I bet you are all wondering (well at least those that swing from a particular side of the plate) what’s under that forbidden black box (who says SM only features pics of hot women?). Seyd tips me off to yet another one of those “I can’t believe they put a Hindu icon on that,” controversies (see previous 1,2). Now my position on this is that I personally don’t care one way or another since I don’t concern myself with religious icons. Other people get upset and sue over this stuff and it’s their prerogative to do so. So what is the situation here? Rainbownetwork.com has the details:
DNA Magazine, Australia’s top gay publication, has censored their latest cover in an effort to quell outrage from the Hindu community.The cover features male fitness star Matt Walch wearing a Roberto Cavalli brief that is screen printed with an image of the Hindu goddess Laxmi.
In a letter to the Hindu community, Editor Andrew Creagh, apologized for the offence and let it known that the magazine had no “deliberate intention to cause offence, antagonize or show disrespect to people of the Hindu faith.”
He added that the magazine was “unaware that the garment portrayed a specific Hindu deity.”
That sounded like a pretty sincere apology. I mean he’s not going to pull the magazine off the shelves or anything because then they’d lose money, but at least on their website there is a black box over the bacon. What truly offends me is that the picture is of the goddess Laxmi. If they had even half a brain they would have more appropriately offended the Hindu community by using an iconic image of the Hindu diety that is associated with the Lingam.
Also, although I’ve been meaning to invest in a good thong, I don’t think that I would buy this design. The last thing I need is for a conflicted Hindu girl to re-discover religion at the…ummm…wrong moment.
So you guys want to see what is under that black box? Click below (might not be safe for work).
And in case you have poor vision:
Seyd asks:
I wonder who’s the Hindu community they are referring to. The straight Hindu community? More than likely, because I checked several gay Desi sources and the magazine has slipped under their radar. Which makes me think, how did the straight Hindu community hear about this? Suspicious…
Q: What can brown do for you?
A: Package tracking.
On the other palm, there might be a ballooning market for religious panties– chastity briefs, if you will, a virtual ‘do not enter.’ Just don’t screen-print Krishna and the gopis.
Thanks for the close-up.
well, this is par for the course. didn’t you tell me about hindu deities on toil bowels manish? the cultural elite might be post-religious but they have monotheistic biases in what they consider a religion. hinduism has a mythology while islam, judaism and christianity have beliefs. when i was a little suspicious of bobby jindal’s social context* for converting to roman catholicism my acquaintance susanna of cut on the bias responded that just because she was irish it didn’t mean that she should worship the old irish gods and revere druids here in america. i responded that it was a little insensitive to compare 800 million hindus to long dead celtic paganism. i’m not much of a functionalist in anthropology but this is a case where the variance in ideas seems to matter in terms of acceptance. the terminology and base concepts differ enough between hinduism and abrahamic monotheism that perception of one by the other as coequal of deserving or respect can be a little difficult. evangelical preachers would sometimes tell my parents (muslims) that they shouldn’t worship idols, but of course they had a prefab talking point as they laughed and suggested their own form of christianity was far more idolatrous. if you read the monotheistic texts idol worship is common negative currency that can be used to communicate value or lack of. obviously this doesn’t translate as well to hinduism.
Hindu’s are so narrow minded. This protest against such a cool thing will bring shame to brown community. And them non-Hindu browns may have to wear that freak-Seekh tshirt.
That’s one itsy bitsy teenie weenie Laxmi. Gives a disturbing twist to the whole “brown is the new black” fashion trend, if you get what I’m saying.
Vick, Riiiiight. Because nobody would riot and have a conniption if I mass-produced and sold a thong with a picture of Jesus Christ on rear panel. LaxmiJi on some guys’ ballsacks is nothing to gasp at, innit?
Here is a lesson for all of you new to blogs. Do not leave comments like this. They are broad and sweeping and contain no context. They are just begging for a subsequent flame war. After 50 comments have been left someone will leave a comment which will then label me as anti-Hindu for having written this post in the first place because they don’t like the comments.
We appreciate comments but please make them count instead of throwing out darts.
if someone is joking, use a 🙂 or do the end sarcasm i thought that would eliminate some issues.
Abhi
Let me understand this. While your comment is appreciated in good faith(the last one) I sincerely ask,
“Did you really believe this was a non-controversial and humorous post and did not have the potential to create unnecessary controversy?
Personally, my knowledge of Hinduism is deep enough that this will not offend me. However, I respect the fact it will and make sure none of my comments imply any disrespect towards another who may have a faith driven association to religion.
Isnt this a little thoughtless? A wee bit? A teeny teeny bit?
I dont mean it as criticism, but a friendly reminder of the responsibilities of journalism(which is really what blogging is)
Sumita
I agree with you Sumita, it is an extraordinarily myopic disclaimer. But blogging is journalism?Yeah and scratching my ass makes me a proctologist.
Looter
Not my opinion read here
http://cyber.law.harvard.edu:8080/webcred/index.php?p=2
Sumita
looter, You Da Man !
Oh, I knew it would be controversial. Controversy isn’t bad, it’s often good. Making un-articulated comments within a controversy however derails the learning process.
Abhi
I see an inconsistency here. Please do not be offended if I point it out.
If you dont concern yourself with religious icons, why would you think this is a worthwhile story?
Or that statement was supposed to absolve you of the ensuing responsibility?
Your tone was irreverent and set the tone for the discussion.
I do not question your right to take the tone, actually support it. But then, there are consequences to it. Comments like that are only part of it.
Thoughtlessness when one has the kind of readership this site does, is not easily excusable.
Now if you were obscure, then….chalo, jaane do bhi yaaron
(Now that is a backhanded compliment so please do not be offended)
Sumita
If you dont concern yourself with religious icons, why would you think this is a worthwhile story?
other people might concern themselves with it, and that might might him. ie; this story has relevant second order affects or broader meta-concern (ie; he’s concerned perhaps about the attitude taken toward hinduism, ergo, brown culture).
Thoughtlessness when one has the kind of readership this site does, is not easily excusable.
and yet, what if the irreverant thoughtlessness is the reason for the broad readership of the site?
that might concern him
also, let’s be cautious about getting exegetical on a blogger’s ass.
I think what Abhi means while he is not religious himself, at the same time can understand why it could be insensitive towards those who are religious. This is because he does have a deeper understanding that it is not mythology to zillions of hindus; the thoughtless display of laksmi on the thong treats it as such.
The humour aspect comes from the ridiculousness of some insensitive person placing laksmi on a thong of all things (no this would never be done with Jesus unless one was attempting to be intentionally controversial/rebellious)… and then on a shameless crotch! While the silliness of it made me laugh, the insensitivity amazed me. Having both feelings at once isn’t impossible.
THUS, it’s a worthwhile story. I’m not religious myself, yet I feel an impulse (b/c of my background) to defend those who are ridiculed where other faiths would not be.
Because this story is relevant to a lot of people that read this blog. SM blogs about stories that may be of interest of concern primarily to South Asian Americans. I took a hum-drum, here-we-go-again type story and made it (hopefully) funny. Didn’t ANYONE out there laugh?
However nothing in my tone (even the irreverant parts) was a lame “dart-like” statement. I simply expressed my personal opinion in one sentence and followed up in the very next sentence with a disclaimer that I respect the prerogative of others to be offended.
I taught myself Hindi out of a book (reading and writing) when I went to do volunteer work in India but I’ve since forgotten it all. You will have to translate 🙂
Is this a blog? If it’s not, I’m not going to read it.
Leave the cat alone already, let the crazy controversy created by a bunch of anonymous bloggers ensue
Razib
Am sure Abhi can asnwer this fo himself
If you have direct questions, am not sure an atheist has the ability to see this persepctive with any objectivity
You may have a vested interest.
Sumita
The reason why people put Hindu icons in disrespectful places is they don’t recognize it as a real religion, they don’t know any Hindus themselves, to them it’s just exotica.
The crotch/toilet/flip-flop deities are just the extreme form of wearing ‘om namo shivaya’ on silk tops and selling pictures of Hindu icons for a zillion dollars at high-end import stores.
My problem with this is more cultural than religious.
unnngh this is so freakin outrageous! The apology is nice but the cluelessness is unforgivable.
I hope we can all look at this as an opportunity to learn and respect each other as people. – From their “letter to the Hindu community”
What exactly is the Hindu supposed to learn from this???
P.S. Well put Razib (comment #3)
Abhi
Of course I laughed.
Ok jaane bhi do yaaron was a popular film in the 80s. (very hilarious)
Stands for :”Friends, please let it go”(in an entreating tone, funnily meant)
Sumita
Angie
“Having both feelings at once isn’t impossible.”
Bingo!!You are amazing with great observations!!
One has to be very careful about one’s constant need to be amused and be funny at others expense though. (even if one is OK with being laughed at)
Auntie Sumita (careful not to call others young and clueless)
Manish
Totally with you on this
Sumita
One other problem with this kind of insensitivity is that it incentivizes the manufacture of fanaticism. i.e. the message the Hindu community is liable to get is: this sort of thing doesn’t happen to Muslim symbols because THEN there’d be hell to pay…
Like this?
Is there a difference between clueless appropriation of a minority culture and clueful satire of the mainstream?
Amen, to that!! Most westerner’s who claim that they are not religious, actually have internalized their worldview based on their exclusivist faith. It could be due to not being exposed to other religions.
On the other hand people in a place like India, although might not have read as much as his/her western peer, lives is a less homogeneous (religiously) world and as a result doesnt have exclusivist ideas. They may have a lot of oppressive, biased and racist ideas about a lot of things, but as far as religion goes, they are more tolerant.
I was watching Eve’s show on UPN last nite. I consider it a masterclass in bold,crisp screenwriting 🙂 (Aside to Razib: How was my use of the emoticon…I’m new to blogs) The plot line consisted of one of the characters dealing with a customer service rep in India about his broken satelite radio. The rep basically tells the guy over the fone, “Why are you buying our stuff? All the best radios are made in JAPAN. Don’t you know that?” The rep’s female supervisor overhears his comments to the customer, comes out of her office and curses homeboy out-madarchod style. Aside from hearing cussing in Hindi on UPN the funniest/most offensive bit was the fact that the rep had a huge blowup pic of Shiva (I think..the screenshot didn’t linger too long) in his cubicle to overexotify him.
Couldn’t be offended for too long. I remembered I ironically used to keep a ‘Great Moments in Black History’ calendar in my office for years.
You may have a vested interest.
1) atheists can be hindus.
2) so do you because you are a hindu.
my main interest is that all religious are equally ridiculed. the double standard on the abrahamic religions and hinduism irks me.
let me be precise: all unexamined dogmas should be equally ridiculed. within this subset are a lot of religions, but also political and social beliefs, and some religions are outside of this subset. take that how you want.
This is just wrong. No matter what religion you are or what silly comments we all want to make. Its WRONG! And why would a gay guy want a goddess on his balls? 🙂
Razib
Can you explain this further. I did not understand
Sumita
im disagree.
i think it is offensive.
I don’t mean using the godess laxmi deity icon is offensive…
what is offensive is the ignorance to not realise that it was a hindu deity, and that some would be hurt by it.
as a hindu, actually, as an indian who folllows advaita vedanta ( the philosophy ), im not deeply hurt by the magazine.
but what hurts me that we think that people can blindly (through ignorance) continue to make these same mistakes time and time again, but would dare not offend a buddhist, a christian or a muslim in the same way.
so my offence is the ignorance so in that regard its not a completely funny article.
Translation: People who do not believe in God can be people who believe in a pantheistic(two or more Gods) belief system.
That sounds logically flawed.
Hmmmm. National Inquirer(brown) in the making?
Ok. I said it first.
Sumita
No Sumita, it is the genes that we inherit from Spicy-Gossip-Aunties and Non-veg-joke-Uncles.
Desidude
Can I invest?(This is a failsafe biz model, as history has shown us) and I got cash to spare.
eagerly awaiting positive response
Sumita
Umm….Sumita, so exactly what are you planning on investing in? Uncle-ji’s?(gag) In your words…can you explain this further.
You might as well donate to my beer-fund. I plan on writing a nuanced dissertation on the advantages of pale ale over stout. The NSF begrudges me my research expenses.
Incorrect DesiDude. I think that was Razib’s point though. Atheists can be Hindus in a sense. Real Hindusim isn’t polytheistic. It is monotheistic. It also doesn’t believe in a personal “God” like Arbrahamic religions but in a Universal Soul (except for Hare Krsnas). Razib’s statement isn’t really flawed in that context.
Desi dude
Expansion plans for SM of course. You missed my comments re Uncleji. My interest lie in different realms
Beer fund? Ok, send me a proposal. I’ll take a look(desi beer or other types?)
Sumita
Abhi, your argument stems from the assumption that atheists are people who don’t believe in the Abrahamic notion of God. I was operating under a more universal definition of an atheist as someone who does not believe there is any ‘invisible hand’ guiding the universe. My apologies to Adam Smith.
Even a monotheistic belief system accounts for a God/Universal Soul/Huge Grand-Unification-Theory Crunching Machine/whatever-label-you-please. I think you mean that Hindus can be Deists.
DD
And I hear your angst about research grants.(deeply share the pain) I read this today. Wondered who gave this guy money to tell us this
http://www.suntimes.com/output/news/cst-nws-brain09.html
Sumita
Sumita. Thanks, you’ll find a sealed envelope containing a ream of closely typed pages in your mailbox soon.
That link does not seem to work though.
Fair enough. When you start talking about a Universal Soul though, which is old-school REAL Hinduism (in my modest opinion) which I have mad respect for, the whole concept of a God becomes nebulous. It can be argued that old-school Hinduism doesn’t even believe in an actively “guiding” hand. That puts you up against the Deist/Atheist boundry but I do see your point.
DD
Its a conspiracy(to keep us from this esoteric knowledge)
I had to find another link with the same news. quick, read it before they zap this one too http://www.boston.com/news/nation/washington/articles/2005/09/09/researchers_say_human_brain_still_evolving/
Sumita
PREACH ON! Yes, I’m a little excited. I also agree that the nature of Brahman is not one that imparts divine guidance. It is one that more or less lets things flow on their natural course. I don’t know anything about Deism (do enlighten) but I can see how an atheist could be coloured with bits of the ol’ Hindoo. If, however, the definition of Theism can be expanded to include a belief that order is maintained by…something, then Hinduism isn’t really atheism. What with the infatuation with all kinds of order in Dharmic Hinduism…
With atheism, it is really difficult to play in-between. You know what I mean? Like,’Agnostic’, to me it means ‘I’ve not had the time to think and make my mind up just yet’.
I have to say, I don’t get angry when I see stuff like this so much as hurt. Since y’all are all so quick to say how much you personally don’t care about Srimati Lakshmi Devi being silk-screened onto somonee’s thong or whatever that is, let me say that I do. I don’t know if I would organize a boycott or protest or whatever—I suppose if it was egregious enough I might, so I don’t want to preclude it ahead of time–but my unwillingness to do something in this case is more because of a feeling that sigh, that’s life, and some people are inconsiderate jerks, and less because I don’t care. I care about a lot of stuff that I don’t think I can or even should do much about.
The reason why people put Hindu icons in disrespectful places is they don’t recognize it as a real religion
Yes, that’s right, it is a real religion, one in which the use of the icon of a Goddess is considered an invocation of the Goddess. The usual say “what about Jesus” is staw-man for three reasons. First of all, people do get offended when you stick Jesus on random stuff, but it usually gets washed out. Secondly, putting an image of Jesus on anything is, in Christianity, not functionally the same as putting an image of Shrimati Lakshmi Devi on anything in Hinduism. Thirdly, there is the minority, majority business.
And finally, it doesn’t get to the real point. I’m not really willing to argue whether people are in their rights or what not. I am willing to state that it’s hurtful (rather than use the diluted and useless word “offensive) and I would sympathize with, say, an Orthodox Iconic Christian being similarly pained at a similar portrayal of Jesus or the Saints.
Let me spell it out. Hinduism is a real religion. It’s one that often places a strong emphasis on a personal relationship with a Deity or Deities, and which channels that relationship through iconography. To many Hindus their experience with the Divine is directly stated as a relationship with a Person or Persons that they regard as real and important to them, on the same order as a family member. How would you feel about seeing your mother’s picture on some guy’s thong? That’s how a lot of people would feel about this. What they do with that hurt is part of another debate, but let us not skip over the fact that that hurt is a real and obvious result of a significant kind of religious experience.
It also doesn’t believe in a personal “God” like Arbrahamic religions but in a Universal Soul (except for Hare Krsnas).
Except for Hare Krsnas? Sorry, Abhi, but you need to learn more about the roots of the Hare Krsnas. They are firmly rooted, if often outgrown from, the Gaudiya Vaishnav tradition that’s prominent in Bengal (both West and Bangladesh), Orissa, and parts of Uttar Pradesh, which itself is rooted in and related with the wider Vaishnav traditions including Shri Vaishnavism in the south, Vallabha Vaishnavism of Rajastan, and some aspects of Vaishnavism of Punjab and Gujurat and the wider UP/Madhya Pradehs/Bihar/Jharkand area. The Personal God of these schools of Vaishnavism (Bhagavan or Isvar is a good general term) is and is not like the Personal God of Abrahamic religions—the ways that God is conceived of as not being like the Abrahamic God is being more personal, and being more able to expand into semi-separate but still Supremely Divine Person, than even the idea of the Trinity. Those are all traditions that are in turn firmly rooted in the Vedas, the Vedanta-Sutra, Puranas, the Mahabharat/Gita, the Upanishads, the Ramayan, the poems of various scholars and saints like Jayadev’s Gita Govinda, the oral tradition, the Sampradya tradition of parampara, or disciplic succession, the folk tradition, etc. etc. etc..
You should be a little more careful making any kind of “It doesn’t” statement regarding Hinduism. It’s far too multi-pronged.
Cheers to Razib, Manish and Abhi for their clarity on this issue.
Sumita, reread Razib’s comment #3 to see what he means by “the double standard on abrahamic religions and hinduism.” (To loosely paraphrase, that Christianity/Judaism/Islam are seen as true, unified religions whereas Hinduism is seen as a quaint collection of disparate deities and superstitions.)