The DufferWatch Manifesto

Duffers from all nations have begun to address fellow Duffers across the world to explain and defend their political decisions. The outpouring of stupidity is historically unprecedented in its sheer scale. These eager gentlemen know that the thoughts of similar and infamous Duffers have, in the not-so-distant past, unleashed two great wars in Europe, and genocide across the world. Yet, they persist in suffusing our society with suspicion and animosity, even depriving the youth in our universities of the ancient and trust-building belief in shared and juvenile ideals—pitching them, instead, one against the other because of man-made differences.


In essence, the Duffers’ manifesto is a haphazard piece of elementary schoolwork, where doctrinal confusion and poor reasoning abound. Let us leave aside the well-known and arbitrary interpretations and manipulations of historical events, for the battering of doctrines and history is a trivial matter when compared to the abuse made therein of the word "religion". According to the idiots, South Asia is now blessed with a religious war, marked by a new gospel and apostolic follower-ship fighting old superstitions, oblivious to death.


In other parts, with naive rhetorical passion, the Duffers celebrate the submission of individuals to the greater good, as if this were the crux of the matter, whereas it really is the capacity of authoritarian regimes to bring forth the highest moral standard.


That same party slanders all members of other political factions as “un-Indian" and "foreigners", and, by so doing, factually becomes foreign to their eyes, an oppressor, introducing thus within the country feelings and behaviours otherwise reserved for the enemy in wartime.


We will not despair or abandon our quest, not even in the face of today's purported indifference and inertia, not even when confronted with the breaches of the law that limit freedom. What matters to us is knowing what we want, which is that most basic freedom of all, to laugh.


(with apologies—and much respect—to Benedetto Croce’s Manifesto of the Anti-Fascist Intellectuals, 1925)