Boss how can you claim vegetarianism as a default virtue in Hinduism when LITERALLY every single myth of ours involves folks hunting. Unless you think Ram or Shantanu were into taxidermy, what do you think they were hunting for? To eat!! That's the whole damn basis of Ramayana!
Like literally the story of the Ramayana is that dude goes hunting so he, wife, and brother can eat some nice roasted venison. And another dude comes and kidnaps his wife. And then war happens.
So FFS stop shoving vegetarianism down our throats using state machinery.
So FFS stop shoving vegetarianism down our throats using state machinery.
If it is Ram Rajya then let us eat what Ram ate. Meat. 🤷🏽🤷🏽
What makes this fetishizing of vegetarianism and criminalizing of meat extra cruel and almost slow burn genocidal is that Indians already suffer from widespread protein deficiency. Even our veg food today is low on protein. It's often starchitarian rather than vegetarian.
India is the only non warzone country in the world where the average height went down over the past decade, even though average incomes rose rapidly.
This has never happened. Economic growth always coincides with population growing taller on average. East Asia is an example.
This has never happened. Economic growth always coincides with population growing taller on average. East Asia is an example.
Indians today on average are shorter than they were in the year 2000. Even though they are eating way more calories on average. And earning way more money on average.
This has also been the era of fetishizing vegetarianism and shunning meat, eggs, fish etc. Plus sanghis.
This has also been the era of fetishizing vegetarianism and shunning meat, eggs, fish etc. Plus sanghis.
Once during a Satyanarayan Pooja katha phase I asked the pandit, if king was hunting when he saw folks doing the pooja, then king was clearly a meat eater, so why can't we have meat at pooja meals?
Dude to his credit said, good point. Didn't go sanghi on me. Simpler times.
Dude to his credit said, good point. Didn't go sanghi on me. Simpler times.
This is the story. Notice how it doesn't say Angadhvaja raja turned vegetarian for the rest of his life. He did pooja and all was cool.
The downright old testament nature of the Satyanarayan stories played a big part in turning me atheist from pre teens. My grandparents & parents - huge fans of the pooja. I attended one every few months. Same stories. That I'd question. And find absolutely ridiculous, like OT.
Once Sabnis aaji was telling how to never accept food from strangers. I was like, but what if it's Satyanarayan Pooja Prasad? Not from strangers, she said. I said but the whole thing starts with a king not eating Prasad from strangers. Yes, you've made your point, she said.
🤭
🤭
My Sabnis aaji (not to be confused with my other atheist aaji) was very religious. She did the wari in her 60s. I asked her sooooo many of these questions.
She often had no answer.
But she never discouraged my questions. Or try to convince me to get into God with her.
She often had no answer.
But she never discouraged my questions. Or try to convince me to get into God with her.
She was the first person to hear a fully formed anti-Gita rant from me in my late teens about how I have so many problems with the message in the book. As a dnyaneshwari stan, it would not have been easy to hear. But she said you do you, kid. Just be a good person, that's all.
In my family, the most religious people I saw growing up, in terms of what faith meant to them, almost uniformly hated the sangh. My grandpa even had "sanghi bhattu" as a term for them. And was not a fan of Savarkar or Vajpayee or anything sangh related.
The sanghis in my family are generally people who do a lot of public or social or excessively ritualistic displays of their religiosity. Very transactional and also performative. For them, being seen as pious is more important than piety.
One uncle said his philanthropy included feeding a hundred poor people every year when he visits the ancestral temple town in Goa. And I was like, why don't you just feed people in Indore? He said no no, you don't get "puNya" by just randomly feeding poor people.
I mean...🤷🏽
I mean...🤷🏽
A cousin and I were once ranting about this together and we came up with a term for it.
Checklist Hinduism.
There's a checklist of things you have to do, whatever the internal logic. Ganpati arti, something kuldaivat related, Satyanarayan Pooja, vastushanti, munja etc.
Checklist Hinduism.
There's a checklist of things you have to do, whatever the internal logic. Ganpati arti, something kuldaivat related, Satyanarayan Pooja, vastushanti, munja etc.
In recent years, the checklist keeps growing. Suddenly Hanuman Jayanti and Ram Navmi are A list rituals that anyone who wants to be seen as pious must follow.
Karva Chauth, instead of being abandoned, is made instagrammable by a few hubbies also fasting and then posting abt it.
Karva Chauth, instead of being abandoned, is made instagrammable by a few hubbies also fasting and then posting abt it.
Btw if all this makes me Hibduphobic, I guess I've been Hibduphobic since about age 11.
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