Beware those titles

The very mention of titles probably remind you of "Sir" and "Lord" if you are inclined to aristocracy. If you are more inclined to movie stars - especially the South Indian version - you probably are thinking of "Super Star", "Supreme Star" and the like. There are reasons to beware of such things too but that is not the subject matter of the thesis here. (Of course thesis! And I expect a doctorate out of it, mind it!)

Let us first consider what deification means. Ram cannot be an ordinary mortal - he is the incarnation of Vishnu. This conferring of godhood makes it easy on all of us. We do not need to be affectionate and obedient sons, loving brothers or faithful to our wives. Gods can be thus but we are mere mortals. On the other hand, though, we can doubt our wives at the drop of a hat citing Ram (When even the god Ram did it how do you expect a mere mortal like me to abstain?) conveniently forgetting that, unlike him, we are not juggling the welfare of our society with the welfare of our wife. So, conferring godhood on Ram ensures that we do not have to live up to the virtues that he embodied.

This country keeps creating problems for us, however. We deify Ram and ensure that we have no troubling thoughts about being worse than we ought to be and it springs a Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi on us. Now, come on, non-violence and Truth? Getting beaten up without retaliation and still fighting injustice? Starvation? Well - that was a bit too much to expect us to do. So, heck, We christen him "Mahatma". Problem solved. Now if anyone catches us in a lie, "I am no mahatma, merely an ordinary mortal". If I walk away from injustice on the streets, why should I be expected to do otherwise? I am no Mahatma.

We have now the solution to all such inconvenient folks who show us uncomfortable things like values in life. The one thing we have ensured is that we have made goddesses out of our women. Goddesses exist to grant the needs of mere mortals, after all. Mere mortals cannot give anything to goddesses, can they? So, very neatly, we ensured that they did everything for us and we had no reason to do anything for them. And they also had to maintain the dignity we vested on goddesses - in dress and deportment, didn't they?

So, now you know. If there is anyone around you who makes you uncomfortable with his value systems - don't rail at him. Just bestow a title on him - that will absolve you of all the need to feel guilty about not living up to those moral standards. And, for Heaven's sake, avoid any title like a plague. It is too constricting a life living up to a title.