Archive for the ‘The Hindus’ Category
- In: Controversy | Penguin | The Hindus | Wendy Doniger
- Leave a Comment
My take on this is as follows:
When a peer (in terms) swears “M***** F*****” at one, one can react in the following manners:
1. Punch back the person
2. Shout back on similar terms
3. Ask the person to shutup
4. Just ignore and proceed
How one reacts depends on one’s disposition. If one takes a survey a vast majority will fall in the first three categories. It is human tendency to react in such a manner as the person being referred to somebody close to one, an ideal, is respected and somebody whom one loves deeply.
It is the same with respect to the Gods of the different religion. For the religious their Gods are ideals, they are somebody who are respected, are loved and are considered to be ideal. Now when somebody comes and tries to malign them the reaction can be either one of the above. Only the callous or the ones who have reached a state of equanimity can remain without reacting.
There was nothing wrong in the appeal of the Hindus who asked for the banning of the book by Wendy Doniger. It would fall in the category 3 mentioned above. If at all it is a mild rebuke to the author. It definitely does not violate “freedom of speech” of any one person.
Sundarrajk's Weblog 