[Reader-list] Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky and ragging!

[Stop Ragging Campaign]

The Russian composer Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky was said to have died of
cholera in 1893, after drinking a glass of contaminated water. This
lie reigned for about a century, but the composer's biographer,
Alexandra Orlova, revealed to the world after migrating to the US the
real story of Tchaikovsky's death. The truth was that Tchaikovsky's
old classmates in law school got to know that the legendary composer
was going to be punished for homosexuality, and possibly exiled. This
would have brought disrepute to their old law school, and so the
composer appeared before a "court of honour" made up of eight other
former classmates who ordered the composer to "preserve the good name
of the school" by taking his own life. One of his judges procured the
necessary poison, and the cholera story was hastily concocted to cover
up the truth.

(The last two sentences in the above paragraph are from
http://www.maurice-abravanel.com/tchakovsky_s_death.html )

Such is the value of an educational institution in the minds and
hearts of their alumni!

This implies that 'students' see an educational institution as not so
much a place to learn, but as an extension of 'home'. Just as
ill-repute should not befall one's family and clan, so must the honour
of one's alma mater be preserved. Even at the cost of the individual's
rights.

The college is a "community" rather than an association of
individuals. The internal functioning and power dynamics of this
community depend upon unwritten social codes. Such a community is
anarchic in nature and has no place for individualism.

That is one context in which we can understand hostel ragging: as not
merely diametrically opposed to individualism, but also a collective,
communitarian, ritual exercise with the aim of establishing the fluid,
unwritten codes which rule the community. These codes obviously are
about power relations, but also about other factors that define what
is permissible and what is not within the community. Sexual
conditioning is one such code.

The junior who is being ragged has to not only suffer abuse but also
accept the discourse of ragging.

As ragging is being increasingly discredited, freshers are often told,
"Do you think I am ragging you? Is this ragging? Or is it personality
development?" Thus the attempt is to make the fresher accept the
discourse, whatever nomenclature you apply to it.

As part of the opposition to anti-ragging disciplinarian measures
enforced in hostels by the law, many students question: "We are
adults, we know where to draw the line. We know how to differentiate
between right and wrong." This is a strong case for anarchism; the
student is arguing that 'the law' does not need to intervene because
the codes of the community ("rites of passage") will take care of
everything.

And so the fresher will be ragged in the manner that is acceptable and
prevalent within the community. What is perpetrated as part of ragging
should be acceptable within the community; whether or not it is
acceptable to the fresher is a non-issue. Furthermore, the fresher has
to be indoctrinated to accept ragging as part of 'college life', that
is, the discourse of the community. The fresher is told: "You have to
live here for three years, dude. So be nice to your seniors. They'll
help you a lot. Then you will also rag your freshers."

This means that rebellion from the individual fresher and
'disciplinary action' by the college 'authorities' are threats to the
codes of the community, to its way of life. It is an ideological
assault that undermines how the community defines itself.

The community's ideology depends a lot on ritual: the fresher has to
stand in a certain manner, speak in a certain manner, never smile even
when provoked by humour. There are little limericks which freshers are
made to learn by heart, and one of the themes of these works of
literature is that "I will make my a**e available to my seniors
whenever they want it."

Any deviance from these rituals is blasphemy; it is an affront to not
just one senior but an insult to the entire community. For power
dynamics, too, ritual is important: because power by itself is not
enough: power has to be shown and explicitly demonstrated.

The problem with all of this is that the individual and his/her rights
are not recognised. Some students oppose the idea of any kind of
surveillance against ragging in the hostel on the grounds of privacy.
Such is the acceptance of the discourse of ragging, however, that the
fresher's privacy is not an issue at all. It is important for the
ritual of ragging that the fresher's room be entered into in the late
hours of the night, that the fresher be prevented from doing what he
wants because getting ragged is more important; because fetching water
for the senior or dancing naked before him is to be given preference
over finishing the book that he was reading.

To the apologists of ragging who say that 'mild' ragging should be
permissible, that's another difficult question: what about the
fresher's right to privacy within the hostel space?

Ragging is not a passage to 'manhood' but to a society of hierarchy
and patriarchy where individual freedom is not respected. This too is
referred to by the senior, who insists that he is training the fresher
for the world ahead ('personality development'): "You will face
ragging everywhere. When you get a job you will see how your bosses
will treat you to begin with." (Incidentally, one doesn't have to
pledge one's a**e in a ritual before being given a job.)

The clichéd theory of ragging as a 'rite of passage' therefore, should
be replaced by the term 'wrongs of passage', which is by the way the
name of a book on hazing in American campuses.

-- 
www.stopragging.org | info at stopragging.org