Tolerance put to the test

All of us would like to believe that we are people of the modern world - broad-minded, tolerant, open to new concepts, new cultures, and new ideas.

The world needs more people like us, we think, as we look around at the mayhem created by the opinionated and the bigoted. We need to stop looking for differences and instead see the commonality all creatures share, we say. Now you and I and our friends are surely a part of this wonderful group and we firmly believe that there should be more of our ilk to heal the world and make it a better place.

But how many of us retain our urbanity when the surface is scratched and we get down to the nitty gritty of choosing or accepting new entrants into the family fold? For decades, we were blasé about it. We chose our own partners, we said, and our children can choose theirs. No caste and creed and colour bars, no specifications, their happiness is all that matters. And so we kept our poise through their teenage years and even into their early twenties before it all started to fall apart and we revealed to ourselves and to the rest of the world our true conservative selves.

In our supposedly cosmopolitan family, this happened almost overnight. Our girl matured early and developed a mind of her own, which, unfortunately, followed her heart towards the most obnoxious of prospective mates. While the rest of society shunned those strays with straggly hair and no family background to speak of, she fixated on one unpalatable choice after another. The showdowns were terrible. Every prejudice and bias we'd shunned came bubbling up - to her horror and our own. How had we hidden these narrow-minded thoughts so effectively that even we didn't know they existed?

Just a short while ago we'd snorted when someone said, "Oh, he/she belongs to an 'old' family".

"What is an 'old' family?" we'd asked. All of us have generations behind us stretching into the very distant past, so do only those who belong to the prominent, well-heeled families lay claim to being 'old'?

"Looks don't matter," we'd also said confidently a blink of an eye ago, but now, without more than one glance at the proposed male, taking in his sloppy gait and hangdog look, we launch into a spiel about his appearance and his antecedents. "What's his lineage? He looks 'different', not good enough for you!"

"We trust your judgement," we'd assured our children. "Bring your friends home. Let us meet them and get to know them." But now, as one bad choice followed another and the child seemed both fickle and foolish, all faith in young judgement flew out of the window. Worse, we who'd never lived our lives in fear of our neighbours' opinions, now began to spout that old-fashioned one-liner, "What will people say?" We didn't want all those unsuitable suitors hanging around our house. Why did she attract so many of them, anyway?

Our disapproval finally got through to her. Admittedly, we achieved this by sometimes locking her indoors, shrieking at the suitors and even throwing a couple of slippers at them when no one was looking. To the last she retained her single status, never having found anyone of her choice to match their pedigree with her Kennel Club registered German Shepherd status, missing out on a huge chunk of life and parenthood thanks to our intervention.

As for us, we no longer have such smug faith in our magnanimity.

Cheryl Rao is a journalist based in India.