Internal Atrophy of Sikh Autonomy

[Sukhvirk1976]

12 hours ago, dallysingh101 said:

Absolutely. My feelings are that 'Hinduism' as is conceptualised today didn't exist in the pre-colonial period. But we're Sikhs and we have to let Hindus figure their own stuff out, we need to focus on our own thing. 

So it would be fair to say the 'sikh' identity is also constructed? 

[dallysingh101]

8 hours ago, Sukhvirk1976 said:

So it would be fair to say the 'sikh' identity is also constructed? 

Only for the brain dead. More and more people are waking up. Colonialism essentially involved dumbing down the wild Panjabi masses and turning them into conforming, useful tools for the imperial agenda. 

The difference between the brain-f**k that goray gave Sikhs versus the Hindus is that Hindus have benefitted from their reconfiguration big time (getting a country for themselves, now having a chance at unity with common language and umbrella concept of 'Hindu', having increasingly powerful military capabilities etc.). Sikhs instead got ar5e-raped. Lost country, redefined along caste/race lines which causes havoc with unity to this day, complete loss of military strength which is largely reduced to a blunt symbolic 'dagger'.

 

Try reading this if you haven't already:

 

[13Mirch]

15 hours ago, dallysingh101 said:

Only for the brain dead. More and more people are waking up. Colonialism essentially involved dumbing down the wild Panjabi masses and turning them into conforming, useful tools for the imperial agenda. 

The difference between the brain-f**k that goray gave Sikhs versus the Hindus is that Hindus have benefitted from their reconfiguration big time (getting a country for themselves, now having a chance at unity with common language and umbrella concept of 'Hindu', having increasingly powerful military capabilities etc.). Sikhs instead got ar5e-raped. Lost country, redefined along caste/race lines which causes havoc with unity to this day, complete loss of military strength which is largely reduced to a blunt symbolic 'dagger'.

 

Try reading this if you haven't already:

 

Naipul, in his India Rediscovered, states that given the diversity of Hindu society (Hindu being a geographical label) it was very easy for the British to re-engineer it into some form of a politico-religious philosophy. Men like Dayanand Saraswati, schooled in Occidental thought, were conveniently maneuvered into prominent positions from whence they could argue that akin to Christianity Hinduism too was a monolithic religious tradition. The evolution of this re-construction is the ultra-orthodox brand of nationalism which we see today in in India i.e. Hindutva, where Hindu (as per the fundamentalists) is synonymous with Indian and nationalistic.

[Sukhvirk1976]

5 hours ago, 13Mirch said:

Naipul, in his India Rediscovered, states that given the diversity of Hindu society (Hindu being a geographical label) it was very easy for the British to re-engineer it into some form of a politico-religious philosophy. Men like Dayanand Saraswati, schooled in Occidental thought, were conveniently maneuvered into prominent positions from whence they could argue that akin to Christianity Hinduism too was a monolithic religious tradition. The evolution of this re-construction is the ultra-orthodox brand of nationalism which we see today in in India i.e. Hindutva, where Hindu (as per the fundamentalists) is synonymous with Indian and nationalistic.

I agree the label 'hindu' is totally inadequate as a way to capture such a diverse group of philosophical traditions. 

It also seems to be be applied and used by people /writers when it is a convenient device to homogenise a group of people to criticise. It happens on this forum when people talk about Hindus, Muslims, 'gora' or liberals. It just a lazy way of articulating arguments stepping around actual analysis or pinpointing problems.. 

[13Mirch]

23 minutes ago, Sukhvirk1976 said:

I agree the label 'hindu' is totally inadequate as a way to capture such a diverse group of philosophical traditions. 

It also seems to be be applied and used by people /writers when it is a convenient device to homogenise a group of people to criticise. It happens on this forum when people talk about Hindus, Muslims, 'gora' or liberals. It just a lazy way of articulating arguments stepping around actual analysis or pinpointing problems.. 

I believe that problems with belief/ideology might be the problem e.g. Caste is a part and parcel of Hindu belief or a majority of it. Is criticizing Caste akin to criticizing Hindus as a whole?

[Sukhvirk1976]

1 hour ago, 13Mirch said:

I believe that problems with belief/ideology might be the problem e.g. Caste is a part and parcel of Hindu belief or a majority of it. Is criticizing Caste akin to criticizing Hindus as a whole?

I don't think criticising caste is akin to criticising Hindus as a whole since.. It's a social construct and a aberration of the philosophy.. Casteism should be challenged at every opportunity. But by conflating it is not useful.. The book of manu out of which casteism developed did not promote inequality but was used by the elites to provide justification to support structural inequalities 

[Ranjeet01]

Power is never given, you've got to take it.

The current set up at the moment may make things difficult to do this. However, if there is a vacuum and there is an opportunity then it is something that needs to be grabbed.

[dallysingh101]

6 hours ago, Sukhvirk1976 said:

I agree the label 'hindu' is totally inadequate as a way to capture such a diverse group of philosophical traditions. 

It also seems to be be applied and used by people /writers when it is a convenient device to homogenise a group of people to criticise. It happens on this forum when people talk about Hindus, Muslims, 'gora' or liberals. It just a lazy way of articulating arguments stepping around actual analysis or pinpointing problems.. 

And I believe your type of argument is a convenient way of ignoring the plain fact that certain problems can often stem from certain communities.

It would be stupid to point at Ghanians and accuse them of fostering global discord through neo-imperialist agendas and militarism. But you could point at powerful, influential, longstanding sections of the English community doing so. That not every last one of them is involved is a moot point. Fact is that those problems stem from those sources. 

Same with grooming, it would be stupid to point at say Gujerati Muslims and accuse them of turning a blind eye to mass grooming stemming from their community. But the same couldn't be said of another community we all know of. 

Same with alcohol-loving, jamboree mentalities amongst our lot. Anyone with an ounce of integrity and honesty knows what subsection of the community popularised this amongst us. But that doesn't mean that every last Jut engages in this. 

Your approach is not only lazy, but also cowardly because it fails to call a spade a spade - which is needed sometimes - especially in a community like ours who routinely go into denial about serious issues they face. 

 

[dallysingh101]

2 hours ago, Sukhvirk1976 said:

The book of manu out of which casteism developed did not promote inequality but was used by the elites to provide justification to support structural inequalities 

Do you know how oxymoronic the above is? 

 

Why are we talking about Hindus now anyway? Ain't we got enough of our own issues to sort out?

[Sukhvirk1976]

3 hours ago, dallysingh101 said:

And I believe your type of argument is a convenient way of ignoring the plain fact that certain problems can often stem from certain communities.

It would be stupid to point at Ghanians and accuse them of fostering global discord through neo-imperialist agendas and militarism. But you could point at powerful, influential, longstanding sections of the English community doing so. That not every last one of them is involved is a moot point. Fact is that those problems stem from those sources. 

Same with grooming, it would be stupid to point at say Gujerati Muslims and accuse them of turning a blind eye to mass grooming stemming from their community. But the same couldn't be said of another community we all know of. 

Same with alcohol-loving, jamboree mentalities amongst our lot. Anyone with an ounce of integrity and honesty knows what subsection of the community popularised this amongst us. But that doesn't mean that every last Jut engages in this. 

Your approach is not only lazy, but also cowardly because it fails to call a spade a spade - which is needed sometimes - especially in a community like ours who routinely go into denial about serious issues they face. 

 

I think you'll find I'm quite happy calling a spade a spade just not all the garden fork and pick axe as well.. That was my point. Thank you for helping me illustrate it..