Religion and stuff...

Note: This post was written on April 2, so quite a lot of it might be outdated.

It is so ironic that people do the most inhumane things in order to prove their community the best. That is, by doing such things you make others doubt in the ideals of your community more rather than making them sing praises for it. If at all there was a group of people that was superior to others and there was a way of proving it, it would be by being more tolerant to others and having a broad mindset and not the other way round.
Still, people use aggressiveness, violence and abuses in order to make their community ‘appear’ the best. I mean, how ridiculous is that?
I don’t need to cite any specific incident in this context; it is just in the air. You can simply feel the tension due to this segregated groupism. Groupism to highlight many differences: differences in gender by feminism, regional differences, religion differences. Reading certain comments on articles, I feel confused about why people are standing up for the oppressed: because they feel what happened was unfair or because they feel what happened was unfair to the ‘people of their community”.
What Varun Gandhi said was atrocious but read the comments to any of the articles about this on internet. Some people affront him by saying his religion worships the genitals and stuff. Is this why what he said was incorrect? Tell me, how is this even connected? Couldn’t you be more offended by the fact that he was trying to split this well-knit community by unnecessary ‘chingaris’ and saying erroneous thing about some section of society? Aren’t you humiliated by the unfair judgement which has been “labeled” as a mass-opinion by a particular group of people against the other? This brings both communities into bad light. The one against which the statements are made are definitely not portrayed good and the community saying so is judged intolerant for making such crude remarks.
Shiv Sena is (was) threatening Anjali Waghmare to quit Kasab’s case(which she did: I had written this long ago). To not comment on the act of idiocy by them, I will talk about the comments on such articles. People again forget the main point and discuss about how bad the other religion is. What Kasab did was wrong, definitely and it has resulted in bringing indignity to his nation. But Anjali’s decision is honouring our nation for standing on its ideals and giving fair judgement. And discussing about the brainwashing by leaders to instill a terrorist in an unassuming person, who is gullible to the exposure of false interpretations and assumptions, is far beyond my range of analysis. Not that I don’t have any opinion, it might be too naïve and amateurish.
I hate this injustice brought by sticking to your section of groups. More than the horrendous acts by certain people, I loathe the general judgement by common people on it. I just want fair verdict to all, and on basis what is wrong rather than on what could be wrong to their community. Why should you be insecure if one among the millions in a community turns out to be a disgrace? Accept it benevolently rather than getting offended or defending their acts.
So one of the most common questions is WHAT NEEDS TO BE DONE? As far as I (as an amateur) can analyse this situation, I feel the more you probe into this, the deeper you get entangled. Demanding a revolution and criticizing the evil-doers will only result in making them stick more to their point. Oppressing their ideology will make them feel more compelled to bring it out in open. Increase in either of the extremes will increase the number of extremists in the other end too. These sensitive emotions need to be neutralized and that can be done only if we are tolerant and indifferent towards it. If more and more people grow indifferent to it, they will realize that such acts would not bring the desired results because these people just need a reaction from the crowd: either positive or negative. Any response keeps the fire alit. Writing against them, though might create awareness in many minds, it adds to their already- existing agony. I know, I am contradicting myself by exactly doing so, and which is why I had always been a little resistant in discussing about it, even I needed to express my ideas at least once. I still don’t mean that we should act as if nothing ever happened because that will only deepen the wounds of the victims. Help them and give them the aid they need. Just don’t sensationalize the already hyper-sensitive situation. The more you remind a child that he was hurt, the more he will cry and the more you try punishing the person who has beaten the child, the more that person will develop hatred towards him. That is it. And even if these attempts do neutralize the situation, it will be a forcefully amicable environment. Instead, try making the child realize that you will be there for them in the worst of situations and make the other person realize in a very friendly manner that what he did is totally unacceptable. I know, I know, what I am saying here is invalid to a large extent when you consider the big picture, but I was just trying to simplify things.
In Indian context, we have to make the extremists realize that we are not the people wearing mini-skirts and having highly accented English, but simple traditional Indians wearing Khadi Kurtas who feel concerned about the scenario. It is not that we have no faith in any religion but that we have respect for all religions and receptive to all types of traditions and customs. We have to strike a common chord with them and show that we aren’t being inconsiderate to their feelings or trying to degrade or even look down upon any of their beliefs. We all equally respect our tradition, only without vengeance for other traditions. Celebrating Valentine’s Day will in no way stop us from celebrating Diwali with same vigour. Atheism is not the solution we say, but communal harmony. We are the same hindu who will attend a christian function and also fast for an islamic fast.
Well, ever since people told me that my blog sounds ‘preachy’ I feel very uncomfortable in voicing my opinions. Hence, I have tried making it sound as light as possible. I still fear that I might have sounded too opinionated by now, so I will stop.