This post is mostly complaints. All that's relevant are the links and the stuff in quoteblocks, and possibly any emphasised text.
Somethings I had observed before and during holidays.
1. swarajyamag.com/culture/interview-vamsee-juluri/
This article was recommended at the R2004 blog as a vision for the future of Hindu religion.
Uh, all it contained was flowery words. Oh and a blatant plagiarism of the Japanese views on evolution - also once mentioned at the Rajeev2004 blog - as being more harmonious and cooperative than purely cut-throat competitive as projected in western storytelling/dramatisation on evolution (though the R2004 blog wrongly attributed the JP view to the Buddhism of the Japanese, instead of their Shintoism. But it is specifically a Shinto view). Saw Elst (positively) describe this feature in one of his articles as a novelty.
indiafacts.co.in/views-hindu-contemporary-activism/
Apparently Elst doesn't know this is a longstanding JP view on evolution either (and JP criticism of western narrative presentations on evolution), that Juluri was not original, that it is not exclusive to Hindu religion and that in Shinto the harmonious interactions between species and cooperative progressions on the path of life (and hence evolution) are often better described/documented including in famous oral traditions than in Hindu religion.
But it's worrying that the article came recommended as a sign of optimism. It was to advertise for a work called "re-arming HInduism" or the like. Except the interview read like yet another modern person writing about heathenism and grasping for heathenism, rather than when you read works by traditionalist heathens who demonstrate expertise in sharing their knowledge and insights about heathenism.
But I guess for modern wannabe-heathens - Hindu nationalists - who are likewise grasping for what is increasingly apparent is their lost once-heathen identity (they want to be heathens, but they're not), these sorts of articles and books are an inspiration, whereas they will feel quite out of place reading actually heathen works by traditionalists. This reasoning would explain the phenomenon of an increasing number of Indian wannabe-heathen nationalists (posing as heathens) reading books and articles on Hindu religion by aliens and recommending these to Indian Hindu audiences of like bent.
It's a worrying trend. More disturbing/disappointing is how it all reveals the extent to which the English-speaking nationalist masses have been de-heathenised. No wonder that modern nationalism has been utterly impotent in being remotely restorative for Hindudom and is disinterested in doing so besides: it is championed by people who aren't actually heathens, though they use the word Hindu to identify themselves (which has come to mean anything and everybody).
Karyakarta once argued - not long ago - that the Sri Rama temple at Ayodhya should be rebuilt for symbolic value. <- That is all that is left of English-speaking nationalists on fire for "Hindutva" which is the de-heathenised remnant of the ancestral religion. Itself a shadow or symbolic placeholder for Hindu religion.
Then again, the progression has been Hindoo heathenism transmuted into Hindu Nationalism transmuted into "Hindu" nationalism/Hindutva (lowercase n) which last isn't even heathen but merely retains the trappings of a heathen nomenclature.
That is, nationalism/Hindutva is a replacement religion, for the Hindu Nationalism (capital N) equated with the Sanatana Dharma by Aurobindo, which itself had slightly lost its heathen focus compared to the sort of uncompromising Hindoo-ness that fired the likes of Shivaji.
It is an inevitability. If you look closely, except for maybe a couple of internet "Hindu" nationalist vocalists in every 500, the rest are actually not heathens.
So yes, trite articles (about what promises to be an equally trite book*) such as on "Rearming Hinduism" are considered some milestone achievement by generations of lost nationalists who playact heathenism, who claim heathenism, but aren't really heathens.
Such articles are just for English-speaking wannabes. Actual heathens of Hindoo origins would be reading *heathen* works. There are so many in local languages. But even the contents are utterly unknown to the vociferous internet activists, the English-speaking generation.
After skimming through Vamsee Juluri's article which said nothing true that was original (or even his own voice)*, nothing actually inspiring, nor were the soundbytes from his lauded book anywhere as novel or as magnificent as the interviewer praised them as (to be honest, I cringed at what passes for good phrasing). I was more moved by statements of Emperor Julian in translation - but his forceful unapologetic heathenism is undeniable, energetic, inspiring. It becomes imprinted.
* Another thing I noticed was Vamsee's use of affection. I have NEVER encountered an English-speaking modern Hindu - like Vamsee or the countless nationalists commenting passionately on the web - use the word "affection" for what the Hindoo feels for its Hindu Gods. NEVER.
Of course, It is an utterly accurate word for what *heathens* feel for their Gods, and it is certainly the word that the translation of Julian showed him using for his Gods (whence I stole it from for Hindoos and Taoists). But it sounded a false note in Vamsee's adoption. Like he thought it a pretty word to add to the rest of his flowery writing. In any case, it is clearly not the same meaning in which Julian used it (and felt it) nor in the sense I have used it for heathens.
But the most galling part of all in Vamsee's interview is the one that shows him to be a new-agey entity and not a heathen at all. (Compare with Julian as an exemplar.) The part where Vamsee Juluri denounces actual heathens fighting for their own survival as heathens=the survival of heathendom, while promoting his purely-theoretical, modern - I will dub it "anglicised" (I could just call it new agey) - take on Hinduism.
I was so glad to see someone else ticked off by the same usual snubbing - carried out by all the elitist new-agey "Hindus" and nationalists - of the Hindoos who are facing the brunt of the christoislamic assault:
India's wannabe heathens need to acquire better taste than promoting wishy-washy stuff like Vamsee Juluri's interview (and his book promises to be equally foggy and pointless for actual heathens). And as for their recommending it as promoting an optimistic view for Hindu-dom's future - which led me to read the interview at swarajyamag.com/culture/interview-vamsee-juluri/ - I came away far more pessimistic than before: if this is what passes for an inspiring voice for heathenism, then it is more than clear that the actual last English-language voices championing Hindu heathenism died with Swarup and Goel (and even they were skirting the boundaries in not having addressed the Hindoos and warning these off from the English-speaking Gangrene/subverted, but addressed the lost cause of the latter instead. And moreover, they left nothing but the twin subversionists Rajarant and Elst as their self-proclaimed alleged 'successors').
Ignoring the fraudulent successors however, I could forgive Goel and Swarup for not sounding heathen enough since their targets were not heathens. They sounded as secular as they needed to attempt to win over the minds of the English-speaking alienated. They massively failed, and modern generations of nationalists inspired by their writings are more de-heathenised than in their era. They picked the wrong target audience.
Current nationalist vocalists pick the right target audience (aiming to reach actual Hindus) but read the wrong lesson: subverting them with nonsense and new-ageism that gets passed off as "Hindu religion".
Anyway, if Juluri is the best that 21st century Hindus writing in English can produce and is considered a success by English-speaking Hindus, I think it's honestly time to write Hindu-dom's epitaph. Can stop pretending anything of heathenism is left in such people. All they can muster is excuses. Like - sadly - Karyakarta's reason for why Ayodhya's Sri Rama temple must be rebuilt.
What a colossal failure modern Hindus have wrought. Themselves the foremost failure.
2. On the same topic (while I'm complaining anyway), at this next page, there is one "Daibon Ten" [Indian with JP Buddhist title?] commenting everywhere, on fire to keep christoislamania at bay and to expose it.
But he also writes this, rendering his efforts/countless posts ultimately pointless if what he wanted to defend was native religions:
swarajyamag.com/featured/heres-why-umashankar-ias-must-be-stopped/
Post-Hindu.
Note how only modern "Hindus" - including those of Hindutva/nationalists on fire for nationalism - cave. Never christoislamics.
Also, no ancient Hindoo would have ever caved in such a manner.
Modern Hindus get subverted so easily. And they never even recognise that they did. Yet they still keep terms like "Hindu" for themselves and insist on being recognised as such.
Which is why the word Hindoo has been coined for the heathens: for the unsubvertibles. To distinguish them from the likes of the above. Who also uttered this inanity amidst his "defence" against christoislam, rendered useless to him since he's already been sucessfully de-heathenised (which is all that christianism wanted). You know it's a victory for christianism when christianism gets should-be heathens to repudiate their heathen Gods.
And this next - total alienation from proper heathen perception, replaced by novel, modern, utterly nonsensical views - is a victory for christianism too:
Only the first part is true: Hindus may or may not have no issues with homosexuality (depends on the individual). In India, they usually they have no opinion either way, since it does not directly impact their lives. Some NRI Hindus tend to be more pro-active and vote for equal rights for people of other sexual orientation. (But as far as I am aware, Hindu religion does not seem to speak of homosexuality at all.)
But the final statement - "there are transsexual and Bisexual Gods and iconography in Hinduism" (by which I suspect daibon is referring to Harihara and Ardhanareeshwara again) - is more of the recently-invented nonsense that only the ignorant de-heathenised "Hindus" and of course alien dabbling "converts" conclude.
Alien dabblers can be ignored: they're not Hindus, their total ignorance is par for the course. In the case of Indians of supposed Hindu ancestry, the nonsensical conclusion is serious: it shows an utter ignorance of Hindu religion, an utter lack of heathen/proper understanding/perception and reveals daibon Ten to be de-heathenised and alienated.
Only aliens draw these conclusionns. And Daibon Ten is clearly an alien. Any ethnic ancestry is irrelevant to alien status. There are many aliens of Hindu ancestry in modern India, after all. Alien is merely an unheathen. In this case, a post-Hindu like Daibon Ten, who goes through the motions of defending against christoislam, even after he has himself lost what it is he is defending.
Perchance Daibon Ten is but an ethnically-Indian Buddhist and not a Hindu. (For his own sake, here's hoping it's true.) Though unlikely, it could explain his position on Rama and his complete ignorance on the other Hindu Gods he alluded to.
Somethings I had observed before and during holidays.
1. swarajyamag.com/culture/interview-vamsee-juluri/
This article was recommended at the R2004 blog as a vision for the future of Hindu religion.
Uh, all it contained was flowery words. Oh and a blatant plagiarism of the Japanese views on evolution - also once mentioned at the Rajeev2004 blog - as being more harmonious and cooperative than purely cut-throat competitive as projected in western storytelling/dramatisation on evolution (though the R2004 blog wrongly attributed the JP view to the Buddhism of the Japanese, instead of their Shintoism. But it is specifically a Shinto view). Saw Elst (positively) describe this feature in one of his articles as a novelty.
indiafacts.co.in/views-hindu-contemporary-activism/
Quote:On the other hand, Juluri explores new trails of anti-Western criticism, and these are rather sensible Thus, he finds that the Western mind easily projects violent scenarios and explanations on natural processes, e.g. in evolution theory. But Hindu experience is that life is only to a very limited extent a struggle, and mostly a matter of cooperation and harmony.
Apparently Elst doesn't know this is a longstanding JP view on evolution either (and JP criticism of western narrative presentations on evolution), that Juluri was not original, that it is not exclusive to Hindu religion and that in Shinto the harmonious interactions between species and cooperative progressions on the path of life (and hence evolution) are often better described/documented including in famous oral traditions than in Hindu religion.
But it's worrying that the article came recommended as a sign of optimism. It was to advertise for a work called "re-arming HInduism" or the like. Except the interview read like yet another modern person writing about heathenism and grasping for heathenism, rather than when you read works by traditionalist heathens who demonstrate expertise in sharing their knowledge and insights about heathenism.
But I guess for modern wannabe-heathens - Hindu nationalists - who are likewise grasping for what is increasingly apparent is their lost once-heathen identity (they want to be heathens, but they're not), these sorts of articles and books are an inspiration, whereas they will feel quite out of place reading actually heathen works by traditionalists. This reasoning would explain the phenomenon of an increasing number of Indian wannabe-heathen nationalists (posing as heathens) reading books and articles on Hindu religion by aliens and recommending these to Indian Hindu audiences of like bent.
It's a worrying trend. More disturbing/disappointing is how it all reveals the extent to which the English-speaking nationalist masses have been de-heathenised. No wonder that modern nationalism has been utterly impotent in being remotely restorative for Hindudom and is disinterested in doing so besides: it is championed by people who aren't actually heathens, though they use the word Hindu to identify themselves (which has come to mean anything and everybody).
Karyakarta once argued - not long ago - that the Sri Rama temple at Ayodhya should be rebuilt for symbolic value. <- That is all that is left of English-speaking nationalists on fire for "Hindutva" which is the de-heathenised remnant of the ancestral religion. Itself a shadow or symbolic placeholder for Hindu religion.
Then again, the progression has been Hindoo heathenism transmuted into Hindu Nationalism transmuted into "Hindu" nationalism/Hindutva (lowercase n) which last isn't even heathen but merely retains the trappings of a heathen nomenclature.
That is, nationalism/Hindutva is a replacement religion, for the Hindu Nationalism (capital N) equated with the Sanatana Dharma by Aurobindo, which itself had slightly lost its heathen focus compared to the sort of uncompromising Hindoo-ness that fired the likes of Shivaji.
It is an inevitability. If you look closely, except for maybe a couple of internet "Hindu" nationalist vocalists in every 500, the rest are actually not heathens.
So yes, trite articles (about what promises to be an equally trite book*) such as on "Rearming Hinduism" are considered some milestone achievement by generations of lost nationalists who playact heathenism, who claim heathenism, but aren't really heathens.
Such articles are just for English-speaking wannabes. Actual heathens of Hindoo origins would be reading *heathen* works. There are so many in local languages. But even the contents are utterly unknown to the vociferous internet activists, the English-speaking generation.
After skimming through Vamsee Juluri's article which said nothing true that was original (or even his own voice)*, nothing actually inspiring, nor were the soundbytes from his lauded book anywhere as novel or as magnificent as the interviewer praised them as (to be honest, I cringed at what passes for good phrasing). I was more moved by statements of Emperor Julian in translation - but his forceful unapologetic heathenism is undeniable, energetic, inspiring. It becomes imprinted.
* Another thing I noticed was Vamsee's use of affection. I have NEVER encountered an English-speaking modern Hindu - like Vamsee or the countless nationalists commenting passionately on the web - use the word "affection" for what the Hindoo feels for its Hindu Gods. NEVER.
Of course, It is an utterly accurate word for what *heathens* feel for their Gods, and it is certainly the word that the translation of Julian showed him using for his Gods (whence I stole it from for Hindoos and Taoists). But it sounded a false note in Vamsee's adoption. Like he thought it a pretty word to add to the rest of his flowery writing. In any case, it is clearly not the same meaning in which Julian used it (and felt it) nor in the sense I have used it for heathens.
But the most galling part of all in Vamsee's interview is the one that shows him to be a new-agey entity and not a heathen at all. (Compare with Julian as an exemplar.) The part where Vamsee Juluri denounces actual heathens fighting for their own survival as heathens=the survival of heathendom, while promoting his purely-theoretical, modern - I will dub it "anglicised" (I could just call it new agey) - take on Hinduism.
I was so glad to see someone else ticked off by the same usual snubbing - carried out by all the elitist new-agey "Hindus" and nationalists - of the Hindoos who are facing the brunt of the christoislamic assault:
Quote:Jishnu ââ¬Â¢ 9 days ago
When Vamsee is happy talking of "what is said about Hinduism" and not "what is being done to Hindu society" he better limits his talk to it instead of pronouncing judgments about things he does not know. To call one self moderate one needs an extreme, so "Hindutva" becomes that extreme. Vamsee probably does not know the difference between writing articles and defending his people when their lives are endangered, as it happened for centuries in this land and is continuing to happen in Bengal, Kerala, Kashmir. If he thinks defense on ground is extreme, he is no different from the left-lib anti-Hindu folk he claims are denigrating Hinduism.
(Emperor Julian was a great defender of his heathens. Not just of his heathendom: he would not let heathens defending Hellenismos from christomania be thrown under the bus, but bore it foremost in his mind to protect them, because they demonstrated in action their love for what he loved as well as they did: the Great Gods of Hellenismos=Hellenismos. But then, Julian was a true heathen. Not a poseur nor de-heathenised, unlike so many "Hindu" "thinkers"/"nationalist" vocalists.)
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Jitu Jishnu ââ¬Â¢ 9 days ago
I feel he just comes across as confused. I know that feeling... When you know injustice is being meted out to your kin, you feel you should speak out, but don't want to come across as extreme. That's a fear many moderates face. But what was striking was, he was all over the place. From Sai baba to Doniger, from academics to rituals. Yet, besides his views on Sai Baba, he said nothing concrete. He didn't take a stand on any issue. Just rambled on from here to there. The questions asked seemed more well framed than his answers did imo.
(Second that. And the only useful and clear things Vamsee Juluri said had already been stated by a great many everyday Hindus. Plus the JP take on evolution was not an original description by Juluri, and not unique to Hindu religion.)
He came across as a an ultracrepidarian. Well, to be fair, I often come across as one too. But I'm not writing a book. He did. I wonder now how the book is.
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Jishnu Jitu ââ¬Â¢ 9 days ago
But thats the beauty of left-lib intellectual rowdyism. If you take any stand on anything you are a hardliner, fundamentalist. If you do not, you are harmless for them regardless of what views you hold. Many play into it without even seeing that they are.
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Arohtak Jishnu ââ¬Â¢ 9 days ago
Pure supremacist Rowdyism. I agree. Well said.
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Jitu Jishnu ââ¬Â¢ 9 days ago
:-) Agree!
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India's wannabe heathens need to acquire better taste than promoting wishy-washy stuff like Vamsee Juluri's interview (and his book promises to be equally foggy and pointless for actual heathens). And as for their recommending it as promoting an optimistic view for Hindu-dom's future - which led me to read the interview at swarajyamag.com/culture/interview-vamsee-juluri/ - I came away far more pessimistic than before: if this is what passes for an inspiring voice for heathenism, then it is more than clear that the actual last English-language voices championing Hindu heathenism died with Swarup and Goel (and even they were skirting the boundaries in not having addressed the Hindoos and warning these off from the English-speaking Gangrene/subverted, but addressed the lost cause of the latter instead. And moreover, they left nothing but the twin subversionists Rajarant and Elst as their self-proclaimed alleged 'successors').
Ignoring the fraudulent successors however, I could forgive Goel and Swarup for not sounding heathen enough since their targets were not heathens. They sounded as secular as they needed to attempt to win over the minds of the English-speaking alienated. They massively failed, and modern generations of nationalists inspired by their writings are more de-heathenised than in their era. They picked the wrong target audience.
Current nationalist vocalists pick the right target audience (aiming to reach actual Hindus) but read the wrong lesson: subverting them with nonsense and new-ageism that gets passed off as "Hindu religion".
Anyway, if Juluri is the best that 21st century Hindus writing in English can produce and is considered a success by English-speaking Hindus, I think it's honestly time to write Hindu-dom's epitaph. Can stop pretending anything of heathenism is left in such people. All they can muster is excuses. Like - sadly - Karyakarta's reason for why Ayodhya's Sri Rama temple must be rebuilt.
What a colossal failure modern Hindus have wrought. Themselves the foremost failure.
2. On the same topic (while I'm complaining anyway), at this next page, there is one "Daibon Ten" [Indian with JP Buddhist title?] commenting everywhere, on fire to keep christoislamania at bay and to expose it.
But he also writes this, rendering his efforts/countless posts ultimately pointless if what he wanted to defend was native religions:
swarajyamag.com/featured/heres-why-umashankar-ias-must-be-stopped/
Quote:daibon Ten shf ââ¬Â¢ a month ago
Gandhi is real. JEsus is fiction.. a Mythology not unlike Mohammad and Gabriel or even Rama.
Post-Hindu.
Note how only modern "Hindus" - including those of Hindutva/nationalists on fire for nationalism - cave. Never christoislamics.
Also, no ancient Hindoo would have ever caved in such a manner.
Modern Hindus get subverted so easily. And they never even recognise that they did. Yet they still keep terms like "Hindu" for themselves and insist on being recognised as such.
Which is why the word Hindoo has been coined for the heathens: for the unsubvertibles. To distinguish them from the likes of the above. Who also uttered this inanity amidst his "defence" against christoislam, rendered useless to him since he's already been sucessfully de-heathenised (which is all that christianism wanted). You know it's a victory for christianism when christianism gets should-be heathens to repudiate their heathen Gods.
And this next - total alienation from proper heathen perception, replaced by novel, modern, utterly nonsensical views - is a victory for christianism too:
Quote:daibon Ten Aravind Ganesh V ââ¬Â¢ a month ago
This whole anti Gay thing is an Abrhamic religious thing. Hindus and Hinduism really has no issues with gays... There are transsexual and Bisexual Gods and iconography in Hinduism which was why it was denigrated by evangelicals as an evil religion.
Only the first part is true: Hindus may or may not have no issues with homosexuality (depends on the individual). In India, they usually they have no opinion either way, since it does not directly impact their lives. Some NRI Hindus tend to be more pro-active and vote for equal rights for people of other sexual orientation. (But as far as I am aware, Hindu religion does not seem to speak of homosexuality at all.)
But the final statement - "there are transsexual and Bisexual Gods and iconography in Hinduism" (by which I suspect daibon is referring to Harihara and Ardhanareeshwara again) - is more of the recently-invented nonsense that only the ignorant de-heathenised "Hindus" and of course alien dabbling "converts" conclude.
Alien dabblers can be ignored: they're not Hindus, their total ignorance is par for the course. In the case of Indians of supposed Hindu ancestry, the nonsensical conclusion is serious: it shows an utter ignorance of Hindu religion, an utter lack of heathen/proper understanding/perception and reveals daibon Ten to be de-heathenised and alienated.
Only aliens draw these conclusionns. And Daibon Ten is clearly an alien. Any ethnic ancestry is irrelevant to alien status. There are many aliens of Hindu ancestry in modern India, after all. Alien is merely an unheathen. In this case, a post-Hindu like Daibon Ten, who goes through the motions of defending against christoislam, even after he has himself lost what it is he is defending.
Perchance Daibon Ten is but an ethnically-Indian Buddhist and not a Hindu. (For his own sake, here's hoping it's true.) Though unlikely, it could explain his position on Rama and his complete ignorance on the other Hindu Gods he alluded to.