#by many sikhs and so trying to talk about these things as existing within a historical context rathern than a religious one upsets people

[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.

[im-the-punk-who]

I know many, many people have said this before but I was talking with a friend last night and she brought up how different cultures have different standards for what ‘masculine’ and ‘feminine’ sexuality and gender look like.

It’s something I’ve been trying to articulate for a while now about why exclusionary practices are based in eurocentrism and racism and xenophobia, and i’m not sure i have it totally thought out but I’m gonna give it a go.

She(a black woman) brought up how ingrained into the Black experience white heteronormativity is, and how if the Black idea of what ‘queerness’ is was expanded, a lot more Black people would likely be comfortable identifying as some sort of queer. Because queer only really means, ‘differing in some way from what is usual or normal : odd, strange, weird.‘

She brought up how a lot of the expectations of both Black men and women are based either in conforming to whiteness or conforming to the Black community’s rejection of it, and how these are seen as ‘straight’ identities even though they are completely separate and often restrictive in their actualization. That so many of the body-image issues POC have are due to eurocentric beauty standards.

If you take a ‘cis man’ and a ‘cis woman’ who identify completely within their cultural genders (say, a Sikh man or an Indigenous woman or a Black American woman or a Mexican man or a Hassidic Jewish man or a Korean woman etc etc etc) all of those presentations of what ‘gender’ means to that culture are completely different. (Not to mention the .... incalculable different phenotypical  presentations of ‘cis’ gender that exist.)

And then of course add in that many cultures already *have* identities that under a colonialist lens are viewed as ‘queer’. The entire umbrella of Indigenous two-spirit identities is in and of itself a colonial conglomeration of hundreds of distinct cultural identities, all of which are ‘queer’ only in the sense that they are not definable by western gender norms. But within their own cultures these people are not viewed as ‘different’ or ‘queer’ but just another way to present an identity.

So, basically, the point that I’m trying to make is that there is no real way to define ‘queer’ - or even being Gay or Lesbian to be completely exclusinist - that does not racialize gender, because gender as white people understand it is already racialized and based on a perception of gender that conforms only to white standards of physical presentation. And so in truth I think the pushback against queer inclusivity cannot be separated from the pushback against normalizing non-white perceptions of gender, and from the expected assimilation by people of color.

Because once you recognize that there are literally millions of different ways to present even a cis-heterosexual gender, culturally(and this isn’t even getting into mixed race people or people who grew up in culturally diverse areas!), it becomes clear that there cannot be a single way to define what someone is, or what someone can identify as or present as, and therefore what people can be ‘attracted’ to in order to identify as a thing.

Saying that there is one ‘true’ experience of womanhood, or maleness, or gayness, or lesbianism, based on who or what people are attracted to is invalidating the millions of different ways sex, gender, and selfhood can be expressed.

To say that someone ‘cannot’ identify as part of the LGBT+ community because they are gender or socially nonconforming but don’t necessarily experience same-sex attraction (and yes I specifically left room for this to include trans, intersex, and polyam/leather/BDSM heterosexuals) is to invalidate the experiences of gender and society that fall outside the white perception.

[theblacksikhcollective]

Last year, I remember telling those Sikhs close to me that if I decided to begin practicing Sikhi again I would not announce it on any public forum. From dealing with the pervasive toxicity and hypocrisy within the Sikh community (anti-blackness included), to the increasing conflict between my mind and heart when it came to tackling Gurbani and Sikh theology, my faith in the Gurus and Sikhi had been completely severed and my anger towards Sikhs amped. In spite of this, I knew that if I was to go down this road again, I would not (nor could not) take the same route that I did, making the exact same mistakes.

Well sure enough, after a bunch of research, intellectual reasoning, spiritual cultivation, removing myself from social media (not all the way — but for the most part), being selective with the people I communicate/interact with, etc., I began to practice Sikhi again in the summer of 2020.

There are several things that led me back to Sikhi, but for me, everything started to make more sense when I redefined what I thought of as the Sacred. Before, I saw Parabraham as a miraculous, magical, pervasive presence that we just can’t see and that we all had to try and merge into. But once I started interpreting the Sacred as the Creative Power/Creative Energy/Creative Process within Nature that stems from One Source, ideas within Sikhi that were contradicting each other began to make more sense. It’s visible, yet invisible. It’s far, yet near. It comes from One, but manifests through the Many. It’s within you (yes, you ally ji) and outside of you. You are already merged into it, it’s just your consciousness that isn’t. Now I know some Sikhs might not interpret the Sacred in that way (heck, there’s still a lot Sikhs believing in “Mr. God” as Bhai Satpal Singh says), but more power to ya. Though our interpretations of Sikhi might be different, may we have diversity in the creed while maintaining unity in the deed (as Felix Adler proposes).

To me, the fact that our body is made of 37 trillion cells and that there are billions of pairs of DNA within these cells is the real magic. The fact that there are 8 million species on our Earth and that our planet makes up only 0.0003% of our Solar System is the real “woo woo”. The fact that everything would cease to exist if the support of this Creative Energy were to stop or withdraw is the real miracle. And the more you learn about this Reality, this Sat (Truth), and the more you investigate into and realize what this Creative Power (otherwise known as Ik Oankar) has produced and continues to produce, you cannot help but feel a sense of awe and reverence. It is all apart of the Hukam (natural order) of things which we work within.

Lastly, I will say that I am still learning about and experimenting with this Oneness. There are so many things to learn, unlearn, discover, and experience in this lifetime. And though our brain is one of the most powerful computers in existence, subduing, controlling, and expanding the mind/consciousness is like participating in a wrestling match against bigger forces than most are barely able to handle (as Gurbani describes several times).

I’m glad that I left the Panth when I did because if I had not, I wouldn’t have discovered what true support and connection looks like (versus conditional support and connection), met some of the people that I met, became involved in the organizations that I’m in, and wouldn’t have been able to learn the lessons that were important for me to learn. But now that that’s behind me, my main concern is that I do not showcase my spirituality/religiosity and do too much talking (as I did in my past), but simply live out my principles, ideals, and ethics.

To the Sikhs within my supportive network who stuck with me throughout my journey and have shown me what living through the lens of Oneness looks like, thank you and I love you. To the Unitarian Universalists within my supportive network who have expanded my view of spirituality and showed me how to conduct activism across religious boundaries, thank you and I love you. To the Humanists, Atheists, and Agnostics within my supportive network who keep me intellectually simulated and challenged while teaching me to live ethically, thank you and I love you. To the Christians, spiritual but not religious, and others within my supportive network who might not agree with or understand my worldview but do not vocally criticize me, thank you and I love you. To those who are outside of my supportive network of all traditions (and none) I hope to serve you from a place of humility, empathy, and compassion. In exchange, I ask for grace and assistance (when needed).

Lastly, whether its through my advocacy in the Sikh community, the UU community, or the Ethical Culture community, I hope (no, I WILL) use my talents, resources, and abilities to uplift those who are marginalized around me as well as provide spiritual support to all (in spite of religious affiliation). May it be so and blessed be.

[sol-futura-est]

My father gave me stories of life on the Mephisto. On each deck, of which there were two hundred and twenty three, were a series of residential quarters, on the rear second mile of the ship, in what we all called the bulge of it, before you lead into the neck and later the head. In the bulge, there was artificial gravity, solariums, and an abundance of social areas, but you could not do so much as breathe without being heard. Finding quiet places to be intimate, to do something as small as share secrets, took planning and know how that made it near impossible. One story he had was about how one deck had a case of common cold, and essentially had two thousand infections in less than six hours before the quarantine was called. I couldn’t even infect ten people out here, unless our territory decided to have a harvest festival at the end of game season. Even then, not all of us would be there, and I might not even meet two thousand. It’s hard for me to fathom being able live within five miles of millions upon millions. Men could get stabbed in alleys, but for me, I don’t think I would ever see an alley for myself. Not for a long while at least.

    For the record, my mother and father are still alive. They live on Elysium, a normal sized rock with a prominent city where the liveship made planetfall, the Mephisto. On their capital district, you mostly find trading offices staffed by clerks of all kinds, but just like the Mephisto, you need mechanics to keep things running. That’s his job, but my mother is mostly content to meet my older brothers grandchildren and help around the neighborhood. Last I heard, she had taken up gardening, and had asked me how I do it out here. You’d be surprised how easy it is doing something man has done for over ten thousand years when you start. 

    However, even with my warm tea, the northern sun rising, I find a familiar face coming up the road from the south. This was my nearest neighbor, Jules. Her family was aboard the Capra, another liveship just like the Mephisto.

    “Early riser, I see. How’s the tea Cadmo?”

    “Those traders who came through gave me more than enough,” standing up, I walk over to my stone fence and seat myself next to her. “However, it’s still going to be great whenever we can grow our own.”

    “Tea plantations? You’re ambitious for sure. You’d think the Sikhs kept that to themselves.”

    “I met a few when I was a kid. I don’t even think they’d think twice about it. We’re all friends now, after all. We’ll trade more with ourselves before we get whatever psychoactives the Herastins like taking. Do you think they take it in their exosuit, or do they huff it?”

    “Oh come on, definitely in the suit itself. Bathe in the glow and the mind opens. I’m sure they’re more interesting up close.”

    Two or three times now, I would ask people if they met any of those outworlders, but everyone says no. Lieutenant Azul actually told me he only met one or two in fifty years of service, but it’s expected to go up. Maybe that was just a recruiting tactic.

    “Jules?”

    “Mister Banat.”

    “How’re your crops running?”

    “Same as always, enough to live off of and a little bit to sell. Just enough.”

    “I still can’t get over it all honestly.”

    “Get over what?’

    “I grew up a bit farther away, right? But when my older brother took me all the way out here and gave me this cabin it was like I was meant to be out here, you know? Something drew me here for more than just the sights.”

    “Are you gonna talk about going into the gate again, or is this something different?”

    Although I was still forever content to explore the wilds, you could never disseminate from me; every time I watched the sun rise in the north, within your sight, just a little to the left, was the gate. You saw it every day. How exactly was anyone, much less someone like me, going to ignore it?

    “How can you not be curious Jules?”

    “I like living, and I don’t want to see what lives down there just by myself.”

    “You could get ten of us and go down.”

    “We would be better asking the legion.”

    “No doubt, but then what? Are you gonna join?”

    “I’m not keen on nursing or clerk duties, you might get sent to fight the brigands too. We might not get what we want. I don’t think the corvids plan on going down there.”

    She was right, you know, even if it didn’t shut off my curiousity.

    “Trust me Jules, I won’t go there any time soon, but I’ll be curious.”

    “I hope so. Is there any tea inside?”

    “Yeah, the water is on my stove still boiling, just be careful with it.”

    I trusted her verbosely with my abode and her sentiment was shared. Out here, you know almost every face that comes up the road, you know the cars, you know the horses, and occasionally still, you know the flyers in the sky. 

    Back on Terra, I’m told at least, there was a plethora of life and a majesty in what could be done, how every landscape known to man was never far. Scorching desert, rainforest, and titanic stone mountains could exist within miles of one another. Out here though, it’s most of the same. Our bucks came from Terra, so did the things we farm. We made our new homes almost like imitations of the old than trying to make ourselves too much like the new places. We didn’t try to live in steel homes or prefabs, but found building our homes with our own hands cemented the idea that this was permanent. We were not passing ghosts without a home, but men and women and children who would wield daggers in our teeth for this land and end any who decided to try and take it. One thing our empire was, was militaristic. We had relied on the legion on Terra for nearly a millennium, and so forth, here we are. 

    Even if it might seem like it, we don’t actually get taught much about our life on Terra. We try to put our education into a scope so we can actually live new lives here, not have people obsessing over the past. There was enough to learn here that actually finding out about our ancestors three thousand years ago would be trivial, especially since we don’t sit above them anymore. 

    “How much did that bag of tea actually run you, Cadmo?”

    “Fifty denarii.”

    “Really? Not expensive at all.”

    “I think he had to get rid of it before he got offworld. Quotas or something by the trading company.”

    “So you haggled?”

    “He tried me for two hundred denarii, but I wasn’t gonna give him that much for tea, not when I could buy a tea sapling of my own for that much.”

    “Maybe you should’ve gone for it and made this place the empires tea capital, rather than the Khalistani world.”

    “I’d still have to ask them how to grow it and tend it, though. Not much tea out here.”

    Jules had a streak of pride for the empire. She saw it as order, discipline, and freedom therein. All of that was ultimately true too, but I was always more concerned with this place. Not just the gate, but the ocean, the hills, the mountains. There was an unconfounded beauty in it. When you went to the capital city, when you walked the avenue full of statues of the greats before us, it lost that beauty, even though it was essentially the same stone trimmed down. Something was separate when you saw fields of flowing grass without even one hint of mankind. Nature could conquer land without even lifting a finger, but for us, it was a thousand men at the oars just to move an inch. Our land was not just an endless stretching mystery our hearts resided on and in, but an artwork made by divine hands we could not comprehend. One who lives here, within that great machination, the air, the earth, the sky, does not question that machination. Whenever I saw the glimmering polished giant of the emperor at the head of the forum, I remembered still, both him and the statue were born of Terran stone. 

    Nevertheless, perhaps each nature and man makes his own artwork, for just like we make poison, at times, so does nature, but in the end we appropriate it each. Perhaps in some ways, that gate was a poison for us, a burning curiousity that infected our dreams.

    “When was the last time Lieutenant Azul stopped by your house?”

    “Azul? Probably last month. Why?”

    “I still think about the corvids. Just being able to see everything out there, all the pieces of nature. That’s why we’re out here, right?”

    “I’m trying to be a pioneer, but yeah, I can’t lie about the beauty of this place. Not many better places, there can’t be.”

    “It’d be a nice thing to confirm that.”

    “So join.”

    Something was stopping me, an apprehension I couldn’t quite place. Perhaps it was a fear of winding up mostly on a ship, fixing an engine that never seemed to stay fixed, manning cannonades to blast rock, or even the devilish endless monotony of navigating a starship, from wake to wink. 

    “Maybe when the time comes I will. Nothing but time.”

    Long lived youths, still, we remained.

    “When’s your next hunt, Banat? Today?”

    “Should be, yeah. So that means you have to plow some, and when I get back, I have to do the same.”

    “Don’t get hurt out there, will you?”

    “You know I don’t like to get hurt.”

    “Then I’ll see you in a few days

[theadamantium]

Harri’s Travel Blog - India 2018

Over the past decade, I’ve been quite fortunate to travel a decent chunk of this globe. But like anything so special, no matter how satisfying an experience, I am always hungry for more. I developed a fixation for culture. For every item I’ve crossed off the bucket list, I seem to add six others. But I will admit, India wasn’t on that list before.

India was my Mom’s dream. It was the top of her list and she wanted to experience it before she was “too old.” Meet my Mom for five minutes and you’ll see it’ll be a long time before she’s too old for anything. I knew she wanted to have this experience with me, her spoiled only child, before he was tied down with too many commitments. So I said, “let’s do it!” My Mom and I travel very well together. We have similar get-up-and-go styles and a do-it-all-while-you’re-here mentality. My Mom won’t shy away from long drives, elephant rides, local participation, live music, and exotic foods. As our guide would put it, “The heart of the mother becomes the soul of the child.” As I started doing research prior to our trip I began to see why India was such a priority for my Mom.

The Itinerary

As a quick outline of our plan, we set out to tackle The Golden Triangle – New Delhi, Agra & Jaipur – with a stop in Ranthambore National Park in the middle and a few extra days heading west to Jodhpur and Udaipur. Fun India fact, cities ending in ‘Pur’ were ruled by Hindu kings, while cities ending in ‘Bahd’ were ruled by Muslim kings.

On out first day in India we met with our guide, Raj, and our driver, Mr. Singh. We’d all be paired together for the next two weeks. Lucky for us, we made an excellent team. Mr. Singh was a quiet man and a traditional Sikh. He is a professional. He was never late and always available for us when we needed. He was shy so didn’t say much, but as he came to realize the easy going people my Mom and I are, he loosened up and became very honest with us.

Raj on the other hand, had the gift of the gab. He loved to share his wisdom and stories from his life and experiences. He enjoys his life’s work and looks at being a tour guide as his responsibility to show off his country and provide his guests with the best experience possible. We told Raj from the start we were excited for the sites, but we also wanted a real India experience and this thrilled him. He treated us as travelers and not as tourists and made special added arrangements to give us the India trip we wanted. More on this later.

Culture

Sightseeing is always special and an important part of travel. However, as I’ve become a more experienced traveler my trips have become less defined by these sights as it has about meeting the people and experiencing the life and culture. Not only is this the best way to expand your worldly knowledge, but I truly believe it is one of the best ways to get to know yourself and expel your own ignorance. Most of what I learned on this trip didn’t come from palaces or safaris but rather walking through local bazaars, attending religious rituals or just witnessing the local life that surrounded us as we passed through town to town.

Making our way through India was very humbling. I don’t need to explain how little many of the people own and the cleanliness of their conditions. But this is the life they know and they seem just as happy with it as I am with my own. Who are we to say this is a worse quality of life? The people of these small villages have a strong work ethic, sense of community, family pride and undying faith. Are these not life’s core values? One may not have this same outlook in the large cities as your experiences can certainly be clouded by the tip chasers and pushy salesmen. Often when we’d stop in one of these small towns or villages, the locals would crowd around us out of curiosity. We’d be the talk of the town and the young people would request a photo with us.  

Of course, a trip to India would not be complete without its culture shocks. Sharing the roads with cows, donkeys, camels and elephants, straight men holding hands, curry for breakfast, recreational mathematics (including upwards of 15 channels on television dedicated to it), and the importance of cricket (I still don’t understand how this overcomplicated, slower and longer version of baseball works) are some of the traditions that would take me some time to adapt to. One of the most shocking sights to a Westerner or European is the number of swastikas painted or carved into important religious structures. This one requires explaining as this symbol does not mean the same thing as we are accustomed to. The swastika is a religious mark the Nazis adopted from Indian culture, alternating the direction in which it points.

Taj Mahal

Unlike the rest of the trip, I had an expectation for the Taj Mahal. It’s impossible not to. It was at the centre of our itinerary requirements and has been declared one of the manmade wonders of the world. So, in fact, expectations were pretty high. But I’m happy to report it did not disappoint.

Mahal which means palace, was built by the king, Shah Jahar, to monument his love for his wife, Mumzel Mahal. This work of perfect symmetry took 26 years to build and was originally supposed to have an identical twin in black marble. Meanwhile, I complain about spending $100 on an overpriced meal for two in Toronto. But if I had the means of a king, maybe I’d build a monument for Margot Robbie in hopes that she’d be my queen. But I digress.

Much like Margot, it’s impossible to take a bad photo of the Taj. We arrived at sunrise as the golden rays reflected off the dome and towers - A photographer’s fantasy. Additionally, Raj had called upon a friend, a young boy named Raja who knew all the best spots to get photos around the premises. I could have stayed there all day snapping Nat Geo worthy (please see contact page to all Nat Geo editors reading this) and potential profile pics with this mega babe, but I guess an extra hour would have to do. Within hours the photo I posted with the Taj became one of my most liked photos on my personal Instagram.

Inside the Taj is basically a large marble room with the tomb of Mumzel Mahal. Although beautiful, it was maybe the only underwhelming part of the Taj. What did I expect? An exotic bazaar, curry buffet, and a Bollywood production of Rocky Horror starring India’s best and most beautiful maybe?

The Taj is located in the city of Agra. A fascinating but poor place with rundown buildings, street vendors and roaming cows. How can a city which brings in so much tourism be so poor you ask? Most of the money earned by the Taj goes back into restoration of the masterpiece. As well as the landmarks, I enjoy experiencing and photographing local culture. I found Agra fascinating but after consulting with Raj, it wasn’t a safe place for me to explore on my own. So instead I found myself taking video clips with my iPhone from the vehicle window.

Driving

If you think driving downtown is stressful. Try driving anywherein India. Stop signs, traffic lights and speed limits only exist in major cities like New Delhi. “Rules are suggestions in India,” Raj explained to us and then joked, “This is a sign that we live in a democracy.” Seatbelts are optional. Signaling is optional. Braking is optional. Driving on the correct side of the road... optional. However, using your horn continuously is mandatory.

It’s not uncommon in India to see vehicles getting bumped, families of five with infants riding a single motorbike without helmets, a bus so crowded some passengers are riding on the roof, and cows casually strolling across the highway. On our second day, we saw a van making a right-hand turn, crash into two women on a motorbike, knocking them over. Something I have never seen in my life before. Luckily no one was hurt. The van did stop to check if they were alive. The two women stood up, dusted themselves off and were on their way again. No exchange of insurance necessary.

Horns aren’t so much used as a way to let someone know how pissed off you are but rather as a tool to let the person in front of you know they’re approaching or passing quickly. For you see it is quite possible the road is being held up by a camel tow, tractor with an overweight load of chaff, or a herd of goats.

Tipping

Ugh.

Call me a cheap bastard. But I dislike the custom of tipping. I’m used to tipping service people - waiters, drivers, barbers, etc. But in India you tip everyonefor everything, and they expect it. On our daily adventures and discoveries, we found the people of India to be very friendly and considerate. But when it comes to service it can become difficult to distinguish genuine kindness from wallet plunging. Some days I felt like a sultan in a strip club, leaving a trail of dollar bills behind me.

After an exchange of pleasantries with someone, I’d often find them awkwardly lingering until I realized they were waiting for a payout. As we’d come out of our hotel room, a cleaner would be standing in front of you already or appear out of nowhere like something out of a horror movie and repeatedly ask if everything is satisfactory with the room. To the point where I felt like I was paying to get rid of them.

Activities that we’d consider common courtesy (like holding the door open for someone) we’d be expected to tip for. I used the gym at one of the hotels and asked the receptionist if someone could turn on the music. A man came ten minutes later while I was on the treadmill and did so. He then stood behind the treadmill and asked more than once if the music was to my liking. Unfortunately for him, this effort would not be a profitable one. For one, I very much don’t like being interrupted in the middle of a workout. And secondly, who carries cash in their sweaty workout gear?

See, my issue isn’t to do with the money (mostly). The tented camp we stayed at in Ranthambore adjusted this tradition in the right way, in my opinion. Instead of tipping the service people individually, you left something in a tip box upon checkout which was equally distributed upon the service people. This removed the sense of false friendliness.

Maybe I should just move to Australia or Japan.

Safari

Going on safari in Kenya and Tanzania was one of the best experiences of my Mom and I’s lives. So, we decided we wanted to slightly detour to include a few game drives in Ranthambore in an attempt to spot some wild tigers. The state of Rajasthan is one of few territories remaining that is home to the tiger. We were well warned by booking agents, guides, and naturalists that due to the dwindling number of wild tigers (only 64 remaining in Ranthambore) there is no guarantee you will see one. Tigers are also solitary animals that don’t travel in packs, making them even more difficult to track and spot. But I won’t lie, our hopes were quite high to see one. Twenty minutes into our first game drive, “Hey, there’s three tigers!” A mama and two young.

Our second and third game drive weren’t quite as lucky. Ranthambore National Park is split into ten zones, but because we booked late we only had access to zones 6-10. Our afternoon drive was in zone 10 and was pretty much baron and completely dried up. I kept picturing a collection of wildlife having a disco in a lush jungle paradise in zone 1. Our naturalist received a call saying one of the male tigers was hanging out back at the entrance to the zone, with our permission the 4x4 driver hit the gas and drove like an Indian version of Schumacher, who drifted corners and cliffs like human Mario Kart. We rattled around the vehicle, jumping close to a foot off our seat at times. Imagine riding the ricketiest coaster at Canada’s Wonderland (definitely The Wild Beast) without a seatbelt... for 30 minutes! Of course, by the time we reached the entrance, buddy had peaced. But it was one helluva ride to remember and we had some enjoyable back pain as a souvenir. Poor Mom!

Highlights

Other than Adam’s quam with tipping, it sounds like our trip was all sunshine and rainbows (well it was a lotof sunshine, complete with 41-degree heat). But no trip is complete without a few bumps. A group of young over-privileged women who felt entitled to party in the hotel hallway at the expense of everyone else on the same floor cost us a night’s sleep in Jaipur. I also had a 24-hour battle with food poisoning, complete with six accounts of projectile vomiting. But no amount of curry spewing from my nose (spicy!) was going to hinder my experience!

As mentioned above, Raj went that extra mile to create great memories for us to take home. Two of these trip extras became highlights of our travels. On our second day in Delhi he took us to the biggest Sikh temple in the city at the time of ceremony. Not only was the white & gold temple breathtaking but it allowed us to spend some time with a group of people we knew very little about. To honor tradition, we entered without shoes and our heads covered with a bandana. We spent a few moments meditating in the temple over song before Raj took us to the “kitchen.” The Sikh people of this particular temple prepare food and feed 60,000 locals every day voluntarily. I used the word kitchen in quotes, because someone from Canadian Health and Safety would have an aneurism after one look at this room. Everything was prepared in giant vats and no one wore gloves or even socks. Mom and I helped make Chapatti, and weren’t even asked to wash out hands. But alas, the Indian iron stomach can withstand just about anything. We were so grateful for this experience as it broke so many barriers of ignorance and replaced them with a foundation of respect and appreciation. Fun India fact, all Sikhs change their name to Singh. So what happens at a Sikh gathering when there is a phone call asking for Mr. Singh?

After being so intrigued by many of the villages we drove through on our commutes, I said to Raj that I would like to stop in a local village. He was pleased I asked as he had a friend who ran a village between our drive from Jodhpur to Udaipur. Upon arrival, we were greeted with great pleasure by Raj’s friend and shown around. We got to meet the elders of the village, who offered us tea (and opium). But the most rewarding part, maybe of the entire trip, was visiting the local school. We went into two tiny classrooms to meet the children, about age 6-10. They were so ecstatic to see us. Their little faces glowing with excitement as they bounced around on their chair or floor and each one of them wanted to shake our hands. More than any heart could handle without melting on the spot. Even as we had to leave, the boys were poking their heads out the window and door to wave at us.

I can’t thank Raj & Mr. Singh enough for their enthusiasm, patience and hospitality. To say I enjoyed my time in India would be a vast understatement. Most important to me was that Mom got the experience she was hoping for. I was happy to come along for the ride (and family time). That mission was a success and I think Mom came back more satisfied than she even expected. I hadn’t set expectation for myself and was therefore overwhelmingly surprised with the experience and the richness of the culture. So much so that some of the (many) other parts of India that we weren’t able to reach on this trip have now made “the list.”

Note: More photos from my professional camera to be shared on the blog as I get around to editing them. All photos above are from my iPhone 8 Plus.

[alexsmitposts]

US Withdrawing from Afghanistan? It Lies About That Too! Now we are being told that the US is finally getting out of Afghanistan, as has long been promised Maybe, just maybe, the forty years of conflict there will be over, and everyone who has had their say about that country might just care enough to make that happen. There is some concern that the US is not negotiating this withdrawal with the Afghan government, but with the once-hated Taliban, the force long regarded as the exemplar of the evils of fundamentalism and terrorism. But the withdrawal is, after all, part of a peace process. It makes sense to try and talk the opposition into laying down its arms and helping rebuild the country, particularly when the US entered Afghanistan to remove that same force from power, and presumably doesn’t want to withdraw if it would mean letting the same force get up to its old tricks. Yes, we know that the withdrawal is not being driven by the situation in Afghanistan but by domestic political considerations. But surely it would not even be contemplated if Afghanistan wasn’t capable of running its own affairs, and re-establishing itself as a stable and democratic nation? Surely there is some sort of endgame, rather than simply a withdrawal, or there wouldn’t be anything to negotiate about, would there? Afghanistan has drifted in and out of the world’s headlines since 1979. But if there is one thing these past forty years have taught us, it is this. If superpowers actually care about the people they claim to be protecting, they give us valid reasons why they want to protect them. If they don’t, you cannot believe a word they say – and this is why the Afghan conflict only makes any sense if you assume everyone involved in it is lying, and wilfully so, and for the sake of doing it rather than to achieve anything. Heap upon heap When the Soviets invaded Afghanistan in 1979, this made some sort of sense, at least if you were a Soviet. The already Communist Afghan government had been acting increasingly independently of Moscow, in an era when there was increasing cooperation between the US and China, but not so much between the US and the Soviet Union, which saw China as an enemy. Not wanting another Yugoslavia in a country cursed with a very strategic location, the Soviets invaded to bring it back into Moscow’s orbit. No one believed the justification given at the time – that Moscow was merely upholding the Soviet-Afghan Friendship Treaty of 1978. But in this Cold War era, no one expected the Soviet Union to tell the truth about anything, so another dodgy invasion, like that of Czechoslovakia in 1968, wasn’t considered newsworthy. The problem the West had was that few had noticed the rift between Moscow and the Hafizullah Amin government in Kabul. Most commentators wondered why the Soviets had gone in to overthrow a government of the same type. The Soviet argument that Amin was alienating the population by imposing Marxism on an unwilling society cut no ice in Western corridors. According to Western Cold War rhetoric, every Communist government was hated by its people, so why should the biggest and baddest of them all care about the popularity of a fellow travelling regime? One man who did see what was coming was Sir Harold MacMillan, the former British Prime Minister who was now a doddery old man no one took much notice of, a relic of a bygone political era. He had reputedly told his successor in 1963, Sir Alec Douglas-Home, that he would be fine as long as he didn’t invade Afghanistan. This was at the time was seen as a joke rather than a lesson of history. Now MacMillan repeated his claim that Afghanistan was impossible to conquer, but was again ignored. Only when the locals dared to take on the Soviet war machine, on the grounds that it was “infidel” rather than Communist, did the US, China and other powers start pouring money into the various mujahedeen factions, claiming they were “freedom fighters” who stood the first real chance anyone had had of defeating the Soviets. Charlie Wilson’s War But the US didn’t really believe this either. How could it, when it was being seriously embarrassed by the Islamic Revolution in Iran at the same time? For the first time, Muslim equalled terrorist, because the US hadn’t seen that revolution coming, and felt foolish. Did it really think arming and funding Muslim terrorism in Afghanistan, even if it was fighting the Soviet Union, would produce a different result? To the amazement of many, the Afghans did kick out the Soviets, but not before they had started fighting amongst themselves. All the different factions, who controlled different parts of the country, were now supposed to meet and agree on the form of a new democratic system, under UN auspices. But when Mohammad Najibullah, whose faction happened to control the part of Kabul where the government buildings were, unilaterally declared himself president and the conflict started again, the US couldn’t have cared less. For many years, every Western government insisted that the Najibullah regime was a legitimate government, with some sort of democratic mandate, when it was a Muslim terrorist group like its opponents, and had taken power by violating the rules the West had set for that process. When Najibullah was forced to resign in 1992 the various Islamic factions continued their war, using their Western-supplied weapons and training, despite all being considered terrorists. Unable to resolve their internal conflicts, they fell victim to a new force, the Taliban, which conquered most of the country without a major battle by preaching a more extreme version of Islam, exactly what the West didn’t want, despite the fact it didn’t care that the others had once promised the same, and been supported. The US entered Afghanistan to kick out the Taliban, claiming it was a threat to humanity due to its links with al-Qaeda and heroin trafficking. How much the US really cares about either of these two things can be seen in other conflicts, where it fights on the same side as al-Qaeda, and the fact that it controls heroin smuggling routes by proxy. But getting rid of the Taliban, those wild and violent extremists, was worth the sacrifice of yet more Western lives – wasn’t it? Now the US wants to get out of Afghanistan, understanding history better than the Soviets did. But is it supporting the constitutional regime it put in place after the Taliban? No, it is talking to that same enemy, spitting on the graves on its own dead veterans and the victims of the Taliban and the forces it aligned itself with. If we take what the US has said about Afghanistan since 1979 at face value, this is the last thing which should happen. If we see the process as a succession of wilful lies which can only be ended by the biggest lie of the lot, it is perfectly logical – almost as logical as the fact that it is the notorious Trump White House which thinks this is not only OK, but part of some Manifest Destiny only Mr. Orange Face could fulfil. We know the rules The Afghan government has every reason to feel aggrieved that the US is holding talks in Doha with the Taliban but not with itself. Matters have hardly been helped by Imran Khan saying that an “interim government” should be set up in Afghanistan to help with these talks, as if the existing one has no mandate or responsibilities. But Imran is only telling it like it is. If the US actually wants peace with the Taliban, why is it still in the country to counter its “insurgency”? If it doesn’t, why isn’t it supporting the existing Afghan government, which it put there, and continuing to try and defeat the Taliban? Either way, the US is treating the Afghan government like a disposable toy, and Imran is simply saying that if it means what it says, creating another disposable toy is the next step. The problem is that any Afghan government installed by the West is as unacceptable to ordinary Afghans as the Soviet-backed regime was. It was often noted that the leaders of the various “Muslim” mujahideen factions were not only breaking the commandments of the Quran by waging war against fellow Muslims, but behaving in other ways which belied their self-description as “Islamic.” But each was obliged to proclaim himself more Muslim than the last because most Afghans share that faith, and expect their rulers to do the same. After the Third Anglo-Afghan war in 1919, Emir Amanullah Khan pursued a foreign policy independent of the United Kingdom. Though he did not abandon Islam, he began doing things which his enemies, and a portion of the general populace, saw as deviant, such as establishing civil legal codes and building factories. He was forced to abdicate on the grounds that he was non-Muslim, and no subsequent Afghan ruler, apart from the Communists, has dared embrace ideas the Muslim majority will not accept, despite the existence of significant indigenous Hindu and Sikh minorities, and various divisions within Islam itself. The present Afghan government is seen by many as a Western puppet regime, and is being treated like one by the West itself. But it represents about the best balance between Western and Islamic principles the West can hope for. Apparently that doesn’t matter now, and bringing back “cleansed” fundamentalists is more important. But will the population which largely accepted the first Taliban takeover do so a second time, if it appears the same US has brought it back? Tigers chase their tails The Taliban has not been defeated because ordinary Afghans don’t think the Ghani government is Muslim (and therefore authoritative) enough. Despite its past crimes, the Taliban now speaks more than anyone else for an important segment of the population. It will no longer do that if it gets into bed with the infidel to return to power. Then the Taliban will have to do as it did before – become increasingly extreme in its interpretation of Islam to regain the support of that public, and seek protection by that old Western method, sponsoring its favourite terrorists. No one will call for the Russians to ride in to rescue Afghanistan, and the international community will not allow China or Iran to do it. So that leaves the US, which still insists on being taken at its word. To save the world from terrorism, and the Islamic fundamentalism it insists breeds it, the US will have to go back to Afghanistan. As we have already seen, all the talk about getting Uncle Sam out of expensive foreign wars means nothing when set against domestic agendas, such as demonising particular immigrant groups to protect Americans in positions of power doing the same thing. With little else going for him, Trump will jump at the chance to rid the world of people like the Taliban, even though his minions are now negotiating with them to put them in the firing line once again. This is not Vietnam, where the US can leave and allow the Communists to take over because they are at least a genuine government which acts like one. The US can’t pursue its current domestic policy and then leave Afghanistan in the hands of those it blames for all its domestic troubles, and both Trump and the Taliban know that. If the US does pull all its troops out of Afghanistan, others will be sent in their place to do the same job. The governments of the countries they come from will soon baulk at working with the Taliban, and enjoy telling the US so to win their own domestic support. So the US will be in Afghanistan until it can find an even bigger lie to tell – and as it has taken forty years to get to this point, and there will be a backlash against Trumpism in the near future, that day is likely to take a very long time to come.

[interfaithconnect]

Hey I am so excited for this blog!! I have a little question and a big question. Little question: what role do metaphysical stores, religious bookstores, etc real-life retail shops play in your religious practice? What kinds of things do they carry, how often do you shop at one if ever, what role do they play in your community? Big question: do you perceive your religion as having been impacted by consumerism at all? What role does "stuff" play in your religious practice/community?

For me - not much of one. There’s definitely a tendency among pagans, especially newbies, to feel like they need to amass the “right” things before they can properly or “truly” practice. And sure, most of us (myself included) enjoy pretty shrine photos, and want fancy statues and icons, but it’s important to keep in mind that the gods don’t care about that. It’s all extra. Of course there’s nothing wrong with wanting those things - and having icons to focus prayers and worship on can certainly be helpful - but doing will always be more important than having. I could spend a million dollars on a solid gold, life-sized statue of Apollo, but it’s not going to make me a better devotee, it’s not a replacement for me sitting down and giving offerings, and it’s definitely not going to help anyone else, which is a very important tenet of my practice - the gods will always look upon charity and selflessness and generosity more favourably than expensive material items which do nothing but sit on a table.

Now, that being said, one thing I do spend at least my fair share on is books, as I’m nigh-constantly doing research and looking to expand my knowledge. However, as a recon pagan that happens to be something very important to my practice, and also part of an agreement I’ve made with one of my gods, and that’s obviously not the case for everyone!

As to your second question: yeah, I do think a lot of pagan communities have been impacted by consumerism. A lot of people try to use (even without even being conscious of it) not having “enough” things as an excuse for not actually doing the work. That “work” will be different for everyone, because we all have different talents and capabilities, but merely collecting a lot of stuff - however visually appealing it is, and as easy as it is to get caught up in - doesn’t automatically make you a good devotee or a more worthy follower than someone without, and as nice as it might be, it isn’t necessary to be a part of any faith.

And believe me, it happened to me too! When I first started out I was convinced that my shrine needed to look a certain way or that I had to wear certain jewellery or whatever else before I could be a “real” pagan (it was also back when I hardly even knew the word recon, but I digress). I’d think, “I’ll be ready to start just as soon as I buy this one thing”, but of course it was never just one thing, and it constantly got in the way of my actually spending time focusing on my gods and on the other people in my life who had more pressing needs. So like, bottom line is there’s nothing wrong with stuff per se, but it can and does become a problem - though that’s true in other aspects of life as well!

- Mod Kal

Little question: Those type of things don’t often play a role, mostly because they don’t exist in America for Hinduism. However, most of the resources a store like that would carry, i.e. religious texts and puja utensils, can be found in temples (mandirs), or Indian stores, sold alongside food and other groceries. But there aren’t specific shops for that sort of thing, at least not that I’ve seen.

Big question: Absolutely, yes! Which is terribly unfortunate.The central tenet of Hinduism is to be unconcerned with acquiring worldly possessions, because they won’t be with you in your next life. When you couple that belief with the anxiety of not ‘getting things’, you immediately suffer 10 times more.

- Mod Lakshman

Honestly, I wish there were retail stores for Sikhs in the US! Most Sikh-related paraphernalia is made and sold primarily in Punjab. It’s easy enough to buy and cut cloth for turbans, but buying something like a kirpan can double its store cost in international shipping alone. 😫 

But commercialism has taken its toll on Sikhi. There’s this brand of tea called “Yogi Tea”…I could rant for an hour about everything wrong with Yogi Tea and the Sikh Dharma International corporation, but that’s like a six page post. That falls more under the heading of commercial appropriation of Sikhi, but there’s the commercialization of Sikhi even within the Sikh community. Committees who run holy sites like Bangla Sahib have even started selling Coca-Cola products on sacred grounds, which is infuriating to no end.

- Mod Lily

For myself, I have the privilege of having relatives send me the things like prayer mats and chadars [x] for prayer, and I have always had a Quran or two lying about. These things are durable and can last a lifetime.

Islam frowns upon materialism. There are multiple Quran verses and hadiths talking about how we shouldn’t give so much weight to the adornments and goods of this life [for example 18:46] in lieu of the next. It’s to the point where it’s not good too have too many religious items, because they won’t be used for their purpose - leaving Qurans unread, prayer mats unused - that sort of thing. Rather, we should always seek to donate the things we don’t need.

Still, many people consider Qurans and prayer mats and Islamic clothing (long covering garments, hijabs, taqiyahs/topis, etc) a necessity, so there needs to be a way to get some items, at least, although you are always allowed to do what is necessary in Islam, so if you can’t possess any of those things for whatever reason, that’s okay too.

- Mod Neha

[kenzieking-012-blog]

Lit Review: Draft #2

I began my research with an observation of polarization within the United States’ political system. The U.S. has two political parties, Republicans and Democrats, that have historically been fiercely competitive and divided. The Encyclopedia Britannica defines the Republican Party by its belief in “laissez-faire capitalism, low taxes, and conservative social policies” (2019), and the Democratic Party by its support of “organized labour, the civil rights of minorities, and progressive reform” (2019). However, in the past few decades what once could be described as simply “disagreement” between the two has turned into a chasm, and the parties have experienced unprecedented polarization, or “concentration about opposing extremes of groups or interests formerly ranged on a continuum” (Merriam Webster Online). This led me to pose the question, What has recently caused an increase in polarization between Republicans and Democrats? I searched through scholarly articles and popular media outlets and found that most resources I encountered adhere to three main responses:

- the political system stays polarized due to fear and mistrust voters have of the opposing party (“the other”),

- extremist representatives are elected who do not advocate for the centrist views of their constituents,

- or citizens are less centrist than they are perceived to be, and they elect representatives who advocate for the extremist social and economic policies they believe should be enacted.

Fear and Mistrust

One group of research argues that political division in the U.S. has taken root due to psychological manipulation of voters through vilifying rhetoric used by Democratic and Republican candidates against the opposing party in local and national campaigns. In an article called “Political Polarization Is About Feelings, Not Facts” written by Robert B. Talisse for the National Interest, he claims that “political parties are driven to overstate their differences, stress ideological purity and vilify the opposition” (2019).  He argues that politicians’ vernacular affects society and exemplifies constructivism — as they propagandize their values, ideas, and norms, citizens respond by assimilating those values, ideas, and norms into their lives and voting habits. The Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science (2019), also credits the rise of polarization to “polarizing political entrepreneurs [who] exploit existing grievances with Us vs. Them discourse to mobilize voters, and opposing political elites reciprocate the polarizing tactics” (Grover, 2019). Iyengar, Sood, and Lelkes (2012) agree — polarization in the U.S. has less to do with extremist policy preferences or misrepresentation of centrists by their representatives. Instead, they too fault the viciousness of campaigns for the reinforcement of negative opinions each side has of “the other.” They claim that negative opinions developed by voters of “the other” often begin in early childhood, are perpetuated by the media’s repetition of negative messages, are maintained as biases in adulthood, and cause voters and candidates alike to have strong hatred and distrust of the opposing group (Iyengar et. al., 2012).

A poll taken by U.S. adults complements this assessment and claims that at least 20% of those surveyed were willing to go so far as to label the opposition as “evil,” at least 40% labeled the opposition “spiteful,” and 50% labeled the opposition “ignorant” (Axios, 2018). These labels used to vilify “the other” are what Holland (2015) claims motivates voters to remain aligned with a particular political party. All of these scholars claim that voters may not necessarily agree with policy positions taken by “their party’s” candidates, but they will choose to align themselves against the group they find to be less trustworthy. Voters’ biases become entangled in their everyday decisions, and become a basis from which many unconsciously discriminate against “the other,” (Lyengar, Westwood, 2015) manifesting in their choice of a spouse, where they live, and who they interact with on a daily basis (Hersh, Ghitza, 2018). Each of these sources contribute to the argument that the U.S. political system remains polarized, not because of extremist representatives or division over social and economic issues, but because language and vicious campaigns have created an atmosphere of loyalizing fear.

Misrepresentation

In an interview hosted by MSNBC with former Representative Jason Altmire (D - PA), he says Americans are a people who ”find themselves waking up every day thinking about things other than politics. When they do think about it, they want a Congress that can work together, that can compromise and get things done.” In contrast to those who posit that citizens’ fear of “the other” is the country’s greatest cause of polarization, he claims that most Americans tend to be centrist and it is the representatives who are polarized. Altmire says we can see this most clearly in an uncompromising Congress, and the state of Congress exists because “we have a system where we elect people on the extremes…We’re electing people, because of our closed primary system, who are from the fringe of both political parties.” Altmire discusses the difficulties of trying to compromise with the other side during his time in office, because for the most part, those who are in leadership want representatives to “push the agenda” of their party, and representatives are willing to play along.

Altmire contributes an important perspective of first hand experience, and Poole and Rosenthal support his claim with research that shows that “at nearly every level of the political system, American politics has been polarized in ways that do not well represent the interests of middle-of-the-road voters” (pp. 1061). Their research falls in line with Altmire’s accusations against a divided congress and reiterate that “For better or for worse, constituencies are generally fought over by two opposing coalitions, liberal and conservative, each with relatively extreme views. The middle-of-the-road voter is thus not a member of a silent majority desiring some radical social change, but a moderate individual seeking to avoid the wide swings in policy engendered by our political system” (pp. 1061). Both of these sources contribute to the argument that polarization is not primarily caused by fear or by extremist citizens, but because elite representatives do not accurately represent the desires of their constituents.

Social and Economic

Another set of research claims that long-standing division over social and economic issues, intensified by the work of activists advocating for social change along party lines, is what has exacerbated polarization in recent years (Miller, Schofield, 2003). In the past century, candidates attempted to convert disaffected voters to their side by adopting social and economic issues that are important to these marginal groups and activists, regardless of whether that meant they were taking a stance typically taken by the opposing party (Miller et. al., 2003). This tactic is referred to as “flanking,” and though this caused the two parties to essentially “switch sides” over time, the chasm between them remains just as wide and keeps them from being able to reach agreements (Poole, Rosenthal, 1984). Abortion, marriage laws, mass incarceration laws, and the separation of church and state are among some of the most divisive issues that cause voters to remain loyal to their particular party rather than voting for third party candidates or along centrist lines (Robertson, 2010).

I noticed that those who place themselves in this camp also offer the most hope for decrease in polarization in the years to come. Journalist Michael Tomasky observes growth in the demographic of liberal Latino populations in swing states, namely Florida, where Republican candidates previously held more sway (2016). He claims that “opposition to immigration reform has been like glue on the far-right, helping hold factions together,” but as groups who were previously minorities begin to increase and subsequently cause a shift in the political atmosphere, this could force the Republican party to “open itself to immigration reform, specifically with a path to citizenship.” Once the “immigration reform glue” dissolves, the party could be forced to become less polarized on other issues as well in order to attract increasing numbers of minority voters (Tomasky, 2016). Others like Valerie Kaur, a “social justice activist, lawyer, filmmaker, innovator, mother and Sikh American” also offer hope for polarization caused by social and economic issues, but take a more poetic approach. At the TedWomen talk in 2017, she says that we must all use “revolutionary love” to combat division along partisan lines — we must be willing to see no stranger, tend to our opponents’ wound, and love ourselves, take deep breaths, and push through the fire of polarization. In her own experience, she has watched the impact that “tending to the wound” of the opposition can have. She is clear that tending to their wound is not “healing them,” only they can do that, but in “tending to it” through forgiveness, we are “able to see our opponents: the terrorist, the fanatic, the demagogue. They've been radicalized by cultures and policies that we together can change” (2017). Kaur emphasizes the importance of not fighting individuals across party lines, and choosing instead to “wield our swords and shields to battle bad systems, (because) that's when we (see) change” (2017).

This collection of researchers/experts/activists emphasizes the importance of disagreements about policy and how this has played a role in the polarization of the U.S. political system. In addition to giving origin explanations about the cause of polarization, this camp collectively offers the most hopeful approach to change in the future.

Conclusion

Based on research thus far, it is clear that there seems to be, at a minimum, three competing thoughts about the cause of political polarization in the U.S. There seems to be some overlap of these theories by experts, but for future research endeavors it would be beneficial to analyze the way these variables are interconnected.

Grover, J. D. (2019). How to Halt the Rise of Polarization That Imperils Our Republic. Foundation for Economic Education. Retrieved from https://fee.org/articles/how-to-halt-the-rise-of-polarization-that-imperils-our-republic/.

Hart, K. (2018, November 12). Poll: Majority of Democrats Think Republicans are "Racist," "Bigoted" or “Sexist". Axios. Retrieved from https://www.axios.com/poll-democrats-and-republicans-hate-each-other-racist-ignorant-evil-99ae7afc-5a51-42be-8ee2-3959e43ce320.html.

Hersh, E., & Ghitza, Y., (2018). Mixed Partisan Households and Electoral Participation in the United States. PLoS ONE, 13(10), E0203997.

Holland, R. (2015). Political Polarization: Why We All Can’t Just Get Along. Retrieved from https://www.forbes.com/sites/hbsworkingknowledge/2015/09/30/political-polarization-why-we-all-cant-just-get-along/.

Iyengar, S., Sood, G., & Lelkes, Y. (2012) Affect, Not Ideology: A Social Identity Perspective on Polarization, Public Opinion Quarterly, 76(3), 405–431.

Iyengar, S., & Westwood, S. (2015). Fear and Loathing across Party Lines: New Evidence on Group Polarization. American Journal of Political Science, 59(3), 690-707.

Kaur, V. (n.d.). Retrieved October 16, 2019, from https://www.ted.com/talks/valarie_kaur_3_lessons_of_revolutionary_love_in_a_time_of_rage/footnotes.

Mccoy, Jennifer & Somer, Murat. (2019). "Toward a Theory of Pernicious Polarization and How It Harms Democracies: Comparative Evidence and Possible Remedies" Forthcoming in a Special Issue of the Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Sciences, guest editors Jennifer McCoy and Murat Somer, January 2019. The Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science.

Miller, G., & Schofield, N. (2003). Activists and Partisan Realignment in the United States. American Political Science Review, 97(2), 245-260. doi:10.1017/S0003055403000650.

Polarization [Def. 2b]. (n.d.) In Merriam Webster Online, Retrieved October 15, 2019, from https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/polarization.

Poole, K., & Rosenthal, H. (1984). The Polarization of American Politics. The Journal of Politics, 46(4), 1061-1079.

Robertson, A. W. (2010). Political polarization. In Encyclopedia of U.S. Political History (pp. 2756-2756). Washington, DC: CQ Press doi: 10.4135/9781608712380.n740.

The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica. (2019, July 17). Democratic Party. Encyclopædia Britannica, inc. Retrieved from https://www.britannica.com/topic/Democratic-Party.

The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica. (2019). Republican Party. Encyclopædia Britannica, inc. Retrieved from https://www.britannica.com/topic/Republican-Party.

Tomasky, M. (2016, November 8). Yes, There's Hope for an End to Political Polarization in the US. Retrieved from https://ideas.ted.com/yes-theres-hope-for-an-end-to-political-polarization-in-the-us/.

(2017, December 28). Retrieved from http://www.msnbc.com/morning-joe/watch/how-the-country-became-polarized-and-what-to-do-1125279811713

[biofunmy]

Before Sex, the Straitjacket? – The New York Times

MILAN — The Gucci show that closed Milan Fashion Week on Sunday afternoon came as something of a surprise, though not for the reasons anyone would have guessed.

It was not, for example, surprising because Alessandro Michele, the creative director famed for his embrace of sequins and sports memorabilia and old lady lunch suits and underground rockers — and pretty much all things, all at once — did an about-face to restraint. Though he did, relatively speaking.

It was not because of any celebrity who showed up, though there were a number: Iggy Pop, ASAP Rocky, Sienna Miller, Jared Leto, Jeremy O. Harris, Gucci Mane.

It was because guests entered a room bathed in red light, strafed by four moving walkways, and were guided to seats under a ceiling speckled by stars. On either end were arched doorways shut tight by rolling steel garage doors. Was it an oven, some wondered? A red light district?

Then the lights went up, the walkways started moving, and out came the models — barefoot, staring catatonically ahead, in white clothing that resembled nothing so much as straitjackets of many styles.

There were straitjackets that looked like giant coveralls, straitjacket smocks, straitjacket anoraks. Straitjackets that buttoned up, laced up and buckled up. There were 20 in all, including one worn by a nonbinary model named Ayesha Tan Jones who, instead of keeping hands down like all the other models, held them up to display the words “mental health is not fashion.”

Later the model, who uses the pronoun “they,” posted a photo of their protest on Instagram, along with a longer statement: “As an artist and model who has experienced my own struggles with mental health, along with family members and loved ones who have been affected by depression, anxiety, bipolar and schizophrenia, it is hurtful and insensitive for a major fashion house such as Gucci to use this imagery as a concept for a fleeting fashion moment.”

And it was, indeed, hard not to wonder: What was Mr. Michele thinking?

Especially because right after the last white-clothed figure rolled by, the lights flickered off and on, and an entirely different show began, one full of long black pleated gowns (black! from the man who has always rejected the dominance of the little black dress) left mostly transparent to display the body beneath; deep, scoop-neck leotard tops over skirts slit to the thigh; men’s colored lounge looks flashing patches that read “Gucci Orgasmique,” “Kitten,” and “Eterotopia” (more later on this word, which seems like “eroticopia” but is not); and lingerie-inspired slip dresses that mixed lace and chiffon and oily black vinyl.

There were shift-like hostess dresses with a four-petal flower cut out around the center of the breast bone and a bit of dominatrix business suiting. There was not much pattern, but there was a lot of color blocking. Accessories were mostly big sunglasses held on by a chunky chain and a few riding crops.

What was Mr. Michele thinking?

In the welcome note emailed to attendees, the designer had name-checked Michel Foucault (source of Erterotopia or, in English, Herterotopia, and refers to Foucault’s worlds within worlds) and his theory of “biophysics” and the way the power of the dominant social group that “imposes conducts and paths, that prescribes thresholds of normality.” In an interview before the show, Mr. Michele had talked about a desire to challenge himself; to confront, for the first time, the idea of “sexiness” he had grown up with in the 1990s; to play with “elegance;” to “work with less.” To stop simply breaking all the rules, but to try understanding them. He had giggled that “fashion is like an orgasm: very quick and very deep.” Ummmm. If he says so.

Then, standing before a board tacked with photos of the run of show, he had gestured at the white series that began the collection and talked about it as a sort of wiping the slate clean; a way to have a fresh start; to break free.

So what was Mr. Michele thinking?

A lot, as always; he has a magpie mind that leaps from reference to inference to imagination with nary time for a breath; that alights on one idea only to fly off to another; that has found expression in a glorious jumble of enthusiastic self-expression.

It has given Gucci a new identity, one that has been adopted with alacrity by a growing tribe of acolytes, and has helped make the brand the envy of the market. But it has also gotten it in trouble before: First in 2018, when Mr. Michele set his show in an operating room and then sent models in what looked like Sikh turbans down his runway, provoking charges of cultural appropriation, and then, earlier this year, with a sweater that resembled blackface.

The latter mistake provoked apologies and systemic company change, including establishing a diversity and inclusion council. Some of their advisers, including Dapper Dan, were on the front row of the show.

What was Mr. Michele thinking?

“I wanted to show how society today can have the ability to confine individuality and that Gucci can be the antidote,” he said later. “For me, the show was the journey from conformity to freedom and creativity. Uniforms, utilitarian clothes, such straitjackets, were included in the fashion show as the most extreme version of restriction imposed by society and those who control it. These clothes were a statement for the fashion show and part of a performance.” Given the show was partly about freedom, Gucci felt the model should be free to protest.

Hari Nef, an actress, who was also at the show, wrote on Instagram that she saw it as “more a provocative reminder of submission than a glamorization of insanity.”

And perhaps the mere fact the conversation exists is a good thing. It is part of fashion’s job to provoke; to challenge conventional wisdom and forms of identity; to give physical expression to emotional ideas.

The fact that Mr. Michele refused to rest on his come-one-come-all laurels and instead tried something newish, though it may disappoint some of his fans, gave his actual clothes, not the performance clothes, a more streamlined, less frenetic presence. They didn’t jabber all at once. They chose their moment — and that idea of choice (to protest, to reveal, to conceal) is powerful.

Mr. Michele thinks about that. Not enough designers seem to. It’s just that he doesn’t always seem to think it through.

Sahred From Source link Fashion and Style

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[sol-futura-est]

When I finally step into my room, I unlace my shoes, undo my jumpsuit, and strip almost naked, save for my boxers. On my desk, besides the dim lamp, is at least four or five stacks of journals, most unread, organized from the formation of the first republic, to the modern era, but I only read about the recent wars more closely. I had returned all but a few of the ones of the beginning. What was open and waiting was Lawrence di Firenze’s account of his movement from Mesopotamia to Saint Petersburg, after fighting numerous skirmishes and enlisting the help of men on the path, he defied the orders of the senate and abandoned a quiet sector in favor of facing the fire, predicting the enemy’s advances as if he knew them more than anyone else. When he arrived to relieve his brother, and routing the siege, he was widely considered by people from east and west to be more than a mere tribune, but a hero worth talking about.

"Today marks the first of February, 2236. I’ve personally, let alone commanded the death of, killed so many of these machines and zealots that I’m beginning to view this war as something eternal, something worth finishing sooner than later. Araasi, the elected chief of the armies and political mastermind of the Svarogovist war machine, has laid siege to the great city of Petrograd, Saint Petersburg, Leningrad, whichever you prefer. As I already made clear to the senate, and the consul, he intends to take the city for the rail lines and airstrips that tie it to the rest of Eastern Europe and north into Finland and Scandinavia. I was ridiculed. I was told he would be stupid to challenge my brothers forces to open combat while entrenched in the city, and that I should take my horsemen and my commandos to greater effect in waiting for another attack from the Caspian Sea, or a new set of tunnels in northern Persia to burst. Despite my track record, despite my national appeal, from Mongols, Sikhs, Latins, Intermarians, even among my auxiliaries from even farther parts of the world, the senate, a handful of men, refuse.

It’s too bad I’m already here, on the banks of the sea to the west, encamped, ready to give the order to advance across the south and give my brother some relief. My chief lieutenant, my divisional legate, is still young. His aptitude is unquestionable, but he’s deeply afraid, almost embarrassingly so. He insists that I’m insane for using my horsemen like I do. I always ask him who won at Sinjar, in Central Asia, or even further back, in Kunduz, or Khalistan. Every time he just shudders, calls me old fashioned. I always tell him that it isn’t the implement, it’s the organization, it’s the application, the details. He insists that my ways will get me killed. In my eyes, this is why I’ve been so successful. Twenty years ago, my adoption and adaptation of coursers was laughed at, until we pushed Araasi’s predecessor into battle and killed him. For the first time in three hundred years, horsemen marched on city streets as heroes. My brother was amazed. He even told me before we deployed that his power armor would be the new knights of old, that I could not be in the spotlight as he hoped. After, it was as if he was seeing horses for the first time. Part of me wishes it was him, that the future, the grand spectacle of old books, where man fought different enemies, with suits of steel powered by space age technology. Little did I know we still used rifles and bows and lances, swords, knives, we even fought in hand to hand ambushes. Those were grand times.

Araasi still has us outnumbered two to one. Most of his other forces are south of us, dealing with Roland in the Caucasus, and the Sikhs further still.  All I have to stop is this one individual, and when this front collapses, I can end the war completely. If I end it, that’s just gonna exacerbate what certain voices are already shouting in the west.

It isn’t just youths who want me to take the mantle of dictator for some time, but even a lot of the men and women my age. Rumors that the senate gamed things after the first war, and allowed this one to happen, and my zeal against the enemy, it all makes these folks wish I was the one making decisions, not men who once upon a time were my peers. 

These dreams of mine are always alight with the same scene. I’m charging headlong through a valley of fire, against frightened machines, mutilated and disformed men, lowering my rifle and gunning them down. But I can see my horse and myself alight, in golden flame, as if the sunlight was pouring out of me. I can feel the horse galloping fast, the thrusting push of my rifle, even the fear through the air from the demons in front me. 

But it goes black suddenly, and I can’t wake up for a few moments. When I wake up, I feel as if the fire had only just gone out, as if Sol was trying to tell me something, but I cannot be sure. I want to believe that his is truly with me, that he was there when my father crossed the alps to take Bern, I want to believe not only that the republic is chosen, but many men themselves, but should I be afraid?"

Almost abruptly, the entry closes. Two weeks later he enclosed Araasi on a field and both of them died in the ensuing battle. Lawrence was found and carried out, Araasi was apparently either mutilated or simply drug back to the underground cities, entombed in whatever strange way they did things.

Specifically, it was this tale that caught my thoughts in moments like this. Two weeks after he penned this, he died. More than that, I know nothing of the man’s ripples in the lake of what remained. My body shivered trying to imagine what that battle was like, how it ensued beyond the tide of time, how the memory that existed on paper was so that the memories of those that adored him could feel his heartbeat through the letters. When I folded the tome and set it down again, next to one of Tarquin’s journals from the first war, I remembered reading it for the first time seven years ago, slowly, each night when one page became ten, ten became twenty or thirty. Mortimer told me once when there was a book or a movie the owners of this place didn’t want a fighter to see in his possession, that he got sent to a mining colony in the Urals. One of the few mandated by the senate, but operated by what used to be Svarogovist refugees. Those were my bedtime horror stories. Mortimer let his hate sew into me from youth on. When I’m stuck here, I can’t know if that’s true.

If the night was going to last forever, I might stay up, read more, but there’s not much reason to. Tomorrow always comes. When I slip under the thin blanket on my bed, I drift closer and closer to sleep as the dim lamp lights my desk, but not revealing the far off corner I was in. Each ride of the waves as they came onto me dragged me into the current, until suddenly…

Stop.

I know it’s a dream, but when I open my eyes again, I’m no longer in the arena, and somehow, I know I’m no longer in Karelia. When I stand, My feet are buried in flowing grass, and my ears can hear the faint whistle of the draft wrapping around me, and in front of me is emptiness, as far as I can see. All there are is rolling hills, the same I have seen every so often in my dreams. If I do dream, it’s lucid, just like this, just as if I can see and feel every little thing in some far off place I’ve never been to. The sun is always at dawn, gleaming rays striking firm into an endless horizon beyond the human imagination, a light that always inflicts on you the fury of comfort, of confidence. Nothing here can hurt you, nothing here is imperfect. Sparse trees and shrubs, hills that come in waves, glimmering dew, glistening blue sky, it all comes together to paint one picture, serene, perfect. Mountains afar stand taller than the ones here in Karelia, and faintly, from the north, is the smell of the ocean, riding the wind. Urban stench, sound, and surefound idiocy are gone. This isolation, the temporal, spiritual, physical isolation is not uncommon to me, but my own life, and I thrive within the quiet moments, where all that is left is to either think or lie down and breathe.

The first time I heard of a dream, I didn’t know what it was. When I found out that Mortimer knew I had dreams, he regrettably mentioned he knew nothing of the dreams I had. When I pried as a young kid, all he could do was shrug, and I came to think there was a local rarity within myself. When I found myself dreaming more than twice a week, I heard comments from the legionnaires, within their own conversations, and I’ve figured out that my dreams weren’t common, but still rare. I got lucky that day hearing that conversation; it helped me not be so afraid of being alone here. At first, all I could do was hope the shadows around trees were the light dancing. Eventually all I learned was that fear is a beast that starves without your hand to feed it, and this world was nobody’s but mine. In domineering it, I domineered the one part I could control.

When all you hear is the wind whipping, every little noise becomes another sound against the background, water running, grass flowing, trees groaning and twisting, and eventually, your own heart becomes an addition to the symphony. I didn’t want anything here. I never wanted more than this, but in my heart, I was curious for more. Every nagging thought, asking if this is all life is, was at times too much. Those nights I would wake up, pace my room, maybe even exhaust myself with two or three hundred push ups until the pain distracted me, and when I finally slept, my eyes simply stared at the absence. Every time I woke, rested or not, I went about my day.

But the questions would stay for night after night until the quiet of my mind returned, and when I finally went back to the dream, to the rolling hills I now sit in, encapsulated by walls of granite on one end, and the endless ocean on another. Each air into my lungs was rhythmic, patterned, as if I was breathing with the earth, with the wind, and no longer was I so detached for a few moments. Even as the hours drew on, the dawn never rose to the day, and the dew never rose up. 

Soon enough, my visage faded more and more, as if there was a great weight on me, and just as it began, my eyes shut.

Stop.

[biofunmy]

Before Sex, the Straitjacket? – The New York Times

MILAN — The Gucci show that closed Milan Fashion Week on Sunday afternoon came as something of a surprise, though not for the reasons anyone would have guessed.

It was not, for example, surprising because Alessandro Michele, the creative director famed for his embrace of sequins and sports memorabilia and old lady lunch suits and underground rockers — and pretty much all things, all at once — did an about-face to restraint. Though he did, relatively speaking.

It was not because of any celebrity who showed up, though there were a number: Iggy Pop, ASAP Rocky, Sienna Miller, Jared Leto, Jeremy O. Harris, Gucci Mane.

It was because guests entered a room bathed in red light, strafed by four moving walkways, and were guided to seats under a ceiling speckled by stars. On either end were arched doorways shut tight by rolling steel garage doors. Was it an oven, some wondered? A red light district?

Then the lights went up, the walkways started moving, and out came the models — barefoot, staring catatonically ahead, in white clothing that resembled nothing so much as straitjackets of many styles.

There were straitjackets that looked like giant coveralls, straitjacket smocks, straitjacket anoraks. Straitjackets that buttoned up, laced up and buckled up. There were 20 in all, including one worn by a nonbinary model named Ayesha Tan Jones who, instead of keeping hands down like all the other models, held them up to display the words “mental health is not fashion.”

Later the model, who uses the pronoun “they,” posted a photo of their protest on Instagram, along with a longer statement: “As an artist and model who has experienced my own struggles with mental health, along with family members and loved ones who have been affected by depression, anxiety, bipolar and schizophrenia, it is hurtful and insensitive for a major fashion house such as Gucci to use this imagery as a concept for a fleeting fashion moment.”

And it was, indeed, hard not to wonder: What was Mr. Michele thinking?

Especially because right after the last white-clothed figure rolled by, the lights flickered off and on, and an entirely different show began, one full of long black pleated gowns (black! from the man who has always rejected the dominance of the little black dress) left mostly transparent to display the body beneath; deep, scoop-neck leotard tops over skirts slit to the thigh; men’s colored lounge looks flashing patches that read “Gucci Orgasmique,” “Kitten,” and “Eterotopia” (more later on this word, which seems like “eroticopia” but is not); and lingerie-inspired slip dresses that mixed lace and chiffon and oily black vinyl.

There were shift-like hostess dresses with a four-petal flower cut out around the center of the breast bone and a bit of dominatrix business suiting. There was not much pattern, but there was a lot of color blocking. Accessories were mostly big sunglasses held on by a chunky chain and a few riding crops.

What was Mr. Michele thinking?

In the welcome note emailed to attendees, the designer had name-checked Michel Foucault (source of Erterotopia or, in English, Herterotopia, and refers to Foucault’s worlds within worlds) and his theory of “biophysics” and the way the power of the dominant social group that “imposes conducts and paths, that prescribes thresholds of normality.” In an interview before the show, Mr. Michele had talked about a desire to challenge himself; to confront, for the first time, the idea of “sexiness” he had grown up with in the 1990s; to play with “elegance;” to “work with less.” To stop simply breaking all the rules, but to try understanding them. He had giggled that “fashion is like an orgasm: very quick and very deep.” Ummmm. If he says so.

Then, standing before a board tacked with photos of the run of show, he had gestured at the white series that began the collection and talked about it as a sort of wiping the slate clean; a way to have a fresh start; to break free.

So what was Mr. Michele thinking?

A lot, as always; he has a magpie mind that leaps from reference to inference to imagination with nary time for a breath; that alights on one idea only to fly off to another; that has found expression in a glorious jumble of enthusiastic self-expression.

It has given Gucci a new identity, one that has been adopted with alacrity by a growing tribe of acolytes, and has helped make the brand the envy of the market. But it has also gotten it in trouble before: First in 2018, when Mr. Michele set his show in an operating room and then sent models in what looked like Sikh turbans down his runway, provoking charges of cultural appropriation, and then, earlier this year, with a sweater that resembled blackface.

The latter mistake provoked apologies and systemic company change, including establishing a diversity and inclusion council. Some of their advisers, including Dapper Dan, were on the front row of the show.

What was Mr. Michele thinking?

“I wanted to show how society today can have the ability to confine individuality and that Gucci can be the antidote,” he said later. “For me, the show was the journey from conformity to freedom and creativity. Uniforms, utilitarian clothes, such straitjackets, were included in the fashion show as the most extreme version of restriction imposed by society and those who control it. These clothes were a statement for the fashion show and part of a performance.” Given the show was partly about freedom, Gucci felt the model should be free to protest.

Hari Nef, an actress, who was also at the show, wrote on Instagram that she saw it as “more a provocative reminder of submission than a glamorization of insanity.”

And perhaps the mere fact the conversation exists is a good thing. It is part of fashion’s job to provoke; to challenge conventional wisdom and forms of identity; to give physical expression to emotional ideas.

The fact that Mr. Michele refused to rest on his come-one-come-all laurels and instead tried something newish, though it may disappoint some of his fans, gave his actual clothes, not the performance clothes, a more streamlined, less frenetic presence. They didn’t jabber all at once. They chose their moment — and that idea of choice (to protest, to reveal, to conceal) is powerful.

Mr. Michele thinks about that. Not enough designers seem to. It’s just that he doesn’t always seem to think it through.

Sahred From Source link Fashion and Style

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