complete attention, the flitting focus changes like the channels on the idiot box. Temper tantrums and eating troubles are also seen.

My personal problem is – Kids are not behaving like kids anymore; running around, going wild and having fun. Can anyone tell me where exactly is the play?
Via ibnlive

Rahul Gandhi says his possible elevation as the prime minister of India is an open question. On a ‘not much hyped about’ trip to Punjab, Rahul did not negate any speculation arising with regard to his future as the premier of the country though he did say that he just wants to make his party strong. All that said, the students he met at the different universities just could not get enough of him. Well, it’s a rare opportunity to speak to a politician who belongs to the young generation. In fact the students were well informed about the current affairs and did not let Rahul get away before answering their incessant questions. During one such session, a student well aware of the finer points of the Nuc deal stumped the youth leader on one of the nitty-gritty. Rahul very smartly said that why is he being asked all this when the student probably knows more than Rahul himself does.
Issues like terrorism, corruption and reservation were also discussed, and the young Gandhi came across as an intelligent, sincere and grounded leader. In fact, there was one more episode when he was passing through Sangrur that someone told him about Udham Singh. Forgetting about security concerns, Rahul ran to the martyr’s statue to pay homage.
Well, Rajeev Gandhi’s son seems to be following in his father’s footsteps. The question is that will he get to lead the country as well?
Via thetimesofindia

Tokyo at night

I have been living in Japan for the past four months. Don’t worry I am not one of those ‘trying too hard to fit abroad’ Indians who do nothing but criticise India. I love my country with passion and tell you what, I like Japan too. And I feel there are so many things we Indians can learn from the Japanese and make our country a better one!

You’d be wondering why all of a sudden, I am writing about the merits of a life in Japan but hey, didn’t you hear the news? The oldest living man is Japanese, his name is Tomoji Tanabe and he is 113 years old. For the uninitiated, Japanese women have been topping the World’s longevity ranks for 23 years while the men follow a close third to Iceland and Honk Kong.

Ok, so let me try and elucidate the reasons for a LONG life in Japan.

1.    People are safe. You know you will come back home when leaving for work/school/market etc. etc. in the morning.

2.    The police actually help a lost soul find the way. You know something, that was precisely their job always but many cops have evolved their duties to suit their comfort or maintain the false aura of fear that distances the common people from them.

3.    They are well prepared to face disasters. We know Japan’s susceptibility to earthquakes. A natural disaster that cannot be predicted. But hey, even the Japanese are ready to deal with one if it happens. The buildings are made of a special kind of light-weight concrete. There are emergency earthquake packs in offices.

4.    Government offices are proactive and well-organised. And may I say efficient too!

5.    They are not afraid to get their hands dirty to keep the place clean. The pain that the citizens and the establishment takes to keep the country clean is commendable. No one complains about sorting the garbage as burnable, plastic, cans and what not. If you don’t do it, your garbage collecter will. So, in a way you are shamed to sort your trash yourself.

6.    You can drink water from the tap directly.

7.    Your children are safe playing in the park. Not just that, 10 year-olds can safely commute on their own by the metro.

Well, I did say I’d try and discuss a few reasons.

Hard to believe, but there is an almost ideal place on the earth. And guess what, it took a lot of effort to get there.

By the way, the long forgotten King of Pop Michael Jackson will turn 50 tomorrow. There is no celebration. Yes, the fanfare is missing; in fact, one can’t even spot the man who was ruling the music arena for decades. You know once there was a popular joke that every child in the world would probably not know who the prime minister or the president of his/her country was but he/she would have definitely heard of Michael Jackson. But the same man has been erased from our memories; quite obviously he gave us reasons to treat him the way we are. So, don’t worry this article will not make you look at him differently. It will just go back into time to look at the singing sensation he used to be till he had a sharp fall from the top due to allegations of child abuse and his crazy whims.
Starting out as a member of Jackson Five, a music group formed with his siblings, in 1964 Michael gave hits like ‘ABC’ and ‘I’ll be there’ in even before he was a teenager. But he created history with ‘Thriller’, ‘Billie Jean’ and ‘Beat It’ in the late 70s. There was another plus point that Michael had — his impeccable dancing skills. You can imagine what fun people my age must have had growing up when Michael was creating musical and visual wonders all around. Women fainting at his live performances were a common occurrence; the special effects did actually take our breaths away. He was a star in the truest sense of the word, and not just in the west, he had a strong fan following all across the globe.
Perhaps that is the reason why he suffered such a severe downfall after the two accusations of child molestation against him in 1993 and 2003. And then there were also the debacle of marriages he entered intoa and the innumerous plastic surgeries. Oh yeah, and holding his baby from the window of the hospital he was born in, did not win Michael any brownie points.
Like many others, Michael blamed his behaviour to the abuse he faced at the hands of his father and to the challenges of being a child star. The latter definitely is a very scary statement that always lurks in the minds of parents whose children are rising to fame. We have had the likes of Britney Spears and Macaulay Culkin suffer the same fate as Michael did. They were sensations, people loved them, they went terribly wrong and then we forgot who they were.
Fame sure is a scary thing.