Please cirtique my writing

[Arrian]

When the conclusion is nutty, I question the scholarship. I have to question the source.

I'm skeptical. Since I've not researched it myself, I cannot know for sure, but I'm very skeptical.

I'm also very skeptical of your claim that Hindus were never imperialistic. That cranks my bull****ometer up to eleven.

-Arrian

[aneeshm]

Originally posted by Arrian
When the conclusion is nutty, I question the scholarship. I have to question the source.

I'm skeptical. Since I've not researched it myself, I cannot know for sure, but I'm very skeptical.

I'm also very skeptical of your claim that Hindus were never imperialistic. That cranks my bull****ometer up to eleven.

-Arrian

Of course we were imperialists! But we weren't disruptive about it. You'll note that when India went around spreading her culture to Indonesia, the gods of Indonesia were incorporated into the Hindu pantheon. Nobody stopped them from worshipping their nature spirits after they became Hindu, the nature spirits became absorbed into Hinduidm, and became part of Indonesia's version of Hinduism. Call it open source religion if you like. The imperialism was such that nobody would be unhappy with it - raising the question that is such imperialism imperialism at all?

[DaShi]

aneeshm, if you are concerned with just the destruction, why not post links to the Muslim articles that documented the destruction of the temples rather than a biased website whose conclusions you don't even agree with.

[Arrian]

The imperialism was such that nobody would be unhappy with it ...

I like "open-source religion" though, that's a good one There's room for everybody's gods!

-Arrian

[Barnabas]

Originally posted by aneeshm


Of course we were imperialists! But we weren't disruptive about it. You'll note that when India went around spreading her culture to Indonesia, the gods of Indonesia were incorporated into the Hindu pantheon. Nobody stopped them from worshipping their nature spirits after they became Hindu, the nature spirits became absorbed into Hinduidm, and became part of Indonesia's version of Hinduism. Call it open source religion if you like. The imperialism was such that nobody would be unhappy with it - raising the question that is such imperialism imperialism at all?

But there is nothing special about it, thats what pagans do, 15 gods, 30, 300, 893 gods, it is all the same for them.
Romans also incorporated gods from egypt, persia etc, the greeks even had a statue dedicated to the unknown gods

[Arrian]

In Christianity they would just be local saints

-Arrian

[Terra Nullius]

Originally posted by Arrian
A clear example is the fact that this essay is written in English.

-Arrian

Except that the main reason people still use English as a lingua franca in southern India today is that they distrust northerners and resist their imperialistic attempts to impose Hindi as a common language.

[LordShiva]

Originally posted by Terra Nullius
Except that the main reason people still use English as a lingua franca in southern India today is that they distrust northerners and resist their imperialistic attempts to impose Hindi as a common language.

QFT. We're still sore that the Aryan invaders destroyed our ancestors' great civilisation

[Arrian]

That was his line, not mine. I reproduced it in an attempt to alter the tone of the message but not the content. Then I gave up on that too.

-Arrian

[Elok]

So...imperialism is only bad if you're not a syncretist?

[Terra Nullius]

Originally posted by aneeshm
Will someone please answer me? I ask again - how do I state unpleasant truths in a pleasant way?

See this is why it's an alaap. It's like listening to someone tune up for half an hour without them ever actually say anything.

You need to put some substance to it.

For example, An Iraqi commenting on the effect of the current occupation might say:
Bremmer's de-Ba'athisation policy alienated many otherwise useful public servants. Many school teachers, in particular, were forced out of work for belonging to the Ba'ath Party. Most of these people were never politically active. They only joined the party because of the massive financial incentives.

Disbanding the Iraqi army contributed significantly to the insurgency. Many troops would have been happy to return to service peacably. Instead, thousands of men were sent home, armed, unemployed and disgruntled.

The failure to restore basic services such as electricity and water led to ...

Rumsfeld is a butthead because ...

Bush is gay as a daffodil because ...

Facts. Inference. Conclusion.
None of these says anything about the American people as such.

[aneeshm]

Originally posted by LordShiva


QFT. We're still sore that the Aryan invaders destroyed our ancestors' great civilisation

Rather rubbish, but let's not go into that can of worms again. Though I do agree that choosing Hindi as the national language was quite arbitrary, it should have been Sanskrit.

[aneeshm]

Originally posted by Arrian




I like "open-source religion" though, that's a good one There's room for everybody's gods!

-Arrian

Fine. Find me a single record of any Indonesian lamenting that the "Indian barbarians" have "disrupted our way of life" or that their old ways are being displaced. You won't find any, because we didn't disrupt their way of life. They have many art forms unknown in India, their culture is quite distinct from that which is found in India, and in fact they remained the same Indonesians that they were before the coming of the Indians - something which cannot be said about the coming of the Muslims.

India provided a sort of quick start to their development, where we just gave them the initial push, and then they chose to do whatever they wanted. It's like one culture throwing cold water on the face of another one which is sleeping, thus waking the other one up. Notice that the biggest Hindu-Buddhist temple in the world is Angkor, which is not in India. And the interesting thing is, it would be unrecognisable as a temple to a person used to Indian temples - that's how vastly different their architecture is.

[Barnabas]

the national language should be an indigenous one, not sanskrit

[LordShiva]

Originally posted by Brachy-Pride
the national language should be an indigenous one, not sanskrit

QFT. If Sanskrit were made the national language, the Southern states would secede.