Chicken Fashion

So now it is the Great Singapore Sale. And we hear a lot of comments about women shopping for clothes. I do not really understand why women love to shop so much. I am one of those who only buy clothes when I absolutely have to. i.e. when my jeans starts to get hole-y, which they have. So I am going to hopefully get some cheap deals on good pair of genes... i mean jeans. Though I wouldn't mind some gene therapy to make me smarter, better looking, give me sharper features, etc.

Anyways. Speaking of fashion, apparently some idiot of a designer has taken to designing clothes for chickens. Yar, you heard me right. Chickens. In the interview he gave, he said something to the extent of: "We should give chickens their dignity back. We eat them, we eat their eggs, we cloth ourselves in nice clothes, we dress dogs and cats, we should dress chickens too. To give them their dignity back." Now I think that this guy is just being typically WASP. He thinks that everyone (and in this case, everything) must accept what he feels as dignified. But I bet that for the chicken, the best way we can give them their dignity is to leave them alone, give them a wide field for which to graze, comfortable place to roost. I bet that the chickens feel more uncomfortable and silly in what we high and mighty human beings consider to be nice looking dresses. Can you imagine what the hens will say to a rooster in a dress?

"Take that silly thing off for crying out loud! I can't see the sheen of your feathers! How am I to know if you are a good mate if I can't see the sheen of your feathers?"

I think that designer's attitude is symptomatic of all cultural Universalists. We can see that from the way the British colonialists tried to force Christianity and their own British ideals and values down the throats of the Indians, leading to much bloodshed and lost lives in the resulting clash. We can also see it from the way the IMF tried to force Indonesia to adopt "Western" style market liberalisations without due considerations for the specific conditions in the country.

We always think that, just because we are better off and are more powerful, we know best and that hence the people we are trying to help should just listen to us. However, we don't realise that sometimes we need to learn about how the people we are supposedly helping should best be helped and be humble enough to learn that we don't have all the answers. It is a lesson that the IMF and the World Bank is slowly learning. Hopefully America will learn this lesson too (though I doubt that that gun-totting Chimpanzee will actually be intelligent enough to understand this lesson).

But not only do these big organizations have to learn these lessons, in fact, so do we, as individuals. I am personally guilty of thinking that I know best and preaching and pontificating. I have dispensed what I thought to be good advice without due considerations of the other party's feelings and have thus not only not achieved the desired outcomes, but in fact have been counter-productive. I hope that I've learnt my lesson.

Perhaps it is worthwhile to note that: People don't care what you know until they know that you care. And one of the best ways to care is to first seek to understand than to be understood.