For sheer brutality, the rape, torture, kidnapping, and murder of a young Indian student in New Delhi last month is astonishing, even in a country known for its ingrained misogyny. Protests continue unabated in India and the topic will continue to rivet the news media world-wide for a long time. The low status of women and the ossified state of the Indian legal system make prosecuting the offenders of such cases (few, unfortunately, are reported) very difficult. Moreover, the current state of affairs is also fundamentally incompatible with the rapid modernization that is sweeping across the sub-continent. One thing is for certain: swarms of morally crippled brutes--of which the monsters who savaged that innocent student are a representative sample—have made life a hell for Indian women who venture outside with or without a male escort. Why are so many young Indian men sliding backwards into a state of feral, sex-crazed savagery and why is it being tolerated?
That religion should ennoble rather than degrade humanity is a noble claim, but history has shown time and again that it is often without warrant. Instead, religious beliefs tend to promote self-serving, irrational notions. One of the worst of these uses what psychologists have termed “transference”; simply put, it is the means by which a culpable party seeks to objectify their moral evils and put the blame for them on an innocent party (usually called the “scapegoat”). This practice, visible in the Judeo-Christian scriptures as well as the Vedic system, is fundamentally a matter of a corrupt and powerful individual or entity seeking to ritually purify the self or group from sins for which they are entirely responsible.
Indian culture is permeated with myths and superstitions that promote the treatment of women as scapegoats. For example, the Laws of Manu claim that
Consuming liquor, association with wicked persons, separation from her husband, rambling around, sleeping for unreasonable hours and dwelling -are six demerits of women (9.13).i
So, if a woman is “rambling around,” how to control her? The answer, as the slavering beasts in New Delhi have shown the world, is to degrade her. Worse, people who otherwise seem models of propriety have sought to export these warped ideas to the West, usually under the guise of teaching the“degraded West” the Vedic system. Many examples abound, but speaking from my own experience as an early Hare Krishna follower of Bhaktivedanta Swami, this is a familiar and highly distressing pattern. The general tactic is disarmingly simple: praise men for their alleged intellectual and moral superiority and attack women for being dull, lustful temptresses. It amazed me when I was a young teenager to see how readily educated European and American men fell for this nonsense and so I was not in the least surprised to see how Indian men have reverted to using young women as scapegoats for their irrelevance and insecurities. As one commenter to today’s Wall Street Journal writes:
It's high time that these animals get over their gender bias and act like men, instead of sex crazed animals. Further, there ought to be severe penalties.ii
Indeed, but what penalties would be severe enough? The rapists who did the unthinkable to such a fine, intelligent young girl anyone would be proud to call a daughter or sister should be executed after a speedy trial. Enough of dragging out the legal process for decades. Like it or not, gropers will soon find their hands and fingers cut off and others will get doused with pepper spray. In my opinion, the pen might be mightier than the sword, but, in a pinch, the sword will do just fine.
http://nirmukta.com/2011/08/27/the-status-of-women-as-depicted-by-manu-in-the-manusmriti/ This website is an excellent resource for any rational analysis of Hinduism, even for believers.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887323482504578227751166162988.html?mod=WSJ_article_comments#articleTabs%3Dcomments.
All rights reserved. No part of this essay can be reproduced in any medium without the express written consent of the author.
"A SEQUIN FOR MR. AL-ZAHRANI," A VERY SHORT STORY.
Mr. Al-Zahrani (as his American nurses insisted on calling him) fumed yet again as the light streaked across the blue of his closed eyelids. Sometimes it appeared to be a tiny comet and at other times, it elongated into a minute, dim torch. “What, am I a superstitious fool or a boy frightened of his own shadow?” he thought. “Worse, why did those murmuring idiots called my family say what I saw is a blessing? What is really a blessing is that since I can’t speak now or do anything except move my eyelids, their inane chatter has finally stopped.” His only regret now was that it had never occurred to him to ask his oncologist whether hallucinations were byproducts of advanced pancreatic cancer.
Just last month he was back in his own country, relaxing with his five sons as they smoked and drank their thick coffee for what seemed to be hours. Looking at the lot of them, he remembered his own youth as one of two boys in a family that included his four sisters. He thought that when he married, he would allow his wife one daughter to be a companion to her and insist that the others be males. Fate and a little medical intervention made it so, but the girl turned out to be just like her brothers, even worse. Sanaa was a bitch, even without the Oxford and Ivy League graduate degrees of her investment-crazed brothers. She married a man in the mold of her brothers, but with ten times the ambition and well-schooled in the subterfuge that had made her father’s financial dealings so effective. “My disciple, my son-in-law,” Fahim mused rather grimly. Then he nodded off again and, feeling the opiate dripping in his veins to be somewhat inadequate, focused on the light as an experiment befitting a man of science in full possession of his reasoning faculties.
“Stop,” he said, and it stopped. Then it hovered above his vision like a contact lens that takes just a few seconds to fully adjust. It was as if he were seeing through a transparent sequin—the colors everywhere seemed almost too bright. He could feel the sun bouncing off what, incredibly, seemed pink sandstone walls and the fuchsia, lemon yellow, and purple of the women’s clothing, which also seemed spangled with tiny mirrors like so many stars. Everyone seemed to be smiling, ignorant, Fahim thought, of the immodest dress of the women, which in his country was forbidden. Then he became conscious that he was not alone.
“What did you promise and what was your gift?” someone or something was asking him, and for a moment, it seemed like a riddle and then the meaning became instantly clear. He felt as if he were surrounded by people who for once were genuinely interested in his well-being. “Fahim," someone was telling him, “answer Shubha, don’t be afraid,” and he again found himself under the loving gaze of she who had died giving birth to his only brother. He then turned to address Shubha and recognized her immediately.
“If you can’t answer right now, don’t worry, you will soon learn what they were and if you truly repent, all will be forgiven," she said in a voice that mingled concern and a touch of regret. Mustering his courage, Fahim asked her what had been her own mission. In response, she quietly embraced him. Suddenly, he found himself back at his hospital room, where the only sound was that of the nurses walking slowly about as they plucked all the wires that had bound him to this world, unaware that he was floating above them, an arc of translucent flame, holding hands with and beaming at his new friend. “In answer to your question,” she was saying, “my gift was to discover the cure for your disease and my promise was to work to overcome each and every obstacle to make it happen. Unfortunately, I was never given the chance.”
Then together they appeared in the night sky above a small concrete house in the city of pink sandstone so lately visited and saw a thin, almost waifish girl who could not have been above seventeen or eighteen years old carefully, and as not to be seen by anybody else, gather a few flowers and pat them to the heaped top of a newly-dug, tiny grave next to three others that had since sunken to the level of the ground.
All rights reserved. No part of this essay can be reproduced in any medium without the express written consent of the author.
Just last month he was back in his own country, relaxing with his five sons as they smoked and drank their thick coffee for what seemed to be hours. Looking at the lot of them, he remembered his own youth as one of two boys in a family that included his four sisters. He thought that when he married, he would allow his wife one daughter to be a companion to her and insist that the others be males. Fate and a little medical intervention made it so, but the girl turned out to be just like her brothers, even worse. Sanaa was a bitch, even without the Oxford and Ivy League graduate degrees of her investment-crazed brothers. She married a man in the mold of her brothers, but with ten times the ambition and well-schooled in the subterfuge that had made her father’s financial dealings so effective. “My disciple, my son-in-law,” Fahim mused rather grimly. Then he nodded off again and, feeling the opiate dripping in his veins to be somewhat inadequate, focused on the light as an experiment befitting a man of science in full possession of his reasoning faculties.
“Stop,” he said, and it stopped. Then it hovered above his vision like a contact lens that takes just a few seconds to fully adjust. It was as if he were seeing through a transparent sequin—the colors everywhere seemed almost too bright. He could feel the sun bouncing off what, incredibly, seemed pink sandstone walls and the fuchsia, lemon yellow, and purple of the women’s clothing, which also seemed spangled with tiny mirrors like so many stars. Everyone seemed to be smiling, ignorant, Fahim thought, of the immodest dress of the women, which in his country was forbidden. Then he became conscious that he was not alone.
“What did you promise and what was your gift?” someone or something was asking him, and for a moment, it seemed like a riddle and then the meaning became instantly clear. He felt as if he were surrounded by people who for once were genuinely interested in his well-being. “Fahim," someone was telling him, “answer Shubha, don’t be afraid,” and he again found himself under the loving gaze of she who had died giving birth to his only brother. He then turned to address Shubha and recognized her immediately.
“If you can’t answer right now, don’t worry, you will soon learn what they were and if you truly repent, all will be forgiven," she said in a voice that mingled concern and a touch of regret. Mustering his courage, Fahim asked her what had been her own mission. In response, she quietly embraced him. Suddenly, he found himself back at his hospital room, where the only sound was that of the nurses walking slowly about as they plucked all the wires that had bound him to this world, unaware that he was floating above them, an arc of translucent flame, holding hands with and beaming at his new friend. “In answer to your question,” she was saying, “my gift was to discover the cure for your disease and my promise was to work to overcome each and every obstacle to make it happen. Unfortunately, I was never given the chance.”
Then together they appeared in the night sky above a small concrete house in the city of pink sandstone so lately visited and saw a thin, almost waifish girl who could not have been above seventeen or eighteen years old carefully, and as not to be seen by anybody else, gather a few flowers and pat them to the heaped top of a newly-dug, tiny grave next to three others that had since sunken to the level of the ground.
All rights reserved. No part of this essay can be reproduced in any medium without the express written consent of the author.
HARE KRISHNA MATING RITUAL REVEALED
"I was rotting in my household life."
A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada, Room Conversation, Bombay, 21 Sept. 1973.
It has often been observed that the stricter the religious sect, the more obsessed it is about sexuality. This is most certainly the case with the Hare Krishna devotees. Of the four “regulative principles” whose practice is required of all aspiring and initiated ISKCON followers, the most onerous is the one banning any sexual activity not specifically intended for procreation. Furthermore, according to the direct instructions of the founder of ISKCON, A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami (“Srila Prabhupada”), privacy was out of the question as to when the conception might take place: the married couple intending to “try for a child” would have to appear before the congregation in the temple in the morning and announce that they would be doing so that night.
If that were not indignity enough, both partners were required to spend the day chanting 64 rounds of the Hare Krishna mantra on their japa beads, which means that they would be rapidly mumbling it for a total of 6,912 times. In practice, this is a sort of self-brain washing ritual designed to rid the mind of any anticipation for the act to follow, which, in any case, was supposed to be limited to one fast act during which the couple was supposed to be chanting Hare Krishna anyway. Artificial insemination would have been far more humane.
For the excuses and some outcomes of these sick practices, please see: https://iskconcultunveiled.blogspot.com/2016/01/sex-lies-and-sadhu-making.html
All rights reserved. No part of this essay can be reproduced in any medium without the express written consent of the author.
THE ISKCON "VEDIC CULTURAL CENTER" HOAX
It is no secret that the Indian Cultural Society operating here in the U.S. and the venerable Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan in India are Hindu in orientation, despite their purported mission to showcase and preserve Indian culture. The approximately 180 million Indian Muslims might have an issue with this and justifiably so. However, since Hinduism is the indigenous religion of the Indian sub-continent, the organizations representing Indian culture have wisely focused on the arts and community values, particularly in their outreach to the NRI (Non-Resident Indian) population. There is simply no comparable Indian Muslim counterpart to these types of organizations either in India or abroad and that fact brings me to the topic of this posting.
Here in New York City we have recently concluded our tenth commemoration of the terrorist attacks on September 11th. While at the time it was unavoidable given the circumstances, the mosques and religious schools attended by Muslims living in this country have been the subjects of intense scrutiny since then. No matter what the reason, alienating an immigrant group distinguished by its widely-admired work ethic and strong family values does not come without a price.
How foolish, then, is the ISKCON cult’s brazen co-opting of the “Indian Cultural Society” and "Vedic Cultural Society" labels to hoodwink Indians (both resident and non-resident) into spending their hard-earned cash to fund the spread of a belief system that most would find both repugnant and illogical. So, instead of the temple in question bearing the name of the resident deities (e.g.,“Sri Sri Radha Govinda Mandir”), you have the “ISKCON Hawaii Cultural Center,” or in Pune, India, the “New Vedic Cultural Center.” Unbelievably, in Almaty, Kazakhstan, ISKCON has established an “Indian Cultural Center” despite the fact the NRI population in the entire country is less than 1,500! How can it make any sense to try to convince the people of Kazakhstan that they need to emulate Indian cultural values?
The practice of changing the name of a controversial group to blend in with reputable organizations is a guerrilla warfare tactic that is commonly referred to as “hiding in plain sight.” It is a simple ruse that, among other things, helps the group in question to evade detection and evaluation by governmental agencies and the general public. In education, matters are as bad or worse. For example, ISKCON runs a “Vedic Cultural Center” in Sammamich, Washington, that contains a "planetarium" which is nothing more than a view of the universe from a profoundly anti-science Vaishnava perspective. Schools run by the Hare Krishna group world-wide share this fault of educating students to pass the government-administered tests while teaching them a view of the universe which adheres to a literal Vedic model which is primitive and, frankly, ridiculous. This view includes such howlers such as the belief that “Vedic” astronomy teaches us that the Earth is a disk supported by four elephants in space and that the moon is an inhabited “heavenly” planet.
Moreover, despite having spread these beliefs in the West, the founder of ISKCON, A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami, never regarded his organization as a form of Hinduism. I can tell you that this is true from my experience in the 13 years I spent in the Hare Krishna movement. In fact, the swami never observed the typical Hindu festivals of Holi or Deepavali in our temples and viewed the devotion many Hindus feel for Shiva, Ganesh, and Durga as mere demigod worship. I also know that he would have also regarded the re-naming of temples to blend into the Indian Cultural Center model with indignant anger and disbelief. Better stop all of this subversive business and admit that using all of this imitation and flattery to pick the pockets of sincere Indians yearning for a taste of the mother country is a cruel joke.
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
Here in New York City we have recently concluded our tenth commemoration of the terrorist attacks on September 11th. While at the time it was unavoidable given the circumstances, the mosques and religious schools attended by Muslims living in this country have been the subjects of intense scrutiny since then. No matter what the reason, alienating an immigrant group distinguished by its widely-admired work ethic and strong family values does not come without a price.
How foolish, then, is the ISKCON cult’s brazen co-opting of the “Indian Cultural Society” and "Vedic Cultural Society" labels to hoodwink Indians (both resident and non-resident) into spending their hard-earned cash to fund the spread of a belief system that most would find both repugnant and illogical. So, instead of the temple in question bearing the name of the resident deities (e.g.,“Sri Sri Radha Govinda Mandir”), you have the “ISKCON Hawaii Cultural Center,” or in Pune, India, the “New Vedic Cultural Center.” Unbelievably, in Almaty, Kazakhstan, ISKCON has established an “Indian Cultural Center” despite the fact the NRI population in the entire country is less than 1,500! How can it make any sense to try to convince the people of Kazakhstan that they need to emulate Indian cultural values?
The practice of changing the name of a controversial group to blend in with reputable organizations is a guerrilla warfare tactic that is commonly referred to as “hiding in plain sight.” It is a simple ruse that, among other things, helps the group in question to evade detection and evaluation by governmental agencies and the general public. In education, matters are as bad or worse. For example, ISKCON runs a “Vedic Cultural Center” in Sammamich, Washington, that contains a "planetarium" which is nothing more than a view of the universe from a profoundly anti-science Vaishnava perspective. Schools run by the Hare Krishna group world-wide share this fault of educating students to pass the government-administered tests while teaching them a view of the universe which adheres to a literal Vedic model which is primitive and, frankly, ridiculous. This view includes such howlers such as the belief that “Vedic” astronomy teaches us that the Earth is a disk supported by four elephants in space and that the moon is an inhabited “heavenly” planet.
Moreover, despite having spread these beliefs in the West, the founder of ISKCON, A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami, never regarded his organization as a form of Hinduism. I can tell you that this is true from my experience in the 13 years I spent in the Hare Krishna movement. In fact, the swami never observed the typical Hindu festivals of Holi or Deepavali in our temples and viewed the devotion many Hindus feel for Shiva, Ganesh, and Durga as mere demigod worship. I also know that he would have also regarded the re-naming of temples to blend into the Indian Cultural Center model with indignant anger and disbelief. Better stop all of this subversive business and admit that using all of this imitation and flattery to pick the pockets of sincere Indians yearning for a taste of the mother country is a cruel joke.
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
SEX ABUSE CLAIMENTS WIN BIG--JUSTICE AT LAST!
Champions of Liberty and Fairness, rejoice! A few high profile sex abuse cases were resolved today and yesterday, both of which deal with the abuse of minors over the course of many years.
The case in the news today (for details, see http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2011/08/10/us/AP-US-Priest-Abuse-Lawsuit.html?_r=1&ref=us)concerns an abuse case dating from the 1970's and gives hope to survivors of decades-old abuse: An Illinois man has received a $6.33 million settlement for abuse he suffered at the hands of a parish priest over the course of five years. Another black eye for the Catholic Church, especially since this case involved the hiding of the priest's misbehavior and the way the Church "quietly shuffled him among parishes."
Yesterday's news was even more significant: Warren Jeffs, the leader of the breakaway of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (also known as the FDLS) was sentenced to life in prison for sexually assaulting one of his child brides, in this case a twelve-year old girl. Please read the full article (http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2011/08/09/us/AP-US-Polygamist-Leader.html?ref=us) to get a fuller picture of this bizarre case. This case shows how the so-called marriage of grown men (often old enough to be the grandfathers of their victims) to children exists in this country. This cult, like so many others,is led by a charismatic leader who takes their money, controls their most intimate activities, and insists that he is divinely inspired.
Put a pajama-style outfit on this man and change his religion, and Jeffs would be comfortable as a tribal leader in Afganistan or Pakistan. Put the priest, who got away with abusing his young parisher without any punishment for 40 years,in a saffron robe, and you have a swami or another cult leader who sexually abused minors and now sits on a throne-like chair, dispensing moral precepts to his gullible followers. Worse, many cult survivors are expected to simply "forget" about their abuse by family and friends, most of whom might wonder why the victim has trouble with dating and is often a loner. It is just wonderful to see that this man, now undoubtedly middle-aged, finally has been compensated for his suffering. $6.33 million for abuse that occurred "dozens of times in five years" seems hardly enough, but it is a start. May the girls who were robbed of their childhoods in the FLDS case get enough money to bankrupt that corrupt parody of the Christian religion and wipe it off the face of the Earth.
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
The case in the news today (for details, see http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2011/08/10/us/AP-US-Priest-Abuse-Lawsuit.html?_r=1&ref=us)concerns an abuse case dating from the 1970's and gives hope to survivors of decades-old abuse: An Illinois man has received a $6.33 million settlement for abuse he suffered at the hands of a parish priest over the course of five years. Another black eye for the Catholic Church, especially since this case involved the hiding of the priest's misbehavior and the way the Church "quietly shuffled him among parishes."
Yesterday's news was even more significant: Warren Jeffs, the leader of the breakaway of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (also known as the FDLS) was sentenced to life in prison for sexually assaulting one of his child brides, in this case a twelve-year old girl. Please read the full article (http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2011/08/09/us/AP-US-Polygamist-Leader.html?ref=us) to get a fuller picture of this bizarre case. This case shows how the so-called marriage of grown men (often old enough to be the grandfathers of their victims) to children exists in this country. This cult, like so many others,is led by a charismatic leader who takes their money, controls their most intimate activities, and insists that he is divinely inspired.
Put a pajama-style outfit on this man and change his religion, and Jeffs would be comfortable as a tribal leader in Afganistan or Pakistan. Put the priest, who got away with abusing his young parisher without any punishment for 40 years,in a saffron robe, and you have a swami or another cult leader who sexually abused minors and now sits on a throne-like chair, dispensing moral precepts to his gullible followers. Worse, many cult survivors are expected to simply "forget" about their abuse by family and friends, most of whom might wonder why the victim has trouble with dating and is often a loner. It is just wonderful to see that this man, now undoubtedly middle-aged, finally has been compensated for his suffering. $6.33 million for abuse that occurred "dozens of times in five years" seems hardly enough, but it is a start. May the girls who were robbed of their childhoods in the FLDS case get enough money to bankrupt that corrupt parody of the Christian religion and wipe it off the face of the Earth.
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
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