When myth becomes reality

Razib Khan · November 26, 2018 · 32 comments


Netflix now has Arjun: The Warrior Prince on its stream. I watched most of it to get a feel for some of the details of the story. I know the general outline of the Mahabharata, but I know the Bible or the Iliad far better (in case you can’t be bothered to follow the link, it’s only a small part of Arjun’s early life).

Depending on the sources you trust, the events of the Mahabharata date to around ~1000 BC. They were probably refined at a later date, perhaps around 500 years later.

I watched a fair amount of Arjun: The Warrior Prince. In some ways, it reminded me a lot of the Iliad and the Odyssey. These two works are a melange of influences and time periods, synthesizing true recollections of the large polities with highly stratified social systems and literacy of the Bronze Age, with the simple chiefdoms of the Dark Age Greece. The issue is disentangling the different periods.

One assumes the same is true of the Mahabharata and Ramayana.

The “wild card” here is that the most recent work has now likely confirmed the arrival of agro-pastoralists from the steppe in the period between 1500 and 1000 BC. By the time the historical analogs of the Pandavas were settled in the Gangetic plain, they’d likely been there for many centuries.

Questions for the genetics of India podcast….

Razib Khan · November 25, 2018 · 76 comments

Zach, Omar, and myself will do a podcast on Indian genetics next week. I already did one on this topic for my main podcast, so I’m curious what readers of this weblog want to hear about. We can’t guarantee we’ll use the questions, but it’s possible. I think the format will mostly involve Zach and Omar leading the conversation and I’ll try to talk as fast and concisely as possible.

Also, we got our first review on iTunes. Would still like to get some on Stitcher. And in case people want to hear more from me, I was a guest on the Two for Tea podcast. My episode should drop in the next day or so.

Pakistani potluck with a dash of politics

X.T.M · November 24, 2018 · 12 comments

Last night V & I hosted Pakistani potluck. It turned out to be a rather intimate affair with a few Pakistani friends of ours. After the last few weeks of intense Indian & Kashmiri events I thought it would be nice to have a light-hearted evening of biryani, nihari and haleem especially before we go meat-free at home.

As an aside I’ve begun to believe that the meat consumption we are having is simply far in excess of our hunter-gatherer ancestors. Industrial farming is a blight and my hack is simply to eat meat outside of the home.

Toward the end of the evening the talk drifted towards politics and V mentioned some of her opinions about Pakistan. It rapidly became a bit more intense since at the root of it V has deep misgivings about the Pakistani state. Her contention is that all Indians, of whatever hue, couldn’t forgive Pakistan for what happened on 26-11 and that in a way it was India’s 9-11. Continue reading Pakistani potluck with a dash of politics

White people will still define the non-white age..

X.T.M · November 24, 2018 · 15 comments

After the jump is a thread on the brief history of the North Sentinelese by “Respectable Lawyer.” This thread appeared in my Moments Page. His bio reads as “Anti-corporate pirate who gains access to courthouses with foolproof cosplay of a Respectable White Lawyer.”

There are three actors in this recent Missionary saga:

(1.) The (part) Chinese American missionary, John Allen Chau, who is technically a PoC.

(2.) The Sentinelese themselves who are the pristine natives.

(3.) The Indian government, which is not Western.

Essentially in a rather amusing way it involves the three great non-white colours of mankind (black, brown and yellow). Also to make the matter even more tantalising when we think “remote Indian tribes” we don’t usually think of India but rather Native American or Amerindian peoples. So the story involves Christianity, missionaries, colonialism and native people trying to fight back; a real life Desi version of Avatar.

https://twitter.com/kaeshour/status/1065545714485403648?s=20

Also when the NY Times did profile an Indian anthropologist (with the helpful name T.N Pandit), they had to throw in these lovely lines (cue eye-roll for helpful mention of caste and colour):

Mr. Pandit, the pale-skinned son of a Kashmiri professor, reaches to pass a coconut to a group of naked, dark-skinned young men who have waded waist-deep in water to greet him. He sits companionably beside a dark-skinned young woman, whose hand rests casually on his thigh. Film shot in 1974 shows him — a reserved Brahmin — dancing exuberantly with a bare-breasted Jarawa woman.

Continue reading White people will still define the non-white age..

Why China will be the Greatest Power in Asia-

X.T.M · November 22, 2018 · 26 comments

It’s using “woke SJWism” to punish Dolce & Gabana. Shanghai was meant to be their biggest fashion show in 35 years.

The ads were racist (a Chinese model struggling with pasta) and China is now making full use of that faux-pas to drive in a lesson in National Honour. As one e-retailer said “the Motherland is more important than anything else.”

I don’t know what to make of the article below.

https://www.facebook.com/551630878316505/posts/1646998772113038/

The Abrahamicisation of Hinduism is one thing but is it worth projecting those values? I know that copulating deities are on temple walls so I’m just asking how do Hindu deities need to be treated.

A funny story last night; V asked me if I knew what the Shiva Lingam was. Apparently she had just found out what it actually was since she had been told throughout Hindu school that it was one of Shiva “limbs.” The Victorian legacy in India is fascinating to observe.

Also this moved me greatly:

Aasia Bibi case comes full circle (part 2)

AbdulMajeed Abid · November 22, 2018 · 5 comments

I showed up at the Institute of Peace and Secular Studies (IPSS) a few days after the rally. The person who had called the meeting was running late so I just loitered around. It was a two-room apartment that had been modified into a makeshift office space with some spare area for sitting, with floor cushions etc. There was a book rack full of books in one corner. The lady who managed the place was present there and said Hello. A few minutes after I had arrived, two boys a few years younger than me showed up as well. We started chit-chatting and it turned out that one of them was a student at LUMS and the other went to another private school. We were talking about democracy when they revealed that they were not in favor of democracy at all and then spent the next hour arguing why they thought so. They were under the influence of Hizb-ut-Tehrir, an Islamist organization that wanted to establish a caliphate. I tried to argue with them using rationality and logic but they were not willing to listen to a counter-argument and eventually stormed off. I discovered that IPSS was offering a short course in Political Economy and History and all I had to pay for was a copy of their syllabus.

Salmaan Taseer (ST) was a larger than life person. He grew up in a literary family, with his father passing away at an early age but the familial ties and his family’s social standing in the Lahori society gave him a footing in the tightly-knit hierarchy of Lahore’s elite circles. He was an active member of the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) during its heyday, starting in 1968 and through Zulfikar Ali Bhutto’s rule (1972-77). After Mr. Bhutto was hanged (1979) and PPP was under threat by Dictator Zia’s government, ST wrote a biography of Mr. Bhutto. I attended a talk by one of the fact checkers on ST’s book (at the cafe, Books n Beans, a small liberal enclave for such events) and she remembered how hard she had to work to meet ST’s standards. ST was instrumental in arranging for Benazir Bhutto’s arrival in Lahore in 1986 and the grand reception that ensued. He was elected in the PPP wave that swept most of Pakistan during the 1988 elections. He didn’t win another election in during the rest of his political life. However, he was considered PPP’s man in Lahore, someone who could take on the Sharif’s of PML(N). ST started an English daily in the early 2000s, called Daily Times (DT) which started with much fanfare and even had an Urdu counterpart. Continue reading Aasia Bibi case comes full circle (part 2)

RIP Fahmida Riaz

Omar Ali · November 21, 2018 · 15 comments

The poet and scholar Fahmida Riaz passed away today. She was known for her fearlessness and her willingness to call a spade a spade and she suffered for it (including an Indian exile during the Zia regime).

Here is Hasan Mujtaba’s poetic tribute to her:

سربکف سارے ستارے مشعلیں
اس کی آنکھوں میں جلوسوں کی طرح چل رہے تھے
جل رہے تھے جام سورج کی طرح سارے اسکے نام پر
اجرکوں کے رنگ سارے اسکی آنکھوں سے چراکر
تتلیاں لیکر اڑیں
دیس دیس دور دور
بچے اپنے ہاتھ مائوں سے چھپاتے پھر رہے تھے
رتجگوں میں بھکشوئوں کی ریت تھی
جیت تھی اسکے ماتھے پر لکھی
تاریخ کی خونی گلی میں
رات وہ مجھ کو ملی۔

Translation:

Severed head in hand

All the stars were like lamps marching in procession in her eyes

In her name, the wine-cups were circulating like the sun

Taking all the colors of the (Sindhi) Ajrak from her eyes

The butterflies took wing

From land to land and country to country

Children are hiding their hands from their mothers

All-nighters and the rites of bhikshus

Victory was written on her forehead

as in the blood soaked alleys of history

She met me..

Her poem Aqlima was translated by Ruchira Paul

Aklima
jo Habil aur Kabil ki maa jaani hai
maa jaani,
magar muqtalif
muqtalif beech raano ke
aur pistanon ki ubhaar mein
aur apne pait ke andar
aur kokh mein
is sab ki kismet kyun hai
ek farba bher ke bachche ki qurbani
woh apne badan ki qaidi
taptee hui dhoop mein jalte
teele par khadi hui hai
patthar par naksh banee hai
us naksh ko ghaur se dekho
lambee raano se upar
ubharte pistanon se upar
paicheeda kokh se upar
Aklima ka sar bhi hai
Allah kabhi Aklima se qalam karain
aur kuchh puchhain.

(Translation)
Aqlima..
Born of the same mother as Abel and Cain
Born of the same mother but different
Different between her thighs
Different in the swell of her breasts
Different inside her stomach
And her womb too
Why is the fate of her body
Like that of a well fed sacrificial lamb
She, a prisoner of that body
See her standing in the scorching sun on a smoldering hill
Casting a shadow that burns itself into the stones
Look at that shadow closely
Above the long thighs
Above the swelling breasts
Above the coils in her womb
Aklima also has a head
Let Allah have a conversation with Aklima
And ask her a few questions.
(Aklima was the lesser known offspring of Adam and Eve, the sister or Cain and Abel)

RIP.

 

Proud of Pakistan-

X.T.M · November 21, 2018 · 6 comments

https://twitter.com/khurram_dogar/status/1064797206023204864?s=21

I’ve been pretty upset with Pakistan because of Asia Bibi however this important news gives me hope for the Homeland.

The picture below (stolen off Omar’s feed) gives me hope about India’s Muslims.

These symbols are important since they signal society’s direction.

I will be honest I feel Indians & Hindus are forced to be far more liberal and enlightened than what their current Socio-economic level whereas Pakistanis are similarly forced to be much more conservative given their basic Indic Cultural orientation. Both will have much to learn and give one another if ever see an Anchsluss (since our Brave Pandit has started using Nazi analogies).

Sting of a WASP

X.T.M · November 21, 2018 · 29 comments

Late Addition:

https://twitter.com/vivekster/status/1065294025542926337?s=21

In the podcast Razib touched on Indian-American SJWs who he found offensive (I hope I’m not mixing or misquoting him). I am just shocked by the above tweet!

I am pro-Dalit and I stand with them. However India must not be humiliated by the West and follow China’s example.

The future doesn’t look good for India’s upper castes; they’ve migrated, intermarried or are barren.

The irony is that only the Parsis are allowed to “complain” or do something about their demographic survival.

But the same thing that’s happening to the Parsis is also happening to Kashmiri Pandits (my Pandit friend is one of 6 cousins who are in their 30/40’s and have two children between them), Sindhis and I’m sure other castes.

This constant vilification of the Upper Castes isn’t going to help India. It will make the UCs morph into the Western paradigm where UCs will split into the traditional conservatives and “woke whites.”

Yes there is something called noblesse oblige and the Indian elite have spectacularly failed in discharging it. However the new “check your privilege” is a hideous mutation of this ancient and aristocratic concept much as the current Lefty moral paranoia is simply neo-Puritanism.

As I said in the podcast Islam, Pakistan and Muslims attending not threats to India in a substantive manner. The India media has frothed over the mouth over the wrong enemy but the Hindu progressives have allied with colonial powers since the first British Invasion.

Yes caste, Sati and untouchability are all wrong but Hinduism would and could have corrected on it in its own right. Islam does many things badly but Muslims are embarking on an internal reformation. It may not work out but it’s worth a try.

An even better example are the Chinese; they’ve collectively fingered the world not only with prosperity but cohesiveness. Pakistan is now a satrapy of China at bargain bucket prices (Pakistan has clamped down on any meaningful debate on CPEC while staying Mum on the burning Uighur question).

India has to maintain her cohesiveness and I fear the external interference of Caste Wars will bring about another 2/3 centuries of ignominy. Power never relinquishes itself peacefully; we only became free because Britain & the West exhausted itself and its moral credibility in WW2 (the Elder Gods plunges themselves into Raganorak).

Brown Pundits