The really serious infectious diseases and Ebola scare

Our knowledge has always been a hopeless mix of facts and fantasy. The two are inseparable and feed on each other, like fact and fiction in history. A case in point is the currently raging Ebola scare. Chances of contracting the infection outside the ebola countries in Africa, a study points out, is nil or extremely rare. But the scare the media are fanning is almost apocalyptic.

Here is a multi-media fact sheet of more scary infectious diseases we are actually living with, courtesy Salon:

http://www.salon.com/2014/11/01/the_planets_deadliest_infectious_diseases_by_country_partner/?source=newsletter

India, fascism and Mr.Narendra Modi. A brief dialogue with Dr. Jerrold Atlas

Response 2
Dear Dr. Atlas,

Thank you for the serious and detailed response to my remarks about poet Manash Bhattacharjee’s thinking on pride, fascism and India. I do agree that Mr. Bhattacharjee’s focus was not India, but I thought the context was.

Incidentally, the breaking news from India is that Mr. Modi’s party will be in power for the next five years.

As to our discussion, you say we ‘choose’ but may get ‘mislead’. I think human choices are never voluntary.

Imagine me watching the Olympic Games. I see an Indian winning a shooting competition. Tears well in my eyes if I am able to connect with him as a fellow Indian. I might also say: ‘I am proud of him!’ I am sure I did not choose to cry. It was involuntary. This could be an instance of pride in its most elementary and personal form, uncontaminated by malice or enmity.

But, the question is, how did or could I connect with him? The answer could be, I was conditioned into feeling so. I would also say that pride of all kinds comes only through conditioning; it is manufactured and manipulated, which would certainly take thinking and planning, may be of the kind Mr. Bhattacharjee will not acknowledge.

We may never know to what extent the ‘manipulator’ leader and the ‘manipulated’ followers were themselves conditioned. But, once conditioned,  thinking may become absent or minimal. Then it may be a trance. Pride then will manifest as ‘my country, right or wrong’ at the national level; ‘my group, right or wrong’ at the group level; and at the personal level just as a transient, private feeling of ‘glow’. Politics is primarily concerned about pride at the national and group levels, not at the personal level.

Following the analogy of ‘handsome is what handsome does’, pride could be what pride does. If it is used to incite hatred or to start wars, they are what pride really is. At the national and group levels, it is identifiable only by what it generates: exclusivism, exceptionalism, jealousy, hatred and aggression. It has, indeed, been exploited by states and groups that were fascist. But, it has been used also by states and groups that were fighting fascists.

I also think, the ‘us – others’ differentiation is built into our ‘system’, perhaps, as a mechanism for survival. Overcoming it, be it through faith, or reasoning, or catharsis, is certainly desirable, but is not happening. The votaries of Hindutva, for instance, are seen chanting old Sanskrit ‘mantras’ like ‘Vasudhaiva kutumbakam’ (the whole world is one family) and ‘Lokah samastah sukhino bhavantu’ (may the people of the whole world be happy) while practising ‘othering’ of a most vicious kind. That is human behaviour as we see on the ground, not as we might wish.

“There is no thinking in fascism, but there is reason”. “Neither pride nor hatred needs thinking”. “Fascist reason is historical pride and hatred masquerading as reason”. These are Mr. Bhattacharjee’s words. I would submit that each one of them, like ‘there is reason but no thinking’, could have some more rigor.

If I may repeat, pride certainly needs ‘others’. It is born of an impulse to feel ‘special’ through comparing and contrasting with others. But in real human situations, which are what, among other disciplines, history also tries to understand, pride has been used to belittle, subdue and annihilate the ‘other’. In this process, the ‘other’ automatically becomes the ‘enemy’. Your question, “Must we do that”, may therefore be more an expression of concern than a question seeking a solution.

As to Mr. Bhattacharjee’s definition of history, it is a pot shot. Cynical definitions about history are legion, but one will be able to engage them only if one knows that the view under discussion is an informed one.

I am worried I am sounding pretentious, even cynical. Sorry. I am poor in feeling poetic sensibilities. I should evolve further.

Suzarin

May 16, 2014

Response 1
Dear Dr. Atlas,

Fascism is an abomination, whether it is of the Nazi brand or of the Hindutva brand. But, I firmly believe that India will not become a fascist state or a military dictatorship in the foreseeable future. Between 1975 and 1977, under Indira Gandhi, there was a brief spell of authoritarianism. But, the institutions of democracy have only become stronger in India ever since.

I have a few reservations about some of the other points mentioned in the article. [Fools of Fascism, 14 May 2014, By Manash Bhattacharjee, Truthout | Op-Ed]. Mr. Bhattacharjee says: “Pride and hatred are not necessarily tied to each other. You don't need to hate another country to have pride in your own.”  This, I feel, is a profound wish one can only preach.

I believe, and I believe history proves, that pride needs an adversary, real or imagined. It can be an individual or a group of a different religion, language, culture or ethnic group. Pride cannot sustain itself without an ‘enemy’. 

The case of the ‘Aryan’ pride in Nazi Germany is too well known to merit a recount. The case of the Hindutva programme is not much different. The meme of ‘Mother India’, the motif of 'swastika’, the invocatory song ‘Vandemataram’, the presiding hero Lord Ram, the demand to make ‘Devnagari’ script of Sanskrit the national script, the demand to restore or reconstruct pre-Muslim place-names and temples, and use of expressions like “Hindu race’ and “Hindu Dharma” were carefully chosen to highlight the ‘us – they’ distinction; ‘us’ the Hindus and ‘they’ the Muslims. But an appeal to pride need not automatically lead to fascism.

I have also some difficulty with Mr. Bhattacharjee’s idea of who thinks and who does not. Statements like “There is no thinking in fascism” lack balance. ‘Thinking’ is not the preserve of only those who agree among themselves. If, on the other hand, ‘thinking’ ought to mean applying a universally accepted way of reasoning based on every available or possible information, at least I would plead my inability to claim I think. Extreme reduction of such
complex issues may produce catchy phrases but would only confuse more.

“And what is history? It is the unending craving for conquest, for power, for humiliating others.” is yet another instance of Mr. Bhattacharjee’s preference for sensationalism. History is much more than that.

The relationship between ‘corporates’ and governments, not fascist governments alone, is certainly a matter of great concern. But linking it with a possible emergence of fascism in India is a little far-fetched. It is already known that ‘corporates’ were involved in most of the corruption cases the Government of Dr. Manmohan Singh was mired in. And, it was not a fascist government!

Suzarin
May 16, 2014

When my first ancestors started in the somewhat determinable past from somewhere in the sub-Saharan Africa

The National Geographic has put up for sale a test kit costing at the time of this post $ 199.00 + shipping charges. It claims that by using it and participating in its ‘genographic’ project each participant could:

1. discover the migration paths their ancient ancestors followed hundreds or even thousands or years ago, and have a view of that journey;

2.  learn what percentage of their genome is affiliated with specific regions of the world;

3.  find out if they have Neanderthal or Denisovan ancestry; and

4.  have the opportunity to share their story and connect with other Genographic Project participants, helping us fill in the gaps in the human story.

The site says that the kit is for taking a “painless” swab of the tester’s cheeks and sending it to the National Geographic's lab. The results one has to access confidentially only on-line.

I am thrilled! If I can know:

1. when my first ancestors started in the somewhat determinable past from somewhere in the sub-Saharan Africa (as is believed now), and the somewhat determinable chronology of that wild journey;

2. when and where all my ancestors had roamed before they settled down, if at all they ever did;

3. when they picked up their various identities, including the ethnic, the linguistic and the territorial; and 4. how long my fellow-beings had been with me in my journey.

Women please excuse. No gender bias meant! Because women do not carry a Y chromosome, the site says, this test will not reveal direct paternal deep ancestry for female participants.

I am not in any way connected with this test. For those who are interested in knowing more, here is the link: http://shop.nationalgeographic.com/ngs/browse/productDetail.jsp?productId=2001246&gsk&code=SR90002&keyword=nat+geo+genealogy&OVMTC=b&OVKEY=nat%20geo%20genealogy&timestamp={msimpts}&url_id=188902921&creative=3856043086&url_id=188902917&adcid=9412503

All the best. We all shall meet somewhere sometime.

Mr. Advani and his delusional taunts.

This is what I sent to The Hindu on 25.3.2009:

PM asks for Mr.Advani’s record.
Sir,
It would be appreciated if Mr.Advani answers Dr.Manmohan Singh’s poser about his track record as Home Minister, and, if one may add, also as Leader of the Opposition. He is seen, instead, to repeat ad nauseam a taunt that Dr.Singh is the weakest ever PM of India. Psychology of taunt, as in the case of name-calling, is that it would give the taunter a false sense of being above the blame. If Mr.Advani wants the voters to believe that he would make a ‘strong’ PM, he may attempt it with the support of his track record.

And this is what it published on 26.3.09:

Mr. Advani, besides telling Dr. Singh about his track record as Home Minister, should also explain his performance as the Leader of the Opposition instead of repeating ad nauseam that Dr. Singh is the weakest Prime Minister India has seen. If Mr. Advani wants the voters to believe that he can make a “strong” Prime Minister, he can convince them by producing his track record.

P.P. Sudhakaran,
Bangalore.

My post script would be: What a waste of a delusion! In 2014, he is not even a leader, let alone a Prime Minister in waiting. He, and almost all the old guards of the BJP are in the party on life-lines.

Caste is not that decisive in Indian elections at the national level

The latest issue of International Journal of Tantric Studies (IJTS) vol.10, n.1 (http://asiatica.org/ijts/10-1/india-elections-2014-end-caste-and-politics/#section-3) has an article by Alessandro Cissilin, India Elections 2014: The End of “Caste Politics”, which argues that in India, though ‘the narrative on caste and politics still persists among intellectual circles with a great deal of analytical debate’, politics as well as society is basically a matter of ‘multiple memberships and overlapping identities’.

 

This I think is what I tried to express vis-a-vis Arundhati Roy’s apprehensions about India becoming a totalitarian state. But, of course, with much less academic rigor. Fortunately, history does not follow any individual’s anxiety or even dictates.

 

My conviction is that castes do not bind people into any pan-Indian groups worth taking note of. They had always been exclusivist clubs, evolving locally and relevant only in their respective immediate locales.

 

The notion that in the beginning there were only four meta-groups (Brahmins, Kshatriyas, Vaisyas and Sudras) called ‘Varnas’, and the various castes and sub-castes were born out of inter-Varna marriages, I am convinced, is a canard planted by the ‘Sastris’. ‘Sastris’ like Manu or Yajnavalkya or Apastamba, who had composed and prescribed the social laws, were extremely adept at classification. They literally divined a near perfect system of castes with a fool-proof formula for fixing social hierarchy. The colonial interlocutors of India borrowed and popularized this story as well as the scheme, which eventually became the given knowledge the world over.

 

 Caste as practiced in India now does not substantiate any of the features traditionally associated with it. Caste markers such as rules of pollution, occupational restrictions, and codes of dress and food are now less visible and are observed more in breach.

 

But, as marriage circles, caste is still extremely virulent. Marriage circles earlier were purely local. The writ of caste rules ran only within those narrow circles. Choice of the spouse was not extended to any distant groups, even those with identical occupations, rituals or names. In the last quarter of the 19^th century, however, there were movements within many castes in many parts of India to co-opt identical castes and enlarge their size and also their political and social bargaining power. This did succeed to some extent, but not to the extent to which Indian elections could be decided by caste formations alone. As far as I could make out from the abstract, which alone I could access, this is what Alessandro Cissilin has argued. Indian elections are still largely unpredictable.

 

Hope I will be able to access the full paper some time soon.

India heading for totalitarianism? Arundhati Roy says, yes.

A brief dialogue about India with Dr. Jerrold Atlas of psychohistory-historicalmotivations Forum between the 19^th and the 20^th of April, 2014.

It began as a response to his comments about a conversation Ms. Arundhati Roy had with Amy Goodman and Nermeen Shaikh for Truthout, published on 16 April 2014 with the caption: Is India on a Totalitarian Path? Here is the link to it: http://www.truth-out.org/news/item/23013-arundhati-roy-is-india-on-a-totalitarian-path

Dr. Atlas:

[Arundhati Roy offers a deep look into the multiple processes at play in a complex India. To understand it well, please try to see that they are all functioning in the same time and space --- ancient traditions, rural poverty, urban overcrowdedness and poverty, fear of the modernity some see as threatening, fear of the backwardness that threatens to overwhelm all gains, rising corruption, radical Hinduism, Hindutva repressive tyranny and

censorship and a willingness to choose radical Right leaders who promise to bring order -- often by suppressing or crushing those deemed to be "enemies of the state".

To understand the interplay of the radical, the modern, the traditional is to understand what drives India more than most articles seen lately.  In a land of huge businesses and moguls of wealth and power, it is also a land where corruption allows the sloppiness of business regulations and a current spate of

improper generic drugs sold globally.  Rising is the goal for so many since it offers hope of assuring one's place in a terribly crowded place.  Fearing Muslim neighbors drives fear and a willingness to target those deemed to be state enemies worth eliminating.

I hope List member Suzarin will lend us his overview of things in India and help us understand what is going on and what is at stake in the upcoming elections.     J ATLAS]

My response:

Hello, Dr. Atlas,

Thank you. As usual, your comments are insightful and interesting. I might touch upon only the general elections of 2014.

As you have rightly said, India is an extremely complex nation. Disparities within and between its countless groups are so huge and varied that averages about anything Indian are always useless. At one end there are sickeningly opulent people like Mukesh Ambani, mentioned by Ms. Arundhati Roy, and at the other faceless millions who live like abandoned cattle.

Broad labels like Hindu and Sikh, Brahman and Dalit, Madrasi and Punjabi, and rich and poor are so misleading that beyond as labels they convey nothing meaningful.  In the colonial discourses, India was depicted as the country of the maharajas, nautchgirls, snake charmers and rope tricksters. That was plain fiction.

Now also, trying to define a common Indian identity will be stereotypically hazardous. Comparing India with other countries and peoples also will only confuse.

Naturally, Indian politics reflects all these complexities. Indian elections are, therefore, generally unpredictable. There are some groups, termed in the Indian context as ‘vote banks’, which traditionally support certain political parties. Usually they are religious or caste groups. The ‘middle class’ groups may vote, cutting across religious and caste affinities, shifting their support on other considerations, like the economic. The poor people of all groups, invariably the largest chunk of voters in any election, are by and large purchasable. Almost all parties and candidates spend unbelievably huge sums of money on them,

giving either cash or consumables. Cash per voter may be as low as Rs. 500/-. These are the voters who quite often decide the poll results. How many will be bought in any election is an unpredictable quantity, dependent upon a number of disparate factors.

There are rules to disqualify candidates and parties indulging in such vote ‘purchases’, but in spite of the vigilance of the Election Commission, malpractices are rampant. Those who spend huge sums on electioneering try to recoup that money and much more using their elected offices. Everyone knows this is the main cause of corruption, but corrective measures are painfully slow.

 Political ideology rarely decides elections in India. Some people may flock together in the name of their religions. But members of all major religions are usually seen among the active supporters of different political parties. The case of the Hindus is a good example. If a majority of the Hindus are a clear vote

bank, the BJP that uses ‘Hindutva’ as a political rallying issue, should always win all elections. But, that is not happening. This time, however, the BJP has put up Mr. Narendra Modi, who is perceived as a militant Hindu leader. as its prime ministerial candidate. That, together with the huge propaganda that the BJP has organized, make the 2014 elections a little more unpredictable.

For India watchers, this election is going to be special.

Suzarin

[Dr. Atlas added:

Thanks to Suzarin for offering us an insight into the pragmatic as it applies in India.  It is hard for those elsewhere to embrace India (or any other incredibly populous nation) because of the realities there not seen elsewhere.  Overcrowding alters the basic psychology of life and people as well as culture and, very definitely, politics.

The nature of so many means that there can be a drift toward massive corruption as a shortcut to the use of democratic ideas. Yet it is an endemic corruption to be found in all things in such nations.  To think that this doesn't corrupt the fiber of society is to miss the very essence of such overcrowding -- all things become negotiable.  This seeps into the moral construct of society and that too may be damaged.

India is now in the position of such anger at those who have run the nation for so long and what has become their seeming to be out of touch with today's needs that it endorses a radical thug (some say).  Yet, some believe that the position and impact alter an individual allowing for ethical and human decency to triumph and change to be made.  One may devoutly wish this to be.  I may not hold this belief -- nor, perhaps, many List members, but it is a possibility in India.

I would hope for this possibility but the rise of Hindutva chastens me and makes it seem hardly likely.  This is a moment in India when puritanical choices seem to be the group-fantasy and harsh, punitive governance imposing will over the many seems to have dominance.  It is understandable that this might be so because of the endless disorder of the Gandhi-Nehru legacy.  Yet, it is a despair and that signals some horrid choices and moments ahead.

India -- like many in the West, especially in the US -- needs a moral regeneration and the redevelopment of opportunity for all. It is the only reward essential for the future to be bright.  The concept of "exclusivity" has never really worked for long in any land and the demographics require an understanding of this.  Only allowing/encouraging the full development of everyone to their fullest can bring grandeur to a society/group.  The sickness of the recent past has been "exclusivity".  Instead, "inclusivity" must become the new stage of the dream of a greater nation.

I would be remiss if I didn't add in the meme unspoken - that this rise of Modi is also endorsed by the corporate world there -- a signal that corporate wealth/power is being used to turn India into a worker-drone situation best for the corporate rich and especially so in a land so overcrowded as to present wealth opportunities from manipulating the many into sources of huge revenue growth for the richest.  I see this trend as the "poisonous apple" more likely to harm India.

I'd welcome a conversation about this subject/India/overcrowdedness/

aspirations/free market philosophy/"inclusivity" v "exclusivity"/etc from List members.           J ATLAS]

My response:

Indian cities are certainly overcrowded, which brings into play many human traits a sparsely populated country would never experience. You are right: “Overcrowding alters the basic psychology of life and people as well as culture and, very definitely, politics.” As you have said, the ease with which corruption is accepted in public life is one such change. 

The cities, however, do not add up to an India political discourses often posit as the real India.

If one may put it this way, there are many Indias, not one. The identities and interests of the different groups, determined by religious, caste, ethnic, linguistic and cultural affinities, often cross and re-cross the political contours. The administrative unit of India is an accident. 

‘Indians’ are not and never were a single nation in the sense in which one can speak of the French or the Japanese. It was after realizing how diverse the people of the sub-continent were that Jawaharlal Nehru, during India’s freedom struggle, coined the expression, ‘unity in diversity’. Like all slogans, it was a call to act and bring it about, not a statement of fact.

The exclusivism you have mentioned is actually working between and among many groups and at many levels in Indian life. Hindu exclusivism is only the most pervasive/pernicious among them. After Mr. Narendra Modi was chosen as the prime ministerial candidate by the BJP, this has only attracted greater attention world-wide.

If the proof of the pudding is in eating it, the choice of Mr. Modi by a party that has any number of leadership-aspirants shows that he is different from the rest. What that difference is seen differently by different people depending upon their biases. One thing is certain. He is capable of evoking strong opposite reactions in those who follow his politics. In that sense, he is a divisive personality. And, of course, he is the demagogue par excellence of modern India.

But, as you have hoped at one point, while in power, ‘the position and impact may alter an individual allowing for ethical and human decency to triumph.’ It might happen to a political party/group also. The promise of three divisive programmes on which the BJP had come to power were put on the back-burner all the six years it was in power from 1998 to 2004.

I wish you had not used “radical thug” to describe an Indian political functionary who has come to power through elections and is under constant judicial review, however corrupt or deficient they might be.

I also wish you had made it a little clearer for those who follow you, that the Gandhi in the “Gandhi – Nehru legacy” is not Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, the ‘Mahatma’. The ‘Gandhi’ in the names of Indira Gandhi’s family is Feroze Gandhi, Indira Gandhi’s husband, who was a Parsee, unrelated to M.K. Gandhi.

Suzarin

[Dr. Atlas added:

As usual, Suzarin, you amplify others' understanding of things Indian. India is far from a unity and never seemed to have been intended to be.  Yet it is.  The working of this has been a major problem but it is one to be overcome in many nations -- including the US.  It's just that the "growing pains" are so great that they hurt many and take too long to heal.

While I referred to Modi as a "radical thug:" in another post, I used it as "some claim".  That is true.  The US government declared him as such as well -- now they're finding his accession to power sufficient to alter that somehow. Let us hope that the wish is parent to the new truth…. I still hope what I said is so -- that he will be tempered by the needs of power to become a leader for all.  There are stains on his record that may prove far more difficult to bleach -- actions speaks louder for this than words.

I suppose you are right in that many outside India don't know the differences between one Gandhi and another -- as many may not understand that one Roosevelt wasn't the same as another, or one Kennedy or one Bush or one Clinton.  Thanks for clearing that up.

I am still more concerned about the rise of corporate/zillionaire power emerging in India. I suppose we can't escape that influence -- even here in the US where it has become a corrupting force pushing away from democracy to oligarchy.  Yet, it is a pernicious power corrupting the goals of a unity and increasing democratic governance -- it is a frightening process harmful to the broad distribution of betterment and promised social compact.  That they have apparently "selected" Modi does not augur well for the majority -- but even that may be tempered by the necessities of governance.  I just see it as for what dangers it signals -- a worrisome challenge to "inclusive democracy".

As we have jointly discussed, Indiaphiles wish and hope for a better India servicing the leap into modernity as well as respecting the grandeur of its past.  There is a glorious, albeit bloody, past and a march into modernity that has yet to be accomplished for the majority. While the zillionaires have managed to use size and wealth to achieve some more modernity and significant employment growth, they are also subject to the corrupt nature of things there.  Sadly, this doesn't help bring betterment for the majority.  India's younger generations may see the zillionaire role model more than the ancient ones, more than Nehru or Indira -- or they may find a better path than their predecessors and achieve the hoped for amalgam into modernity. Like you, I hope for the best and worry as well.

Unlike you, I never found Aurobindo's abandoned revolutionary zeal or his embrace of the mystic threatening or troubling -- he was on a journey that may have gone astray or never reached its goal before he died. So be it but "the Mother" accomplished something good with it all -- and we agree on that. 

There are many special places in India -- new and old -- and they contribute to what may eventually become a national patrimony of greatness and good life.  The national history is too rich to ignore, too large to absorb and too important to forget.  But, for me, best of all is the richness of the foods and recipes I labor hard to master.  Enjoy someone's foods and you love them even more.

Thanks for your conversation about your country.     J ATLAS]

Further response to Dr. Jerrold Atlas

Atlas adds:
Dear Suzarin raises some important on-the-spot
comments about the changing climate in India.
It is a groundswell reaction to dissatisfaction with 
the ways things have not been going well in India.
Thus, Congress has lost the people's confidence --
as have the old concepts of Gandhi/Nehru based on
building a "civilized" India on the foundations set 
in the British rule.

I think much more discussion about this is essential 
to understanding India ahead.  It is a rejection of 
what had been the founding ideas -- never a mark of 
stability in a nation the size of India.  Size and 
incredible diversity really mark what others have 
preferred to see: a fantasy meme of a monolithic 
people. 

Size prevents a modicum of order and civility as 
barely contained rage from overcrowdedness 
imperils order. One simply can't find "space" in 
public space to achieve calm and escape crowds 
-- thus, isolation becomes a mark of status and  
wealth enabling order and calm in one's private 
isolation space.  But what do the billion+ others do?

Diversity is now an increasingly burdensome mark 
of the reality of India despite a long history of 
public education instilling whatever the accepted
homogenized group-illusion of India has developed.
Thus, identity-formations exist among many sub-
groups creating a rash of parties emphasizing 
whatever their base seeks. This inhibits unity and
an acceptable national group-illusion. 

Indeed, frustrated younger elements turn to chaos 
and fomenting troubles for the larger national 
group because of this.  Large political parties find 
themselves broadening their message to 
accommodate the sub-groups within and this 
waters down their impact and acceptability to 
others. One simply can't be all things to all sub-
groups and remain a viable message in a huge and
very diverse group.  Simpler, all-embracing virtues/
values need to become the messages sold by large 
parties.

The turn away from what was also means a turn to 
a nationalist Hindu fantasy embodied in one party 
and leader.  How this will turn out for India is 
anyone's guess but it will definitely bring a rise in 
influence of the puritanical.  Thus, this change is so 
far turning more to cleansing India than marrying 
the sub-groups.  It is "exclusivity" rather than 
"inclusivity" -- a nasty turn and certainly one where
hates are turned into allowed rage by Indian laws.

Suzarin is wrong, however, in denying "banned" as 
the correct expression for what is taking place (with 
Doniger's book and many other elements of life there).
That Penguin chose a business decision rather than 
intellectual reality is a mark of the savaging of what 
had been India's real past for a revisionist meme 
hardly in keeping with the greatness that was. True,
the settlement eliminated the "banning" but it was
really a caving in to "banning".

Suzarin is fully correct, however, in everything else.
This is a dangerous turn for India, it will gain little 
more than hatred unleashed, violence nascent, anger
for a nation that needs tolerance and inclusivity. India
will be wasting its vast intellectual/cultural heritage
in the pursuit of unleashed angers and repression in a 
regressive regime.  Things do not bode well.  Mark's
other illustration of this shows the spreading nature
of this passionate "exclusivity".    J ATLAS]

My response:

I agree that the effect of Penguin India’s out of court settlement with the petitioners is the same as banning. But in India, a distinction is usually made between challenging and banning. Banning has to be by the government, with or without a court order.

Doniger’s book was only challenged by a retired school teacher and five others in a civil suit filed before one of the Additional District Judges in New Delhi in 2011. They had also registered two criminal complaints before a police station in New Delhi in 2010 and 2013.

But on February 4, Penguin agreed to withdraw all the copies of the book from India within a period of six months. On February 10, the court accepted the agreement and dismissed the suit as withdrawn. Following that, the two criminal complaints also stood withdrawn.

Wikipedia has a list of the books ‘banned’ and the books ‘challenged but not banned’ in India till date. Please see the link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_books_banned_in_India

Some of the books on the list may really surprise you.

I also agree with the detailed observations about what is looming over contemporary India, threatening its very survival as a single state. But history seldom follows predictions! One factor that might change the course for the better is a movement, nascent though, led by Arvind Kejriwal. India watchers may take note of the name.

Suzarin

Wendy Doniger's Op-Ed in the NYT - A response to Dr. Jerrold Atlas' remark

Dr Jerrold Atlas posted the link to Dr. Wendy Doniger's Op-Ed on the Psychohistory-historical motivations forum with his comment:

[Worthy of interest, even if just for the rising tide of Hindu nationalism that is 

about to burst forth in a new leader once condemned by the US.  This is the 

India few wanted to see -- a deeply nationalist, revisionist, highly puritanical 

defenders of a group-illusion that never was.  It is undemocratic in leaning 

and very willing to condemn those who oppose them as "enemies". It 

condemns their vision of a purified society in a deep group-think and rejects 

what had been the Hinduism of yore.  Thus, the Nehru-orginated Congress 

Party has lost control over the hearts and minds of the majority in India.

We should try to remember that India is a mix of old and new with enormous 

corruption and shoddy workmanship as well.  It is a country where education 

is prized but business shrewdness is more preferred, along with cronyism.  

Thus, some succeed while others feel the sting of rejection and or losing to 

become rather outcasts in their own world.  Add in the demographic bulge 

making population swell enormously (like China), increase urban tensions, 

harbor desires for emotional outbursts as a way of relieving overcrowdedness-

caused stress, seek relief in Bollywood-style extravaganzas and allow an 

increase in fundamentalist groups demanding faith-based purity or 

erversions with religious context.  

That neighboring Pakistan is nuclear and sees all purpose as attacking larger 

India while Pakistan fundamentalism has led to civil wars between opposing 

religious fanatics, fanatical modernists seeking success through industrial 

opportunities misusing their fellow Pakistanis, westernized generals and their 

armies focused on maintaining balance in society and protecting the nuclear 

arsenal and the borders, ISI agencies playing all sides against each other 

and willingly confronting what they deem to be Pakistan's enemies while 

rewarding or dealing with enemies of neighbors (and keeping Afghanistan

weak, disorganized and confused).

This region is a powder-keg of trouble dangerously trying to not let anyone 

light a match.  All the while, they have to watch the East where larger 

neighbor China is going through growth spasms and currency. manipulation, 

generating endless billionaires annually and then seeing them collapse into 

corruption (dragging down many of the party's potential leaders with them).  

Their enemy neighbor is blustering for power and making demands on 

neighbors that now frightens many.

In this context, the censoring of this standard text on Hindu past and culture 

past is very clearly understandable, albeit disgusting.  It is an academic 

author's dream, to be banned and become a best seller.               J ATLAS]

This was my response:

 ‘Banned in Bangalore’ is a misleading title for Dr. Doniger’s NYT Op-Ed. She chose it to sync with the mid 19^th – mid 20^th century selling caption in the U.S., ‘Banned in Boston’.

I am from Bangalore. The book was not banned there. It was not banned anywhere in India. It was just withdrawn by its publisher–distributor, Penguin Books, with the offer to ‘pulp’ the remaining stock in an out of court settlement with the petitioner. The Indian blasphemy law is quite illiberal and sweeping, and Penguin obviously wanted to avoid an acrimonious litigation. I condemn both the blasphemy law and the pusillanimity of Penguin Books.

I have read the book. I found it has nothing much to commend and nothing much to condemn.

The problem with every discourse is the mismatch of perceptions. This problem is extremely acute in the case of Hinduism. In the first place, the word ‘Hinduism’ itself is a misnomer. It does not signify any comprehensive system of belief or practice, let alone a unified one. As Dr. Atlas has correctly pointed out, some “deeply nationalist, revisionist, highly puritanical defenders of a group-illusion that never was” are trying to give it a monolithic form, but in vain. It was partly because of this problem that the main Hindu political outfits are using the word ‘Hindutva’ (the state of being a Hindu) instead, which the Indian Supreme Court has glibly defined in one of its judgment as a “way of life”. Actually, it is not one way of life but many.

About the Hindus, Doniger gave her perception. If others had disagreement with it, they could have given their versions. But fundamentalism does not work that way, whether it is of the defenders of a certain point of view, or its detractors.

This April, India is going to the polls. Political atmosphere here is hyper charged. Doniger’s book became an issue also because of that. As an aside, I agree with Dr. Atlas that the dream of an academic author to become a best seller through controversy has come true in the case of Dr. Wendy Doniger. So far so good!

Suzarin    

One rich guy will own India one day. Then...

Reproducing a cartoon by Tom Tomorrow on the Psychohistory-Historical Motivations Forum, Jerrold Atlas noted that what was depicted in it had actually happened long ago in Argentina.  There, in a chain action, the ever-rising cost of electricity made it accessible to fewer and fewer people, who in larger and larger numbers illegally tapped into the power lines, which forced the electricity companies to raise the price of power higher and higher on the few who could afford it, and eventually, only one very rich person paid the bill for the whole country.

Dr. Atlas further noted: “Humor is a coping mechanism and also signals the group's sense of being screwed. It is a signal of the large frustration by the many against the few. It is a warning to the few and they respond in various ways to prevent themselves from losing power – ‘police armies’, slashing safety nets, ending help for the young/poor/sick/seniors/public employees/working-middle classes/rigging voting districts/denying voting rights/corrupting all governance systems/buying congress people and judges/controlling the media.  Oh wait, that's what they're doing right now.”

As is evident from the cartoon itself, it relates directly to the U.S. super-rich individuals and corporates. But it can be about India too. With a class of political leaders that is ready to crawl when asked by the moneyed masters only to bend running the show, we are moving along the same path.

Hitler hated Jews? My head is spinning!

We are all used to historians changing the past. They could do it because they only create it! Through interpreting the 'records', they create 'evidence', From the 'evidence' thus created, they create the 'past'! No Gospel, no theologian, to my knowledge, has claimed that God could or would change what has already happened! But historians can! That is not a big deal, though. But, this is a more serious matter. They have brought to light a new record! Questions about interpretation, evidence and true past can wait. Is this record genuine?

According to a news report [http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/176781], Shimon Rahamim, an 'elderly Israeli', discovered an article in a Hebrew-language newspaper, Doar Hayom, dated August 8, 1924.

In the course of discussing Hitler's role as leader of the “nationalist Germans,” that article states that in an interview with a German publication, he had expressed “his warm feelings for the Jewish people.” It further says that Hitler had told the interviewer that all nations that had fallen in the past had suffered that fate because of their negative treatment of Jews. “He recommended that the entire world take stock” of their relations with the Jews, and adjust their behavior accordingly.

The given history of the context is that Hitler was in prison at the time, having been arrested the year before for attempting to start a rebellion in Munich, known as the “Beer Hall Putsch,”. He was sentenced to five years, but was released after only nine months, in December 1924.

Is this article authentic? Rahamim says yes, that it is indeed possible that Hitler did make those statements, "perhaps in order to impress upon the authorities that he had reformed." Hitler was writing his anti-Semitic manifesto, Mein Kampf, precisely at that time! Mein Kampf was published in 1925.

Rahamim has also this advice: "The Jews need to be very wary of those who claim to 'love' them.... If they could say this about Hitler, how much more careful must we be'!

Let the 'sacred' facts of history take care of themselves. What matters is the perception. Does this news bite wring familiar to those Indians who are holding their ears close to the not so distant 'past'?