Letter: 'Dharma' and the issue of racism in Guyana!
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| Published on Saturday, February 24, 2007 |
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Dear Sir,
Guyana is in the middle of a silent, deadly, social upheaval, referred to by one leading Caribbean economist as the “insertion of criminal enterprise into the interstices of the state”, and the recent extraordinary outbursts against Christianity by two government ministers in Parliament (for which they have not apologized; and which still remain part of the official record of that session) illustrates the religious implications. Similar sentiments about Hinduism or Islam would have evinced a storm of protest!
It is not now very popular to defend blacks in Guyana, the majority of whom happen to be Christians, but in a fledgling democracy we have a duty to address racism wherever it rears its ugly head. Christianity is the only religion that does not currently tolerate racism and/or slavery.
We thought that we had comprehensively addressed the issue of covert and overt racism under “Hindu Nationalism” as evidenced in Guyana in our copious submissions to the Ethnic Relations Commission when looking at Kean Gibson’s “Cycle of Racial oppression in Guyana”, but the recent spate of hate-mail against the author demands that all citizens should now take another look at her latest book “Sacred Duty: Hinduism and Violence in Guyana”, as I will.
History will vindicate Gibson as one of the great iconoclastic thinker of this generation, and misinformation specialists are falling over themselves trying to confront the ugly truth that her books somehow elicit.
“Sacred Duty …” is the latest instalment of her brutally frank expose' of racism, lawlessness and death in Guyana, and the attack dogs of the letter-writing brigade are out in force to try to discredit her.
The latest in these adventures into scholastic confusion is Lthchman Gossai (SN 2/22/07: “Dharma teaches that one should obey the laws”), John Da Silva (SN 2/20/07: “Why does Ms. Gibson suggest that this is a Hindu Government?”) and one “R. Williams” (SN 2/22/07: “Caste is almost absent from the consciousness of Indians in Guyana”). We have addressed many of these matters before at “The Case For Scholarship in Kean Gibson’s Book” at http://www.landofsixpeoples.com/news402/ns4042114.htm
These three gentlemen have reduced a remarkable proposition by a fine scholastic mind to an inane discussion.
They arguments all are as remarkable in their inattention to detail as they are in their portent of the real role of a Hindu “presidential advisor” … to the total exclusion of additional “Muslim” or “Christian” presidential advisors. The President is hiding his intentions in plain sight, and to the extent that his defences have represented a thesis for “Hindu Nationalism”, it should like Gossai says be “thrown into the garbage”.
Gossai, whom we have met before, accuses Gibson of misinterpreting a “universal standard” for the interpretation of “dharma”, ignoring the fact that in traditional Hindu society with its caste structure, “Dharma” constituted the religious and moral doctrine of the rights and duties of each individual. We have already pointed out the pathological and destructive propensity of that religion to differentiate its subjects and objects into racial and social classes, and to relegate to them specific “duties and roles”. This has fuelled a horrible racism in India itself, and led to its partition at one time. To deny this fundamental is to engage in criminal misrepresentation.
Then “R. Williams” concludes that native Indians are “not worried” about the caste system, oblivious in his recklessness to the plight of three hundred million Dalits who represent the dilemma of the largest racial minority on the planet. He blissfully cites three of four classes of honorific Dalit appointees, completely disregarding the Human Rights Watch position at http://www.hrw.org/reports/2001/globalcaste/caste0801-03.htm#P358_71817 and http://hrw.org/reports/1999/india/India994-04.htm#P550_72244. Williams’ arguments are almost as ridiculous as Evan Radhay Persaud’s contention to the ERC that Minister Clinton Collymore is Guyana’s his best example of a “black Hindu” in Guyana.
It gets worse. According to Dr Pandurang Vaman Kane, the word "Dharma" acquired a sense of "the privileges, duties and obligations of a man, his standard of conduct as a member of the Aryan community, as a member of the caste and as a person in a particular state of life." Aryan? Caste? Reminds you of something? This should settle the issue of Gibson’s “knowledge of Sanskrit”.
Williams’ contention that caste is “almost absent” from Hindu consciousness is denial masquerading as scholarship, or else monumental intellectual hysteria. Caste is fundamental to Hinduism. Hinduism is meaningless without caste. To the extent that this is true, Vishal Mangalwadi (a native Indian) makes the point that “Hindu Nationalism” (who else would the president have given $200 million of the taxpayers’ money … for the sake of “national pride”?) is opposed to democracy.
The one spells the death of the other.
And we don’t need the indiscriminate arming of thousands of ethnic government supporters to make this point (Guyana Review June 1999, pages 31-32). The Review article has never been rebutted. Requests to the ERC to specify the ethnicity and political affiliation of those persons armed have fallen of deaf ears. The amount of 30,012 weapons may have doubled by now.
Then we have Sir Michael Davies’ treatment (Guyana Parliamentary Needs assessment 2005) of the destruction of democratic institutions like parliament …
And that, I believe, is what Gibson is warning us about!
We ignore her at our peril.
Roger Williams | | | | Reads : 194 | | | |
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