Category: X.T.M

The Dalai Lama is right-

X.T.M · June 28, 2019 · No comments

The Dalai Lama has come under some flack for claiming that his successor has to be attractive.

I know that aestheticism is deeply prized in the Buddhist texts and even in the “Kathmandu goddesses.”

This idea that ugliness is a virtue and is correlated with BAME is profoundly pernicious.

A few good examples are:

please note I’m loving the representation of black and disabled people but I would also like to see Black Beauty really underscored as well instead of in a tokenistic manner.

Continue reading The Dalai Lama is right-

Markian asexualising Colored women?

X.T.M · June 28, 2019 · 2 comments

I’ll start this piece with an observation- I follow this chap on Facebook and have noticed something rather odd (subliminal) about his videos. I first came across his viral video on what it’s like to have an Indian girlfriend.

https://www.facebook.com/markianb/

Whenever he needs a platonic girl friend she’s usually black or brown. Whenever it’s a girl or romantic interest she’s blonde (unless it’s a video about specifically having an ethnic girlfriend).

The default romantic interest is blonde while a black(ish) woman is the *friend.* I’m assuming Markian has some sort of Armenian ancestry. Continue reading Markian asexualising Colored women?

Good luck Pakistan-

X.T.M · June 26, 2019 · 40 comments

Ordinarily I’m stuck between three teams, England (I don’t like failing the Tebbit Test), India (Vidhi) & Pakistan (apni Qaum).

So I don’t want to say anything to jinx Pakistan but I play pool the way Pakistan plays cricket, erratically with flashes of brilliance.

The Rise of the Quarter-breeds in Bollywood

X.T.M · June 25, 2019 · 26 comments

We saw Kabir Singh over the weekend and while I had issues with the film; I enjoyed it.

I had known of Kiara Advani (the lead actress playing a demure Punjabi girl) but I had just assumed she was another Sindhi (Brahmin) girl.

I was surprised to look at her profile and see that she’s half Muslim but that the Muslim half is mixed in with some European.

So essentially like the Kapoor sisters; Alia Bhatt (Vidhi was telling me that she’s Muslim because her nana is Razdan loll) and now Kiara, there is a trend of starlets having a hidden European maternal grandmother (lets not even start with Katrina Kaif).

They have the Indian surname, upbringing and Hindi but also get that “look enhancement” from the European infusion. I’m using that controversial term because that is the Indian beauty standards; sharp features with a fair skin and dark hair/eyes.

Pakistan girls will usually push the envelope and lighten their hair, if they can pull it off. Though I find the Pakistani aesthetic standard to be sometimes a bit too fake for my own tastes.

Intriguingly enough this aesthetic appeal was probably fixed during the Mughal-Muslim period since its not a European ideal. It also doesn’t feel that pre-Muslim India’s aesthetic ideal was similar but then in the Indian Numismatics podcast I was told India’s only imports were wine & (fair) women..

The irony is that the Western perception of Desi beauty is more along the lines of Freida Pinto; softer features with duskier skin.

Happy birthday to Hollywood’s most fabulous Brown Star; Mindy Kaling. She’s an amazing role model on so many levels and as I tell all my +35 single Desi female friends, just go to the sperm bank and get a tall Dane to be your baby-daddy.

Of course my own hypocrisy knows no bounds since my social media coup; I’ve erased all the previous Brown symbols (Kal Penn / Mergagh Man) and replaced it with Kiara Advani, Mughal Princesses & the Hum Safar cast(e).

When White Men rule the roost; there are no need for Rules.

X.T.M · June 25, 2019 · 3 comments

I was rifling through the obit of an Oxbridge Historian. What jumped out at me:

With a good degree in the subject, he embarked on a PhD on the Austro-Hungarian army before 1914, though never completed it, and gained a reputation for brilliance sufficient, along with his linguistic abilities, to obtain a research fellowship at Caius in 1965, and two years later an assistant lectureship in Russian history, moving to Jesus College in 1971 as director of studies in history.

I was shocked at reading this because a PhD is a pre-requisite to any academic research path. I mentioned this to Vidhi and she glibly replied back that when it was all white men, there wasn’t really a need for rule enforcement.

It articulated something that I had felt but not been able to voice heretofore. The role of white people constantly acting as gatekeepers and rule-enforcers in my interactions in Britain.

The sanctimoniousness with which I’ve been lectured, always subtle never overt, is something that I’ve internalised over the years.

The identity crisis in the West is marked by the fact that the older generation is one race while the younger generation is mixed with another (and the generation after that is even more tilted). The reflexive reaction of the Establishment is now to make sure that those who take on the mantle must know the law if they will not imbibe in the customs in their Oriental homes.

humblebragging History-

X.T.M · June 24, 2019 · 14 comments

https://twitter.com/dipaah/status/1143017900925759488

I’m really glad to know that the Greeks (read white people) were responsible for the Ramayan. That’s a huge weight off my mind.

The author apologised in the following tweets but I’m posting it that we may remember. There is a very subtle historical bias that constantly pumps up the Greco-Romans at the expense of other civilisations. It’s a way to justify not only colonialism and a linkage that there has always been something exceptional (and outward looking) about Western Civ.

BP Episode 50: South Asian Subnationalism with Prof. Majeed

X.T.M · June 24, 2019 · 5 comments

Another BP Podcast is up. You can listen on Libsyn, iTunes, Spotify,  and Stitcher. Probably the easiest way to keep up the podcast since we don’t have a regular schedule is to subscribe at one of the links above.

Professor Majeed and Xerxes discuss linguistic sub-nationalism and the all important Grierson survey in establishing it.

As many viewers will probably notice that many of my interest veer towards language politics (episode 49). Professor Majeed was very forthcoming and gave the background to how linguistic regionalism began to soon complement the intense communalism in pre-independence India.

Many Punditeers usually suggest that x & x language will die out (Telugu, Kannada, Tamil etc), which is hyperbolic.

Languages in India are very healthy

As Daniyal Shoaib said in Episode 49 even Bhojpuri, Mathili and Braj are very healthy. The point of linguistic states is that language survival is pretty much guaranteed but in a Hinglish milieu will there be sufficient language sophistication.

It remains to be seen how much of North India will reconfigure linguistically but the great victory of the Sikhs has been to ensure that Punjabi is a very vigorous and influential language in India, in a way that it is not in Pakistan (though having nearly 3x the speakers there if one includes Saraki & Hindko).

Saraki is probably going to be the biggest transformation of the Pakistani polity- I can’t imagine a separate Saraikistan agreeing to keep Urdu as the provincial language in the same way Punjab, KPK and Baluchistan (all of which are diverse states) have done.

The languages that are threatened are Sindhi in India (Sindhi in Pakistan is the most vigorous linguistic sub-nationalism in South Asia, on par with Tamil), Kashmiri (Urdu has supplanted it for generations) and other minority tongues that are stateless (maybe Tulu and so on). The Adivasis languages are under threat by other state languages as their populations being to mainstream to regional (as opposed to national culture).

Continue reading BP Episode 50: South Asian Subnationalism with Prof. Majeed

weight loss 101

X.T.M · June 23, 2019 · 17 comments

LV was saying instead of always writing at BP on random topics; I should be offering my services (pro bono) on weight loss and weight lifting.

https://www.facebook.com/32040/posts/10107759967235251?s=32040&sfns=mo

My Six Pack Journey — How I went from Fat to Ripped in 6 months

The author went from 87kg to 65kg. Roughly my height and weight but I started with much more muscle (at 89kg I was still a waist size 34).

I plan for 68.5kg to be my “death weight” so the idea is come what may I’ll stick to that.

I am relying on red meat however as I love it so much (it’s my crutch). A George Foreman grill cooks meat in 5 minutes flat and pair it off with a salad. I don’t put any oil on the meat but I probably should.

Apparently Protein is the most satiating nutrient so I tend to front-load my nutrition first thing in the morning.

I will rebalance my diet once I hit my weight metrics for more sustainability but I have the advantage that I have a somewhat “iron constitution” and I am not “taste-sensitive.”

I also use the mental trick of filling up my fridge and freezer with groceries. Since I have a pathological aversion to wasting any food, it stops me from going out to eat.

My problem is that I am a fast eater; I don’t chew as much as I want to so mindfulness is important in that area.

Apps I use:

Noom (Fitness Pal with Psychology)

Fitbod (for weight lifting)

Peak (for brain training)

Things I Do:

OMAD (one meal a day): I try to limit myself to 1.5kg a week of weight loss (so technically on Tuesday the 25th of June I should be 75.9kg instead of 79.9kg according to my timeline) so I use OMAD to nudge myself downward when I need.

IF (intermittent fasting): I used to do this 8/9yrs ago but I’m sort of building this up. I do find not eating does give a rest to the body.

The fear that if one *starves* the body goes into metabolic shutdown/slowdown seems a bit overrated. A Cambridge Prof, who runs some of the nation’s largest diabetes studies, was telling me that there were two Lancet published studies on the utility of a low calorie diet.

The key in an weight loss is long term sustainability.

It’s not always Racism

X.T.M · June 22, 2019 · 4 comments

A few trends emerged over this week’s. This is separate to MJ’s powerful post, which is about a different framework altogether.

(1.) people are quick to blame racism for everything. In an age of no discrimination; people are going to select on intelligence, beauty and other such features.

(2.) BAME is rapidly being tagged with LGBT.

(3.) BAME runs the risk of being physically unattractive since anything goes.

(4.) White people are even prominent in BAME space so in a lot ways these new identities are more about attention for newer types of elite.

(5.) Elitism may not be about race but class and other selecting factors.

(6.) Utopian conversations is about a world “without an elite” are bs. We should rather have honest conversations about what the elite should be and to what extent should they be in control.

(7.) ego-trips are a thing in idealistic politics and being self-aware is important (thankfully I have V to keep me in check constantly).

(8.) Much like the Jews in the era of civil rights; Dharmic (model) minorities in the West are rapidly gaining control of the anti-establishment narrative in order to colorise the elite. It’s questionable once this batch of Indians, Chinese and other Asians are fully WASPified whether they will retain their sympathies for the next wave of coloured aspirants.

(9.) the contentions that White people and the West are hide-bound racists elides the narratives that we all have a “home back home.” The question as to why none of us want to resettle East is complex (colonialism ruined our countries, material and social opportunity in the West) but it’s a painful contradiction.

(10.) unlike the Aframs, Aboriginals and Native Americans; the West has very few “involuntary minorities.” So any criticism of the West have to tread a fine line and negotiation (hence why I’m suspect of immigrants who join anti-establishment parties).

White Privilege & Protesting

X.T.M · June 21, 2019 · 2 comments

Continue reading White Privilege & Protesting

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