#Sikh people

[divinum-pacis]

“At the Delhi Queer Pride 2017, I amplified the message around my intersectional identity when along with the rainbow turban, I carried a poster by the group Sarbat that read 'Some Sikhs are gay. Get over it!'” - Sukhdeep Singh (credit photo: Kartik Sharma (QGraphy).

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[jewishboricua]

every time i see someone exclude, mock or ignore queer religious people's existence (whether from bigoted religious people or bigoted queer people) i think it should be perfectly acceptable for us to punch them in the face for that

[mastersoftheair]

on the point of including black people in the show (or any period show), a lot of the outrage can sometimes come across as performative to me. it's one thing to feel upset about how little screentime black characters get compared to white characters (a valid criticism, believe me, I Know! give me an hour and i could talk your ear off about how this constantly annoys me as a black person who's damned to enjoy period pieces), but it's another to Only get upset while not actually creating content for said black characters, Especially when fandom (not just hbo war, but in general) is famous for taking Extremely minor characters and creating entire worlds with them, to the point where you wouldn't know they're minor characters at all until you check out the source yourself. richard macon, alexander jefferson, and robert daniels each have only 20 or less posts about them (at the time of publishing this post). in my own fandom experience (within fandoms both big and small and old and new, whatever), i've seen more content (posts, art pieces, analyses, fics, etc) made for minor white characters in less than a mere week's time (it's not a competiton lol i'm just giving a perspective here). so idk. obviously, there's nothing anyone here can do about a show that's already been filmed and released. we got what we got. thas it. at least in the great wide world of fandom, you can actually do something about it, turning the big into small. there's precedent for that. otherwise it just feels like complaining for the sake of complaining

[handweavers]

i've been reading some essays about the history of what is called 'modern sikh theology' and how the idea of sikhi having a theology - which is a specifically western phenomenon, a concept of 'theology' as a distinct idea - was created out of the singh sabha movement from the late 19th and early 20th century whose primary historical-material goals were to create an interpretation of sikhi that would allow sikhs to retain a special status under the british colonial rule, aligning ourselves with christian ideas and understandings of what a religion is, what a theology is, and to emphasize our difference and therefore superiority to both hindus and muslims in the eyes of the british empire. and how the ideas of the singh sabha movement have become the primary ways in which we understand sikhi, the language we use to talk about sikhi in english, the ways in which we choose to translate sikhi and the teachings of the gurus into english. prior to that the concept of 'gurmat' (the teachings of the gurus, the fundamental ideas of sikhi) did not have an english translation which it is now equated to 'theology'. like prior to this sikhi was not emphasized as a monotheistic religion, because those terms and concepts are english ones, and these ideas have penetrated our understanding of sikhi as sikhs even when reading the original punjabi text, within our communities. and i'm kind of interested in a way of conceptualizing sikhi that does not appeal to western understandings of religion or theology, that does not necessarily try to situate itself as inherently distinct from either islam or hinduism but part of a greater cultural continuum, while acknowledging (and reiterating, expanding) the doctrinal emphases on equality among all, and the explicit rejection of caste that gurmat takes. because we know that while casteism is rejected from a religious standpoint, within sangat and langar, it absolutely is still present outside of the gurdwara within our communities. my own understanding of sikhi is monist or pantheistic, and from what i have read prior to british rule in punjab that kind of understanding of sikhi was more common; it has been heavily compared with the vedanta school as well as sufism, and both are practices i feel a lot of intellectual fondness for. and i feel incredibly limited by my extremely rudimentary punjabi language abilities, and i feel that without gaining that specific language knowledge there really isn't a way for me to engage more deeply with this subject because it will always be filtered through english.

[harbinger-of-lesbianism]

Gora Pakoras Need to Shut the Fuck up About the British Raj (Written From the Sikh Perspective)

Gora pakoras need to shut the fuck up about things that they don't know shit about. Your people weren't the ones that were forced to be a colony that was ruled by white people even though they tried to hold them off for as long as they could. They didn't fucking make it so that the government had control over your places of worship and basically fucked every single person that was practicing that religion over. They didn't just take religious artifacts that were sacred. They didn't just fucking take your religious texts (Kaur). They didn't fucking commit mass murder of people just gathering there even though there was an order that public gatherings weren't allowed. Thousands of people were killed (I don't fucking trust official numbers given by the fucking British) just because they were hanging out in a space that was normal to hang out at and some people wanted to peacefully protest at that place (Pletcher). Also, the British knew it was going to be a high traffic area because this was an extremely important Sikh holiday. These are just a few of the things my people went through under the fucking rule of the British. I cannot fucking stand you just saying "straight out of the British Raj" whenever as a fucking talking point. You know who the fuck you are. Just fucking research shit for once in your damn LIFE so that you can truly see how these people were viewed and treated. They didn't just fucking say that certain religions in India were toxic. They did so much more than that. They saw us as barbarians, people who weren't civilized like they were. By us, I mean every person that lived on the subcontinent. They then used those views to control them and take away their rights. That was racism and oppression, not just saying "oh that religion sucks because it literally has a system of oppression that is just built into it."

[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.

[griancraft]

I am so fucking scared for this next Canadian election the conservative guy wants to strip protections for queer people in the military and my brother is in the reserves and he's gay (he is very left he's doing it bc it's the only place that's actually hiring) and dating a trans guy. I'm scared for him and I'm so scared for whatever else that right wing fuckhead will ruin.

[spockvarietyhour]

Sikh men in turbans sitting and standing on rocky bank with bags and supplies, Whitehorse, Yukon Territory, April 1906

[nando161mando]

Location: Brampton, Canada

Date: November 5

Hindu nationalists called for the Indian Army to invade and attack Sikh temples in Canada. They gathered in large numbers, attacked passing cars, and raised chants of “Jai Shree Ram.” The protest was organised against the alleged attack by Khalistan supporters the previous day.

[apostate-in-an-alcove]

Controversial opinion perhaps but based off of experience, Sikhs are far more kind, more charitable and more accepting than Christians ever could hope to be.

[divinum-pacis]

October 27, 2023, Amritsar, India: A volunteer removes rose petals from the holy sarovar (lake) after a helicopter showered rose petals over the Golden Temple Photograph: Narinder Nanu/AFP/Getty Images

[demonic-shadowlucifer]

Shoutout to Black Pangender folks! Shoutout to Indigenous Pangender folks! Shoutout to Pacific Islander Pangender Folks! Shoutout to Polynesian Pangender Folks! Shoutout to Asian Pangender folks! Shoutout to Hispanic/Latino Pangender folks! Shoutout to Middle Eastern Pangender folks! Shoutout to Jewish Pangender folks! Shoutout to Romani Pangender folks! Shoutout to Sikh Pangender folks! Shoutout to multiracial Pangender folks!

[skyhawkstragedy]

maybe we need the shorter seasons bc things that we've been asking for years and years (more diversiry, more demographics being represented) are starting to piss us off

[handweavers]

also realizing just how much in common swahili east africa (particularly kenya due to shared british colonialism but still valid across the entire swahili-speaking region) has with malaysia and how even visually our architecture and climate is so so so similar due to overlapping influences from the same cultures - arab, indian, chinese, portuguese, and british (in the case of tanzania and mozambique it's the french) like i was watching some documentaries for school and i swear to god even just visually the cities of mombasa and zanzibar and antananarivo etc felt so incredibly familiar to me they look so much like malacca and penang and kl i was in awe... the tropical maritime climate too, the coral concrete everywhere covered in green damp and moss and the red earth and the food too everything about it all felt so familiar just like home. the multiethnic society with a complex web of ethnicities and languages from all over asia and africa... i felt/feel such kinship so strongly i feel dizzy

[voluptuarian]

Googling a guy who screamed obscenities at me, called me a "heffalump" (that's a new one at least), and tried to punch in the bulletproof glass partition bc I didn't get him his new room key fast enough and immediately finding out he was arrested as an accessory in a hate crime is um... Interesting

[rrcraft-and-lore]

Grimdark Magazine Issue 38 is here!!

This issue deserves so much thanks, most of all to Beth Tabler and Adrian of GDM for making it happen, and personally, I want to thank them for choosing my story as inspiration for the cover and featuring Punjabi Sikhs - which is huge.

For those who don't know, my family background is Sikh, and it's a religious minority that doesn't often feature in fiction, and I've never seen Sikh coded characters on the cover of anything sff in the West personally. In Reed Lions you'll find a band of brothers on the march, Sikh coded by names like: Harpreet, Buppi (nickname for Bulpindher), Many(short for Maninder - a Sikh friend of mine I tuckerized), and others.

The story pays nods to the sacrifice of Sikh soldiers in history and wars - like those used as cannon fodder in Africa and other wars.

At it's core: it's a story of positive masculinity and male brotherhood, duty, sacrifice, PTSD/depression, and the tolls/tragedy of war.

I want thank the members of my discord for all their support and this one is dedicated to them, and to Boe Kelley for the gift of a gaming keyboard I specifically wrote this on.

I'd like to thank Mihir, Shazzie and all the others who've taken time out to read, review, and share this. And of course the deepest thanks as well to the contributors with whom I get to share this lovely TOC and for giving their BRILLIANT stories, which you can get here.