The regressive Mind set

So a month ago or so there was this news article of how an actress, Gauhar Khan, was slapped by an audience member belonging to the same community as she.

The television media was obviously all over it. And the coverage of this caught my attention in the way the media worded this incident.

The specific verbiage used by the media is, that this person, with a "regressive mindset" took offense to the way the actress was dressed and slapped her.

First of all I don't think slapping an adult is the right thing to do.

But I am not here to discuss how to deal with someone's ideas of what is right. But this post is about the idea of what is right, what is the right way for women or for that matter anyone to dress.

So according to the media, the person who suggested that Gauhar Khan wear respectable clothes (we will come to what "respectable" is in a bit) in full public view has a regressive mindset.

So my next question to the media in India (especially) and the educated urban youth of India who share the same feeling as the media report use of words, is, what is progressive then?

Is this progressive?

What about this?

How about Kim K?

How about our very own superstars on primetime TV, the likes of Poonam Pandey, Mumaith Khan, Sunny Leone (A former porno actress, now making A rated movies previewed on primetime TV)

A small sample of how Poonam Pandey has become famous through postings on twitter and its all over Times of India main page almost everyday.

And of course my all time favorite "progressive" news article:

Teenager-dating-father-two-years-reveals-pair-planning-married-children

Updated Apr 09 2016: And here is the mother of all progress milestones of modern progressiveness, after reading this, I think the progressive's should take a bow. Mission accomplished:

Mother and Son, Madly in love. Great sex life. And they don't care what others think.



I wanna take a statistic of how many agree with this news being "progressive".

You all know this list is endless. So i am curious, is all this "progressive"?

Since when did progressive start meaning that we go back to how we were as primates? essentially.
Since when did progressive start meaning that its ok to be as naked on national media prime time and be famous and no one can say anything against them?
Since when did glorifying living like animals int he wild on national prime time TV become progressive?
Since when did normal women dressing like prostitutes on national TV become progressive?

If wearing skimpy clothes by women is progressive because it goes against the "regressive" / "traditional" attire is progressive, then is men cheating on their wives, leaving their parents in old age homes or on the streets, cheating their brothers progressive?

I am not sure. At least I am not there yet.



Now some of you "progressive" minded people might ask,

Is this progressive?

Or how about this?

or this

(just in case you thought I was cornering one community only)

getting back to the discussion....

So is the burkha, the ghoongat  or whatever it is that subjugates women progressive?

I am going to tell you, no, of course not. This blog is to to say that both ways its an extreme stance. In the first case, how far do you want to go before something is too much? Is going topless on national TV at prime time progressive enough? Is having Sex on the streets on NY while being filmed is progressive enough? Is the program, "naked dating" on Vh1 where people date naked on prime time TV while the private parts are hazed out, progressive enough? ( I am actually questioning why are the private parts hazed out? Why be so regressive in their mind sets? Such a regressive culture these Vh1 channel folks..geez!!!

The Burkha, the ghoongat, the subjugation of the woman is the other extreme I think.

You see the ghoongat in India where women were not supposed to show their face to men other than their husbands or fathers is a practice north India that took foot hold during the Islamic invasions of the country where the invaders/rulers started taking any women they see and like. The ghoongat helped as a deterrent.There is a reason why that this culture continued for almost a 1000 years.

In Sanatana Dharma there is NO instance any where in the Puranas or the Itihasas (Ramayana and the Mahabharata) where the women on the good side ever had to hide their faces and live in subjugation.

As far as I know there is no dharma shastra which says the women have to be veiled when they leave their house.

You see in India the women were never subjugated. They were never treated like owned objects of sexual desire. They were never considered equal to animals that have no souls (look up the philosophy of the ancient greeks that very much has been carried down to the cultures that adopted orthodox abrahamic religions).

The status of women in India is that when we say the name of a couple, we call out the lady before the man: Sita Rama, Radha Krishna, Parvati Parameshwara. In India we revere mother Goddess as much as we revere the male aspect of the divine entity. In Sanatana Dharma, we dont have a special "mother's day" because the mother is revered before ANYONE and ANYTHING in society.

That is why we start our everyday prayer with "Maatru devo bhava" and then continue on to the other important people of our lives.

In Sanatana Dharma we took the respectable ground of how women need to dress to gain respect while being proud and not subjugated. In Sanatana Dharma the way women need to dress is the middle ground where women have the freedom to choose the myriad of ornaments and clothes to look spellbinding, yet respectable.

Of course different cultures across India evolved different ways of doing it, yet as far as I know, no major culture ever took an extreme stance on this issue.

A few samples are here:

The last one is an image portraying one of the forms of Mother Goddess that millions of Indian worship with the highest reverence.

Now in just these samples here I've seen fashion work its magic without having to resort to almost getting naked to get attention.


Just before people start accusing me of male chauvinism, I will say, that usually I don't see naked men on the streets, from time immemorial across cultures men have had a history of showing their upper half even on the streets, so I dont see why that needs to change, but the day or the instance a guy starts running on the streets or dancing on prime time with this thing hanging I' will have to ask that person and anyone who supports that to read this blog top down and get the point of trying to maintain a balance between decency, freedom, non-subjugation, fashion all the good things civilizations have flourished around.

So yes there is a word that the media could and should start using more often in this context, its definitely not "regressive" or "progressive", it is traditional Indian. Traditional in a philosophical, fashionable and literal sense.

Don't you think the word tradition needs to be discussed clearly in the media to get to an agreement as to what constitutes as "regressive" and what constitutes as "progressive"?

Don't you think its time to really start reading what Sanatana Dharma says about the role of women in our society is and has been from time immemorial? Don't you think its time for us to start going back to being human again? Don't you think its time to do away with any societal malpractices that might have crept into even in Indian cultures due to influences from the west of the Indus?

Don't you think?

Think!!!