#Hindu majority India

[curtwilde]

TW: Rape, violent language, islamphobia.

On Slide 3 you can see the vile genocidal fantasies of hindutva ghouls towards grieving Palestinian mothers and children, and yet they'll whine about safety of Hindu women just to demonize Muslim men. Please remember every accusation from the Hindutva genocidal majority is a confession.

Source

This is what hindutvavadis - even the soft sanghis here on tumblr - support and align themselves with. This is what they believe and what they vote for.

[artcinemas]

it’s sad how india who once recognised palestine as it’s own nation is now assisting israel in it’s genocide it’s awful it’s sick. as a country who was colonized and invaded for centuries, are ignoring the value and parallel of the palestinian resistance. especially those specialists in history. rot.

[peachiyyy]

ind*a’s h*nduv*ta issue needs to be addressed globally bc they essentially want to do the same thing isr*el is doing to non-hindu indians. They’re also one of isr*el’s biggest supporters + isr*el funds the indian occupation in kashmir. B*p and m*di are garbage and I pray for their downfall everyday. Considering the history of 🇮🇳 , being in favor for genocide should be anti-indian but they hate muslims so much that they don’t care. But when I talk about it some yt saviour on here wants to tell me, a DESI- not just south asian, a DESI person, that im ‘racist’ for calling majority of them garbage lmfao.

[daniel-munthe-agger]

Nepal legalised same sex marriage. India when?

[shesnake]

“Monkey Man” was shot and completed in 2021, and Netflix soon after acquired the rights for around $30 million, but it’s been on the shelf for three years and they‘ve all of a sudden decided to get rid of it? What gives? It turns out, according to an in-the-know source, that it was the portrayal of a fictional right-wing Hindu Nationalist character in the film that worried Netflix about their future dealings in India. And even though they had paid more than twice the production cost, they decided to give the film back to the producers, which is what caused the long delay. Universal and Peele eventually took a particular liking to the film, so much so that they suggested possible editing changes and delayed the release until what they thought would be the right date. It’s as simple as that. In the end, it was all about politics and optics for the streaming giant, especially since India has become the current top growth market for Netflix. Co-Founder Reed Hastings has mentioned that a majority of the service's next 100 million subscribers would most likely come from India.

Universal/Jordan Peele's "suggested possible editing changes" in question:

[sunncourts]

for me, the heart of monkey man was its immense love for india, and the confidence of articulating that love through representation and criticism—the things that make india beautiful are not the colorist, hindu-nationalist propoganda stories of bollywood but largeness of the diaspora: indians who trans, who are muslim, who have been oppressed by their government, who are unacknowledged by society, etc—and prevail despite the odds stacked against them. they are encouraged to be themselves and fight against these occupational forces.

major props to dev patel for showing that hey, you actually can make a movie about indians in a way that perfectly encapsulates the various cultures, mythologies, AND egregious political climate, while also highlighting indian people and giving them the recognition and respect they often don't recieve in western—OR bollywood—canon. now that we know it's possible (it always was) i want more! thanks!

(also it helped that he was either in a suit, shirtless, or covered in blood [sometimes two at a time] for most of this movie. dev patel, i literally only need one chance...)

[fiercynn]

Can you elaborate more on how hindutva is tied to zionism and white supremacy? I'm not trying to hate I'm genuinely curious.

tbh i don’t have the energy rn to write up an explanation myself, but here are some sources to get you started:

hindutva’s ties to fascism, nazism, & white supremacy broadly

hindu fascism 101: what is hindutva?, by the alliance for justice & accountability

why white nationalists are working with hindu supremacists, by safa ahmed at progressive

why white supremacists and hindu nationalists are so alike, by audita chaudhery at al jazeera

white and hindu supremacists are a match made in heaven, by amardeep singh dhillion at novara media

when hindu nationalism and white nationalism meet, by thomas crowley at jacobin

hindutva & zionism specifically

united in hate: the similarities and solidarities between hindutva and zionism, by ananya ray at feminism in india

the hindu nationalists using the pro-israel playbook, by aparna gopalan at jewish currents

why zionism rules the hearts of hindutva acolytes, by shreevatsa navatia at frontline (a magazine of the hindu)

in state repression and its justification, india and israel have much in common, by achin vanaik at the wire

violent majorities: indian and israeli ethnonationalism, a discussion between balmurli natrajan, lori allen, and ajantha subramanian at recall this book podcast

how hindu nationalists became best friends with israel, by goldie osuri at jacobin

india's hindutva proponents and zionist israel: strange bedfellows, by kavita chowdhury at the diplomat

[reasonsforhope]

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi is, by some measures, the most popular leader in the world. Prior to the 2024 election, his Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) held an outright majority in the Lok Sabha (India’s Parliament) — one that was widely projected to grow after the vote count. The party regularly boasted that it would win 400 Lok Sabha seats, easily enough to amend India’s constitution along the party's preferred Hindu nationalist lines.

But when the results were announced on Tuesday, the BJP held just 240 seats. They not only underperformed expectations, they actually lost their parliamentary majority. While Modi will remain prime minister, he will do so at the helm of a coalition government — meaning that he will depend on other parties to stay in office, making it harder to continue his ongoing assault on Indian democracy.

So what happened? Why did Indian voters deal a devastating blow to a prime minister who, by all measures, they mostly seem to like?

India is a massive country — the most populous in the world — and one of the most diverse, making its internal politics exceedingly complicated. A definitive assessment of the election would require granular data on voter breakdown across caste, class, linguistic, religious, age, and gender divides. At present, those numbers don’t exist in sufficient detail. 

But after looking at the information that is available and speaking with several leading experts on Indian politics, there are at least three conclusions that I’m comfortable drawing.

First, voters punished Modi for putting his Hindu nationalist agenda ahead of fixing India’s unequal economy. Second, Indian voters had some real concerns about the decline of liberal democracy under BJP rule. Third, the opposition parties waged a smart campaign that took advantage of Modi’s vulnerabilities on the economy and democracy.

Understanding these factors isn’t just important for Indians. The country’s election has some universal lessons for how to beat a would-be authoritarian — ones that Americans especially might want to heed heading into its election in November.

-via Vox, June 7, 2024. Article continues below.

A new (and unequal) economy

Modi’s biggest and most surprising losses came in India’s two most populous states: Uttar Pradesh in the north and Maharashtra in the west. Both states had previously been BJP strongholds — places where the party’s core tactic of pitting the Hindu majority against the Muslim minority had seemingly cemented Hindu support for Modi and his allies.

One prominent Indian analyst, Yogendra Yadav, saw the cracks in advance. Swimming against the tide of Indian media, he correctly predicted that the BJP would fall short of a governing majority.

Traveling through the country, but especially rural Uttar Pradesh, he prophesied “the return of normal politics”: that Indian voters were no longer held spellbound by Modi’s charismatic nationalist appeals and were instead starting to worry about the way politics was affecting their lives.

Yadav’s conclusions derived in no small part from hearing voters’ concerns about the economy. The issue wasn’t GDP growth — India’s is the fastest-growing economy in the world — but rather the distribution of growth’s fruits. While some of Modi’s top allies struck it rich, many ordinary Indians suffered. Nearly half of all Indians between 20 and 24 are unemployed; Indian farmers have repeatedly protested Modi policies that they felt hurt their livelihoods.

“Everyone was talking about price rise, unemployment, the state of public services, the plight of farmers, [and] the struggles of labor,” Yadav wrote...

“We know for sure that Modi’s strongman image and brassy self-confidence were not as popular with voters as the BJP assumed,” says Sadanand Dhume, a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute who studies India. 

The lesson here isn’t that the pocketbook concerns trump identity-based appeals everywhere; recent evidence in wealthier democracies suggests the opposite is true. Rather, it’s that even entrenched reputations of populist leaders are not unshakeable. When they make errors, even some time ago, it’s possible to get voters to remember these mistakes and prioritize them over whatever culture war the populist is peddling at the moment.

Liberalism strikes back

The Indian constitution is a liberal document: It guarantees equality of all citizens and enshrines measures designed to enshrine said equality into law. The signature goal of Modi’s time in power has been to rip this liberal edifice down and replace it with a Hindu nationalist model that pushes non-Hindus to the social margins. In pursuit of this agenda, the BJP has concentrated power in Modi’s hands and undermined key pillars of Indian democracy (like a free press and independent judiciary).

Prior to the election, there was a sense that Indian voters either didn’t much care about the assault on liberal democracy or mostly agreed with it. But the BJP’s surprising underperformance suggests otherwise.

The Hindu, a leading Indian newspaper, published an essential post-election data analysis breaking down what we know about the results. One of the more striking findings is that the opposition parties surged in parliamentary seats reserved for members of “scheduled castes” — the legal term for Dalits, the lowest caste grouping in the Hindu hierarchy.

Caste has long been an essential cleavage in Indian politics, with Dalits typically favoring the left-wing Congress party over the BJP (long seen as an upper-caste party). Under Modi, the BJP had seemingly tamped down on the salience of class by elevating all Hindus — including Dalits — over Muslims. Yet now it’s looking like Dalits were flocking back to Congress and its allies. Why?

According to experts, Dalit voters feared the consequences of a BJP landslide. If Modi’s party achieved its 400-seat target, they’d have more than enough votes to amend India’s constitution. Since the constitution contains several protections designed to promote Dalit equality — including a first-in-the-world affirmative action system — that seemed like a serious threat to the community. It seems, at least based on preliminary data, that they voted accordingly.

The Dalit vote is but one example of the ways in which Modi’s brazen willingness to assail Indian institutions likely alienated voters.

Uttar Pradesh (UP), India’s largest and most electorally important state, was the site of a major BJP anti-Muslim campaign. It unofficially kicked off its campaign in the UP city of Ayodhya earlier this year, during a ceremony celebrating one of Modi’s crowning achievements: the construction of a Hindu temple on the site of a former mosque that had been torn down by Hindu nationalists in 1992. 

Yet not only did the BJP lose UP, it specifically lost the constituency — the city of Faizabad — in which the Ayodhya temple is located. It’s as direct an electoral rebuke to BJP ideology as one can imagine.

In Maharashtra, the second largest state, the BJP made a tactical alliance with a local politician, Ajit Pawar, facing serious corruption charges. Voters seemingly punished Modi’s party for turning a blind eye to Pawar’s offenses against the public trust. Across the country, Muslim voters turned out for the opposition to defend their rights against Modi’s attacks.

The global lesson here is clear: Even popular authoritarians can overreach.

By turning “400 seats” into a campaign slogan, an all-but-open signal that he intended to remake the Indian state in his illiberal image, Modi practically rang an alarm bell for constituencies worried about the consequences. So they turned out to stop him en masse.

The BJP’s electoral underperformance is, in no small part, the direct result of their leader’s zealotry going too far.

Return of the Gandhis? 

Of course, Modi’s mistakes might not have mattered had his rivals failed to capitalize. The Indian opposition, however, was far more effective than most observers anticipated.

Perhaps most importantly, the many opposition parties coordinated with each other. Forming a united bloc called INDIA (Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance), they worked to make sure they weren’t stealing votes from each other in critical constituencies, positioning INDIA coalition candidates to win straight fights against BJP rivals.

The leading party in the opposition bloc — Congress — was also more put together than people thought. Its most prominent leader, Rahul Gandhi, was widely dismissed as a dilettante nepo baby: a pale imitation of his father Rajiv and grandmother Indira, both former Congress prime ministers. Now his critics are rethinking things.

“I owe Rahul Gandhi an apology because I seriously underestimated him,” says Manjari Miller, a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations.

Miller singled out Gandhi’s yatras (marches) across India as a particularly canny tactic. These physically grueling voyages across the length and breadth of India showed that he wasn’t just a privileged son of Indian political royalty, but a politician willing to take risks and meet ordinary Indians where they were. During the yatras, he would meet directly with voters from marginalized groups and rail against Modi’s politics of hate.

“The persona he’s developed — as somebody kind, caring, inclusive, [and] resolute in the face of bullying — has really worked and captured the imagination of younger India,” says Suryanarayan. “If you’ve spent any time on Instagram Reels, [you’ll see] an entire generation now waking up to Rahul Gandhi’s very appealing videos.”

This, too, has a lesson for the rest of the world: Tactical innovation from the opposition matters even in an unfair electoral context.

There is no doubt that, in the past 10 years, the BJP stacked the political deck against its opponents. They consolidated control over large chunks of the national media, changed campaign finance law to favor themselves, suborned the famously independent Indian Electoral Commission, and even intimidated the Supreme Court into letting them get away with it. 

The opposition, though, managed to find ways to compete even under unfair circumstances. Strategic coordination between them helped consolidate resources and ameliorate the BJP cash advantage. Direct voter outreach like the yatra helped circumvent BJP dominance in the national media.

To be clear, the opposition still did not win a majority. Modi will have a third term in office, likely thanks in large part to the ways he rigged the system in his favor.

Yet there is no doubt that the opposition deserves to celebrate. Modi’s power has been constrained and the myth of his invincibility wounded, perhaps mortally. Indian voters, like those in Brazil and Poland before them, have dealt a major blow to their homegrown authoritarian faction.

And that is something worth celebrating.

-via Vox, June 7, 2024.

[probablyasocialecologist]

Where does this curious Hindutva-Zionist solidarity spring from? One origin is from the earliest Hindu nationalists who modelled their Hindu state on Zionism. Hindutva’s founder, Vinayak Damodar Savarkar, supported majoritarian nationalism and the rooting out of all disintegrating forces. These included Muslims who supported electoral quotas for their community and left-wing internationalists. As a result, he even condoned the Nazis’ antisemitic legislation in two speeches in 1938 because, as he saw it: “a nation is formed by a majority living therein”. Yet Savarkar was not antisemitic himself. He often spoke favourably of the tiny Jewish-Indian minority because he considered it too insignificant to threaten Hindu cohesion. In fact, Savarkar praised Zionism as the perfection of ethno-nationalist thinking. The way Zionism seamlessly blended ethnic attachment to a motherland and religious attachment to a holy land was precisely what Savarkar wanted for the Hindus. This double attachment was far more powerful to his mind than the European model of “blood and soil” nationalism without sacred space. Today, Hindu nationalists perpetuate this legacy and still look to Zionism as a uniquely attractive political ideology. To Hindu nationalists, some Zionists were engaged in a project to reclaim their holy land from a Muslim population whose religious roots in the region were not as ancient as their own.

[...]

In 2018, Israel passed a law that rebranded the country as “the nation-state of the Jewish people” and delegitimised its non-Jewish citizens. Similarly, India’s controversial Citizenship Amendment Act in 2019 eased paths to citizenship for immigrants from several religious groups, but not Muslims. Coupled with rhetoric associating millions of Indian Muslims with illegal immigration, human rights groups argue that this law could be used to strip many Muslims of their Indian citizenship. Hindu nationalists have also stoked a culture war to consolidate “Hindu civilisation” and sweep away symbols of Islam. This is very much in keeping with the wish of Israel’s far right to rebuild Solomon’s Temple on the site of the holy Temple Mount in Jerusalem, where al-Aqsa mosque compound currently sits. In 1969, a Zionist extremist burned the south wing of al-Aqsa. And in 1980, the fundamentalist group Jewish Underground plotted to blow up the Dome of the Rock, an Islamic shrine at the centre of the compound. A similar project of demolishing mosques and building temples in their place was suggested by Savarkar and Golwalkar. Hindu nationalist organisations focused their attention on Babri Masjid mosque in Ayodha, since this was the mythical birthplace of the Hindu god, Ram.

[transmutationisms]

hi! i was wondering if you’ve ever talked about your thoughts on yoga?

um. no but i have a friend who writes about it in relation to early 20th century degeneracy theory in india—yoga was part of the whole physical and spiritual practice meant to counter degeneration and strengthen the race and nation, analogous in some respects to the emphasis on gymnastics in french medicine in the nineteenth century. also some overlap between this genre of degeneracy theorist and some of the major figures in the creation/popularisation of modern ayurveda (predictably predominantly hindu, upper-caste, some gaining positions in colonial government and synthesising eg sanskrit medical texts w/ anthroposophist ideas, etc). wish i could link his stuff but he hasn't published yet and doesn't blog

[poetessinthepit]

It's amazing how many people are incredibly uncharitable towards Palestinians and Arabs in general. I can recall this one video on YouTube where an Israeli guy is asking a handful of Palestinians what they think of Hitler; it's hardly scientific. The majority of Palestinians interviewed in the video have an unfavorable view of Hitler. One guy specifically says Hitler was evil because he burned jews. There are a few of them who say positive things, but then the translator makes it clear that they are joking or being sarcastic. Only 1 or 2 people in this video say good things about Hitler in seriousness.

While that is alarming and no one should be praising Hitler, I think you'd sadly find similar answers in any area of the world where people do not get a decent education on WW2, the holocaust, Hitler, etc. For example, when I was in India, I saw a pack of cigarettes at a truck stop called Hitler cigarettes. My assumption was not India is full of nazis but that there is ignorance about who Hitler was in India ( hindu nationalists/modi supporters are actually comparable to nazis, but that's another convo).

Even with this minute sample size, the video hardly confirms the popular Israeli narrative that Palestinians are nazified people. Yet, if you only read the comments in the video and you didn't watch it, you'd think the opposite was true.

Many of the comments say the video is terrifying and chilling and proof that Palestinians don't want peace/hate jews/are nazis. Some say that even the Palestinians who called Hitler "bad" or "evil" or a "tyrant" are just lying for the camera, and you can tell by their body language. Commenters who don't speak a lick of Arabic insist that in the cases where the translator says the interviewee is not being serious, the translator is whitewashing the answers. Apparently, arabs incapable of joking. If somebody randomly came up to me on the street and asked me, "Do you think Hitler was good?",I can imagine easily laughing and sarcastically saying,"No, he was a good guy. " Maybe not if someone shoved a camera in my face, but I have an awareness of how things could be misconstrued that these people most likely do not.

And I'm not saying there is no antisemitism in Palestine,that would be ridiculous, but it's interesting to me that Israelis can say the most explicitly anti-arab racist shit and people will go out of their way to not see it for what it is, but a Palestinian can clearly state say Hitler was evil man because he burned jews and people will insist that their body language reveals they are a secret nazi.

I might remember some of the details wrong, but I'm just spitballing about something I vaguely remember.

[room-surprise]

EXTERNAL INFLUENCES IN DUNGEON MESHI: INDIAN PHILOSOPHY

(SPOILERS FOR DUNGEON MESHI BELOW)

We know that Ryoko Kui spent considerable time at the beginning of working on Dungeon Meshi doing research and planning the series. Kui constantly references real world culture, history and mythology, but she also occasionally references real-world philosophy.

The story of Dungeon Meshi is full of philosophical questions about the joy and privilege of being alive, the inevitability of death and loss, the importance of taking care of yourself and your loved ones, and the purpose and true nature of desire. Kui explores these issues through the plot, the characters, and even the fundamental building blocks that make up her fictional fantasy world. Though it’s impossible to say without Kui making a statement on the issue, I believe Dungeon Meshi reflects many elements of ancient Indian philosophy and religion.

It’s possible that Kui just finds these ideas interesting to write about, but doesn’t have any personal affiliation with either religion, however I would not be at all surprised if I learned that Kui is a Buddhist, or has personal experience with Buddhism, since it’s one of the major religions in Japan.

I could write many essays trying to explain these extremely complex concepts, and I know that my understanding of them is imperfect, but I’ll do my best to explain them in as simple a way as possible to illustrate how these ideas may have influenced Kui’s work.

HINDUISM

Hinduism is the third-largest religion in the world and originates in India. The term Hinduism is a huge umbrella that encompasses many diverse systems of thought, but they have some shared theological elements, and share many ancient texts and myths.

According to Classical Hindu belief, there are four core goals in human life, and they are the pursuit of dharma, artha, kama, and moksha.

Dharma is the natural order of the universe, and also one’s obligation to carry out their part in it. It is the pursuit and execution of one’s inherent nature and true calling, playing one’s role in the cosmic order.

Artha is the resources needed for an individual’s material well-being. A central premise of Hindu philosophy is that every person should live a joyous, pleasurable and fulfilling life, where every person's needs are acknowledged and fulfilled. A person's needs can only be fulfilled when sufficient means are available.

Kama is sensory, emotional, and aesthetic pleasure. Often misinterpreted to only mean “sexual desire”, kama is any kind of enjoyment derived from one or more of the five senses, including things like having sex, eating, listening to music, or admiring a painting. The pursuit of kama is considered an essential part of healthy human life, as long as it is in balance with the pursuit of the three other goals.

Moksha is peace, release, nirvana, and ultimate enlightenment. Moksha is freedom from ignorance through self-knowledge and true understanding of the universe, and the end of the inevitable suffering caused by the struggle of being alive. When one has reached true enlightenment, has nothing more to learn or understand about the universe, and has let go of all earthly desires, they have attained moksha, and they will not be reborn again. In Hinduism’s ancient texts, moksha is seen as achievable through the same techniques used to practice dharma, for example self-reflection and self-control. Moksha is sometimes described as self-discipline that is so perfect that it becomes unconscious behavior.

The core conflict of Hinduism is the eternal struggle between the material and immaterial world. It is often said that all of the material world is “an illusion,” and what this means is that all good and bad things will inevitably end, because the material world is finite. On the one hand, this is sad, because everything good in life will one day cease to exist, but on the other hand, this is reassuring, because all of the bad things will eventually end as well, and if one can accept this, they will be at peace.

The central debate of Hinduism is, which is more important: Satisfying your needs as a living thing, having a good life as a productive member of society, serving yourself, your family, and the world by participating in it the way nature intended? Or is it rejecting desire and attachment, discovering the true nature of existence, realizing the impermanence of material things, and that one can only escape the suffering that comes from the struggle of life by accepting that death and loss are inevitable?

There is no set answer to this question, and most believers of Hinduism tend to strike a balance between the two extremes simply because that’s what happens when a person leads a normal, average life, however there are also those who believe that pursuing extremes will lead to ultimate enlightenment and final release as well.

BUDDHISM

Buddhism is an Indian religion and philosophical tradition that originated in the 5th century BCE, based on teachings attributed to religious teacher the Buddha. It is the world's fourth-largest religion and though it began in India, it has spread throughout all of Asia and has played a major role in Asian culture and spirituality, eventually spreading to the West beginning in the 20th century.

Buddhism is partially derived from the same worldview and philosophical belief system as Hinduism, and the main difference is that the Buddha taught that there is a “middle way” that all people should strive to attain, and that the excesses of asceticism (total self-denial) or hedonism (total self-indulgence) practiced by some Hindus could not lead a person to moksha/enlightenment/release from suffering.

Buddhism teaches that the primary source of suffering in life is caused by misperception or ignorance of two truths; nothing is permanent, and there is no individual self.

Buddhists believe that dukkha (suffering) is an innate characteristic of life, and it is manifested in trying to “have” or “keep” things, due to fear of loss and suffering. Dukkha is caused by desire. Dukkha can be ended by ceasing to feel desire through achieving enlightenment and understanding that everything is a temporary illusion.

There are many, many other differences between Hinduism and Buddhism, but these elements are the ones that I think are most relevant to Kui’s work.

Extreme hedonism involves seeking sensual pleasure without any limits. This could just be indulging in what people would consider “normal” pleasures, like food, sex, drugs and the arts, but it can also involve doing things which are considered socially repugnant, either literally or by taking part in symbolic rituals that represent these acts. Some examples are holding religious meetings in forbidden places, consuming forbidden substances (including human flesh), using human bones as tools, or engaging in sex with partners who are considered socially unacceptable (unclean, wrong gender, too young, too old, related to the practitioner). Again, these acts may be done literally or symbolically.

Extreme ascetic practices involve anything that torments the physical body, and some examples are meditation without breathing, the total suppression of bodily movement, refusing to lay down, tearing out the hair, going naked, wearing rough and painful clothing, laying on a mat of thorns, or starving oneself.

HOW THIS CONNECTS TO DUNGEON MESHI

Kui’s most emphasized message in Dungeon Meshi is that being alive is a fleeting, temporary experience that once lost, cannot truly be regained, and is therefore precious in its rarity. Kui also tells us that to be alive means to desire things, that one cannot exist without the other, that desire is essential for life. This reflects the four core goals of human life in Hinduism and Buddhism, but also could be a criticism of some aspects of these philosophies.

I think Kui’s story shows the logical functionality of the four core goals: only characters who properly take care of themselves, and who accept the risk of suffering are able to thrive and experience joy. I think Kui agrees with the Buddhist stance that neither extreme hedonism nor extreme self-denial can lead to enlightenment and ultimate bliss… But I also think that Kui may be saying that ultimate bliss is an illusion, and that the greatest bliss can only be found while a person is still alive, experiencing both loss and desire as a living being.

Kui tells us living things should strive to remain alive, no matter how difficult living may be sometimes, because taking part in life is inherently valuable. All joy and happiness comes from being alive and sharing that precious, limited life with the people around you, and knowing that happiness is finite and must be savored.

Dungeon Meshi tells us souls exist, but never tells us where they go or what happens after death. I think this is very intentional, because Kui doesn’t want readers to think that the characters can just give up and be happy in their next life, or in an afterlife.

There is resurrection in Dungeon Meshi, but thematically there are really no true “second chances.” Although in-universe society views revival as an unambiguous good and moral imperative, Kui repeatedly reminds us of its unnatural and dangerous nature. Although reviving Falin is a central goal of the story, it is only when Laios and Marcille are able to let go of her that the revival finally works… And after the manga’s ending, Kui tells us Falin leaves Laios and Marcille behind to travel the world alone, which essentially makes her dead to them anyway, since she is absent from their lives.

At the same time, Kui tells us that trying to prevent death, or avoid all suffering and loss is a foolish quest that will never end in happiness, because loss and suffering are inevitable and must someday be endured as part of the cycle of life. Happiness cannot exist without suffering, just like the joy of eating requires the existence of hunger, and even starvation.

Kui equates eating with desire itself, using it as a metaphor to describe anything a living creature might want, Kui also views the literal act of eating as the deepest, most fundamental desire of a living thing, the desire that all other desires are built on top of. If a living thing doesn’t eat, it will not have the energy necessary to engage with any other part of life. Toshiro, Mithrun, and Kabru are all examples of this in the story: They don’t take care of themselves and they actively avoid eating, and as a result they suffer from weakness, and struggle to realize their other desires.

Kui suggests that the key difference between being alive or dead is whether or not someone experiences desire. If you are alive, even if you feel empty and cannot identify your desires like Mithrun, you still have desires because you would be dead without them. The living body desires to breathe, to eat, to sleep, even if a person has become numb, or rejected those desires either to punish themselves, or out of a lack of self-love.

Sometimes, we have to do things which are painful and unpleasant, in order to enjoy the good things that make us happy. I believe Kui is telling us that giving up, falling into despair, and refusing to participate in life is not a viable solution either.

The demon only learns to experience desire by entering into and existing in the material, finite world. This experience intoxicates the demon, and it becomes addicted to feeling both the suffering of desire, and the satisfaction of having it fulfilled. This unnatural situation is what endangers the Dungeon Meshi world, and it’s only by purging the demon of this ability to desire that the world can be saved. The demon is like a corrupted Buddha that must give up its desires in order to return to the peaceful existence it had before it was corrupted.

The demon curses Laios to never achieve his greatest desires at the end of the manga, which manifests in several ways, such as losing his monstrous form, Falin choosing to leave after she’s revived, and being unable to get close to monsters because they are afraid of him. In some ways you could compare Laios to a Bodhisattva, a person who tries to aid others in finding nirvana/moksha, even if it prolongs their own suffering and prevents them from finding personal release. Laios gives the demon peace, but Laios himself will never be able to satisfy his desires, and must eventually come to accept his loss and move on with his life.

(This is an excerpt from Chapter 3 of my Real World Cultural and Linguistic influences in Dungeon Meshi essay.)

[metamatar]

im asking this out of pure ignorance but I've always wondered how does hinduism handle people who are not hindu? i know Christianity is essentially 'be the right kind of christian or go to hell' (so much as to beleive that Jewish people are literally devils, for example) but i was wondering how hinduism deals w people who are in proximity but not of the same religion. also if a dalit or lower caste person converts from hinduism to another religion, how does that affect thier life and how they're treated? appreciate your answer if u feel like explaining ^__^

it depends, in some parts of the country the non hindu has the same status as the lower caste dalit by default – so exclusion but in most places its a detente where religious and caste endogamy is strictly maintained. housing and employment discrimination is v common. its actually much harder to marry under the special mariage act and violence against interfaith and intercaste couples by their own families is common. in 2023, the muslim is the designated enemy of the state. the christian was fooled by the british and/or money to give up their culture or is literally a foreign agent. if you're looking for a textual answer, the equivalent of the "infidel," there isn’t really one because the streamlining of the canonical religious texts and construction of the hindu is recent. hinduism has aimed to appropriate instead of convert.

in modern india, legally anyone who is not a christian or a muslim is treated as a hindu. you are hindu by default in india to the state, governed by hindu codes for marriage and inheritance. for indigenous tribals it is a matter of coercing their children to feel shame at the (state sponsored but outsourced to private religious groups, love privatisation!!!) residential schools about their animist practices and making them worship the proper gods. for sikhs, jains and buddhists their is marginally more toleration. but they are basically seen as wayward hindu sects. this does change when they're in conflict with the majority in a way that resists "national cohesion" – see sikh pogroms in 1984 and the recent moves against sikhism due to the invocation of khalistan in the farmers protests. when dalits convert to buddhism many right wingers will invoke the spectre of predatory conversions.

since you are supposed to be hindu by default, christians and muslims are then seen as invasive outsiders and conversions are regulated very strictly by many states. it is historically true that christian missionaries brought christianity as part of a broader civilising mission, but imo it says something really depressing about hinduism that its epithets for christians is 'ricebag converts' bc people apparently converted for a bag of rice. islam's foothold in the continent is older, accompanying immigration from the west as well as the sultanate and the mughals. returning these christians and muslims to the fold, or "ghar wapsi" is a major project of the hindutva right. note that india is home to one of the world's largest populations of muslims (~200mil).

lower caste dalits have long converted to christianity and islam but caste violence follows them there anyway. caste may have textual origins in religion and focus on ritual purity but it is a socioeconomic form of subjugation. this means that while still subject to caste violence, dalit christians and muslims will be denied redressal through state protections like legislations against anti caste violence or reservations because those are restricted to hindu dalits.

[curtwilde]

The oldest Sufi shrine in Delhi has been demolished.

"The earliest Sufi Shrine in Delhi - belonging to a relative of Prithviraj Chauhan and dating from BEFORE the Turkish conquest - has been Demolished by the Delhi Development Authority in an "anti encroachment" drive.

In the late 12th century, a group of Afghan pastoralists, suddenly burst onto the world stage. In a matter of years, they toppled their rulers of Ghazni and seized major Persian cities like Herat, and then established the major Indian sultanate in Delhi.

We often think of this "Islamic invasion" as the start of the Muslim presence in India. Yet recent scholarship has shown that by the time of Ghori's conquest of Delhi, Muslims were already a central part of Indian society

Some of the earliest mosques are found in Kerala, dating from a few decades after the prophet Muhammad's death. Tamil Pallava, Chola and Pandya kings all built sizeable mosques

Delhi also had a single sufi shrine before the Afghan conquest - this one.

Until 31 January, when it was demolished, the shrine of Baba Haji Rozbih had been located by the Fateh Burj, or Victory Gate of Lal Kot. The grave next to it under a reddish Chador belongs to his female disciple Bibi. Bibi was said to be a close relative of Prithviraj Chauhan who embraced Islam under the aegis of Haji Rozbih.

This demolition is an UTTERLY MINDLESS LOSS and complete cultural desecration.

What's more the "anti encroachment" drive is apparently scheduled to include the Aashiq Allah Dargah dated to 1317AD which is where the great Punjabi Saint Baba Farid used to meditate, and his small 'chillagah' is still visible here.

Please do share and write about this so we can save what remains! "

- from the historian Sam Dalrymple .

...

This is the third Islamic structure to be demolished in Delhi this month. Isn't it funny how only certain structures are the victim of anti- encroachment drives? This is part of a planned programme by the current right-wing government of India that is violently islamophobic and wants to create a hindu ethnostate modeled after Israel.

[whencyclopedia]

Khajuraho

Khajuraho was an ancient city in the Madhya Pradesh region of northern India. From the 10th to 12th century CE it was the capital of the Chandella kings who ruled Bundelkhand. Despite Khajuraho's once great reputation as an important cultural centre there are no surviving non-religious buildings, but the presence of 35 Hindu and Jain temples make it one of the most significant historical sites in India today and worthy of its name given by the 11th century CE Muslim historian Abu Rihan Alberuni as 'the City of the Gods'. Khajuraho is listed by UNESCO as a World Heritage Site.

Architectural Highlights

Most of the temples at Khajuraho were built using sandstone but four also used granite in their construction. In the latter group is the Chaunsat Yogini (64 tantric goddesses), built c. 875-900 CE, which has 64 shrine rooms arranged around a rectangular courtyard. Next in the site's development came the Lalguan Mahadeva, Brahma, and Matangesvara temples which are all quite plain in design and decoration compared to the later temples.

The majority of temples at Khajuraho were constructed between 950 and 1050 CE and are either Hindu (Saiva or Vaisnava) or Jain. The most famous is the Kandariya Mahadeo built in the early 11th century CE and dedicated to Shiva. The more or less contemporary Laksmana temple was built in 954 CE by King Dhanga (r. 950-999 CE) to celebrate independence from the Gurjara-Pratihara rulers and has a similar layout and exterior to the Kandariya Mahadeo. So too does the Visvanatha temple (c. 1002 CE) which was designed by Sutradhara Chhichchha. Both temples have shrines at each corner of their terrace platforms. The Laksmana was dedicated to Vishnu and its terrace is of particular note as it carries a narrative frieze running around all four sides: Elephants, warriors, hunters, and musicians form a procession watched by a ruler and his female attendants.

Other notable temples at the site include the single-towered Caturbhuja and Vamana, the squat Matulunga, and the rectangular, more austere Parshvanatha Jain temple with its unique shrine added to the rear of the building (c. 950-970 CE). Probably the latest temple at Khajuraho is the Duladeo which was built on a star-plan.

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