Pakistan, Sept. 26 -- In most South Asian households, and in many cultures that share its instinct for order, there is a word that does more social work than almost any other: "shareef". It means respectable, decent, well-behaved, the kind of person who does not cause a scene. It is offered as the highest compliment a family can pay, and it is also, quietly, one of the most effective mechanisms ever invented for keeping people small. The cult of being shareef is not really about virtue. It is about legibility. A shareef person is predictable. They can be placed at a dinner table, introduced to relatives, presented to a marriage broker or a business partner, without risk of surprise. Their value lies not in what they contain but in what th...