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Rteacher
Joined: 23 May 2005
Location: Western MA, USA
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 Posted: Fri Aug 16, 2013 3:53 am Post subject: |
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Hmmm... I think this requires philosophical analysis.
All men are created equal ...
All men and women are created equal? ...
Created by what or whom? ...
Is the Creator male or female - or both? ...
In the Vedic tradition, although the Supreme Person is originally the all-attractive male (Krishna), His internal pleasure potency is always manifest as the all-attractive female (Radha), Who can attract and captivate the Supreme Male - ultimately for His enjoyment.
Although the Absolute Truth is both male and female, technically it may be considered that the Creator - the Supreme Enjoyer - is male, and all created beings (men and women) are female - in that we were all created to be enjoyed.
So, in the spiritual sense, it would be philosophically more correct to state "All of Us Women are Created Equal". Of course, materially we are equal only in the sense that everybody is different (to varying degrees).
To more specifically address the thread topic, we might as well use the term "freshwomen" to designate all first year students. |
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12ax7
Joined: 07 Nov 2009
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| Posted: Fri Aug 16, 2013 4:16 am Post subject: |
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I don't use freshman, sophomore, junior, or senior because they are neither phonetically nor esthetically pleasant... plus, it's ludicrous to call a young woman a 'freshman'. I prefer using 1st, 2nd, 3nd, and 4th year student for the aforementioned reasons and, well, because these appeal to my love of numbers (I'm a math nerd).  |
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GF
Joined: 26 Sep 2012
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| Posted: Sat Aug 17, 2013 7:06 pm Post subject: |
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| Rteacher wrote: |
Hmmm... I think this requires philosophical analysis.
All men are created equal ...
All men and women are created equal? ...
Created by what or whom? ...
Is the Creator male or female - or both? ...
In the Vedic tradition, although the Supreme Person is originally the all-attractive male (Krishna), His internal pleasure potency is always manifest as the all-attractive female (Radha), Who can attract and captivate the Supreme Male - ultimately for His enjoyment.
Although the Absolute Truth is both male and female, technically it may be considered that the Creator - the Supreme Enjoyer - is male, and all created beings (men and women) are female - in that we were all created to be enjoyed.
So, in the spiritual sense, it would be philosophically more correct to state "All of Us Women are Created Equal". Of course, materially we are equal only in the sense that everybody is different (to varying degrees).
To more specifically address the thread topic, we might as well use the term "freshwomen" to designate all first year students. |
I guess the question this raises, for me, is why traditional Vedic culture is patriarchal. If men might as well be called women, then men and women are the same. And so I wonder how it is possible that born-and-bred Hindus misunderstood their religion for thousands of years by insisting on distinction between men and women, while a convert like yourself - who happens, I might add, to have been mentally and emotionally formed in a secular and radically feminist culture - is so much more knowledgeable in the Vedic tradition. |
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Rteacher
Joined: 23 May 2005
Location: Western MA, USA
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| Posted: Sun Aug 18, 2013 3:16 pm Post subject: |
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| Women are highly valued in Vedic culture, but foreign influences worsened their plight in India. The varnashrama system, while apparently discouraging their independence, is basically designed to protect women from being exploited. http://www.stephen-knapp.com/women_in_vedic_culture.htm A man refers to all women except his wife as mataji (mother). |
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Fox
Joined: 04 Mar 2009
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| Posted: Sun Aug 18, 2013 4:54 pm Post subject: |
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| Rteacher wrote: |
| Women are highly valued in Vedic culture, but foreign influences worsened their plight in India. The varnashrama system, while apparently discouraging their independence, is basically designed to protect women from being exploited. http://www.stephen-knapp.com/women_in_vedic_culture.htm A man refers to all women except his wife as mataji (mother). |
You are reinforcing his point. |
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GF
Joined: 26 Sep 2012
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| Posted: Mon Aug 19, 2013 5:45 pm Post subject: |
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| Rteacher wrote: |
| Women are highly valued in Vedic culture, but foreign influences worsened their plight in India. The varnashrama system, while apparently discouraging their independence, is basically designed to protect women from being exploited. http://www.stephen-knapp.com/women_in_vedic_culture.htm A man refers to all women except his wife as mataji (mother). |
You say that Hindu women were "highly valued", yet simultaneously mired in a "plight" which foreign meddling merely "worsened" ? I agree that any culture which reveres mothers is one in which women are truly valued, but I disagree fundamentally with the feminist narrative suggested by the word plight. When I take in both of your recent posts, you come across as someone whose primary loyalty in this matter lies with feminism, rather than with traditional Vedic mores and beliefs. In other words - if I may borrow an analogy from the language of Catholicism - a Liberal and a Modernist. No actual traditional Hindu would assert that men and women are effectively identical, such that men can just as well be called women. Your link simply confirms, over and over and over, that Vedic culture regards men and women as remarkably different from each other. So it's plain that your attempted application of Vedic theology to this 'freshwoman' thing is in all likelihood a total failure and a mess of confusion; either you are wrong, or thousands of years of Vedic culture are wrong, in which case you are still wrong, since you are then building your views upon six thousand years of incomprehension and error. I strongly discourage you from believing and practising this damnable Eastern paganism, but if you insist, all I can say is that you should believe and practise with honesty, and with fidelity to what your Indian spiritual forefathers believed and practised. Sorry, but that doesn't include feminism. |
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Unposter
Joined: 04 Jun 2006
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| Posted: Mon Aug 19, 2013 10:26 pm Post subject: |
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| Don't ask me why I am biting on this tangent but I really am curious...why all the duality? Why does traditional Vedic culture have to be either patriarchal or feminist? I in now way profess to know much about it but I am willing to bet that some people were patriarchal and some people were feminists and some people even had other ideas...There must have been a myriad of thoughts on the subject. I bet there still are. |
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Fox
Joined: 04 Mar 2009
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| Posted: Mon Aug 19, 2013 10:58 pm Post subject: |
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| Unposter wrote: |
Why does traditional Vedic culture have to be either patriarchal or feminist? |
It "has" to be patriarchal because it was patriarchal. As a general rule, if Wikipedia answers your question, and the Wikipedia entry is sourced, and you cannot think of any legitimate, non-speculative objections to the points raised by those sources, you have little ground upon which to stand.
| Quote: |
| The Vedic household was patriarchal and patrilineal. The institution of marriage was important and different types of marriages— monogamy, polygyny and polyandry are mentioned in the Rig Veda. Both women sages and female gods were known to Vedic Aryans. However, hymns attributable to female sages are few and female gods were not as important as male ones. Women could choose their husbands and could remarry if their husbands died or disappeared.[24] While the wife enjoyed a respectable position, she was subordinate to her husband.[23] |
| Unposter wrote: |
| I in now way profess to know much about it but I am willing to bet that some people were patriarchal and some people were feminists and some people even had other ideas...There must have been a myriad of thoughts on the subject. I bet there still are. |
While you're patently wrong with regards to the culture in question, you are not wrong that matriarchal (not feminist; feminism is a purely destructive philosophy of complaint, unable to exist save in societies which are both wildly wealthy, so as to bear its parasitic burden, and liberally democratic, such that they will deign to bear that burden, making it a modern phenomenon) thought was also attested in the same region of the world at around the same time. Ancient Tantric cults, for example, inclined strongly to the superiority of the feminine principle, and they were probably outgrowths of primitive matriarchal societies. This is, of course, why you're wrong to presuppose the degree of intellectual diversity within Vedic thought that you presuppose: to the extent that someone embraced matriarchal thought, they would be placing themselves outside of Vedic thought in the first place. A "Vedic Feminist" would be on par with a "Catholic Abortionist" in a sense: one could certainly claim to be such, but at best it would mean one is confused, and at worst it would mean one is an active liar who is attempting to co-opt an ancient tradition to support their own personal practice.
Rteacher is not a part of the Vedic tradition. Rteacher is part of a modern cult which superficially clothes itself in Vedic imagery to lend it a degree of perceived legitimacy it could never have otherwise attained. |
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Unposter
Joined: 04 Jun 2006
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| Posted: Tue Aug 20, 2013 4:05 pm Post subject: |
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Fox,
You do not have to be so pedantic and over-bearing. I understand that the modality of Vedic thought is patriarchal. But, as you so kindly pointed out, there were other forms of thought: polyandry for example. You also said there were goddesses - and no doubt they had priestesses and female adherents who most likely not only had different thinking but different ways of life than the average. Traditional Vedic culture is not unique in this - many cultures tolerate a diversity of thought and ways of life under one cultural umbrella. In fact, your sense of culture is too dualistic (is or not) and too monolithic.
Your dogmatic approach to a Vedicism in which non-patriarchy is patently absurd and a Catholicism in which being pro-abortion is patently absurd flies in the face of those who believe otherwise and that is dehumanizing and demeaning. In such light, it is not surprising that you think you have the power to even categorize and declare Rteacher a member of a cult and insinuate he is not really a Hindu. Your power is as great as your kindness.
To clarify, my previous point was that traditional Vedic thought may be a lot less dualistic and a lot fuller and deeper (including with minority opinions) than otherwise thought by some of the posters in the discussion. |
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Fox
Joined: 04 Mar 2009
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| Posted: Tue Aug 20, 2013 9:55 pm Post subject: |
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| Unposter wrote: |
Fox,
You do not have to be so pedantic and over-bearing. |
Yes, I do, precisely because it's the only way to respond to low content, highly emotional posts such as the one you have made here. Read again what you wrote. You're objecting to the notion of a historically attested patriarchal Veduc civilization, in direct opposition to actually data-driven, scholastic opinions on the matter, while yourself providing absolutely no data or references.
I have, sitting right bext to my computer, an expertly argued, heavily sourced book on this exact subject which devotes no small amount of its page count to arguing and reinforcing the patriarchal character of Veduc culture. On the other hand, I have you, in a data-free fashion, bemoaning "duality" of such a position and whining about my pedantry (which evidently means relying upon data and argument instead of soppy, vague opinion). If you want to discuss this issue seriously, you must do better, and if you cannot or will not do better, then you must live with being dismissed as incorrect.
| Unposter wrote: |
| I understand that the modality of Vedic thought is patriarchal. But, as you so kindly pointed out, there were other forms of thought: polyandry for example. You also said there were goddesses - and no doubt they had priestesses and female adherents who most likely not only had different thinking but different ways of life than the average. |
Yes, and that is all true, but it does not support your opinion. Indeed, the fact that I, and not you (or our "Vedic" friend) raised these examples ought to get you thinking about why I would have posted them if I did not feel the backed my case. Female deities reinforce patriarchy when they are subordinate to males, as does the worship by women of those deities. What you call a "diversity of thought" is something else entirely regarding these examples. Real diversity of thought did exist in the Vedic era, but only really among select scholarly (male) individuals and their followers, not the general populace. Ancient man did not feel "diversity was his strength," and you render a historic understanding of this culture impossible when you try to modernize it as you do here. You really seem to believe that university trained feminists like yourself were abundant in the ancient world, and that their publicity stunts would have been tolerated. Well, of course you can believe what you like, but you are wrong.
| Unposter wrote: |
| Your dogmatic ... |
Words like "dualistic," "dogmatic," and so forth are not going to get you anywhere here fellow. This is not a book club or undergraduate discussion section, where all opinions are equal. If you have sourced facts to share, I want to hear them. If you do not, vague attacks and "d words" are no suitable replacement.
| Unposter wrote: |
| flies in the face of those who believe otherwise and that is dehumanizing and demeaning. |
If being told you are wrong when you are wrong is "dehumanizing" and "demeaning" (there you go with the d words again!), then I am sorry, but consider yourself dehumanized and demeaned. If you have well-sourced facts, bring them to bear. If you do not, then I am not going to pretend you have a point for the sake of your self esteem.
| Unposter wrote: |
| In such light, it is not surprising that you think you have the power to even categorize and declare Rteacher a member of a cult and insinuate he is not really a Hindu. Your power is as great as your kindness. |
I have no power, but neither do I need it. Truth transcends power; I do not need to be able to force you to accept I am correct in order to be correct. As far as kindness goes, I do not think you are in a position to evaluate that in any general sense, but if you are saying I hurt your feelings, then I am sorry. My goal is not to hurt your feelings.
| Unposter wrote: |
| To clarify, my previous point was that traditional Vedic thought may be a lot less dualistic and a lot fuller and deeper (including with minority opinions) than otherwise thought by some of the posters in the discussion. |
Yes, and maybe ancient Vedics could really make nuclear explosions by singing like Rteacher here believes, but both are probably false. Let's pass on the maybes and stick to sources and facts, all right? |
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Unposter
Joined: 04 Jun 2006
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| Posted: Wed Aug 21, 2013 2:35 pm Post subject: |
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Fox,
The ironic part is it is your posts that seem emotional to me.
Anyway, it is these people who you are demeaning: http://www.christianpost.com/news/catholics-similar-to-mainstream-in-support-for-abortion-stem-cell-research-37775/
Amogst other things, Wikipedia has this to say about feminism in Hinduism:
Within Ancient Hinduism, women have been held in equal honor as men.
Note the part about "equal honor"
Within the Vedas the Hindu holy texts, Women were given the highest possible respect and equality. .Moving on towards the Monotheistic era of Hinduism when such ideals such as Shaivism and Vaishnavism, a specific deity for feministic worship was bought about under the Shaktism branch. From a Hinduism point of view women are equal in all measures to men in comparison.
Note the part about women are equal in all measures to men.
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feminist_theology#Hinduism
Minimally, I hope you realize that there is more diversity of opinion than you present, whether you think that makes your original ideas "dogmatic" or not is up to you.
Lastly, I find your ad-hominem streams where you have to label everyone (R-teacher is part of a cult - Unposter is a college trained feminist - which by the way is not true) amusing. You may want to reflect how your argument style may be interpreted by others.
I suspect it is different than you think. |
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Fox
Joined: 04 Mar 2009
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| Posted: Wed Aug 21, 2013 4:13 pm Post subject: |
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| Unposter wrote: |
Fox,
The ironic part is it is your posts that seem emotional to me. |
Thanks for letting me know.
| Unposter wrote: |
| Anyway, it is these people who you are demeaning |
Catholicism is structured around authority, and the relevant authority has already made the proper Catholic position clear; calling oneself Catholic while rebelling against that authority is self-deluding. I do not demean them, they demean themselves through self-contradiction. They hunger for the legacy and perceived legitimacy of Catholicism, but they obviously don't take it seriously, so why should I take their purported "Catholicism" seriously?
| Unposter wrote: |
| Amogst other things, Wikipedia has this to say about feminism in Hinduism: |
Now just a moment. Here is what I said, Unposter:
| Fox wrote: |
| As a general rule, if Wikipedia answers your question, and the Wikipedia entry is sourced, and you cannot think of any legitimate, non-speculative objections to the points raised by those sources, you have little ground upon which to stand. |
The section of your quoted Wikipedia entry which is relevant to this discussion has literally zero cited academic sources to back up its editorialization. Zero! It does have some direct quotes from scripture, but that is problematic in its own right. Understanding ancient writings of this character requires two things: context and commentaries. Do these quotes have context? No, they are carefully winnowed individual sentences (maybe even parts of sentences) completely divorced from their framework. Do they have commentaries? No, any useful explication that might come from the participants of the actual cuture in question is entirely lacking. What your anonymous feminist has done here is in direct opposition to the proper procedure for extracting meaning from ancient philosophic texts. And that's ignoring the fact that we are provided anonymous English translations instead of the original language text. And even if we had the text, can you read Sanskrit? I can't, but I can read Classical Chinese, and I've seen obvious errors in Classical Chinese translations (especially older ones, which as with Sanskrit is most of them), so I'm fully aware of both the challenges of ancient language translation, and the (strong) possibility for error. Why on Earth would anyone with a genuine interest in this subject blindly accept isolated, commentary-lacking, translated sentences cherry picked from a huge corpus as a valid source of inference? The answer, of course, is that no one with any genuine interest would do such a thing. Someone trying to prove an invalid point would though, and a modern feminist foot soldier perfectly fits the bill.
If you want to provide some serious, rigorous academic sources, do it. If you do not wish to, then do not proffer this garbage in its place Unposter. I'm interested in the issue, but you are not taking this conversation at all seriously (despite, bizarrely, putting in the effort of participation). I gave you a chance to redeem the deficits in your original post, and you've chosen instead to double down on them. What am I to make of that? Is it demeaning and dogmatic of me to point out that fact? Am I dehumanizing you by pointing out no remotely serious thinker would accept your case as you've presented it?
| Unposter wrote: |
Lastly, I find your ad-hominem streams where you have to label everyone (R-teacher is part of a cult - Unposter is a college trained feminist - which by the way is not true) amusing. You may want to reflect how your argument style may be interpreted by others. |
All you're telling me here is that you don't know what an Ad Hominem Fallacy is. An Ad Hominem is when I argue that some fact about you as a person proves that you are wrong; if I were to say, "Unposter is a feminist, therefore he is wrong," that would be an Ad Hominem. I'm doing the reverse: I'm concluding you are a college trained feminist (and I'm emphasizing the word "trained" instead of "educated" there) precisely because of how you're comporting yourself. It's a supplement to my main point regarding your incorrectness, not the basis of it. Likewise, Rteacher is part of a cult, that's just an objective fact. He talks about it all the time.
You need to research your fallacies if you want to bring them up in conversations, Unposter. I understand it's nice to share opinions, but as I said, this isn't your college discussion section anymore, and not all opinions are equal. |
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Unposter
Joined: 04 Jun 2006
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| Posted: Wed Aug 21, 2013 11:36 pm Post subject: |
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Ok, this is getting ridiculous. We are just going to have to agree to disagree about diversity of thought on women during the Vedic Period of Indian history.
I think the information that I have provided and even you provided (that proved my point such as polyandry) is fine (it is not like there wasn't a bibliography and reference list) but you cannot seem to see it any more than you can see that Catholics have more than one point of view).
So, personally, I am going to drop this line of argument. If you wish or if anyone else wishes to go on be my guest. All you have to do is put in thoughts on women or feminism and the vedas into a search engine and plenty of sites will spring up. Again, for the third time, I am not disagreeing that patriarchy was the mode in Vedic India, just that there were other forms of thought on the subject and even people who behaved differently.
But, I do feel I need to make a point of your labeling, Fox. You have this tendency to say things like R-Teacher is part of a cult or Unposter argues like a college trained feminist (in no shape or way is this accurate by the way)or this is not a college discussion (where all viewpoints are equal - never had one of those by the way). The intention of these comments seem to be to tarnish the image of the speaker without directly attacking the arguments or ideas. Now, you may not want to see them as ad-hominem attacks but I certainly do. I just want to point this out to you on the chance that you do not realize what your argumentation looks like to others because on many subjects other than women you seem very level-headed and have lots of perceptive points to make. Alas, I don't think you have been on this little tangent. |
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Fox
Joined: 04 Mar 2009
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| Posted: Wed Aug 21, 2013 11:56 pm Post subject: |
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| Unposter wrote: |
| Ok, this is getting ridiculous. We are just going to have to agree to disagree about diversity of thought on women during the Vedic Period of Indian history. |
We shan't agree to disagree. I will accept your thoughts to the precise extent that you can provide me with any coherent, academic sources defending them, and will be silent about them to the extent that you cease to insist, in a data-free, emotive fashion, that "Vedic feminists" existed because, "Hey, maybe!"
| Unposter wrote: |
| I think the information that I have provided and even you provided (that proved my point such as polyandry) is fine (it is not like there wasn't a bibliography and reference list) but you cannot seem to see it any more than you can see that Catholics have more than one point of view). |
Some people falsely call themselves Catholics. I understand you are completely lost to a world view where anyone can call themselves anything and insist upon anything and we have to pretend it's valid, but I am not, nor will I give ground to that world view.
| Unposter wrote: |
| So, personally, I am going to drop this line of argument. |
That's wise.
| Unposter wrote: |
| But, I do feel I need to make a point of your labeling, Fox. You have this tendency to say things like R-Teacher is part of a cult or Unposter argues like a college trained feminist (in no shape or way is this accurate by the way)or this is not a college discussion (where all viewpoints are equal - never had one of those by the way). The intention of these comments seem to be to tarnish the image of the speaker without directly attacking the arguments or ideas. |
If you think your feminism tarnishes you, then you should think carefully about why that is. If by contrast you do not believe you are tarnished by your feminism, then my pointing it out ought not distress you at all.
| Unposter wrote: |
| Now, you may not want to see them as ad-hominem attacks but I certainly do. |
That's because you do not understand what an ad hominem fallacy is. |
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Threequalseven
Joined: 08 May 2012
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| Posted: Thu Aug 22, 2013 4:01 am Post subject: |
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| I'd prefer if they changed manhole to something along the lines of "non-gender specific hole". I don't like it that my holes are associate with something so disgusting. |
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