Cows

tribeandnation

Can anyone tell me what's going on with the cows in India? Last time I was on Bazaar St in Delhi I watched for whole hour while people were feeding a cow all the while a kid who looked like he hadn't eaten in a long time sat by begging. I've heard different stories on this and was wondering why a cow is eating better than that little boy.

Lost in India

Cows are considered sacred in India.

is it possible that the kid was there because he knew cow were getting feed there and it becomes very dramatic, and maybe draw a bit more money from it ?

Lost

tribeandnation

Well, I quess I knew that they're sacred...but what about that kid? what about the sanctity of human life?

Nick-H

But so are little boys!

tribeandnation, it's pretty hard to make sense or logic out of life here sometimes.

There can be all sorts of 'logical' explanations to the event you saw, for instance people may well have been feeding waste matter to the cow, that they would never have offered to a human.

Who can tell? We weren't there!

crvlvr

Some dogs and cats in the US eat better than the homeless people here.

cyberhippie

Hell cows in Kobe eat better than most of us!!

PeakXV

One Hour! For God sakes, splurge a few rupees, and go get the poor kid a bunch of bananas next time.

__________________
What lies behind us and what lies ahead of us are tiny matters compared to what lives within us.
~ Oliver Wendell Holmes

Don't go to India ~ Pre-trip Warnings & Misconceptions?

tribeandnation

First of all, I have done quite a lot of work to feed the poor, so you can suspend your judgment of my charity. Second, my question pertained to social justice with in India. That said, I realize there are people in the US not as well fed, so save the relativistic rhetoric. All I asked was why it seems that cows in India seem better fed than most people.
The situation is a sign of a national pandemic, and I am just wondering why.

julesa

i understood there was little real hunger in india, only 3% (ok that's a lot of people still).

PeakXV

Maybe that was their cow and the begger kid was one of those begging syndicate kids that are run by the local mafia.

Even if the cows look healthy from the outside - they wander around in toxic traffic fumes, constantly eat refuse & plastic bits in the roadside dumps and although well feed may only appear to be healthier than the poorer citizens.

Even in North America - the part of the population that appears very "well feed" may be but a tick away from a heart attack or worse by consuming to many cheap transfat/cholesteral/preservative filled "processed fooods".

tribeandnation

I'm not quite understanding why it is such a ridiculous notion to mention a little criticism about how people are treated compared to roaming cows.
There seems to be a lot of poverty that the west turns a blind eye to, and pretending there is not a lack of justice doesn't make it better. Is it okay to be productively critical of cultures?
I realize (once again) that there are fatties all over America and that there are starving people here too. I see it daily and I defintely see it in India (case in point) on a grander scale. Maybe we haven't gone to the same India, but my experience has shown me this is a real problem.

cyberhippie

You are engaging with a bunch of people here who are only too aware of the problems of poverty.

Your illustration reads like the begger in a western street next to a rolls royce, why does this happen because the world isn't a fair place.
People dying on the streets of Europe whilst someones horse or pet gets fed.
Life stinks for many, all over the world

You took a snapshot and extrapolated a whole reality, chances are the wee boy just got fed by some passing stranger that day, on main bazaar that would be highly likely, hell I may have fed him myself, or that cow has just been beaten black and blue, perhaps you didn't see the lowly foodstall owners slip the wee boy a couple of pieces of fried potato or a puri and some dal, the shop owner give him a smile and a friendly whack around the head as some small sweet was given to him. Or the Sadhi buying him a samosa with the last of his coins!! Perhaps he just made a windfall of a couple of rupees gambling with his mates, or was knackered from his brief excursion into childhood running around with his mates, the other street urchins, he might even have made a ton that day but an oscar actor sees through the day!

There are many stories to what you saw, not all of which reflect badly on other people!

Nick-H

Frankly I think this thread is a troll.

You saw one event in one place, tribeandnation, and you are trying to criticise a whole culture and nation accordingly.

Stuff and nonsense.

So you checked out an awful lot of cows, did you? As well as 'most people'?

Troll.

Thread closed