TECHIE AMONG THREE BURNT ALIVE IN GARUDA BUS MISHAP
February 22, 2017 5:36 AM   Subscribe

"In one occupational boogeyman, Bangaloreans can see their future and their fears." IT worker as hated yet envied figure in India. Is this about class divides, cultural gaps, ecological stress, spousal abuse, or something else? (SLBloomberg)
posted by doctornemo (8 comments total) 6 users marked this as a favorite
 
I admit the phrase, "if it bleeds, it leads", in regard to newspaper headlines changed to "if it codes, it explodes" made me giggle.
posted by jadepearl at 6:22 AM on February 22, 2017 [3 favorites]


Welp, as someone who was whisked off by an H1B techie in peak Y2K as a disempowered H4 bride to deepest snowy western PA, my bet is a combination of spousal abuse as the response to not receiving the accolades and coolness conditioned as an entitled expectation in their developmental years.

tl;dr - Y U no kiss my bronderwul ass woman? [within the pressure cooker context of not getting promotion, treated like shit when sent abroad, or some combination of the above]
posted by infini at 6:22 AM on February 22, 2017 [12 favorites]


I have a cousin who built a life from scratch after getting kicked the pregnant stomach in Sunnyvale.

/This is far bigger problem and been going on since "Bangalore" began
posted by infini at 6:24 AM on February 22, 2017


last comment

The OP is an attempt to decipher the problem from outside of the socio-cultural dynamics. It's about all of the above mentioned factors with a hefty dose of illprepared to cope with stress patriarchy

/ok, I take a walk now
posted by infini at 6:26 AM on February 22, 2017 [2 favorites]


If you read the article, it's not clear that "techies" are committing or being the victims of crimes any more often than the average person; rather, stories involving them have greater news value. I personally find the uneasy relationship between techies and the rest of Bangalore and the parallels to Silicon Valley to be the most interesting aspect of this story.
posted by peacheater at 6:30 AM on February 22, 2017 [8 favorites]


Tej Pochiraju, the managing director of Jaaga Startup, which bills itself as India’s first co-working space, said the divide between engineers and laymen would only accelerate. “As things get more and more automated, technology and techies will become more godlike,” he said.

It seems like the lack of industrial planning (so that everything gets crowded, polluted, unequal and horrible) and the lack of any way to cope with inequality in general are a lot of what underpin the sentiments in the article.
posted by Frowner at 7:43 AM on February 22, 2017 [2 favorites]


It seems like the very same forces leading to similar backlashes, albeit playing out in different flavoured ways. Taking peacheater's comment together with Frowners, that is.
posted by infini at 10:03 AM on February 22, 2017


Taken together, the stories can read like morality plays. They assuage a reader’s envy by suggesting that a tech worker’s material wealth conceals a deeper poverty.

Not too different from how American tabloids go on endlessly about celebrity divorce, weight gain, health problems, etc.: "Yes, they have millions of dollars and the world is plastered with Beautiful People photos, but are they really, truly happier and healthier than me??? Maybe not!!!"
posted by Michele in California at 12:31 PM on February 22, 2017 [1 favorite]


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