Starker on 15/6/2024 at 02:30
Quote Posted by Subjective Effect
You do recognise that there's a significant amount of anti-semitic behaviour tied up in this, right? I've been against Israeli military action from the start but only because I knew civilians would be disproportionately harmed. I'm dying to see what happens after the war ends, which I hope is soon.
Of course there is anti-semitic behaviour, but at the same time there is anti-arab/anti-muslim behaviour as well. People have been harrassed because of their ethnicity/race and in extreme cases, it has even escalated into violence. For example, a while ago I remember a Palestinian child was stabbed to death in the US and Palestinian students have been shot at and injured.
And of course actual nazis gleefully jump into all this while hating both sides equally and escalating things wherever they can.
And the US in particular has a long history now where occasionally merely looking vaguely Middle-Eastern can get you killed -- such as Sikhs getting murdered for wearing a turban or Indians having been killed for being "Middle-Eastern".
Sulphur on 15/6/2024 at 03:07
In case you're completely oblivious to this fact, I live in India. Hindus are not a 'soft' target compared to Muslims, they're the majority population, so I don't how you managed to land that particular pratfall.
There's no 'fearmongering' about it, this has been the case for India during Mod's regime for the past 10 years. The (
https://www.indiatoday.in/elections/lok-sabha/story/modi-vote-jihad-congress-samajwadi-party-up-election-rally-bjp-2544077-2024-05-26) nationalistic and religious sentiment he's stoking is a very real thing, because it is, in the end, a weapons-grade political tool he knows he can wield. Every now and then, I read on the news that some Muslim's been arrested for possessing beef, or been lynched and killed for it. We've been witnessing policies designed to further marginalise minority populations - Muslims especially - over the past bunch of years. I've witnessed people get more openly hostile and bigoted towards Muslims and other minorities myself.
I also live in an area where I can hear the RSS train kids in the mornings with Hindutva slogans, and I talk to people on a regular basis who are blinded by his demagoguery because he's telling them what they want to hear, and there's promises of great financial prosperity for them via the BJP. None of this stuff is made-up fluff or hyperbole by news agencies. It's real, it's been happening, and it is happening.
SD on 15/6/2024 at 04:31
Some of those Hindus do seem a bit extreme. A lot of the more enthusiastic comments under the IDF Twitter account seem to come from Indians. You'll have relatively sober commentary on some military operation or other, and there'll be guys called Vijay and Kumar writing stuff like "Crush the insects" and "Finish them off!"
To be perfectly frank though, I don't think we in the West have much to fear from Hindus.
Sulphur on 15/6/2024 at 05:31
Nah, we'd be too busy imploding from our massive social contradictions first. India's not in any danger of screwing over its relationship with the west even if it's handshaking Russia in public. If there's anything to be afraid of, it's that Indian techs will be the only people who know how to work your IT infrastructure eventually.
PigLick on 15/6/2024 at 05:51
eventually?
Subjective Effect on 15/6/2024 at 06:12
Quote Posted by Sulphur
If there's anything to be afraid of, it's that Indian techs will be the only people who know how to work your IT infrastructure eventually.
But I was told that AI would be handling this from next year.
Quote Posted by Starker
Of course there is anti-semitic behaviour, but at the same time there is anti-arab/anti-muslim behaviour as well... ...For example, a while ago I remember a Palestinian child was stabbed to death in the US and Palestinian students have been shot at and injured.
And the US in particular has a long history now where occasionally merely looking vaguely Middle-Eastern can get you killed -- such as Sikhs getting murdered for wearing a turban or Indians having been killed for being "Middle-Eastern".
I remember that case. Absolutely disgusting behaviour. I found it extremely shocking and I've tried to find out the outcome of the trail against the landlord, to no avail. I'm against capital punishment because I think it's not worth it to risk innocent lives, not because I disagree with it in principle, but this case made me wonder.
The US has a long history of lots of people being killed/attacked for dumb reasons. I don't like to use it as a yardstick.
Cipheron on 15/6/2024 at 09:57
Quote Posted by Subjective Effect
I get that they are doing that, and I don't think the uniformed idiots joining the protests without a clue are representative of the entire protest. Does anyone?
You can't really be serious.
These days, it seems almost every week there's some highly improbable hoax that a large chunk of the right-wing seems to fall for without doing any fact-checking.
See the amount of people who believed the "furry litter boxes in schools" hoax.
See the amount of people who believed the "paul pelosi gay lover" hoax.
Nobody expects even the barest minimum of actual fact-checking from anyone on the right wing. If you think "surely they won't believe <next idiotic thing>" you're always disappointed when they DO, so you learn to lower your expectations, until there are no expectations remaining.
Make some shit up, or edit a fake video and put it out. It's how most of the conservative pundits get their foot in the door, doing that stuff. Or basically just offend people so you go viral then now you're what passes for an intellectual / motivational speaker on the right.
Subjective Effect on 15/6/2024 at 13:57
I told you - I'm not talking about redneck twits.
Azaran on 15/6/2024 at 14:31
Quote Posted by Sulphur
In case you're completely oblivious to this fact, I live in India. Hindus are not a 'soft' target compared to Muslims, they're the majority population, so I don't how you managed to land that particular pratfall.
There's no 'fearmongering' about it, this has been the case for India during Mod's regime for the past 10 years. The (
https://www.indiatoday.in/elections/lok-sabha/story/modi-vote-jihad-congress-samajwadi-party-up-election-rally-bjp-2544077-2024-05-26) nationalistic and religious sentiment he's stoking is a very real thing, because it is, in the end, a weapons-grade political tool he knows he can wield. Every now and then, I read on the news that some Muslim's been arrested for possessing beef, or been lynched and killed for it. We've been witnessing policies designed to further marginalise minority populations - Muslims especially - over the past bunch of years. I've witnessed people get more openly hostile and bigoted towards Muslims and other minorities myself.
I also live in an area where I can hear the RSS train kids in the mornings with Hindutva slogans, and I talk to people on a regular basis who are blinded by his demagoguery because he's telling them what they want to hear, and there's promises of great financial prosperity for them via the BJP. None of this stuff is made-up fluff or hyperbole by news agencies. It's real, it's been happening, and it is happening.
I'm FB friends with an Indian Hindu from Kerala and he posts about some interesting things that have been happening in India. Surely you must have heard of all the attacks
on Hindus in India itself?
(
https://www.opindia.com/2023/03/ram-navami-processions-attacked-by-islamists-across-the-country/)
Wave of attacks on Hindus by Islamists during Ram Navami festival
(
https://organiser.org/2024/05/18/238300/bharat/west-bengal-three-hindu-temples-desecrated-in-jalpaiguri-check-visuals-and-read-complaints/) 3 temples desecrated in West Bengal
(
https://www.indiatoday.in/india/story/delhi-temple-attack-how-a-parking-scuffle-led-to-communal-tension-in-hauz-qazi-1560545-2019-07-02) Temple attacked in New Delhi
(
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2016_Kaliachak_riots) Kaliachak riots, started over an insulting remark about the Prophet. Temples and houses of Hindus were attacked
By comparison,(
https://organiser.org/2022/06/02/83814/bharat/fringe-elements-organised-rally-to-defame-hindu-gods-beliefs-and-rituals-in-dmk-ruled-tamil-nadu/) this event mocking Hindu Gods was met with no riots
(
https://www.oneindia.com/india/hindu-shiva-temple-attacked-in-west-bengal-3508471.html) Hindus trying to renovate a temple get attacked by a mob
Evangelical pastor arrested for (
https://www.timesnownews.com/india/article/andhra-pradesh-pastor-praveen-held-for-kicking-hindu-god-idols-and-converting-villages-into-christ-villages/708383) bragging about attacking temples
I could go on and on. Wikipedia also has a (
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religious_violence_in_India#Anti-Hindu_violence) list
Is there violence against minorities in India, and people lynched for having beef by nationalists? Absolutely.
But why ignore everything else that's happening, and paint a narrative of Hindu oppressors versus defenceless minorities?
Sulphur on 15/6/2024 at 15:30
How convenient, part of my family hails from Kerala, so clearly we're brothers in arms.
Your very first link is about a temple being built on the site of the Babri Masjid, which was a mosque built in the 16th century that was demolished decades ago by Hindu activists, and one of the sparks of the many, many communal tensions between Hindu and Muslim groups. In order to understand India, you need to understand that community tensions and violence has been going on well since before we achieved independence. You can link all of those articles, and I can link back a dozen more about what extremists have done to Muslims and Christians, running the gamut from murder to rapes.
They key issue, and this is directly in response to your last point, is that the scale of attacks on minorities is much more than the other way around, and the people who hold the power to marginalise them further - and are actively doing so with impunity because they're backed by the government, and in fact in many cases are the government - are not the minority groups. Whataboutisms don't change the balance of those scales.
