Collective failure of society

Collective failure of society reminds me of the story of four people: Everybody,
Somebody, Anybody, and Nobody. There are different versions of the story. This might look like a funny read, but on reflection one is likely to see the tragic outcomes of this attitude as is revealed in a number of instances.

Arunn expresses his anguish at one such instance that he came across in his post - Sad but true.
Mridula records two such incidents in her posts -
A Tragic Death at IIT Kanpur.
More deaths at IITK.

Can we do something about it?

Social conditioning and Identity

A lot of one's identity is conditioned by the environment (family, society) in which a person grows. A friend of mine had posed an interesting question to me, quite a while ago.
Assume that there is a person who is brought up in an environment that says that his/her own race (caste/religion/language) is superior to that of others' and the person is also a proponent (subconsciously or vocally) of that creed. Now if it is revealed to that person that (s)he is indeed a person belonging to the others' race/caste/religion/language, how would that person react?

Mosilager sent me this link, Reflections of a Queer Dalit; though not an exact fit to the situation above, it does have elements of similarity. It highlights the problems faced by people who don't fit into the hetero-patriarchal order. It analyzes the different axes of discrimination and their inter-connectedness. A very well articulated post.
Another post by the same author relevant to this topic - My Gender Dangles On The Margins.

* About the author - Sumit Baudh works on sexuality and law. His areas of interest include the human rights of queers, dalits, and undocumented migrant workers in India. Sumit obtained his LLB from the National Law School of India University and his LLM from the London School of Economics. An Advocate (Delhi Bar), and a non-practicing Solicitor (England and Wales), he has worked with the Commonwealth Human Rights Initiative (CHRI) and the AMAN Trust, both NGOs based in India. Sumit is presently located at the South and Southeast Asia Resource Centre on Sexuality, in Delhi. He self identifies as a Queer Dalit Buddhist.