Can there be Mimetic Superfairness?

A distribution is fair if everyone prefers his own outcome to that of anyone else. There is no 'envy' in the sense that every agent feels every other is worse off (according to his own system of preferences).
Thus, if I just sold you Manhattan for some glass beads, I don't envy you at all because Manhattan is full of ghosts while glass beads sure are shiny and you're a real sucker to have made the trade. However, as time goes by, and you just keep giving me more glass beads to prove the trade we made was Super-Fair, though I still keep taking your glass beads- coz damn them beads be shiny!- I still can't help feeling more and more envious and more and more of a shmuck and more and more hard done by, even if I believe them Manhattan ghosts gonna git you eventually.

To get round the problem of substantive interpersonal comparisons of Utility- which otherwise made it impossible to speak positively about fairness- a number of approaches were taken to show that Economists could still talk about fairness on the basis of purely bilateral (or indeed Chichilnisky type 'limited arbitrage') considerations and that this could enable Economics as a discipline to move forward by redefining 'fairness' in a manner internal to its own axiom system.
Baumol's classic work on Superfairness- i.e. positions in which all parties suffer zero envy even if something is substracted from them- sought to overcome the obvious objection (nevertheless made by Holcolmbe) that it is unfair to usurp the ordinary meaning of 'fairness' by proving the utility of just such a usurping language game in various topics in Economics- more especially models with individual but no aggregate risk, where it has been shown that ex post and ex ante equity can be satisfied such that envy free allocations exist.

In his book,  Baumol defines a notion of incremental Superfairness but shows that allocatively efficient Superfair improvements can be unfair. Thus, for Economics, some scandal lurks for the notion of a golden path Fairness.

Can Tardean mimetics, to which Rene Girard gave a De Maistrean twist, come to the rescue? At first sight, no, not at all- the reverse is the case. We are envious of he whose example comes to be emulated- somehow he has shown his superiority and become the target of 'mimetic rivalry' for others, whereas we ourselves- even if our preferences and beliefs are unchanged- have become invisible or marginalized. More seriously, he can extract a rent or exploit an early adopter advantage while our ability to do the same thing, ceteris paribus, worsens day by day. Initially, it may be, mimetic rivalry causes the envious killing of the 'King' at the apex of Society's system of Tardean imitation, but soon enough a 'phramakos'- a scapegoat- is found from amongst the hoi polloi whose periodic sacrificial killing acts as a sort of innoculation against Violence becoming endemic.
Yet, for a De Maistrean reason, we may accept this dispensation as if not Fair, or even incrementally Superfair, yet Divinely Fair for Christ too was a King and we killed him and ate him and still get a little tipsy drinking his blood and dunno how Girard got all this out of reading Proust but he did okay and like his bestest bro was Mandelbrot so there's probably some heavy duty fractal Maths which shows like how all this is Kantian kosher and euvoluntary and shit.
This follows because in a De Maistrean Universe- as if by mathematical convention, or 'normalization'-  there is no aggregate but only individual risk. Thus, glass beads are verily the ghosts of Manhattan and forever is their feast.

Ghalib's Elegy.

If, at Journey's end, your vigil's prolonged by my dilatory ways

Recall, alone you ventured forth, bide alone a few more days.

Whether its rain can dissolve rock or my eyes are their own maze

My skull or your sepulchre will crack in a few more days

Just yesterday you came, not as a guest who forever stays

Why so fain to flee 'fore my plea for 'a few more days?'

Your parting jest was ever 'from now, till the End of Days!'

My Doom is now and forever, not in a few more days.

Yes, more than Endymion, Selene, Arif had a youthful face

Old Siren of the Skies, couldn't you wait a few more days?

He was our Moon of Eid, we feasted by his rays

Now our lifelong Lent knows but Ember days

My dear one, do you naively ask why Ghalib yet delays?

Death too is a desire at least for a few more days.

{66,1}

lāzim thā kih dekho mirā rastā koʾī din aur

tanhā gaye kyūñ ab raho tanhā koʾī din aur

{66,2}

miṭ jāʾegā sar gar tirā patthar nah ghisegā

hūñ dar pah tire nāṣiyah-farsā koʾī din aur

{66,3}

āye ho kal aur āj hī kahte ho kih jāʾūñ

mānā kih hameshah nahīñ achchhā koʾī din aur

{66,4}

jāte huʾe kahte ho qiyāmat ko mileñge

kyā ḳhūb qiyāmat kā hai goyā koʾī din aur

{66,5}

hāñ ay falak-e pīr javāñ thā abhī ʿārif

kyā terā bigaṛtā jo nah martā koʾī din aur

{66,6}

tum māh-e shab-e chār-duham the mire ghar ke

phir kyūñ nah rahā ghar kā vuh naqshā koʾī din aur

{66,10}

nādāñ ho jo kahte ho kih kyūñ jīte haiñ ġhālib

qismat meñ hai marne kī tamannā koʾī din aur

Khobragade indictment- painful reading for Indians

Mid rank, Indian diplomats are normally only allowed to take one domestic servant per trip. The Government pays the air fare and provides an allowance to pay the servant. It is in the diplomat's interest to keep the servant happy otherwise the servant has the right to return to India leaving the diplomat to fend for herself.
Many servants will feel lonely, they may find the climate not to their liking, they may miss their own families. Thus the diplomat needs to ensure that the servant has a good social life and is treated as a member of the family- e.g. being taken along for sight-seeing trips and Community events. Also their Religious needs must be catered for.
Did Devyani keep her maid happy? It appears not because the maid left her. Now the maid was entitled to return to India at Govt. expense if she felt mistreated or if her mental health had suffered in the new country or by reason of family emergency and so on. It was the duty of the Consul General to ensure that her grievances were addressed and that she was sent back safely.
What about if the maid simply absconded? Then the Consulate had a duty to inform the U.S authorities and also to take such steps commensurate with their duty of care- i.e. establish that she was not ill, under duress or at risk of exploitation.
Did anything of this sort happen?
According to the the U.S indictment of Devyani Khobragade-

Devyani's f.i.r accuses Sangita Richards and her husband of various crimes of cheating and conspiring to obtain and retain an official Indian passport for a malafide purpose.
It is poorly written-

This is quite extraordinary. Why is the husband of the maid being accused of cheating and conspiracy and other such crimes? Which ordinary diplomat would proceed in such a high handed way? If Devyani herself, and not her superior officials at the Consulate or the M.E.A, initiated this plot she must be sacked and tried in an Indian Court. If not, she must be questioned as to who ordered her to put her name to the above.
We might suspect that her father acted officiously and she reluctantly backed him up. This would fit the mind-set of the retired I.A.S officer. However, the fact that Devyani made this f.i.r speaks for itself.

I don't know if it is true that Sangeeta Richards demanded to be sent back on her own passport. But it is quite probable as it improved her bargaining position. Devyani had no right to deny this request. Now, the Consul General could have spoken to the maid-servant and promised to redress her grievances. He could have said- 'okay, tell you what, we will pay you for helping out at Consulate parties. We will include you in more sightseeing excursions. We will get you vocational training. We will organize a creche so you and others like you have more time off. One thing, as a matter of urgency, we will ensure you can attend Religious services to your liking.
'One thing we will never do is to say you can't return to India even though you are finding it difficult to cope here. You are a citizen of India same as us. We may appeal to your patriotism to stick it out but we can't deny your right to go home.'

Indian Courts must now take cognizance, by suo moto or other means, of what has happened and send a clear signal to the I.F.S cadre in this matter.

I wonder, had no strip search occurred and if, instead Devyani had been merely subpoenaed, whether Govt of India might have waived civil immunity?

Ghalib 125

Gone is that matter which e'en addressed wouldn't matter

Why speak when what is spoken like ashes must scatter?

Union is the name of what gnaws at our Mind

If it isn't where isn't it to Loose or to Bind?

Courtesy is a mask that lacerates the face

Shame in this matter is Beauty's disgrace

Adoring his idol- how would the Brahmin eat?

Did every idol its adorer she like me treat

Even the timid glance of the mirror so excites your ire

Had you a second in the City it's minarets were of Fire.

Whose fate is to face days black as mine

If Day he calls Night which Moon will repine?

My hope revives with her professions of esteem

 If further she won't inquire, my lot is but dream

The faith I placed in her epistle was no foolish mistake

What eye to eye isn't seen, is Unseen for Heaven's sake!

 Of the Theodicy of Love in Separation, if this Envoi is trite yet odd.
 Tell her, Ghalib isn't raving,  he echoes the shadow of God

gaʾī vuh bāt kih ho guftago to kyūñkar ho
kahe se kuchh nah huʾā phir kaho to kyūñkar ho

hamāre żahn meñ us fikr kā hai nām viṣāl
kih gar nah ho to kahāñ jāʾeñ ho to kyūñkar ho

adab hai aur yihī kashmakash to kyā kīje
ḥayā hai aur yihī gomago to kyūñkar ho

tumhīñ kaho kih guzārā sanam-parastoñ kā
butoñ kī ho agar aisī hī ḳho to kyūñkar ho

ulajhte ho tum agar dekhte ho āʾīnah
jo tum se shahr meñ hoñ ek do to kyūñkar ho

jise naṣīb ho roz-e siyāh merā sā
vuh shaḳhṣ din nah kahe rāt ko to kyūñkar ho

hameñ phir un se umīd aur uñheñ hamārī qadr
hamārī bāt hī pūchheñ nah vo to kyūñkar ho

ġhalat̤ nah thā hameñ ḳhat̤ par gumāñ tasallī kā
nah māne dīdah-e dīdār-jo to kyūñkar ho

mujhe junuu;N nahii;N ;Gaalib vale bah qaul-e ;hu.zuur

firaaq-e yaar me;N taskiin ho to kyuu;Nkar ho

Khobragade's ace in the hole.

Devyani Khobragade was in trouble. Her Mary Poppins had absonded. Her dad back at home was accused of having threatened the Nanny's family. She was being accused of Visa fraud and Human trafficking and failure to pay the minimum wage and might even have faced Jail time.
As a 'creamy layer' Dalit- one, moreover, married to a High Caste naturalized American- she stood in danger of becoming a hate-figure for not just jhollawallah types but even the 'Aam Aadmi'. Her glamorous career would stall. She'd be transferred to a desk job in New Delhi or some punishment posting in the Third World. It would take years for her to live down the scandal. She'd also have to pay a hefty fine to a U.S court.

Then, as if Bhagwan Krishna had Himself intervened, everything changed. She was strip-searched. But hers was a Draupati Vastraharanam, by which her antagonists were undone while her innocence was preserved.

An Upper Caste Khatri had sought to humiliate the chaste Devyani for the crime of being an 'uppity' Dalit!

She immediately received the offer of a safe seat in U.P. But, Maharashtra will give her something even better. From being tainted by the Aadarsh scam and her own father's maladroit medlings, Devyani was able to emerge as stainless and pure as Draupati from her Disrobing.

Interestingly, it turns out that Devyani actually did have diplomatic immunity by reason of accreditation to the U.N. She claims to have forgotten or not known this at the time of her arrest. Her own ignorance in this matter, or indeed the State Dept's on going refusal to certify her immunity or issue a Statement of Interest, still does not alter the fact that, as a matter of substantive and procedural due process, her arrest was unlawful and thus she can claim a 7 figure settlement for wrongful detention while simultaneously escaping prosecution for visa fraud. In other words, she can have her cake and eat it too. 

It's an extraordinary reversal of fortune and all thanks the U.S Marshals Service insatiable desire to gape at the orifices of all and sundry. This, truly, was Khobragade's ace in the hole.

Note- the warrant against Devyani was issued on the basis of an affidavit from a State Dept Diplomatic Security Agent which, in showing 'probable cause' failed, however, to mention her U.N. Accreditation and thus was faulty. Was it also recklessly so?

This may sound reasonable. The guy checked a database and made a couple of phone calls to some other guy. Clearly, it wasn't reckless at all of him, or the guy whom he talked to at Protocol, to just go ahead and sign off on the affidavit which got Devyani strip searched.

So what if SCOTUS  decided, in Florence vs Board of Chosen Freeholders, that there is no longer any 4th amendment right not to have some guy shine a flashlight up your arse if you are arrested for even the most trivial offence? 

How does this fact impact Protocol? 

The answer is that Protocol must make damn sure that America really does have personal jurisdiction over a foreign diplomat before signing off on a probable cause affidavit because, thanks to SCOTUS, America is now a barbaric and perverted country which can't be trusted to respect the human rights of anyone caught up in its corrupt, racist and utterly unfit for purpose, Criminal Justice System.

It now transpires that Devyani had personal immunity. An agent of a State Dept. Agency signed a recklessly false probable cause affidavit because he relied on some guy at Protocol to know his arse from his elbow. Will any of the people responsible for this travesty face arrest themselves? No because no good purpose would be served. Everybody already knows what these shitheads have got up their assholes- viz. more assholes, assholes furiously shitting assholes, while themselves being shat out by assholes and even the American Criminal Justice System- and American Diplomacy is now nothing but an asshole shitting out that asshole while being shat out by it- can't muster up sufficient resources of Perversion and Imbecility to shine its flashlight up that infinite regress of assholes.

Which is why Obamacare is like totally Socialistic and un American and the moral equivalent of Sodomy. Incidentally, did you know Devyani is a Medical Doctor? Maybe, that guy at Protocol, or Proctology, did know and arranged for this dainty little diplomat to get Obamacared but good. That'ill larn her. That'll larn all youse dam dothead sand-nigger scum.

Why Vivek Chibber is both Right & Shite.

Vivek Chibber is right about Subaltern Studies. It genuinely was shit. But, look at the thing in context. To get ahead in Indian Academia from the late Sixties onwards one needed to either
1) kill and rape random dudes while embezzling as much money as possible.
2) pretend to be a Revolutionary of some sort so if anyone gang-raped you or beat you to death with a hockey stick then like these real mean Naxal dudes or KGB dudes or the ghost of Gramsci would turn up and take a fitting revenge.
Subaltern Studies was the coward's way out but, at one time, it appeared as remunerative a route to a Green Card as being a Code Monkey.
Its great utility to the Indian Disapora was that
1) it was a way of whining about being Brown that didn't get you lumped with the Blacks or Blue Collar proles or Tamale eaters or Chinky chopstick users.
2) it permitted one to make ridiculous claims about one's own parochial, deeply ignorant, sub-culture- like Guha's claim that Ramram Basu was actually a great historian rather than a Kayastha scoundrel of a scribbler, who procured abortions for the girls he seduced, and whose titanic contribution to Indian historigoraphy was written to order for an English Baptist Missionary who held his nose but paid the worthless hack so as to turn a profit on his Printing Press.
This was important because the old White professors who were heads of Area Studies Departments tended to be awfully patronizing coz they knew your Grandfather's Boss or Clan Chief or Maharaja or whatever. Subaltern Studies was about pretending that there was stuff in some vernacular which had never been written down, but which you knew and the Professor didn't, which showed that Grand-dad was actually the Lenin of the Latrine Inspection Dept. in Ludhiana,  or that Granny was like the Rosa Luxembourg of  the Lady's Knitting Circle in Coimbatore.
As such, Subaltern Studies was shite, but it was deeply Indian shite and, okay, it passed its sell-by date round about the time the diaspora could point to genuine Porn Stars and Professional Wrestlers of its own, still, it's scarcely nice of Chibber - a Punjabi- to point this out to the Bongs coz Bengal has scored no similar success since Niradh Chaudhri's infamous nude one-man show 'O! Calcutta!'.

American academics boycott Israel- Armageddon is at hand.

I read this in the Guardian-

'A prestigious US academic body has joined a growing movement to boycott Israel in protest at its treatment of Palestinians, in a move both welcomed and condemned in a bitterly divisive international arena.

'The American Studies Association (ASA), which has more than 5,000 members, is the most significant US academic organisation to back a boycott of Israeli educational institutions following a two-thirds majority vote. Around a quarter of members took part in the ballot.'

Would it surprise you to learn that you could be a member of this prestigious American academic body? Now I know very well that the vast majority of you people are pubescent Pakistanis searching for nude pics of Veena Malik and that you are all as ignorant as shit. Still you possess the only academic qualification necessary to join ASA as can be verified from their website.

Individuals: The ASA is open to all persons who have an interdisciplinary interest in American culture. Individual membership includes subscriptions to American Quarterly, the ASA Newsletter, and the Encyclopedia of American Studies Online. Membership is available for a calendar year only. Persons who join by October 1 will be enrolled for the current year. Those who join after October 1 will be enrolled for the following year. Dues are based on a graduated scale, according to income. International members are asked to ascertain their dues category based on the American dollar equivalents and to remit payments in U.S. Funds.

Institutions: The ASA is open to colleges, universities, museums, foundations, societies, and other institutions sympathetic to the aims of the association. Institutional membership includes subscriptions to American Quarterly, the ASA Newsletter, and the Encyclopedia of American Studies Online, plus discounts on association services, upon payment of $170 annually in July or September. A list of institutional members is published in each issue ofAQ.

I like watching 'Orange is the New Black' while drinking Bourbon. That's an interdisciplinary interest in American culture right there. What's more I like watching 'Orange is the New Black' on my Nexus & sipping Bourbon from my hip-flask while presiding over my local Girl Guide's jamboree. (Yes, I know, it was very racist of the dowager Lady Baden Powell to mistake me for a scalp taking Indian Squaw and appoint me Chief Inspector of Tomahawks for the Surbiton branch, but it still beat being buggered in the Boy Scouts). This means that my chapter of the Girl Guides can join the ASA because clearly its interest in American culture is interdisciplinary and involves scalping people.

Israel is trembling in its boots at the ASA's boycott of it. I personally have been boycotting Israeli academics- unless they are clearly mad and stupid, like Liah Greenfeld (except she isn't really Israeli, is she?)- all my adult life because them fuckers do totally Nazi stuff like 'research?' and shit. 

Strangely enough, the Universities which are now boycotting the ASA aren't doing so because, clearly, it is too easy for a vested interests to create bogus memberships to influence voting and secure a (relatively cheap) P.R coup, but because they believe in 'academic freedom' and their own right to run a Credentialized Ponzi scheme for Careerist Cunts with Shit for Brains.