From Doodism to Noobism and (as)many things (as can be put) in between!

So, I am fresh from reading the first three and a half chapters( okay...two.) of Russell's 'History of Western Philosophy',( By the way, Russell is Bertrand Russell. A guy actually asked me if it was Russell Peters.) and I haven't written anything on the blog for a long long time. So long that I am having trouble typing in the dark. Anyways, spurred by the highly intellectual and clever sounding statements in the book and the fact that I am back home and having troubles trying to adjust my body clock so that it matches humans( atleast my parents.), I have decided to let my mind wander a bit and document its proceedings as it, well, wanders.

I had begun blogging a few months ago with a post on the CGPA induced discrimination on campus. There is another kind of apartheid- more on a socio-cultural basis, which flourishes on campus- especially a closed one. When you dump a thousand teenagers from different backgrounds inside a 200 acre space with books, laptops and DC++, you are bound to have differences of opinion which evolve into certain ideologies and lifestyles. Spurred by the innate cultism which is the hallmark of the IIT/BITS system of education and the seemingly never ending enthusiasm of the students, these ideologies thrive in the campus soil. Thus, being a student on campus makes you, voluntarily or involuntarily, and to some or the other extent, an ardent follower of some or the other ideology. If not, then you become a saturaday night philosopher, trying to unravel the mysteries of the vast plethora of a mini civilisation the campus is. A few of of such ideologies studies and documented are Doodism, Dudeism, Godlikeness(This is not much of an ideology because you cannot follow it as such. You either are God or you are not. And it is not for you to decide.) Proism, Cultism, Noobism, Gamerism, Magguism/Ghotuism, Special friend(ism), etc. Let us look at some of them in brief-

DOODISM( and not 'dyoude') -

I have decided to elucidate this ideology first not because it is more important than the others, ( it is not) but because it is one of the more recognised ones. And the reason is quite simple- Doods are seemingly some of the easiest species to spot around the campus. Even a noob(we will come to that later.) anthropologist will be able to spot a dood with his designer slippers, shorts, ipod and sack attire roaming around with the least care for the existance of any fellow mortal in proximity. But then, he is a noob. A real dood is not characterised by what he wears. If that were so, then every lousy son-of-a-bitch would get up everyday, NOT take a bath, wear his sundass slippers and 'Reejok' shorts( greeen with red stripes.) and roam around campus hailing "WazzZZaaa" to every other lousy son-of-a-bitch he met and be called a dood. But, sadly, especially for the wannabe doods, that is not how it works. Imagine a campus where every person would own an 80 Gb ipod filled with Alice in Chains and Nine inch nails and the like and puma slippers and nike jerseys. And when I say everybody, I mean everybody. Then, a dood on that campus could( and this is an arguable hypothesis.) wear burgundy pleated pants with maroon and blue checks shirt and hum 'Teri pant phatri, teri sandal phatri...' or 'Sonava ke pinjde me band bhaaiii...' with the same attitude as in the regular case. This is because a dood is characterised by his attitude( a very very important word for anyone who wants to be a dood.) The 'least care for the existence of any fellow mortal in proximity'. This is precisely why they wear so much deodrant-least care for the existance of any fellow mortal in proximity!! Doods generally have a good fluent english accent and are not afraid to speak out in front of authority. Even if the 'speaking out' consists of heavily drunk and very heavy renditions of ' come crawling (hic) faster! Obey your MMMMASSSTERRR!!!', trying to be in sync with the ipod while the Chief Warden is trying to interrogate you about you being late and drunk outside the college gates.( The matter ends with the dood passing out. Before that he has politely asked the Warden if he(it) is the dog from the Hutch ad, and whether his kids are humans by day and puppies at night and then sung a quite ingeniously derived version of 'Master of Puppies').

Its not hard to find a dood on the omlette pav gaadi saying" Can I have one Mirchi bhaji and a palti to go please?" while the baffled goan guy ( I mean to say that he is originally baffled. God sent him on earth that way.) becomes more baffled.( I have seen this happen guys. The dood was acting as if he was standing in a friggin burger king.)

On the whole, doods are hated on campus. But one has to understand that some part of the hatred is because of jealousy. Many are jealous of the doods. Some who give it the status of hero worship become sidekicks. They are usually made to stay on the side and get kicked. They hang out with the doods( as much as the doods let them.) and laugh at their crappy jokes.

Then there are the wannabe doods or the dudes( pronounced dyoudes. This is because a 'dude' is just another ordinary guy!). You can seldom differentiate a dude and a dood. The trick is to find out who fulfills the dressing characters of a dood more. The one who looks more doodlike is usually the dude.( Have you read the 'idiot's guide' series of books? I keep wondering how come no dude has come up with the idiot's guide to become a dood. Maybe they like to keep it a secret.) Another and a surer way to differentiate is to go and ask the guy something about rock music. Because, I am sure, through personal experience, that some dudes seem to think that Lamb of God and Judas Priest are actually choir groups. They tried to listen to some metal, but they found it made their head woozy. They tried headbanging and it was horrendous. So then they for settled the 'rock' of Linkin Park and Nickelback and Avril Lavagne. So, you know, just start talking about Porcupine Trees and see if the conversation leads to thorns- literally.

Today we studied, albiet briefly, the characteristics of the dood family of ideologies. Next time, when I have insomnia and a few hours to spare, we will look at the other interesting lifestyles on campus. The above observations are completely emperical and done for the purpose of elucidating. Interested insomniacs can gtalk/gmail/ or whatever me to discuss the theories presented above. Thankyou.