"Hurting The Sentiments Of The Sikh Community" ?

[West London Singh]

There are alot of things that make me cringe and get my goat, but none more so than this often used expression by Sikhs.

It's "hurt the sentiments of the Sikh community", they say. And they say it with all sincerity without even realising how ridiculous it sounds. The expression started life in India......where the expression exists in a written law. We can put that down to bad and immature usage of the English language and thus forgive Sikh groups based in Punjab for often using the expression. But lately.....especially after the Jay Leno rigrormole the last couple of weeks.....I've noticed even educated western born Sikhs based in England have started using the expression.

Do they not see how silly it sounds ? Do they not see how, when a target audience hears it, they don't think to themselves "oh dear....this is terrible.....the Sikhs have been unjustly wronged". No ! What they think is "are Sikhs immature children ?".

You see.....in the English language and to the western mind...the term 'hurt the sentiments of' implies that the victim is a little child with very delicate and fragile sentiments. A person, or a group of people, with child-like qualities.

So...PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE stop embarrassing all of us Sikhs by using this pathetic expression. It just makes us all look silly.

[garch]

i hear you brother, in the end the whole story was about how fragile sikh emotions are that they cant take a bit of banter that wasn't even directed at them (the media slant not mine before im gunned down).

did leno make a sincere apology or did he just crack another joke?

[VanHelsingh]

It's a phrase that certainly makes me chuckle although I do understand the...erm...sentiment behind it, lol.

People back home (and India in general) have very little self-awareness. Some things which are considered cringe-worthy or "cheesy" by western-dwellers such as ourselves are par for the course over there; they have completely different frames of reference (in terms of society, pop-culture....) compared to us.

To them the phrase "Hurting the sentiments of the Sikh community" is perfectly fine. For us it just comes across as a bit feeble. For a race and a faith of people who pride themselves in being warrior-like and of strong conviction, to use the phrase in question seems to be a bit odd.

[SarabhaPanjab]

we need to pick and choose when we head any sort of objection. Being in the limelight everyday moaning about something or another will back fire because when there is a legitimate cause to object and protest we wont be taken seriously.

i.e. Turban rights, protests when 1984 butchers enter this country.. others such as behzti play.

These are legitimate reasons to protest.

Stupid things such as odd joke on TV, i.e. "have i got news for you" remark are pointless reasons to protest.. makes us look so weak

[pedrorizzo]

Haha good point. The other one that makes me laugh is the expression they have in India for sexual harrassment: They call it 'Eve-teasing' lol and it is an actual term that is used in judiciary. Bunch of jokers!

[GurSa Singh]

Are we better off using terms such as "grossly offensive" , "deeply insulting to the sikh community" or "mocked the ideals of the Sikh community" ?

"Hurting the Sentiments..." is probably used as it's a softer way of saying someones taking the P!