[Reader-list] Husain Exhibition Attacked in Delhi

Rahul Asthana rahul_capri at yahoo.com
Wed Aug 27 05:54:11 IST 2008 

Sonia,

A question to you.Don't you think someone else deciding on what people should get hurt from;and what they shouldn't is a tad condescending?When you see a person lying down on the road after an accident,do you tell him that hey listen, you shouldn't really feel hurt or do you try to resolve his\her situation?
Its another thing to tell someone that they can stfu and you don't care about how they feel.Thats insensitive at the worst.But I don't see what moral ground a person has,to tell anyone else what they should feel hurt from.
For the same reason I don't get this debate on nudity.How does it matter whether your mother or mine is okay with that.According to a widely accepted social norm one can safely say that many people would not be okay with a goddess painted nude and Hanuman's tail going through her legs.So why not stop reducing this to freedom of expression and say that it is in bad taste,because it offends the sensibilities of a group of people?
By the way ,I had made a similar point on the Prophets cartoons as well.The  issue was highly distorted by the Western media.It painted Muslims as some kind of crazy cave dwellers who would kill if someone paints there prophet. There would sure be some people like that,but the media made us fall prey to the binary.If you have to criticize the violence by the fundoos you end up supporting the media's rally for the freedom of expression.Its another matter that there are paintings of prophet in some Islamic traditions,and Muslim anger was not against the painting of the prophet per se but painting him in a bad light;and it was not a single incident but it took place repeatedly,in an obvious in the face attempt to spite them.It stopped being a matter of freedom of expression.
One more point,Hussain being a Muslim and painting a Hindu Goddess like that is important.Its perfectly human to have a group identity and recognize other group identities as "the other".It does not matter what my world view is,there shouldn't even be an argument on that.Just recognize human tendencies and respect them,on the basis of what a large group of people may feel.
I feel that the more liberal a person becomes the more intolerant that person becomes of others points of view.I am sure a devout Muslim would find that painting offensive.If the media can be a little bit less obsessed with their own world views and try to respect points of view of other people and groups,for eg if a significant section of media had come up and said that those paintings were offensive,perhaps such issues would not flare up.

regards
Rahul


--- On Mon, 8/25/08, S. Jabbar <sonia.jabbar at gmail.com> wrote:

> From: S. Jabbar <sonia.jabbar at gmail.com>
> Subject: Re: [Reader-list] Husain Exhibition Attacked in Delhi
> To: "Prabhakar Singh" <prabhakardelhi at yahoo.com>, "Shuddhabrata Sengupta" <shuddha at sarai.net>, "Sarai" <reader-list at sarai.net>
> Date: Monday, August 25, 2008, 8:25 PM
> People have become rather emotional and touchy of late. 
> Everyone seems to
> have become hypersensitive and quick to take offense-- of
> course it helps if
> there are TV cameras to record one's display of piety.
> 
> Is one's faith so fragile that a drawing or a piece of
> poetry or writing and
> can shake it?  Evidently so and mores the pity.  Why tear
> down works of art
> when it is faith that is crumbling?  My prescription is
> twenty years of
> solitary meditation in a cave in the Himalayas.
> 
> Do you know the story of Swami Vivekanand who stood in
> front of the goddess
> at Khir Bhavani? Look it up.  It's instructive.  And
> humbling.
> 
> 
> On 8/25/08 7:52 PM, "Prabhakar Singh"
> <prabhakardelhi at yahoo.com> wrote:
> 
> > Artists should be careful about the cultural or
> religious sensitivities of the
> > people.Art can flourish even without delving on such
> sensitive and touchy
> > issues which may have emotional importance for some
> > people.
> Prabhakar
> 
> 
> 
> 
> ----- Original Message ----
> From: Shuddhabrata Sengupta
> > <shuddha at sarai.net>
> To: sarai list <reader-list at sarai.net>
> Sent: Monday, 25
> > August, 2008 6:30:19 PM
> Subject: [Reader-list] Husain Exhibition Attacked in
> > Delhi
> 
> Dear all,
> 
> Once again, with depressing, monotonous and disgusting 
> >
> predictability, a group of hooligans affiliated to the
> Hindutva 
> (Hindu
> > Fundamentalist) agenda who call themselves the
> 'Shri Ram Sena' 
> have attacked
> > and ransacked a small exhibition in Delhi of images
> by 
> and about the
> > nonegarian painter M. F. Husain, The exhibition was 
> held on the premises of
> > the office of the Safdar Hashmi Memorial 
> Trust (SAHMAT) in Delhi, to protest
> > against the decision by the 
> orgnaizers of an Art Summit in Delhi to exclude
> > work by Husain citing 
> reasons of security. This incident demonstrates, yet
> > again, how 
> inimical the forces of Hindutva are to an open society and
> to
> > the 
> freedom of expression.
> 
> See - 
> > http://www.expressindia.com/latest-news/Husain-photo-
> >
> exhibition-vandalised-yet-again/352835/ for a report in the
> Indian 
> Express
> > that carries details of the incident.
> 
> This list has discussed such attacks on
> > freedom of expression before, 
> and just as we have had forthright criticism
> > of Muslim 
> fundamentalists attacking Taslima Nasrin, and the CPI (M)
> led
> > West 
> Bengal government making it impossible for her to stay in
> Kolkata, so 
> >
> too, we must take into account this latest assault on
> cultural 
> liberty.  I
> > appeal to all to condemn this attack on the freedom
> of 
> >
> expression.
> 
> regards
> 
> Shuddha
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> _________________________________________
> 
> > reader-list: an open discussion list on media and the
> city.
> Critiques &
> > Collaborations
> To subscribe: send an email to
> reader-list-request at sarai.net
> > with subscribe in the subject header.
> To unsubscribe:
> > https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/reader-list
> List archive:
> >
> &lt;https://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/>
> 
> 
>       Be the first one to
> > try the new Messenger 9 Beta! Go to
> > http://in.messenger.yahoo.com/win/
> _________________________________________
> r
> > eader-list: an open discussion list on media and the
> city.
> Critiques &
> > Collaborations
> To subscribe: send an email to
> reader-list-request at sarai.net
> > with subscribe in the subject header.
> To unsubscribe:
> > https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/reader-list
> List archive:
> >
> &lt;https://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/>
> 
> 
> _________________________________________
> reader-list: an open discussion list on media and the city.
> Critiques & Collaborations
> To subscribe: send an email to
> reader-list-request at sarai.net with subscribe in the subject
> header.
> To unsubscribe:
> https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/reader-list 
> List archive:
> &lt;https://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/>

More information about the reader-list mailing list