IDEOLOGY, ARGUMENT, REDUCTIONISM AND STEREOTYPING, OUTRAGE-The Debating style of the Hindu

While conducting rational conversations with those of Indic Origin I have noticed certain tendencies, which I feel it would be in their best interest to eschew

1. Ideology as a determinant of character. There is a strong civilizational tendency to gage the character of a person by the ideology he/she espouses. This extends to the identification of a person by the politics he espouses. While this stereotyping is prevalent in every society and nation, it is especially pronounced in India. In every age, a certain group of people are picked for especial opprobrium.
In the current milieu, it is the person who espouses Hindutva that is the target of special scorn . In every action that a Dhaarmik indulges in he makes it clear that he prefers ideology over integrity as the quality that he prefers in the politician. It is also the case that the Otherwise intelligent, sane and rational individuals will express themselves in very strong language and insist that every member of the Hindutva community is guilty unless proven innocent of a whole host of crimes. Their moral outrage is expressed in very voluble terms and they use strong epithets such as brigand, bastard, scoundrel, rascal to describe such individuals. The utter inanity of such a viewpoint does not seem to deter them. They do not realize that a statement such as ‘ all Hindutva are bad’ is no less egregious than saying ‘ all Muslims are bad’ and that the individual is indulging in bigotry of a high order.
2. It is a universally accepted truism in the twentieth century, especially in the Occident and in certain countries like India that the pursuit and toleration of diversity is an end in itself and should be pursued for its own sake. In the Occident such a realization has been late in coming and has been neither encouraged nor tolerated before WW II. In fact entire native populations and ethnic groups, such as the extensive Meso- American civilization have been wiped out by Western civilization, before they decided that such behavior should be classified as extremely barbaric and uncivilized. In the case of India they tried their best to snuff out the Dhaarmik tradition. Yet such a toleration of diversity does not extend to the notion that, the more central component of diversity is the diversity of ideas and ideologies. It is very rare to see a communist that will tolerate the peaceful coexistence of another ideology other than communism. In fact the behavior of the left is no less bigoted and dogmatic and in fact is much more virulent than the ideologies they constantly excoriate. The most intolerant individuals are to be found amongst the left when it comes to intolerance towards other ideologies. So while they inveigh on the virtues of diversity, which few would dispute, they indulge in cognitive dissonance when it comes to embracement of diversity of ideas

3. As a corollary to the above there is widespread stereotyping of individuals in India, especially by ideology. For a civilization that prides itself on the uniqueness of each individual , there appears to be as little reluctance to stereotype individuals as there is in the west, and the victim of such stereotyping today is invariably the hapless Hindu.

4. Reductionism is widely resorted to by Indics, when the possible alternatives to a particular scenario are reduced to 1 particularly obnoxious course of action such as ‘ Do you propose to get rid of all Muslims in India. Never mind that the Hindu has rarely if ever engaged in Genocide , never mind that Pakistan has successfully eliminated its Hindu population and the question should properly be posed to them .Never mind that no Islamic republic has ever tolerated a significant proportion of non-Muslims amongst their midst, and this is by and large true of all the 50 Islamic republics. Reductionism reigns as the order of the day and the choice presented to the Hindu is between 2 equally unpalatable alternatives. For example , if the objection is raised that a Hajj pilgrimage should not be subsidized , as it violates the constitutional right of every citizen by denying him equal treatment under the law, Ockham’s Razor would suggest the removal of such a subsidy, but such an obvious course of action is rarely discussed

5. Outrage is a frequent emotion expressed in India, to express moral superiority. In a recent debate I had , I deplored the incident where a woman had gone to a bar and was physically humiliated and I had expressed the view that the perpetrators should be brought to justice. I was excoriated for merely deploring that incident and for not expressing myself in stronger terms and that i was minimizing the extent and gravity of such incidents by describing them as anecdotal incidents and not indicative of a broad pattern of behavior where an entire community or ideology (in this case Hindutva) should be held responsible for the act. I was told that there was not one incident but at least 2 or 3. Of course few in India have personal knowledge of more than 3 such incidents. And yet they will convert anecdotal evidence into a universal truth despite the fact that the vast majority of the population has nothing whatsoever to do with these incidents. The interesting fact is that these arguments are usually made by Hindus against other Hindus. It does not seem to faze them that such behavior does not occur anywhere else in the world.
6. But few who are outraged at such behavior will so much as say Entschuldigung or आप कि क्शमा मांग रहा हू or even raise an eyebrow when they are reminded that they received the news with great indifference when the 50 odd in the Sabarmati express , the majority of whom were women and children were burnt alive . In fact the entire English language press took the position that they were Karsevaks ( members of the RSS ) implying that being burnt alive was perhaps a deserving fate for these individuals. That such indifference extended to children did not seem to affect their indifference. But what kind of a strange creature has the Dhaarmik become that he is more incensed at the destruction of a building than the destruction of women and children
7. The rest of the world has noticed this strange behavior of the Hindu, and those among them who harbor megalomaniacal dreams of converting the entire population to Christianity are rejoicing because a population that is so bereft of self esteem is certainly ripe for picking.

8. The fight for the dignity and respect of a large part of humanity is far from over. We do not have the world's largest property holder to back us up. No government supports us. We have only truth on our side. There is only one way we can be defeated. It is only we who can defeat ourselves. Now more than ever those of us who believe in the philosophia perennis should stand united ... not for an ideology or even a religious belief but for the universal principles on which we progress and evolve, because it is these principles like freedom, courage, integrity the ability to think and reason for oneself, that threaten our elite adversaries the most and that they wish to abridge or even eliminate by snuffing out the Sanaatana dharma