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Slumdog kids

Discussion in 'Anything goes' started by The Big Ragu, Feb 25, 2009.

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  1. Mizzougrad96

    Mizzougrad96 Active Member

    Did the kids at least get to go to Disneyland when there were in California?
     
    Mizzougrad96, Feb 25, 2009
    #13
  2. txsportsscribe

    txsportsscribe Active Member

    [​IMG]
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Dec 15, 2014
    txsportsscribe, Feb 25, 2009
    #14
  3. The Big Ragu

    The Big Ragu Moderator Staff Member

    Unless that is their new home behind them, I'm not as impressed as I'd like to be. :)
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Dec 15, 2014
    The Big Ragu, Feb 25, 2009
    #15
  4. Mizzougrad96

    Mizzougrad96 Active Member

    Then what are they bitching about? ;D
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Dec 15, 2014
    Mizzougrad96, Feb 25, 2009
    #16
  5. JR

    JR Well-Known Member

    The Indian government has stepped in

    Two of the kids are getting free flats.

    http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/Mumbai/Two-Slumdog-kids-to-get-free-flats/articleshow/4185428.cms

    Mumbai board chairman Amarjit Singh Manhas said, "On Monday, we had a meeting of Congress leaders and we felt that since the children have made the nation proud, they must be given free houses. We have recommended it to the parent agency, Mhada, which has written to Chavan, saying flats must be granted to Rubina nd Azharruddin from the 2% discretionary quota of the CM.''
     
    JR, Feb 25, 2009
    #17
  6. The Big Ragu

    The Big Ragu Moderator Staff Member

    Right. That was the focus of the story that I linked to in the first post. That Mumbai was providing them with new homes.

    I just did some googling, because I find it hard to believe that nobody who worked on the film was aware or doing anything. The story below says that Danny Boyle had already promised them new homes when the Mumbai authorities stepped in. I don't know what to believe. They should have been moved into better homes by him--or someone else with the means who worked on that film--before now, though.

    http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-1154667/Boyle-takes-Slumdog-children--film-bosses-pledge-buy-poverty-stricken-families-new-homes.html

    Stories I found also said the Mumbai authorities were coming under criticism because the perception was they were doing this to look good because there is an election coming up.
     
    The Big Ragu, Feb 25, 2009
    #18
  7. Mizzougrad96

    Mizzougrad96 Active Member

    Well, Boyle should have an in with Brangelina, since he worked with her first husband on Trainspotting. Maybe he can get them to adopt the kids.
     
    Mizzougrad96, Feb 25, 2009
    #19
  8. Double Down

    Double Down Well-Known Member

    Of course I meant mine as a playful joke, but to be serious for a second, allow me to politely say that I'm sure the folks at Fox Searchlight and Warner Bros. took full advantage of the fact that this film was shot outside the United States and that these kids were almost certainly not offered membership in the Screen Actors Guild and were not subject to any kind of child labor protection laws of the United States or England. One of those stories said they were paid above what would be typical of child actors in India, which for all we know could be $30 a day. Lot of companies have their customer service in India, including newspapers. Are their CEOs under a moral obligation to help out the guy living in poverty who helps me reboot my shitty Del computer if he does a great job, I write a great story on it, and the company makes millions of dollars?

    I might argue yes.

    Seems like most true free-market gurus would laugh in my face if we were talking about sewing shoes or soccer balls together for Nike in China.

    Why is it so different? Because these kids are cute and we feel like we know them?

    I'm not going to assign views to you one way or another. Of course the studios should have done the right thing and snatched these kids and their families out of the slums, especially when this movie started pulling in millions.

    They didn't, which seems to me like another example of a corporation feeling like it doesn't have to do the moral thing unless someone shames into it.
     
    Double Down, Feb 25, 2009
    #20
  9. The Big Ragu

    The Big Ragu Moderator Staff Member

    1) I never suggested they are owed anything except what they agreed to, whatever it was. If they didn't do that film, of course, they'd be anonymous and living in a slum.
    2) My point was that they are surrounded by people who know them well--and presumably were charmed by them because they are cute little kids--with the means to make a small gesture that could have a great impact on their lives. That is not the case for most kids in rural Asia sewing soccer balls. That is the major difference.
    3) India, as a whole, has benefited from free, globalized markets. It's overall standard of living has increased by leaps and bounds during the last 10 to 20 years. And as its workers continue to learn skills that give them leverage, that standard of living will further increase until it closes in on what most Western nations enjoy. India, on the whole, has been an advertisement for free markets. Before it's economy globalized to the extent it has, poverty was much worse than it is today. And without the recession that has slowed down their growth, they were on a path toward kicking the U.S.'s ass in innovation, which is what gives a place real economic power.
    4) None of that has anything to do with "the moral thing." My ideas of morality, or caring about people around me have nothing to do with the fact that when I make a futures trade, for example, I am trying to clean the clock of the guy on the other side of the trade. It doesn't mean that if I saw that same guy get hit by a car, I'd let him bleed in the street instead of helping him.

    A corporation doesn't "have to do the moral thing." That is not a necessary free markets characteristic, though--in fact, the typical Indian person is better off than he or she was 10 years ago because of economic growth in a free market system. But even if that wasn't the case, you can run a controlled centralized economy of some sort and does not do the "moral thing."
     
    The Big Ragu, Feb 25, 2009
    #21
  10. Double Down

    Double Down Well-Known Member

    Got to run to an interview, friend. But I'll have some kind of response later.
     
    Double Down, Feb 25, 2009
    #22
  11. The Big Ragu

    The Big Ragu Moderator Staff Member

    Grill em, Dano.
     
    The Big Ragu, Feb 25, 2009
    #23
  12. Mizzougrad96

    Mizzougrad96 Active Member

    Ragu,

    When you say "a small gesture" do you mean, feed and house them all until they're 18?

    Don't get me wrong, I hope they do something for these kids, but I don't know why anybody should feel obligated to do so. I have no idea what kind of royalties (if any) that any of these kids would get, but I seriously doubt Boyle intentionally worked with these kids because they weren't SAG members. This was a low budget, tiny, tiny film that happened to hit it big.
     
    Mizzougrad96, Feb 25, 2009
    #24
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