Monday, May 30, 2016

We need to understand, analyze and evaluate all traditions and rituals

I was born and brought up in a conservative Hindu family. There were many rituals and traditions that were followed in our family for generations, and as a child, I used to participate in them or observe them with a lot of curiosity and interest. One thing that always surprised me was that no one around me actually knew the real reason or logic behind why we follow certain traditions or perform certain rituals. They just did it because it was a practice followed by their ancestors. If anyone raised any question, then the standard answer was, "This is what our ancestors did, there must be some reason behind it and therefore we need to continue doing this." While this answer was enough to snub a curious child, it is not a rational and logical explanation to quench the thirst of an inquisitive mind. There were many questions that remained unanswered for a long time, A few of them were: why fast only on a particular day? Why not eat meat during some religious festivals? If meat is that bad, then why do people eat it at all? How come it's good to eat it on a particular day but not good on any of those so-called auspicious occasions? Why women are not allowed to worship during their menstrual cycle? Why feed rice only to crows among all birds to pacify souls of dead people? There were many questions like this and I tried to find answers to many of them on my own. Actually, it is not that difficult to search for answers to many of these questions, mostly it is a matter of applying some common sense. But, the first necessary step is to ask a question, if your faith stops you from asking these questions, then you may never be able to find any answers related to any of your doubts.

Many of these traditions were the result of some sort of social needs of that era. Sometimes it was a combination of medical, hygiene, and economic reasons. It makes lots of sense if we analyze these things with respect to that time, but things don't look that rational and logical when we do the same things today without even evaluating if we need to practice these things today or not. Without the availability of personal hygiene products, menstruation can be a difficult thing to handle, maybe at that time it made sense to quarantine menstruating women and force them to rest. Occasional fasting can be good for our health, so it made sense to fast a few days of the year. Rice was an easy and cheap agricultural product and a crow was one of the abundant bird species that never attained the status of being a pet bird, so maybe it was a great idea to have some ritual where everyone could feed this ignored bird so that they also survive. Meat is a very tasty food, people eating meat might get addicted to its taste and consume it to threaten the existence of those animals, that's why they might have restricted consumption of meat on some particular days. Understanding and analyzing these things is very necessary and we all should do it. We can go on like this, finding some kind of explanation or reasoning for each ritual and tradition, but this is not at all the reason to practice these things blindly in today's world.

It doesn't make sense to restrict women from worshiping during menstruation when proper means are available to deal with personal hygiene. A healthy diet is important, with so much medical advice available, what and how much food one should eat should be a personal choice. Like this, we can rebut most of these outdated practices to which people tend to cling just because it is part of their culture. Cultural heritage is undoubtedly something we should study and preserve for the reference of our future generations, but we should not get trapped in it and stop moving forward. So, please try to understand and analyze each and every tradition or ritual, try to find logic and reasoning behind it, if they are outdated then don't hesitate to discard them, if they need any change then change them, but please don't get stuck in the web of cultural dogma. This heritage and knowledge should act as a launching pad for future discoveries and progress not a stinking trap to get stuck in the past.

Thanks for reading and please share your views on this topic.

[Copyright: Vinay Thakur. Please contact the author for re-posting or publishing]

Friday, May 27, 2016

Problems associated with "blind faith"

"Faith" has been always a very interesting subject for me. Mostly, "faith" in a general sense is used to describe religious beleifs of a person or group. People can have faith in anything without verifying the truthfulness of that thing. Faith is an emotion and like other emotions and can manifest in various forms and it can play a major role in developing the personality of many of us. For many people, their 'faith' is an integral part of the day to day life. It helps them in many ways and for many it has become a necessary thing for their survival, it offers them the reasons for their existence. Like many other emotions faith also is being heavily commercialized emotion and there are various products in the market of faith to fulfill various needs of people who are interested in faith and its related aspects. Religion is one of the oldest and the most popular product which is ruling the market of faith for the longest time. Faith helps people to get over many difficult situations and offers some answers to many of their questions. Whether these answers are true or false, logical or illogical is not a matter of concern for all those who put all their faith in those answers. So it seems that this phenomenon called 'faith' can do wonders in some cases. We can see many people doing admirable social work or philanthropic work inspired by their faith. This is all good and desirable side of faith, but at the same time we can also see people killing innocents in the name of their faith. This is another extreme where people are so blinded by their faith that they don't hesitate to engage in heinous and gruesome acts.

Why do people react so differently while following the same faith? Why some are extremely kind and some extremely violent, but they both claim to have faith in the same ideology? What makes some perform extreme noble acts and some take the path of gruesome violence while claiming to follow the same faith? One can only say that maybe the problem lies in the inherent blindness associated with faith. Any product used without knowing about all its effects and side effects is bound to produce undesirable side effects. Some of its side effects can be bad or even fatal and this is the main reason why blind faith in holy books or religions produces such an extreme response exposing the good as well as bad side of the human behavior. Someone might argue that faith is always blind, as whenever people put their faith in something they generally don't question it. Maybe this was true in the past but in today's world we are trained to question everything, and we should question as many things as possible, including our faith. Questioning is the only way to move forward, inquiry is the first step in the direction of solving any puzzle or problem, no matter how complicated it is. If any faith or discipline forbids questioning beyond a certain point, then it means that it doesn't have answers to those questions, and the worst part is, it doesn't even want to seek answers to those questions. This attitude is the main reason for the inherent blindness associated with faith. Any discipline or religion that can allow questioning can cultivate what I call a 'rational or logical faith,' which is exactly the opposite of 'blind faith.' The difference between 'rational faith' and 'blind faith' is that in one case people believe in something by recognizing the fact that their beliefs can be questioned, and challenged and there can be some problems associated with that which they should try to resolve. This system is much less dangerous than the system which commands 'blind faith' in anything.

I don't have to go into more detail to describe the problems we are facing today because of blind faith in today's world, issue of terrorism is just one of them. Many of these problems can be resolved or at least their impact can be minimized if people from the same 'faith system' take the initiative to reform their faith to stop such a blatant misuse of their faith. Emotions like faith are here to stay, as humans we cannot get rid of these things as they play the role of support system for many, but we all can definitely work to make these things better and I think the time has come where we all need to challenge the system of 'blind faith,' no matter which discipline or which religion. We need to challenge it as misuse of this system has the potential to harm entire humanity.

Thanks for reading and please share your views on this topic.

[Copyright: Vinay Thakur. Please contact the author for re-posting or publishing]

Friday, May 13, 2016

Indira Gandhi - an intriguing personality

I have been always curious about the life of India's third prime minister Mrs. Indira Gandhi. She became prime minister for the first time after the death of the second prime minister Mr. Lal Bahadur Shastri in 1966. She held that position until 1977 and then again from 1980 to 1984 until she was assassinated by her own bodyguards. I read her biography written by her friend Mrs. Pupul Jaykar, a long time back and recently I finished reading another book about her by Katherine Frank. There is no doubt that anyone who reads about the life of such an intriguing personality will be overwhelmed by the series of events such people go through during their lives, and I am no exception to this. Mrs. Jaykar's account is somewhat biased because of her close association with Mrs. Gandhi as a friend, but still, it has lots of useful information that only a close confidant can tell about her, but she is very sympathetic towards most of her acts, good or bad. I suggest reading Katherine's book to anyone who wants to read a somewhat unbiased account of Mrs. Gandhi. I am sure people can find fault with this book also but it is relatively unbiased compared to other books on the same subjectabout her.

My first traceable memory of Indira Gandhi is the incident when I heard the news about her assassination. It was way back in 1984 when there were no 24-hour news channels, cell phones, or social media. One of my friends told me that someone killed Indira Gandhi, maybe someone from his family heard it on the radio and told him about it. But I didn't believe him, I ridiculed that guy and said to him that it was Mahatma Gandhi who was assassinated, that too long back not Indira so he must have confused the names, but I was wrong. By evening it was clear that Indira Gandhi was killed by her own bodyguards. That time I did not know about her impact on Indian politics or anything about what resulted in the tragic end of her life. When I started reading about her, I came to know various aspects of her political and personal life. I never appreciated her socialist economic policies. I still feel that the nationalization of all major industries like banking, steel, and cloth was a horrible idea. I feel that 'license raj,' a term used to indicate excessive control of the government over the industrial sector via totally unnecessary rules and regulations hampered India's industrial progress tremendously. These policies were largely responsible for India's pathetic industrial and technological growth during that time. I guess everyone knows about her special love for Article 356 of the Indian constitution, which she used very freely for political purposes, the declaration of emergency was another decision that shows how she was comletely different politician than her father Mr. Jawaharlal Nehru. Actually, one can find such anomalies in the life of any powerful political leader, who has ruled any country for a considerable time and she is no exception to this. There is no doubt that she was a very powerful leader who wanted to have total control of her party and her government. As a woman, she must have faced many challenges and issues n Indian society and I think she discovered her own ways, of dealing with each of those issues. Whether those ways were right or wrong, is up to us to decide. There is lots of gossip and trash talk about her personal life, some of it might be true, but many of those things really don't matter much as far as Indira Gandhi, the politician,  is considered.

Whenever I try to discuss the impact of any political leader of her status in Indian politics, I find that most people talk based on information they receive from nonreliable resources. They go more by perceptions, they don't even bother to cross-check or confirm the information they receive. Very few really study the person they want to praise or criticize, and rarely there is an informed opinion. This is true for any leader of today's politics as well as for any past leader including leaders like Mahatma Gandhi. People go by their perceptions rather than trying to find facts, these perceptions are based on their region, religion, or party their family supports. This makes most discussions very futile and in the end, people end up arguing or abusing these people rather than trying to discuss and understand the person and their impact on India. I recommend readers who are interested in knowing about any person to read as much as possible about them. Try to read various accounts, positive and negative both to get the complete picture of that person. The life of Indira Gandhi was very interesting and her impact on Indian politics is huge, maybe more than her father Jawaharlal Nehru. If you want to understand her, please read as many books and articles as possible about her. I am intrigued by her personality, and even though I don't support many of her policies and actions, I cannot deny her impact on India and Indian political culture.

Thanks for reading and please share your views on this topic.

[Copyright: Vinay Thakur. Please contact the author for re-posting or publishing]

Friday, May 6, 2016

Left hand and right hand, which one is right?

I have seen very few left-handed people in India. Especially during my childhood, it was very rare to spot a left-handed person. But, when I came to the USA I was surprised to see so many left-handed people. This sharp difference made me look for some reasons behind it. Is it genetic or due to a different climate or there is some other reason? While looking for possible reasons, I realized that it has to do with culture and tradition more than anything else. In India left hand is considered as a 'wrong' hand and many parents force their kids to use their right hand the time they realize that their child is using the left hand, especially while eating or writing. This happens at a very young age when the child is still trying to learn to perform his or her tasks on their own. Because of this cultural dominance of right-handedness, many kids change their "wrong" way and switch to the "correct" way. The ultimate result: they start using their 'right' hand for eating and writing and hence they ultimately become right-handed. 

Now, slowly things are changing for good. Even in India parents are more tolerant towards their kids using whatever hand they prefer while eating or writing. However, this was not the case during my childhood, this is why I think I didn't see many left-handed people around me. During my son's first India visit since he started eating on his own, when my mom saw him eating with his left hand she was really shocked. She blamed me that as a parent, I didn't make any efforts to correct this fault of his. She was worried about him using his 'wrong' hand to do pious tasks like eating, writing, or performing some religious rituals. My mom is not the only one who thinks like this, most people of her generation think like this and still, many people believe in these types of traditions. Most of them are fine with a person being a leftie in sports, rather lefties get special attention in popular sports like cricket in India, but if the same person uses his or her left hand while eating then the reactions are totally different.

I am completely opposed to this notion of right being a "right hand" and left being a "wrong hand." It should be the choice of an individual to decide which hand they want to use as their dominant hand. There is nothing right or wrong in this, it really doesn't matter. I am glad that slowly people are trying to understand this simple fact, but still, it is not acceptable to use the left hand during religious rituals. Priests often try to force a person performing the ritual to use their right hand and many oblige to this order just to avoid any confrontation or they somehow think that using their left hand is the wrong thing to do. I am sure this happens because of brainwashing since early childhood. I feel left-handed people should stick to their guns during religious ceremonies also, let these priests understand that there is nothing wrong in using the left hand, let others understand that there is nothing wrong in being a leftie, and one hand is not more pious than the other, both are equal. I know this is not easy, it might result in some struggle, also it might create some unpleasant situations or arguments, but someone needs to take the stand so that others don't suffer the same discomfort and humiliation. It will be interesting to see how my son reacts when he is told to use his right hand during some religious ritual. I am interested in knowing about the experiences of left-handed people who feel they got discriminated against or treated differently just because they use their left hand. We need to correct this bias, it is not that serious, but still, it is a bias and we must correct it.

Thanks for reading and please share your views on this topic.

[Copyright: Vinay Thakur. Please contact the author for re-posting or publishing]