Is Erdogan the Turkish Modi?

X.T.M Ā· June 26, 2018 Ā· 40 comments

Erdogan has consolidated his power in yesterday’s election. This post was sparked by a Facebook friend’s (Indian Muslim) comment “why do Muslims in India hate Modi but love Erdogan.” Shashi provides some context here:

Comparisons are generally invidious, especially when they involve political leaders from different countries. But, while Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan rose to power 11 years before Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, there is much about their personal and professional trajectories that makes comparison irresistible.

Both Erdogan and Modi come from humble, small-town backgrounds: Erdogan sold lemonade and pastries in the streets of Rize; Modi helped his father and brother run a tea stall on a railway platform in Vadnagar. They are self-made men, energetic and physically fit ā€“ Erdogan was a professional soccer player before becoming a politician; Modi has bragged about his 56-inch (142-centimeter) chest ā€“ not to mention effective orators.

Both Erdogan and Modi were raised with religious convictions that ultimately shaped their political careers. Erdoganā€™s Justice and Development Party (AKP) and Modiā€™s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) have both promoted a religiously infused, nationalist creed that they argue is more authentic than the Western-inspired secular ideologies that previously guided their countriesā€™ development.

History has definitely not come to an end; Turkey and India (Israel/Hungary) seem to be on the vanguage of nationalistic revivals. Thankfully none of these countries border each other.

Related:Ā Modi believed Vajpayeeā€™s wooing of Muslims in 2004 was a fruitless exercise

Ps: All comments welcome except abusive or overwrought ones. Tone and tenor of any conversation (on my posts at least) must be calm and measured.

Africaā€™s only Hindu island

X.T.M Ā· June 26, 2018 Ā· 127 comments

https://www.facebook.com/drewbinsky/videos/1792525924117662/

I’m pretty sure that Mauritius is a secular democracy but it is 52% Hindu.

As an aside it would be interesting to study the evolution of Hindu island diaspora culture around the world (Suriname, Guiana, Fiji, Mauritius etc).

There doesn’t seem to have been much Brahmin migration and it was mainly done by farmers/labourers. The early 20th century into East Africa seems to have had much Gujarati merchant castes but if memory serves me right they also served as labourers for the railways so it’s all a bit complicated and understudied.

Disregarding the Out of India migration theory (but there must have been a pulse with the Mitanni in the Levant); India has periodically pushed out waves of migrants to spread its culture, script and religion. To my mind though the only Hindu society, outside of core South Asia, to have a strong Brahmin presence is Bali.

It’s brings a further observation is that can Vedic and Hindu be separated. The reason I suggest this is that the Hinduicisation of South India seems to have primarily mediated by Brahmin migrants from the north. They seem to have found local hierarchies and adapted it to the caste system (the Reddys seem to be indigenous Dravidians).

I’m still unclear what the original nucleus of Hindu society would have been. After the collapse of the IVC culture it seems that Indian/Hindu civilisation (I’m treating them as equivalent since we are talking about BC) was continually shifting towards Haryana than Western UP and then Bihar. It’s only the Islamic incursions in first millennia AD that shifted it back towards Delhi and plugged India back into the Turkic network.

Of course the Buddhist interruption can’t be ignored but the role of Brahmins in the coherence of Hindu civilisation simply can’t be ignored. What is interest is that all the Hindu islands sans Brahmins seem to become very relaxed creole island cultures that resemble Sri Lanka. All of sudden the pulsating sensuality and tropical sexuality that is so repressed in North India/Pakistan emerges and the hidden matriarchy also peaks through.

Much as the Muslim invaders were very obviously symbols of patriarchy and a stern nomadic culture; its not unreasonable to supposed that the Aryans represented much of the same stream and applied that to a relatively relaxed pagan Dravidian/AASI South Asia. It would make sense that Indra, a masculine thunder god, is Aryan but Lingala worship is an indigenous feature.

The model we would be looking at is Mother Goddess worshipping AASI with naturistic pagan beliefs being coopted by Dravidian farmers. It would be a classic case of farmers and hunter gatherers coexisting in the same spaces; most of the farmer culture and genes winning out over the generations. Then come the Aryans with their migration/invasion but progressively Sanskritise the rest of South Asia with a much more masculine pantheon.

A question comes to mind that if Malaysia/Indonesia had a strong and resilient Brahmin network, would they have become Muslim? Had the spread of Buddhism undermined Brahminism as it seems to have done in the northern Punjab/Bengal peripheries of the Subcontinent.

Ps: Smart comments welcome (as in the Climate Change thread) – I’m simply speculating. I’ll delete anything overwrought; everyone featured in this post (except the Mauritians) are long gone.

Why Climate Change is a cult-

X.T.M Ā· June 24, 2018 Ā· 30 comments

I really enjoy the tweets from the Aerogram since they provide well-curated content. However this third-party article on Monsoon dispersion of pollution is simply rife with generalities and polemicism, high by even BP’s well-worn standards.

The article starts off on a fascinating note:

As South Asia burns fossil fuels, researchers from Germany say the clockwise-spinning storm pulls the emissions high into the troposphere. There, lightning-fueled chemical reactions transform the pollutants into more stable forms, which fall to earth as harmless rain.

A paen to Mother India cleaning up after her messy spawn. However before we could take any consolation in the good news:

By combining these measurements with computer models of air circulation, the researchers tracked the path of the contaminants and how they changed as they reached higher altitudes.

As expected, at lower altitudes, the South Asian monsoon did disperse pollutants over a wide region, including distant areas like Tibet. However, the scientists also found that the monsoon pulled the polluted air from the atmosphere into the much higher troposphere, where with the assistance of the stormā€™s lightning, it reacted with other gases, and could be washed out by the rain.

Note they use simulated models to track the pollutants so in a way this isn’t verified or empirical based science. It would have been good to actually validate pollution levels in places like Tibet etc. And then for the final piece de resistance:

Unfortunately, Lelieveld told VOA, ā€œthe monsoon is weakening, which can reduce the cleaning mechanism. We also believe that the air pollution contributes to a weakening of the monsoon.ā€ He added, ā€œIntuitively, if the monsoon weakens, the pollution will stay more near the ground rather than being transported upward.ā€

This is a comment that wouldn’t have even passed muster in our own threads. How do we know the Monsoon is weakening and how do know that air pollution is weakening the Monsoon.

I do think it’s fairly straightforward and uncontroversial to state that we should pollute less but it’s increasingly evident that anthropogenic pollution isn’t as clear-cut a topic as we think it is. The Earth does seem to have some feedback mechanisms and it’s also worth reflect if the human scale of pollution can match natural events (like a volcano eruption etc).

We live in a liberal-defined shibboleth and these new orthodoxies are sometimes even more pernicious than the ones of yore since these are draped in the values and ideals of the enlightenment. Please note I’m not necessarily espousing one view over the other but we as learnt in BP; argument from authority (experts) is a logical fallacy and the article above reeks of it.

Midnight’s Descendants: A History of South Asia since Partition

Razib Khan Ā· June 23, 2018 Ā· 2 comments

I recently read John Keay’s Midnight’s Descendants: A History of South Asia since Partition. Like his earlier books on the history of India and China, this is a work written by a journalist, not an area specialist (though Keay seems to take a particular interest in South Asia judging by his oeuvre).

To be frank I’m not sure if I learned that much…and I don’t know much about South Asian history after 1945. But, it reaffirmed my intuitions that some of the ideologues who bandy extremely high casualty rates are doing a disservice to the real tragedies that have marred the subcontinent over the past century.

In any case, I do recommend this book to the 50% of the readers of this weblog who areĀ notĀ South Asian.

Note: I don’t have the time or interest to read Guha’s India After Gandhi. Also, my friend Reihan Salam has indicated to me it’s a more tendentious work than most are willing to admit.

Post Modernist attack against muslims, darkies, India, America and the world

AnAn Ā· June 22, 2018 Ā· 23 comments

IndiaĀ is ranked 136 (behind many tinpot dictatorships with no freedom of speech or freedom of press) by Reporters without Borders in theĀ Ā World Press Freedom Index.Ā US is ranked 43 (behind many countries with little freedom of press.) This is a post modernist hatchet job. The real criteria of ranking is how post modernist a country is and whether it conforms to post modernist politically correct thought police.

One reasonĀ IndiaĀ ranks so bad is becauseĀ IndiaĀ protects freedom of speech of muslims to some slight degree . . . which is unheard of in the modern world. By contrast, Nordic countries don’t protect the freedom of speech of muslims (through the guise of Orwellian rubrics such as hate speech), which is a major reason the Reporters without Borders ranks them so highly.

IndiaĀ is the only country in the world that has a TV programs on a national network (hosted by Tarek Fatah) where muslims openly discuss and critique the holy Koran. Including taboo topics such as the Korans burnt by Uthman, the version of the Koran that was created by Ali, and how Uthman and Aisha assembled the modern Koran. They also openly discuss the ordering of the Koran and the context of verses. Many episodes of this show had over 100 million viewers as muslims around the world eagerly watched. While many muslim Imams and muslims scholars are eager to discuss this in private, they say it is too dangerous to talk about in public. This is indescribably sad.Ā  šŸ™

IndiaĀ is a land of amazing freedom of thought and questioning, including on all the most controversial philosophical, existential, religious and spiritual topics.Ā  The most ancient eastern texts are about inquiry, questions, answers, conversation. The East for thousands of years was a beacon of freedom of art and thought which was exported to Europe during the European Enlightenment. The only other country in the world with similar freedom of thought to India I can think of is the US. Some say Israel is another example. While Israel might be, I don’t know enough about Israel to validate if this is true.

The UK and most of Europe lack freedom of thought (if it is politically incorrect) and as a matter of state policy do not protect the freedom of speech of European muslims. Europe is heavily controlled by post modernist thought police.

Canada has more freedom of press, speech, thought than Europe, but less thanĀ IndiaĀ or America:

Canadian Senator Grant Mitchel is clearly a very dangerous sectarian demagogue who supports Islamists against muslims. It is hard to exaggerate how Muslims around the world–especiallyĀ IndianĀ muslims or minority muslims or liberal/reform/secular/agnostic/atheist muslims–cringe in deep fear and horror at this clip. He tried this against Tarek Fatah–one of the most loved and respected muslims inĀ India, Pakistan and Canada. Tarek Fatah is one of the world’s greatest living Koranic and Islamic scholars.

Before every mosque service, there is a prayer in Arabic for the military victory of the faithful (or “real”) muslims against the nonmuslims and the minority (fake) muslims. Yes, this means twelvers, sixers, fivers, Ahmedis, Kurds, Sufis. The prayer doesn’t come from the Koran. Many muslims are well aware of this problem and want to remove the prayer . . . but they are afraid of getting killed (and their mosque blowing up) if they remove the prayer. This is what Senator Mitchel is talking about.

Freedom of thought and freedom of dialogue are everything for muslims. Reporters without Borders is opposed to muslims having freedom of thought and dialogue. Without freedom of thought, there cannot be dialogue between good muslims and Islamists. Without freedom of thought the fourteen century Islamic civil war that has killed over a 100 million muslims cannot end.

The post modernists are slowly taking over many very powerful global organizations such as the Southern Poverty Law CenterĀ (which until recently doubled as an anti muslim hate organization), Reporters without Borders,Ā Ā Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International to harm muslims and harm the world as a whole. Perhaps the world will finally begin to awaken to the global post modernist threat. They areĀ  no longer only targeting muslims, darkies and India, but are now attacking America too.

In May, U.N.Ā special rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights Philip AlstonĀ released a report sayingĀ the United States has the highest rates of youth poverty, infant mortality, incarceration, income inequality and obesity among all countries in the developed world, as well as 40 million people living in poverty. AlstonĀ accused President Trump and the Republican Congress ofĀ deepening poverty and inequality in the country, citing the Republican tax law passed last fall.

ā€œTheĀ policies pursued over the past year seem deliberately designed to remove basic protections from the poorest, punish those who are not in employment and make even basic health care into a privilege,ā€ Alston wrote in the report.

Alston is a post modernist with little economics understanding engaged in a clearly inaccurate piece of propaganda, [which might be elaborated on in future articles] much the way the UN has engaged in dangerous propaganda attacks against many darkie countries all over the world for decades. Post modernism was created as an imperialist attempt to oppress European colonies. They colonize the mind in an attempt to divide and conquer, and reduce self confidence to create inferiority complex. They try to discredit, negate and replace all ancient cultures, civilizations, values and religions with post modernism. And they do enormous damage to poor people all over the world. Articles at Brown Pundits related to post modernism and nonmuslims harming muslims include:

Some of the people resisting the global post modernist wave are collectively referred to by some as the intellectual dark web:

Why I don’t eat Pork

X.T.M Ā· June 21, 2018 Ā· 32 comments

https://www.facebook.com/nasdaily/videos/1065986840220134/

This is a really interesting video because Nas asks the question that why don’t secular Muslims eat pork.

It taps into the old Jesuit saying “give me a child till 7 and I will show you the man.” In fact it’s supposedly Aristotle who said it but the idea that initial childhood impressions form our adult views.

Back to the questions of Muslims & pork; it’s the ultimate shibboleth. Allegedly Quaid-e-Azam ate pork; I don’t really know if there is a good quality pork in the Subcontinent but perhaps it was different in the Raj.

In all religions there is that red line of apostasy. In Islam it is pork, in the Baha’i Faith it’s alcohol, for Hindus it’s beef and for Sikhs I guess it would be not wearing the turban?

To requote the late & great Anthony Bourdain in his first seminal article all the way back in 1999:

Like most other chefs I know, Iā€™m amused when I hear people object to pork on nonreligious grounds. ā€œSwine are filthy animals,ā€ they say. These people have obviously never visited a poultry farm. Chickenā€”Americaā€™s favorite foodā€”goes bad quickly; handled carelessly, it infects other foods with salmonella; and it bores the hell out of chefs. It occupies its ubiquitous place on menus as an option for customers who canā€™t decide what they want to eat. Most chefs believe that supermarket chickens in this country are slimy and tasteless compared with European varieties. Pork, on the other hand, is cool. Farmers stopped feeding garbage to pigs decades ago, and even if you eat pork rare youā€™re more likely to win the Lotto than to contract trichinosis. Pork tastes different, depending on what you do with it, but chicken always tastes like chicken.

Continue reading Why I don’t eat Pork

Sheryl Sandberg desi lookalike speaks out against Trump

X.T.M Ā· June 21, 2018 Ā· 3 comments

I was stirred by Rep. Jayapal’s evocative speech on the ongoing child separation crisis on the US border:

However what struck me as well is that her unique facial structure essentially makes her theĀ coloured doppelgƤnger of a rather well-known liberal billionairess and advocate.

Image result for sheryl sandberg

Rising global caste and tribalism

AnAn Ā· June 21, 2018 Ā· Comments Off on Rising global caste and tribalism

Related articles:

Should Amy Chua and Michael Shermer be added to the list of leaders for the Intellectual Dark Web? They discuss the rise in global tribalism (caste) and victimhood and how it is threatening the entire world. Amy Chua implies that the opposite to caste tribalism in global classical liberalism, which has not really caught on around the world. Most people who self identify with European enlightenment values unconsciously retain nationalism and many other forms of tribal (or caste or cultural) identity.

Amy Chua has written 5 books. Her first four were very well written. No doubt her fifth, which I haven’t read, is too.

What does everyone at Brown Pundits think is driving the dangerous surge in global identitarian caste tribalism? I think post modernism is the largest. Are there are other drivers too?

India Still Rising

AnAn Ā· June 20, 2018 Ā· Comments Off on India Still Rising

The Honorable former U.S. ambassador to India David C. Mulford’s summary of why India is rapidly becoming a great global superpower and why PM Modi might become the best PM in Indian history. My estimate is that India will have more billionaires than America in less than a generation. When this happens what is to stop post modernists from decrying “Asian supremacy”, Asian hegemony, Asian exploitation, Asian empire, Asian imperialism, Asian oppression, Asian racism/bigotry/ sectariansim? How to reduce jealousy of Asia? Or is this dark future inevitable?

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