As If I Needed To Clarify The Point

If you read some recent comments on this blog, you would have seen some bizarre accusations being made against me. If these, namely that I am some sort of anti-Indian racist, were true, then it would follow that the recent news of the Indian company McDowell taking over French winemaker Bouvet Ladubay would be causing me both agitation and anxiety.

But, of course, this news is having no such effect. In fact, I think the deal looks like a good move for both parties. McDowell is an interesting company positioning itself well in the upper end of the non-luxury drinks business in India (with some quite creative advertising). Bouvet Ladubay is already making moves in the emerging winemarket through China and so the growing Indian winemarket is a good fit.

Whilst the accusation that I am some kind of racist crusader is massively untrue (in fact it is assine and obtuse), what is true is that the Racist Moi? post garned a lot of hateful accusations (prompting me to clarify my approach to comments). It seems clear my point in that thread was misunderstood and it also seemed clear that no amount of clarifications were going to clear that up. The response has made me think a lot about how I post. I was at one point considering either pulling the post, or witholding from future posts on India, or both. However, that would just be caving into to bully tactics and something of a disservice to regular readers of this blog (whose email support extends far beyond the comments that appear on here).

Anyone who knows me, or has read this blog for any length of time knows that I take racism very seriously. This is because it defined, negatively, my youth and a number of experiences subsequent to that. As a consequence I don’t take accusations of it very lightly, either when they are levelled at me or at others. I’m no expert on India (whatever that means), but I did live there for three years and during that time religiously avoiding closing myself off in some expat bubble (in fact it was harder than expected to say goodbye). I feel this entitles me, if nothing else, to comment on my personal experience of the country, as if that point needed any clarification.