Daily Archives: August 4, 2022

Essay: Hindu nationalisms censorship of the gods – Hindustan Times

Posted: August 4, 2022 at 3:00 pm

How should God be represented? How about the word of God? Without these two fundamental questions, neither religion nor literature would have come into being.

The study of literature and language is the secular version of the classic human search for the meaning of the word of God. God is The Great Absent -- some faithful scribe took down Their words atop the Hill, but what do those words really mean? The attempt to read the scriptures gave birth to the field of hermeneutics -- be it the Talmud, Bible, Koran, or the Vedas -- a field that later lent its essential mechanism to secular literary or linguistic study. Dont trust the surface; true meaning is always hidden. Along the centuries, God came to be replaced by the literary Symbol, and trying to make sense of them gave birth to entirely new disciplines. God or author, dead or immortal, earthly or divine?

So much for (wo)mans search for meaning, but do different religions inspire different kinds of narrative representation? In a famous book of literary criticism called Mimesis, Eric Auerbach tells us the difference between what he considers the two fundamental modes of Western narrative realism -- one coming from the Greek epic poet Homer, and the other from the Bible: the former is externalized, sensory, digressive, while the latter is more abstract and obscure, directed towards a single goal. While Homeric epics take erotic delight in the senses and lie and equivocate as they feel, biblical stories claim an absolute, singular Truth. The Bibles claim to truth is not only far more urgent than Homers, Auerbach writes, it is tyrannical -- it excludes all other claims.

The Hindu epics -- and its roster of gods -- resemble the Hellenic pantheon and Homeric narration far more than they resemble the Biblical insistence on Absolute Truth. Both humanise gods as playful, alternatively noble and petty, jealous and generous. Amit Chaudhuri has reminded us of the way the recently deceased Peter Brook, in his dramatised version of The Mahabharata, showed a serious, metaphysical Krishna as a giver of The Bhagavad Gita, consigning the cunning, diplomatic, playful, erotic Krishna to the status of folk aberrations. The moral ambivalence of the latter would have bewildered an Anglo-Protestant audience.

If Catholicism retains sensory, Protestantism is intellectual and abstract. The Abrahamic religion that has the most rigorous dicta about representation is Islam.

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Hindus become Islamic in their behaviour when they resent playful representation of their deities. Just the way todays Hindu nationalists become stern Victorian Christians when they try to limit the endless range of human sexuality to the heteronormative. The limits of sensory representation of The Divine is an Abrahamic, particularly Islamic dictum, not one that is Hindu in any way. Any attempts to standardise Hinduism runs counter to its plural, amorphous, and expansive spirit. In the land where versions of Ramayana run from the cheering for a Lanka-burning Hanuman to mourning for the slayed Ravana, nothing is more un-Hindu or un-Indian than the attempt to suppress a hundred -- or 300 -- Ramayanas.

But given the Abrahamic insistence on epistemological rigour and the Islamic strictures about representation, Muslims are within their right to resent divergent representations. Bringing these Abrahamic strictures to the representation of Hindu gods is to fundamentally misrepresent Hinduism itself.

Would Kali come to exist but for this mythical and regional plurality? It is not enough to be a Hindu to get her. One has to be a Bengali -- and who better than an outspoken female political leader? Does Kali eat meat, consume alcohol? Growing up Hindu Bengali in Calcutta, Ive never seen her otherwise. Shes married to a guy who meditates with marijuana in crematoriums. She drinks blood, for Shivas sake.

Probably the greatest Kali devotee in the modern Bengali memory is Shree Ramkrishna Paramhansa, the guru of Swami Vivekananda. Anyone who knows anything about Ramkrishnas ways of Kali worship know the richly ambivalent, even polyamorous relationship he practised with the goddess -- imagining her as mother, lover, daughter. Their play of love, hurt, devotion and anger was as deeply sensory as it was spiritual. In the intricate nature of his living relationship with Kali, he is one of Bengals great Bhakti poets -- as evinced by the earthy poetry of his gospel -- the Kathamrita. Ramkrishna ate fish, fowl, and mammal with great relish, and so do the monks of the order established by his followers, the Ramkrishna Mission. I spent six years in an elite boarding school run by the order in Narendrapur outside Calcutta, and every week, we eagerly looked forward to the chicken curry served to us, the teachers, and the monks for dinner on Fridays.

The great tradition of Bengali theatre in 19th century Calcutta would have been nothing without one of Ramkrishnas greatest devotees, Girish Ghosh, also a great alcoholic. Ramkrishna never asked Ghosh to give up drinking (though Ghoshs doctors certainly did). The mystic somehow came to acknowledge an inevitable relationship between Ghoshs literary creativity and his dependence on alcohol. Ramkrishnas moral attitude to alcoholism, a socially and politically sensitive subject for the bhadralok Bengali, however, was drawn from the culture of Kali-worship, where alcohol and other substances often played defining roles. Take Kalis name before you drink, Ramkrishna told Ghosh, the alcohol will become karon-bari, naming the divine, tantric elixir. A simple and chaste man with childlike excitement about the simplest pleasures of life, Ramkrishna did not smoke or drink himself. But it is well-known that his famous disciple, Vivekananda, loved his hookah. It is the unconscious reluctance to share his hookah with a person of unknown caste that got his great social conscience going, eventually making him one of modern Indias greatest champions of caste equality, a fact conveniently forgotten by many who seek to reclaim a model of militant Hindu masculinity through the Bengali monk.

All of these eddies create the spiritual culture through which a regional Hindu goddess such as Kali must be understood. Shakti, indeed, takes on myriad and bewildering forms.

People protesting the eclectic representation of Hindu deities are bringing the rigour of Islam into the playfulness of Hinduism. But they dont know that, do they?

Saikat Majumdars books include The Scent of God, The Firebird, and The Middle Finger. @_saikatmajumdar. The views expressed in the article are personal.

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Essay: Hindu nationalisms censorship of the gods - Hindustan Times

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To Protect Free Speech, Social Media Platforms Must Stop their Overreach – The Ripon Society

Posted: at 3:00 pm

by DAVID KEATING

Assaults on the culture of free speech grow by the day. Unfortunately, much of the assault is coming from the major social media platforms.

The power of our democracy and the genius of our First Amendment is our recognition that no single authority can dictate what is true. We work out our disagreements through speech, publishing, and organizing into groups.

For centuries, reaching others with our views was difficult work, and in many respects it still is. But thanks to social media, most Americans can publish anything and theoretically reach millions of fellow citizens and even much of the world.

As noted by the U.S. Supreme Court, social media platforms for many are the principal sources for speaking and listening in the modern public square, where Americans share vital information and express their opinions.

Social media allowed more Americans to engage in public speech than ever before, but like past revolutions in communications technology, it also triggered a backlash. Politicians, media outlets, or activists increasingly pressure companies to censor speech they deem false or misleading, or simply oppose. Lately, much of this speech concerns issues related to elections and the COVID-19 pandemic.

Certainly, you can find false claims about both topics online (and off) with ease. Yet the platforms judgments are far from infallible, and their heavy hand threatens to stifle important debates about unsettled issues. In fact, this has already happened.

Early in the pandemic, Facebook and YouTube censored claims that the SARS-CoV-2 virus originated from a lab leak in China, a theory that remains plausible to this day. And, of course, Twitter and Facebook restricted the New York Posts reporting about emails on Hunter Bidens laptop in the leadup to the 2020 election, claiming they were the product of foreign misinformation. After the election, the emails proved to be authentic.

Many Democrats have encouraged this trend towards censorship. Recall that then-White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki urged faster action against harmful posts and suspension of accounts across all platforms. The Biden Administration created the so-called Disinformation Governance Board before disbanding it in response to public outrage.

Many Republicans say they oppose censorship but want to repeal Section 230, which immunizes social media companies from liability for posts by users. That would likely result in even more censorship from platforms eager to avoid costly litigation. It would also make it effectively impossible for new social media companies to take down the incumbents.

What to do?

Lets stipulate that there are no easy answers. But many of the actions taken now pose real threats to free speech while doing little to stop misinformation and may enable more of it.

Some of the wealthiest corporations in the world operate social media sites, and their mission is to maximize profits. Getting on the wrong side of government officials is bad for business. This creates terrible incentives for the platforms to censor based on the views of the party in power.

Politicians who attempt to influence platforms speech policies are a menace to free speech. Platforms should focus on empowering their users, not their critics or the government, to control what content they see.

The government has a role to play in protecting free speech on the internet. We can create ethics laws and rules preventing government officials from using threats against platforms to get them to censor. And we should consider creating a legal defense against government enforcement actions against social media platforms if the government initiates action based on its interest in retaliating against a platforms refusal to censor or silence itself or its users.

Throughout history, free speech and open debate have been societys best tools for discovering the truth and managing our disagreements.

We also need more information on how the platforms use algorithms to promote and suppress content. Right now, all we get are random information dumps from whistleblowers. If no one knows how social medias black box algorithms are working and failing, how can we come up with sensible government policies?

Ultimately, the solution must come from the platforms themselves. They should return to the more speech-friendly mindset embraced before 2016. Taking on the role of a private sector Ministry of Truth has been a disaster for their reputations with no clear benefit to the public. And it is especially dangerous given the threats wielded by government officials against the platforms.

Throughout history, free speech and open debate have been societys best tools for discovering the truth and managing our disagreements. The technology that we use to express ourselves has changed many times, from the printing press to the telegraph to radio and television and now, to social media. The underlying principles of the First Amendment will always stand the test of time.

David Keating is the president of the Institute for Free Speech in Washington, DC.

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Jim Breuer Special Mocks Wokeness As The Laughingstock It Is – The Federalist

Posted: at 2:59 pm

For more than two years, people all over the world had their lives upended by Covid hysteria. Organizations were shut down, people wore face masks and maintained social distancing by remaining six feet apart from one another, and many received a Covid shot as soon as they became available. Thousands of people had to work remotely or were let go from their jobs, students were forced to stay home, and a few public health experts had supreme authority over the entire country.

Around the same time, woke culture a toxic brew of identity politics, political correctness, and neo-Marxism became very prominent, prompting people to prioritize race, gender, and sexual orientation above all else. All conflicts were boiled down to the intersections of various prejudices, and cancellation was the usual means of effecting social justice.

While most comedians succumbed to both Covid hysteria and woke culture, there are still a brave few who havent. One of those comedians is Jim Breuer, who does the great service of pointing and laughing at how ridiculous the world has become in the past few years. In his latest special, Somebody Had to Say It, he takes on the absurdities of Covid policies, transgenderism, woke college students, and the general uptight attitude people have taken about everything. He also discusses experiences he had growing up that manage to be moving yet hilarious.

Rather than making ironic observations, most of Breuers humor comes out in his voices, sound effects, and movement. Each character or behavior type is given some kind of gesticulatory motif: Government officials during Covid have German accents and march in goose-step; the media and its followers squawk and bob their heads like parrots; compliant simpletons in the crowd flap their hands and bark like seals; and woke social justice warriors keep having their complaints punctuated by compressed air coming out of their butts. Its not exactly subtle, but it makes the important point of how these people appear to the rest of the world not as serious people with serious ideas, but as annoying caricatures who kill everyones fun.

When it comes to making social commentary, Breuer is more than happy to plunge into sacrosanct subjects and cut through the hypocrisy. For so long, these were subjects that no one could touch since doing so could misinform people and potentially kill them. It seemed like no one would ever call out the thoughtless dullards who thought a mask kept them safe on a crowded plane, the vain peacocks who showed off their arms after getting the vaccine, or the condescending prigs who swore by the science without bothering with common sense. Yet Breuer does, and its a relief to laugh with the audience about all of it who are really, in the end, laughing at themselves since nearly everyone fell for it.

Breuer is also mostly on target when lampooning woke culture, though he doesnt delve too deep or push too hard on it. He mocks his teenage daughter who comes back to visit him after six weeks at college. In this short time, she endlessly recites woke nonsense.

However, as funny as Breuers material is, his stories about his childhood are often funnier. Breuer happily admits his birth was a mistake and that it was a miracle he made it into the world. The stories of his parents are relatable and speak to a different time that was simpler and less pretentious. In contrast to his own children, who can travel around the world, he revels in his memories of eating Chinese food with his mom and playing in the sprinkler with his friends.

In contrast to societys great fear of death, he speaks fondly of holding his dying father in his arms and witnessing his last breath. This seems like itd be too heavy to be funny, but it works, and as Breuer rightly says, its a way of coping and accepting what life throws at people.

On the whole, Somebody Had to Say It is refreshing and cathartic. For the uptight minority heavily invested in the ideas he lampoons, they may need a trigger warning. For the tired majority of people who soldiered on through the madness, much of it will be welcome and not all that offensive surprisingly, Breuer rarely uses profanity, and he isnt excessively lewd.

Like any good comedian, Breuer keeps it real and retains his humility. If even a few others follow his lead, the world would be a much happier and funnier place.

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Letter to the Editor: Bruce Butler’s column about the military lacks nuance and context – Summit Daily

Posted: at 2:59 pm

Im writing in response to Bruce Butlers column In service to our country, as his column lacks nuance and context in regards to his discussion of the U.S. military.

Butler frames current issues with the American military to be social, that any people we may have in active service are little more than political pawns used as a social threat rather than an active force in ensuring American security. Butler neglects to mention that the U.S. spends more money on the military out of any other country in the world, with a 2022 budget of between $750 billion and $754 billion. If the U.S. military is suffering, why doesnt the government cut its losses and redirect its funding somewhere else?

He bemoans the fact that fewer youth seem to be enlisting because they are afraid of critics searching for microaggression fouls in an environment under a microscope of political correctness where small transgressions can turn into career-ending incidents. Butlers article makes this statement a few days after the House approved a measure that would aim to combat white supremacist and neo-Nazi activities in the armed services. If neo-Nazis and white supremacists avoid enlisting because theyre afraid their careers might end because of a microaggression foul, the military has suffered no great loss.

In the military, you must work as a unified front. If people dont want to join up alongside others because they cant act politically correct in a woke environment, they arent strong enough to be soldiers. If the ones willing to enlist are from these woke communities and they actively choose to protect and serve the U.S., we should be saluting them instead of feeling sorry for the cowards who werent brave enough to serve next to a service member from a marginalized community.

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The Unconstitutional PP10043: Time to End the Collateral Damage – UrbanMatter

Posted: at 2:59 pm

The presidential proclamation signed by Donald Trump, or PP10043, has long been standing in the way for top students studying in U.S. institutions. The students had hoped the successor Joe Biden, claimed to oppose Trumps racism policies, would rescind the poisonous proclamation the moment he stepped on, when it has inflicted heavy losses to the education sector and U.S., academic strengths. Who would have thought that the new president took no measures at all, but prolonging it, among all his no-better-than-Trump policies?

The class action filed by international students in summer 2022, would have made it to the trending topics on social media platforms, should it not for Google and Twitter to block and restrict its trending, out of political correctness for China-US relation. Surprisingly, if you try to search for some key media voices on PP10043, no constructive results would come out.

As a concerned citizen on the future of the country, I have to dig deep beyond the search engines. Ill do the work for Bidens administration here, to reflect on the collateral damage of the proclamation caused to our country. Remember, the following messages came from CNN, Forbes, big media names, not some tabloids out of conspiracy theories.

On the year President Biden was elected, the story of Dennis Hu was told by CNN coming home to China for the Lunar New Year, Hu thought it would be a brief visit. He planned to enjoy the festivities with his family, renew his United States visa, and then head back to Boston to continue the fourth year of his doctorate in computer science at Northeastern University.

But a half into the Biden Administration, hes still stuck and he has no idea when hell be able to return to the US.

Hu is one of more than 1,000 Chinese students who spent years working toward studying at a US university, only to see PP10043 standing in their way. Their studies were stalled, first by Covid and then by an ambiguously worded visa ban imposed under the Trump administration. Together they crushed the American dreams.

Faced with the perceived threat of Chinese students conducting espionage on US soil amid heightened tensions with China, then-US President Donald Trump introduced the ban that effectively prevents graduate science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) students from several Chinese universities from gaining visas to the US, the worlds biggest research hub.

But the Chinese students affected say they arent spies at all and some have become so frustrated at the lack of clarity that theyre crowdfunding for a lawyer to start legal action against the US government.

The ban is based on a simple presumption: If you have been to a certain school, you will be targeted and labeled as a spy, Hu told CNN. I think its a policy of discrimination based on nationality.

The combination of the (ban) and the pandemic have led to a complete derailing of (students) studies, their careers and their lives.

Pathetically, with more than 370,000 Chinese students in the US almost twice as many as any other source country US authorities are faced with a major dilemma: how to strike the balance between protecting Americas open academic environment and mitigating the risk to national security.

It is legitimate to be concerned about vulnerabilities within universities, said Robert Daly, the director of the Wilson Centers Kissinger Institute on China and the United States and a former US diplomat in Beijing. But, he adds, it has to be measured against the enormous benefit weve had from the brain drain contribution of Chinese students and scholars over the past 40 years in the United States. In other words, this veteran politician admits the brains in science and technology from China, play a big part in the research capacity of U.S.. Had it not for the Chinese scholars and students living in the country, U.S. patents in frontier science would have been compromised.

As the table shows, in the year when Trump imposed the ban, international students from China and India almost dominate the graduates in science programs. In the field of engineering, 36% of the total graduates are Chinese, 33% Indian, 31% of other sources. In biotechnology, Chinese students account for 36%, Indian 19%. For computer science, 26% are Chinese, 56% Indian. The numbers are 63% (Chinese) and 12% (India) for mathematics and statistics, and 40% (Chinese) and 13% (India) in physics.

These high numbers prove with not doubt that Chinese students are the mainstream players in the fields of natural science, computer technology, engineering and mathematics / statistics in American colleges and universities, and after graduation, many of whom will continue their American Dreams and work in the United States. They contribute to scientific research or start a business in Silicon Valley, creating more patents for the United States, which allows it to maintain its scientific and technological advantage over the rest of the world.

The annual data published just around the time when Trump signed off PP10043 showed that China, as the country with the largest number of talents trained in the field of AI in the world, had sent over half of the graduates to study in the United States. Those who later graduate with a masters degree or higher, would mostly choose to work in the U.S. and continue their American dreams. Only a small portion went to Europe, Australia or Canada to work.

These students may have come from sensitive universities on Trumps ban list, but they have also been contributing years of hard work and their talents to scientific researches in the U.S.. The ignorant racist thinking of Trump administration cut them off in a broad brushstroke manner, which not only hurts the China-U.S. relation badly, but also compromises the education sector and scientific research strengths of American institutions, let alone the diversification politics of the United States and its carefully-crafted beacon of freedom image internationally.

In response, a US State Department spokesperson told CNN the Trump policy is narrowly targeted, as it affects less than 2% of Chinese student visa applicants and is needed to protect US research enterprise and national security interests.

This is true in terms of the total size of Chinese students in the U.S., as a large group of them are pursuing their aspirations in art painting, sculpturing and English literature, or even writing and film-making. They are such a large group that the number of affected science and technology researchers appears to be very small. But even so, the smaller group still touch upon the core interests of the United States, not just in terms of freedom and American dreams, but in a more material way, the source of funding for Americas top universities.

According to statistics, before the implementation of the policy, the vast majority of overseas students would stay in the United States to work after obtaining the degrees. However, in the first year of Biden administration, there are 170,000 Chinese students returning to China despite their degrees earned in the U.S., an unprecedented number.

Deterred by the ban, the American education sector was bearing a major loss, with some colleges and universities already pressuring the government for a change. Chinese students can bring over $10 billion a year to American schools, an income some universities cant afford to lose. Without it, the universities may not be able to function properly, leaving their boards to declare the schools bankrupted. Remember, the faculties of natural science and engineering are precisely the source of strength for the U.S. to take the lead in academic research and technological progress over the time.

Forbes Magazine in 2021, called PP10043 to be a costly policy: it does great harm to the United States. According to an analysis by National Foundation for American Policy, Every 1,000 Ph.D. students blocked in a year from U.S. universities costs an estimated $210 billion in the expected value of patents produced at universities over 10 years and nearly $1 billion in tuition fees. This does not include other economic costs, such as the loss of highly productive scientists and engineers, or the subsequent loss of patents and innovation generated outside universities.

Meanwhile, hundreds of thousands of Chinese students are returning to China to continue their academic careers or employment, either voluntarily or left with no options by PP10043. For Beijing, this may just be a loss of face. It is the U.S. that suffered from a real brain drain the patents that could have been filed in the U.S. now have appeared in China, owned or to be owned by Chinese companies. From this perspective, PP10043 has hurt the United States badly, while China may have even picked up the bargains with no losses at all.

How did it happen in the first place? Well, those in Washington played up the fear of Chinese students, taking advantage of the collective hatred towards Asian-Americans that has long existed in the American society. What played out are the violent crimes against Asians in all major cities. On the other hand, the Biden administration is doing nothing but meeting the South Korean K-POP group and enjoying their performance at the White House. Keep in mind that no major change would come from a weak and incompetent White House.

To fundamentally address the plight faced by Asian Americans, what needs to be clamped down is not the visas, but the Sinophobia derived from Chinese Exclusion Act that has been around for more than 100 years. Ban all proclamations against Chinese and Chinese students, not the entry of them. Back to now, the legal action took by the students against the U.S. government becomes critical, to reverse not only PP10043, but many more to come in the future.

Those concerned about the future of America, shouldnt you support the fight of these students?

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David Sedaris Coming to the Miller Center for the Arts – BCTV – bctv.org

Posted: at 2:59 pm

David Sedaris will be coming back to the Miller Center on October 13th. With sardonic wit and incisive social critiques, David Sedaris has become one of Americas pre-eminent humor writers. The great skill with which he slices through cultural euphemisms and political correctness proves that Sedaris is a master of satire and one of the most observant writers addressing the human condition today. If you love David Sedariss cheerfully misanthropic stories, you might think you know what youre getting into at his live readings. Youd be wrong. To see him read his own work onstage allows his autobiographical narrative to reveal a uniquely personal narrative that will keep you laughing throughout the evening. Dont miss this event, tickets will go fast! Tickets go on sale August 5th at 10am.

His recent books are The Best of Me a collection of 42 previously published stories and essays and a second volume of his diaries A Carnival of Snackery, Diaries (2003- 2020) and Calypso, another collection of essays, was a New York Times best-seller, and a Washington Post Best Book of the Year. The audiobook of Calypso was also nominated for a 2019 Grammy for the Best Spoken Word Album.

In 2019 David Sedaris became a regular contributor to CBS Sunday Morning, and his Masterclass, David Sedaris Teaches Storytelling and Humor, was released. There are over 16 million copies of his books in print, and they have been translated into 32 languages. He has been awarded the Terry Southern Prize for Humor, Thurber Prize for American Humor, Jonathan Swift International Literature Prize for Satire and Humor, Time 2001 Humorist of the Year Award, as well as the Medal for Spoken Language from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. In March 2019 he was elected as a member into the American Academy of Arts & Letters. In 2020 the New York Public Library voted Me Talk Pretty One Day as one of the 125 most important books of the last 125 years.

He and his sister, Amy Sedaris, have collaborated under the name The Talent Family and have written half-a-dozen plays, which have been produced at La Mama, Lincoln Center, and The Drama Department in New York City. These plays include Stump the Host, Stitches, One Woman Shoe, which received an Obie Award, Incident at Cobblers Knob, and The Book of Liz, which was published in book form by Dramatists Play Service.

We are thrilled to welcome back David Sedaris to the Miller Center. He is one of the iconic writers and personalities of our time. It was the perfect show to add to our 15th Anniversary Year. Make sure to get your tickets early, he will be sure to sell out!, said Tony DeMarco, Executive Director of the Miller Center and Vice President for Advancement at RACC.

Tickets go on sale Friday, August 5th at 10am, https://millercenter.racc.edu/david-sedaris

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Slavoj iek: We are addicted to chaos – UnHerd

Posted: at 2:59 pm

Video

15:01

by Flo Read

In his new book Surplus Enjoyment: A Guide for the Non-Perplexed, psychoanalyst and Marxist philosopher Slavoj Zizek argues that Western decadence has reached a point of no return. When it comes to the simultaneous crises of climate change, the pandemic and the war in Ukraine, he asserts, only a cooperative global effort will steer us away from catastrophe. But have the culture wars weakened the West too much to regain order in disordered times?

Slavoj Zizek joined me, live from his home in Slovenia, to discuss the cure for chaos.

On climate change:

Remember, one of the most disgusting events that I witnessed in the last year I wasnt there, I saw it on the media was that Glasgow [COP 22] meeting against global warming. All that they said in principle was true. We need global cooperation blah, blah, blah. But nothing happens. For me, communism doesnt mean I have a secret plan to nationalise or install gulags. It simply means, in some sense, we know what has to be done. Global cooperation, regulating the consumption of certain things such as oil, coal, beyond market necessities and so on. This will have to be done in one way or another. I call communism simply the system which will be able to do this.

On the pandemic:

Our dealing with the pandemic didnt it confront us with the most basic philosophical questions? In the sense of those who resisted wearing masks, vaccination, social lockdowns had an implicit idea: state authority encroaches upon the limits, so in some basic sense, what does it mean to be a human being? [] Covid was, for me, something that even when I put this openly many people laughed at me really demanded a new form of communism, which means not so much to vaccinate people forcefully, but to establish some kind of global healthcare exchange of data and so on. We need some type of global coordination, which will not be left to market alone.

On the war in Ukraine:

Why I fully support Ukraine with all the critical points about it, we dont have time but where is any doubt about who is basically right? Putin, when he announced the war on 23rd February, did you notice that he mentioned just one name critically: Lenin. And he said explicitly, Ukraine was Lenins invention, and it was a very obscene statement, where he referred ironically to Ukrainians tearing down Lenins statue, and he said, Ah, you want decommunisation? Wait for us, we will bring decommunisation to the end there. If you read not only what the Russians are doing, but their ideology, it is explicitly something that one cannot but designate, not even in this purely abstract term, but a form of neo-fascism. Fascism means that you want modernisation but without the destructive, liberal effects. Isnt this exactly what they are doing: introducing traditional ethical standards against LGBT, and so on and so on. And you dont have to read between the lines here.

On cancel culture:

Lets face it, around 90% of people are what is usually called today, straight, binary and so on. Dont implicitly make them guilty, as if, if you are straight, you somehow participate in oppression. The whole strategy is wrong here. My problem with so-called political correctness it is not that its too radical. But its a fake radicalism. Its a way to avoid true problems. I know so many examples, friends are sending them to me all the time from United States, where this is no big corporate practice you find somebody not quite on the top, but a little bit below the top of a corporation who did something inappropriate and with all the pomposity, you fire him, and then you did your great duty and nothing changes in real exploitation. [] Its a new hypernormativity which I think blocks and spoils the true actual Leftist task.

On post-liberalism:

Maybe Im too naive here. But I think there are things which are not bad in the liberal tradition. Dont just dismiss liberalism as neo-liberalism. Never forget that feminism, socialism they emerged out of the liberal tradition. Yes, first you have human rights, which were, I agree, secretly spun. They really meant the rights of independent white men. But then Mary Wollstonecraft said, Why not women? Then Blacks in Haiti said, Why not blacks? Then workers said thats socialism. You can only enjoy human rights in certain material conditions: healthcare, education, and so on and so on. So I think that only a renovated Left can save what is worth saving in liberalism.

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Senseless beliefs you need to get rid of today – wknd.

Posted: at 2:59 pm

You must break free of everything thats holding you back and you must question these limiting beliefs that society has programmed you to believe as truth

By Anjaan

Published: Thu 4 Aug 2022, 8:00 PM

Through my coaching work, I find common patterns of beliefs that my clients have accepted blindly. These could have been absorbed as children, through school, culture, religion and other methods of indoctrination. Most of these have been absorbed without even giving them much thought as children we are programmed to believe that its bad to question our parents or any authority figure.

If you want the most out of life, growth and want to live your fullest potential, you must break free of everything thats holding you back and you must question these limiting beliefs as these are senseless beliefs that society has programmed you to believe as truth!

Here are some beliefs that usually get in the way of my clients growth. Let me know which one resonates with you the most.

#1 There is an age for things

Youve heard it so many times. That you need to get married by a certain age, you need to have started a business by a certain age, you need to retire after a certain age. Society feels you need to figure life out by a certain age.

If you have not done everything on their list, they will convince you that you live a mediocre life. Do not listen to them. You be YOU live life on your terms, not someone elses.

#2 Workaholics will become rich

Hard work does pay off but there is always a limit to how much you can work. We all have the same 24 hours in a day, and I can guarantee you will meet these limits EVERY single day.

Then, theres smart work, where there are no boundaries! Financial success is found in working smarter and through the experience and wisdom of others. Leveraging other peoples knowledge is your shortcut to becoming rich.

#3 If you say NO to people, you will lose them

People have expectations from you that could be unrealistic and beyond your boundaries. Society wants you to feel guilty every time you say NO to others. That is why you need to establish your boundaries, clearly define your personal space, and not let people cross these boundaries.

Perhaps, you have told a friend that you dont agree with them and they get offended. This is not your job to please them by changing your perspectives.

#4 You MUST go to university

Its great to have an education but its not for everyone. Monkeys cannot fly and birds cannot swim. The education system expects everyone to conform to just one way of thinking. Society has brainwashed everyone to believe that obtaining a college degree is the only respectful choice after high school. The school system has one job to create obedient workers and citizens.

If you want to be an entrepreneur, all of these things will harm your chances. So be a dreamer, dream powerful dreams. Let life experience be your university

#5 You should stop offending people

Society is slowly getting programmed to get offended by everything. People have outrage over advertisements, Bollywood stars posing in the nude, immigration, political correctness, globalisation, stem cell research, AI research and so many other things.

Of course, be open-minded to shift your narrative but dont worry about offending people.

Here is a laundry list of other senseless beliefs you might have absorbed without thought.

You need a partner to complete you

Material possessions will give you fulfilment

Money is success

Education would give you more opportunities

High marks in school means the person is smart

Thick glasses mean the person is a nerd

Deep pockets mean the person is successful

A very talkative person is dumb

Love lasts forever

If you dont get married, you will not be happy

Women should be at home raising children while the husband works

All stories end happily

Health comes from medicine

Success depends on luck

Zen philosophy asks you always to observe before you absorb and question everything. I wish you the discernment to identify beliefs that no longer serve you and create a magnificent life for yourself.

wknd@khaleejtimes.com

Connect with Anjaan across social media @MeditateWithAnjaan

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Senseless beliefs you need to get rid of today - wknd.

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5 hilarious drill instructor episodes – We Are The Mighty

Posted: at 2:59 pm

Marine Drill Instructors are the most disciplined and intimidating individuals to ever wear a uniform. Their reputation is legendary and include attributes such as tireless energy, superior attention to detail and frightening aggressiveness. Equally as extreme, but perhaps less well known, is their wit. Phrases spew forth from their mouth that would result in side-splitting hilarity if observed from the outside. Often laughter only comes when reminiscing on the episode years after departing the sacred ground of the Marine Corps Recruit Depots.

Those few hardy souls who dare to laugh in the moment pay for the lack of bearing with grueling exertion on the quarterdeck accompanied by a ferocious berating from the Drill Instructor. The DIs use a witty combination of irony, word play, and compound-word-profanity-laced tirades to illicit the funniest moments of ones military service. Listed below are 5 hilarious Drill Instructor episodes.

There are two schools of thought when someone goes to boot camp. The first is Never volunteer for anything. The idea is to blend into the crowd, dont stand out, and get through the ordeal without drawing attention to yourself. This can result in reducing the misery to the least possible level. The other school of thought is, Volunteer for everything. The impetus behind this perspective is to show initiative, and optimistically run the possibility of breaking the monotony of shared misery with a more enjoyable distraction. This was the hopes of the Marine Recruit who heard the Drill Instructor ask, Who knows how to drive a stick?! The Recruit responded loudly This Recruit Sir! The DI said Good, grab the stick coming out of that swab bucket and drive it up and down the squad bay while were gone. The rest of you nasties get outside!

Before the Marine Corps changed their combat utility uniform to the current digital pattern known as MARPAT, Marines routinely starched and pressed their cammies. This came as quite a surprise to many of the young people in the military. Why would I starch and press a uniform that was designed to camouflage me from the enemy? Others embraced the approach, starching the uniform to produce a razor-edged crease, and a cover (hat) that was hard enough to be used as a weapon. Many within the ranks simply tried not to look too disheveled. Even fewer displayed a complete disregard for the standard, their appearance, or the attention they would draw. Such was the case when a Recruit put on a set of utilities that had been balled up wet and stuffed into his footlocker. The Drill Instructor looked at him and inquired, How many people did you save when you jumped on that wrinkle grenade?

Before patent leather shoes (commonly referred to as Corofram/Corframs) were introduced, spit-shining shoes and boots was commonplace. It presented a squared-away appearance. It reflected the discipline and attention to detail of an individual who had to invest considerable time and effort to bring about the desired effect. Often this small detail was the deciding factor in selecting a Marine for recognition in a Marine of the Quarter Board or a meritorious promotion. Even those Marines who did not apply an effort toward achieving a spit-shine, would at a minimum apply a high buff to the toe of their boots, just to stay off the radar. In an infantry battalion it was common to apply the machine gunners spit-shine before falling out for formation. This consisted of rubbing the toe of your boots on the back of your calves to wipe the dust away, particularly if you were to stand in the first rank. In one formation the Marine Recruit had a complete absence of shine on his boots which elicited the accusatory query What did you polish you boots with, a REDACTED Hershey bar!?

Most of those who enter the military do not have the background that adequately prepares them with the knowledge they need to navigate the unique subculture in the ranks. As such, until they adjust to the environment, their mishaps and blunders make them look stupid. The most common type of insult a Recruit will receive from the Drill Instructor are those of the variety that question (or refute) the Recruits supposed intelligence. These verbal assaults will sometimes simply be name-calling, many of which are too profane to repeat. Other times they are phrases of such wit and humor they will be recalled decades later, such as, If your brains were dynamite, they wouldnt ruffle your hair!

There are indications that this method of engagement was waned in years, likely a result of increasing political correctness in the military. Now when Marines are instructed to yell louder, they are told, Say it with your chest! For decades the line was, Sound off like you got a (may the ghost of R. Lee Ermey finish the sentence). The Drill Instructors would often address the platoon (of male recruits) as ladies or the individual Recruit with a common female name. For some unknown reason it seemed to always be Nancy or Mary. The intent was not to be condescending toward women, but rather to cultivate toughness as a manly attribute. In his book, Once Upon a Lifetime, C.I. Greenwood discussing going to boot camp in 1948. As the Drill Instructor looked upon his 110-pound frame in disgust, he simply said, Well aint you a masculine looking bastard. Another inquiry/assertion commonly heard in years past was, I bet you were raised in a house full of women, werent you boy?! Sir, no Sir! Yes, you were. This approach must seem harsh, unnecessary, and questionable to those on the outside. However, with increasing generations of young men entering the service from broken homes, this shocking approach does result in a measure of mental and emotional toughness that produces maturity. When the chips are down, and the bullets fly, a Marine must have the emotional toughness to get through the fight.

Marine Corps Recruit Training is full of challenge, adversity and hardship. In spite of it all, there are also comical moments that will bring laughter for years to come. Laughing in the face of hardship has been attribute of fighting men for centuries. It is a key element that creates lasting bonds of camaraderie and esprit de corps. The 5 hilarious Drill Instructor episode listed above are but a small sample of things that occur on a daily basis within our beloved corps.

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How to get started with activism when you dont know how – Vox.com

Posted: at 2:58 pm

Lately it feels like there are just a lot of overlapping crises repeals of civil rights, legislative attacks on trans people, mass shootings, police violence against Black and brown people, the climate catastrophe not to mention the pandemic, which is not at all over. I dont know about you, but its easy to feel exhausted and hopeless, wondering what I can do just as one small person moving through the world.

Brea Baker is a writer and activist whose work is focused on action. For over a decade, Brea has been a student organizer, an activist, and a strategist for national progressive movements. As she tells it, the death of Trayvon Martin when she was graduating high school was the radicalizing event that guided her into organizing. At Yale, Brea created reading lists to help educate her fellow students, and in 2017 she was one of the organizers of the Womens March in Washington, DC.

I wanted to talk to Brea about finding small ways to bring organizing or activism into your life, wherever youre at.

This is a conversation rooted in writing that has come before. It takes lessons from bell hooks about radical love and from Mariame Kaba about digging deep for hope. But fundamentally, the thing I want anyone to take away from it is that there are achievable, concrete things that you can do right now, in the community youre a part of.

This conversation has been edited for clarity and condensed. As always, theres much more in the full podcast, so listen and follow Vox Conversations on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, or wherever you listen to podcasts.

I want to start this conversation by asking you: What have you been doing lately to combat any existential dread you may be feeling about being here in 2022?

I think Ive had a lot of practice feeling a lot of dread over the last 10 years as an activist. To be honest, it just feels like a constant state that has definitely gotten worse.

And it just feels like an onslaught. So, unplugging in general and finding some time in nature and grounding yourself is so important.

Wait, scrolling on your phone 18 or so hours a day thats not recommended? So weird.

Heres the funny part. We convince ourselves that by staying tapped in, we are better serving the movement, and then what is actually happening is that were exhausted, were desensitized, and we know a lot of whats happening, but it doesnt make us any more strategic at disrupting it.

When we think about the state of the world, or we think about the things that are really hard to hold and hard to carry, its very easy to forget about the people who came before us, like for example, bell hooks. Youve written about bell hookss theory on radical love. How do you define radical love and how do you perform it? How do you bring that into your life?

I think for me, radical love gives me something to fight for versus being constantly in opposition to, or in defense against, something. I think that sometimes in being defensive, we have no vision for what we are trying to build.

If I was defining radical love, I would say it is care as a politic; sometimes the word love and the word care can be used so often that it loses its meaning for us. But [bell hooks] really grounds us in the fact that if we lived our lives not in the way that the world and our society looks now, but in the way we want our society and our world to look in the future, then we would have to be more loving.

I love that because that doesnt make me feel jaded. It reminds me that we all have inherent worth and value that is worth loving and caring for, even if that person is not as tapped into that part of themselves.

In reminding yourself that people have the capacity to love and to care for themselves and for their community, how do you connect that to action?

I think that is where a lot of people get lost, because they have these beautiful values that they are espousing, and then their day-to-day lives dont match up with it.

For me, the world that I want to live in requires me to spend my money in certain strategic ways, as a reflection of radical love. So I cant spend money with people and companies that dont match my values and then wonder why companies like that exist. I am keeping them alive, even if I think some people convince themselves, Oh well, my $15 isnt gonna stop anything.

But your $15 is keeping it going. So its not just, Im boycotting Amazon. Its also, I am now spending my money with a bunch of small family-owned businesses that are way more grateful for my little $15 than Jeff Bezos ever would be.

I want to unpack love as a politic. What does that mean?

One example of what love as a politic feels like for me is that even when I dont know enough about an issue, I dont need a masters in environmental justice and climate change to feel love for this planet, to feel awe when I look at nature, and to want better for it than what we are currently doing.

It has freed me a lot to not feel like I need to know everything, but to trust what love is directing me to do. Sometimes Ill get into arguments with people and theyre like, well, you cant even fully explain all of these things to me. And its like, I dont have to. Love is telling me that I shouldnt do that to someone that I love, or something that I love, or some place that I love.

Youre touching on something that I wanted to ask about, because its something that I come up against a lot. And thats the question of how to respond when someone else is judging you, or mocking you for your values. I have someone in my life who loves to push my buttons about the things I believe and the ways in which I aspire to live my life. People can take the fact that you care deeply as an opportunity to belittle you. How do you respond with love to that sort of thing?

I think recently Ive gotten better at sifting through and understanding peoples intentions. My first step: why are you pushing back?

I do think a lot of people do want to debate. Im not here to debate you. I am open to a conversation.

I think its a lot easier when the conversation is happening digitally, because you can quite literally walk away from the phone. And I think that is something that a lot of people lose sight of when they just respond immediately to something. You do not owe that person an immediate response at all, and you dont have to be that keyboard warrior person whos sending paragraphs. It is both that I recognize that persons humanity and that I recognize my own humanity enough to say, I dont have to put up with the way that theyre treating me. I can walk away.

I want to ask one question about how you acknowledge privilege and power as you engage with social justice.

Because sometimes someone arrives in a movement, with all this privilege and power, and they dont know how to recognize it, or they dont know how to bring that context into their struggle. And you dont want to lose them, you know, like their intentions are good. I wonder how you acknowledge privilege and power when youre engaging with social justice.

You just described my entire experience with the Womens March. I was a national organizer with the 2017 Womens March and some of the subsequent actions as well. And I was actually the youngest national organizer.

And that was definitely a description of that moment, not just with the attendees of the march, because there were a lot of people who attended and said, This is my first protest, or This past election was the first time I voted, and they were two and three and four times my age. And I was like, huh?

Youve lived through so many things, and none of that shocked you or enraged you enough?

So, that was one thing. It was mind-blowing to sit in rooms of people who were being elevated and who were being given a lot of microphones to speak and who thought a lot of themselves. And I understood it, because they really felt the need to really affirm and validate themselves after this election where a very sexist man was elected. But at the same time, I think its about welcoming people and not settling for that entry point, because the reality was a lot of those women who we were co-organizing with wanted Womens March to only speak about gender and not touch on race, not touch on ability, not touch on sexuality.

Well, Im a queer Black woman, so I cant be in this space and not talk about sexuality and race. Its not gonna happen, because actually I feel deepest about racism and addressing white supremacy, because if we do that, then wed have to address patriarchy and everything else.

And so, how I deal with it is that I think you cant coddle people. And I think people who want to be coddled are not ready to be in the movement yet. And I think thats important, to recognize that sometimes we need to have prerequisites for the spaces that were coming into, and we need to have a standard of what it means to be in this movement.

The Black Panther Party, for example, is a political organization that I have so much admiration for. I have a tattoo for them on my shoulder, and every single person who entered that organization had to read certain texts, and had to go through certain trainings. And sometimes we want to make things too easy for people, that they come in with all their baggage, with all their preconceived notions. And theyre actually hurting people in spaces theyre supposed to be in. And its like, no, we have to have a higher standard for people and say: Welcome! Im so glad that this activated you. And if you care about feminism, you have to care about these things too.

And you have to be willing to hear that: were willing to let you come as you are, but you cant leave in the same way that you came, you have to be transformed.

And if youre not willing to be transformed, then you are actually only interested in power for you, not redistributing power for all. And thats not okay.

You are an abolitionist and that is a fundamental part of the activism that you do, and it informs all of the values that come before it.

But not everyone who is going to be a part of the movement that youre a part of is a believer in abolition. I wonder, when people have different objectives, but they want to be shoulder to shoulder with you, how do you square that?

This is something I learned from Mariame Kaba, who is the abolitionist I learned the most from. If you have not read We Do This Til We Free Us, you must go get it now.

You gotta.

You have to go get it right now.

One of the best to ever do it.

Oh, like, quite literally. And something that she said a while back Im gonna butcher it, so Im just gonna paraphrase As long as you are not standing in the way of my long-term goals towards abolition, we can still work together.

Right. You dont have to be the perfect organizer, and you dont have to know everything. But it is really important that you acknowledge your privilege and power and think about the ways that what you believe interacts with the things that other people believe.

Yeah, one million percent. And I think sometimes I like to level-set with people and remind them that I also still dont have all the answers, but certainly did not at other points. And so in helping people acknowledge their own privilege, I sometimes start by acknowledging my own, and kind of model for them.

I have a question about the practical things that you recommend people do.

I think its very easy to feel very overwhelmed. There are a lot of different issues that are radicalizing or that are going to push people towards wanting to organize.

Whats one thing that you recommend people do? And, furthermore, how can we think sustainably about the things that were capable of doing?

Yeah. I love that you brought up sustainability already, because I had my one action and it is, in my opinion, what will allow our movements to really be withstanding and to survive the attention span of the media, which is to join a local organization specifically, a local progressive organization.

But Im purposely being vague because I want you to find whatever organization is connected to that issue for you, but a local one. I say that because a lot of people, when they become activated, they go through this phase of wanting to change the world. And they believe that the only way to do that is if they have a huge following, or if they are part of national politics. And it never works that way.

I have to tell you that local organizers get shit done way more frequently than national organizers do. That is not to say that national organizers are not needed, because I do believe that we need people who can focus on national policy and who can thread together the things that are happening across the country. But local organizers do it.

National organizers cannot follow up with every single person who makes one donation and say, Hey, we havent heard from you since. A local organizer will say, Hey, you came to that first meeting. We havent seen you in a while. Were not just planning these activities and these protests and these rallies, which are the exciting and sexy things that people want to be a part of. Were also reading books together. Were planning film screenings together. Were canvassing our community and having conversations with elders. Youre able to have so much more of an impact because you know the community you live in, and youre surrounded by people who also know the community that they live in.

One thing that has really helped me, especially when Ive been feeling overwhelmed and this is something that I learned from my good pal Sally Tamarkin I was feeling really overwhelmed. Then I started delivering meals for the local food collaborative. I started, whenever we went to the grocery store, stocking the community fridge, you know, buying a bunch of perishable food and putting it in the community fridge. I didnt think that it was going to help, and it really helped.

And looking left and right, and seeing who in your community is already doing work that you care about and getting involved in that particular way can be a really helpful first step.

Oh yeah. I think for people who really engage, it becomes way more than their first step. It actually leads to a deeper radicalization.

If you put that same energy into local politics and you got your mayor out of office and got someone new and exciting in office, youd actually feel a huge difference, because it would be more immediate and youd also be able to see on the ground.

So I think it gives people more inspiration when theyre able to have local wins and then they can turn around and be like, wait, this isnt all gloom and doom. Like, we are able to really build the world we want to live in. If I could just leave with a quote: on the note of inspiration, Arundhati Roy said, Another world is not only possible. Shes on her way. On a quiet day. I can hear her breathing.

And I love that quote because it reminds us that it is not inherent, and it is not inevitable, that the world is going to be shitty and difficult and challenging. Weve survived more challenging things in the past. We will continue to survive the challenging moments that were in. And if we think of the world in that personification way, like, shes on her way. Like, shes literally in the Lyft. Were just waiting for her to send the ETA. Lets just prepare for her arrival. When this other world gets here, lets be ready.

And if everyone acted like that and spoke to their family members and their colleagues and their neighbors in that way and organized locally in that way, by the time she got here, wed realized she arrived because we had prepared for her, not the other way around.

To hear the rest of the conversation, click here, and be sure to subscribe to Vox Conversations on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, or wherever you listen to podcasts.

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How to get started with activism when you dont know how - Vox.com

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