it is incredible the number of people who mix up unbiased and non partisan. possible to have biases without being partisan …no ?

for example i am biased towards women’s rights or against loutish behaviour, does that mean i am also partisan … does it translate into support for a party? Not really, because i can’t think of a single political party that stands for the rights of women, and i don’t know of a single political party that hasn’t exhibited loutish behaviour. If an issue is important enough to me, I will have a bias on it. That bias does not translate into party positions, possibly because parties do not have any positions except winning. People like me are floating voters. I will vote for a party that i believe will give me most. I am as loyal to a party as it is to me, which is to say not at all. Conversely, I don’t have biases on issues that don’t matter to me or I don’t know enough about. I may have a Yes/No position on that, but if that Yes/no is challenged by an expert who explains it, i don’t have issues in admitting that I am wrong. Give you an example. I still believe that first come first serve on 2G was the best way to increase penetration of telephony. And that the real scandal is unaffordable 3G that is a result of auctioning. Does that mean i support the Government/Congress Party in the way telephony has been handled – no i don’t support them on this.

Those who conflate the two – bias and partisanship – are trying to confuse the issue and make targets of those who don’t follow their world view. And I have begun resenting that.

Also on the rise are those who are in the us or them mode. The number of guys on the Right who have told me ‘you shouldn’t be speaking to x, or y or z’ because they are paid congis, and the number of people on the opposite side who have told me that they will ‘judge’ me because i talk to sanghis, is on the rise. I am not on a KG playground… I know lots of people. I try and find common cause with most.  The real world is real and not made up of 140 character barbs. Yes, if people are genuinely abusive – and I have had people call me corrupt, a paid propagandist, loose in terms of sexual morality, all sorts of things – right from the days of blogging- I will do what i do in real life, cut them out of my life. Have no interaction if possible – unless i bump into them or step on their toe -in which case i will acknowledge that and move on. Your enemies are not mine, unless you happen to be my business partners or my closest friends. Your biases are not mine. Your Party is not mine. Your role models not mine. And mine are not yours…

Do i judge – of course I do. You have issues with the Election Commission’s behaviour, i will buy your point and hear you out. You target the EC because of his faith – i will bracket you as a bigot. You make jokes about rape, i will think you strange. You go after women and target their morality because you disagree with them I will bracket you a misogynist. And you cry wolf, i will hear you once and respond to it, but then next time will no longer take you seriously.

My world is not black and white. It has millions of hues and shades – and you know what, I recognise most of those hues and shades.