[Reader-list] What's pain got to do with it?

[Gargi Sen]

Thanks R. of A.R.K.P.
Thank you for explaining but I didn¹t mean you, or any Rahul for that
matter. That was a serious typo. I meant Pawan. The one who so thoughtfully
sent a list of communist excesses to this list. My intention was to share
with him that had my father been alive he would have happily and wickedly
added to the list. My typing in the name Rahul in place of Pawan was a
mistake. 
That¹s also why I am beginning to really like the acronym A.R.K.P. Keeps
typos short.
Gargi Sen

On 9/3/07 3:54 AM, "Rahul Asthana" <rahul_capri at yahoo.com> wrote:

> Hi Gargi,
> I am assuming the Rahul you mention in your emails is
> me.I will try to answer.
>> >You see, my friends Aditya, Rashneek , Kshemendra ,
>> >Pawan and Rahul
>> > allow me
>> >to be straight forward. I have two problems with most
>> >of your posts.
>> > Your
>> >arguments are weak. You can¹t keep taking recourse to
>> >pain as an
>> > argument.
>> >Arguments need to be constructed and pain
>> >unfortunately can only be
>> > felt. So
>> >to talk only of pain, over and over and over again
>> >without adding
>> > anything
>> >else, apart from abuse and false accusations, has the
>> >danger of
>> > skidding
>> >your position into the terrain of boredom. And even
>> >your abuse becomes
>> >tedious, repetitive, boring.
> My argument has nothing to do with pain.I am not a
> Kashmiri.As for accusations and abuse,I don't know.If
> I did,I apologize.I try to keep this impersonal.As for
> your boredom,sorry but I cant help you there.I don't
> know how to make my writing interesting,nor do I try.
>> > And the second problem I >have is with the
>> >strategy you describe and I read in the sub-texts of
>> >your posts and its
>> >consequences. For if you try to stop arguments and
>> >points of view  by
>> > force
>> >or falsehood, if you try and still voices you don¹t
>> >agree with, you
>> > run into
>> >two problems. First you end up giving a lot more
>> >credence to what
>> > you¹re
>> >trying to stop. Second, and this is probably far more
>> >dangerous, if you
>> >emerge victorious, i.e. if you are actually able to
>> >stop all voices you
>> >don¹t like one day the silence of silenced voices
> will >silence even
>> > your
>> >litany of pain.
> Its not about what I want or don't want.Its not about
> me.Since the two principle actors in this problem are
> nations,so this problem has to be viewed from the
> perspective of these nations.
>> >Do you understand?
> Yeah I do understand,but your assumption and
> conclusion is wrong;at least in my case.
>> >Is that truly what you want?
> What I truly want is the resolution of Kashmir issue.
> Hope this helps
> Rahul
> 
> --- Gargi Sen <sen.gargi at gmail.com> wrote:
> 
>> > Hello Everybody,
>> > I am not a writer but have nevertheless discovered
>> > the two banes in the life
>> > of a writer. First, how to start, and second, how to
>> > stop. As I have merely
>> > crossed the first hurdle I crave your indulgence.
>> > And apologies for another
>> > mail addressed to a few people on the list.
>> > Gargi
>> > 
>> > Dear M. Ray (and of course my young friends Aditya,
>> > Rashneek , Kshemendra ,
>> > Pawan and Rahul)
>> > 
>> > M. Ray I am a little annoyed with you. How could you
>> > forget my Œboddi¹
>> > lineage and its implication? While the non-Bengalis
>> > on this list will not
>> > know what I am talking about you should know better.
>> > Because either you are
>> > a Bengali or you know enough about Bengalis - who
>> > insist on seeing the world
>> > divided into two simple camps: Bengalis and
>> > non-Bengalis - to so astutely
>> > identify my roots. But how could you forget the
>> > boddi bit? After all most
>> > all boddi women, and men, are enormously proud of
>> > their levels of education.
>> > And to the best of my knowledge, from that part of
>> > the world, after the
>> > Khasi women, I believe it was the boddi Bengali
>> > women who took to education
>> > like fish to water. And even you will agree that to
>> > construct convoluted
>> > arguments some form of education is necessary. So
>> > please do correct your
>> > definition.  
>> > 
>> > The term Boddi basically delineates ­ draws the
>> > boundary of -  caste. And in
>> > Bengal - Bengal/ West Bengal/ East
>> > Pakistan/Bangladesh/ whatever, or if you
>> > want another take Bangla/ Goudiya/ Kalinga/
>> > whatever, for sake of simplicity
>> > lets go with a concept called Bengal that is not
>> > connected to geography or
>> > nation but is perhaps necessary to root the Bengali
>> > - who still insist that
>> > the world has two simple of camps of Bengalis and
>> > non-Bengalis. (I won¹t use
>> > Language as a definer for fear of digressing into
>> > another messy story.) So
>> > in this concept called Bengal emerges a caste called
>> > Boddi. Stuck between
>> > the Brahmin and non-Brahmins they insist on being
>> > more on the side of
>> > Brahmins than non-Brahmins. The men wear the thread,
>> > the death-retreat is
>> > for 11 days as versus 13 of the non-Brahmin
>> > Bengalis. But you know because
>> > caste is far more vigilant than human wishes you
>> > can¹t be more or less, you
>> > can only be this or that, or here or there. So the
>> > Boddis, grudgingly
>> > allowed many Brahmin privileges including education
>> > are denied the
>> > penultimate one: access to God. They can¹t carry out
>> > the ritual of religion.
>> > That is kept for the Brahmins only.
>> > 
>> > But despite their attempts at creating an exclusive
>> > space the Bengali
>> > Brahmins are considered a bit outside it all by
>> > other Brahmins. As are the
>> > Kashmiri Brahmins. Both eat meat you see. I mean the
>> > Brahmins from the
>> > concept called Bengal and Kashmir eat meat. In the
>> > concept called Bengal,
>> > quite a few hundred years ago my sir-namesake, one
>> > Ballar, invited 7
>> > Bhramins from Ujjain to initiate the caste system
>> > and watched in mute agony
>> > his personal love life wash away in the deluge he
>> > unleashed. I am sure you
>> > know better than me the story of genesis of caste in
>> > Kashmir. You are after
>> > all the RIK. And you might know that in these
>> > conceptual states, having
>> > begun late, they took to caste with the zeal of the
>> > new converts and forgot
>> > to watch out for its evolution. Caste, though rigid,
>> > is not ossified and
>> > continued to evolve and Brahminism went on to marry
>> > the virtuous
>> > vegetarianism. The two Brahmins forgot to join the
>> > brigade and hence earned
>> > contempt from the brethren. But perhaps both these
>> > communities, with
>> > different histories, are similar in their love for
>> > food, and maybe they
>> > didn¹t really want join the brigade fully because
>> > that would have been very,
>> > very inconvenient. Where will be the great cuisines
>> > of Bengal (or Kashmir)
>> > be without the flesh of dead animals? Although I
>> > must admit the Bengalis
>> > tried quite hard. They have almost managed to
>> > convince themselves and quite
>> > a fw others that fish is basically a vegetable from
>> > the sea.
>> > 
>> > The logic of Caste is compelling and seductive. It
>> > delineates humans into
>> > fixed boundaries of hierarchy determined at birth.
>> > At its root it provides
>> > two very interesting principles: the first the
>> > doctrine of inequality (some
>> > are born higher and thus must fare better than those
>> > born lower), the second
>> > of divinity ­ God decreed that some are born higher
>> > and some lower, so
>> > accept without question, it¹s authorised by God you
>> > see.
>> > 
>> > Interestingly, because god is not restricted to  the
>> > private domain of the
>> > practicing Hindus many other religions/ systems too
>> > accept god, and as a
>> > corollary, caste. Its simply one of the most
>> > brilliant ruling-class
>> > strategies. How very wonderful if the subjects
>> > believed that they deserved
>> > to be ruled, and how even more wonderful if they
>> > believed that they deserved
>> > to be ruled by the present ruler. So Islam, the most
>> > liberal and emancipated
>> > organised religion at its time of emergence, an
>> > organised religion that
>> > recognised even say the rights of women to property
>> > and partner, comes to
>> > India through many routes but conveniently adopts a
>> > version of caste system
>> > when its readying to rule. See how could a Thakur
>> > converting to Islam for
>> > convenience call a dhobi convert his brother? The
>> > roots of the  Dalit
>> > Christian is newer still. Even the newest organised
>> > religion Sikhism ,
>> > drawing heavily from philosophies of Islam, couldn¹t
>> > resist playing footsie
>> > with caste. 
>> > 
>> > So M. Ray, call me a Hindu if you must but don¹t
>> > forget the boddi bit, its
>> > important for this narrative.
>> > 
>> > Hitler, drawing up the blue print of a ruling
>> > philosophy draws upon a
>> > treatise of Nietzsche who draws this one from the
>> > Manusmriti written by one
>> > Manu, the man who writes down the rigid structures
>> > of caste. You see in the
>> > 1920s Hitler and his party the Nationalsozilistiche
>> > Deutsche Arbeiterpartei
>> > (NSDAP) or the Nazi party, outside of a small groups
>> > of fanatical Bavarian
>> > Nazis, are considered to be vulgar rabble-rousers.
>> > When he becomes the
>> > chancellor in 1933 the percentage of vote is a mere
>> > 33% and people predict a
>> > demise of the Nazis. But soon all that changes and
>> > the Nazis win the support
>> > of the majority of the majority ­ they are able to
>> > convince the majority
>> > about the superiority of some over other, a doctrine
>> > drawn from India,
>> > defining the Aryan presented as Fascism. Films
>> > played an important role in
>> > this shift. Film after film extolled a few
>> > principles and themes. The two
>> > common and recurring themes in the Nazi films are
>> > blut und bloden (blood and
>> > soil) and Volk und Heimat (People and homeland).
>> > The films though might not
>> > have been so effective without ensuring that these
>> > were the only films seen.
>> > All other voices needed to be blocked without
>> > blocking out all other voices
>> > propaganda looses its power.
>> > 
>> > Can you begin to see the torturous route of history?
>> > Don¹t the Nazi themes
>> > still ring true? Blood and soil, people and
>> > homeland? The blocked voices?
>> > Can you hear them?
>> > 
>> > Another day if you remind me I¹ll tell you the story
>> > of Leni Reifenstahl and
>> > the persistence of memory. No not the painting, but
>> > images that she created
>> > that live on till date, images that dazzle,
>> > captivate 
> === message truncated ===
> 
> 
> 
>        
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