Why white people need to stop saying 'namaste'

a reply to: Dark Ghost

get out of my Namaste space!!!! hahaha funny thing coming out of boulder colorado

a reply to: DBCowboy

Humans were always insane. It's just that prior to the internet, we used to lock the crazy people in an attic for great ghost stories. Now? Loony Uncle Larry gets to orate and pontificate daily. And the view from the attic is quite lovely. . . . .

Its more of a sign of a type of "informed opinion" or "direct democracy" where people now can take a broad spectrum of grass roots thinking of others before accepting MSM propaganda as "Truth".

They still "lock people in the attic" whether they are genuinely loony and capable of harm to themselves/and/or others
or more pertinently are rocking the boat against vested interests. Whistleblowers etc

It's just that White people never truly understand the things they appropriate before they appropriate it. Many Western cultures are so shallow in their spiritual lives that they can turn a very deep cultural experience into a robotic series of steps in the blink of an eye.

a reply to: prepared4truth

roflmao.

originally posted by: prepared4truth
It's just that White people never truly understand the things they appropriate before they appropriate it. Many Western cultures are so shallow in their spiritual lives that they can turn a very deep cultural experience into a robotic series of steps in the blink of an eye.

While I get where this quasi-intellectual approach comes from...it boils down to a "no real scotsman" fallacy.

I agree with your O.P.! However, I also agree with the article to a certain point. White people tend to take something like the deeply-rooted culture of Yoga in India and water it down. They likely miss the whole point of it.

a reply to: bigfatfurrytexan

"true"


:p

originally posted by: darkbake
I agree with your O.P.! However, I also agree with the article to a certain point. White people tend to take something like the deeply-rooted culture of Yoga in India and water it down. They likely miss the whole point of it.

Oh come on, what a totally unreasonable statement. Surely this kind of thing is at the heart of multiculturalism?

Two cultures meet and an offshoot develops, in this case, Westernised Yoga.

Its no different to British curries not being "Authentic" Even Indians started eating Baltis a few years ago (Which were invented in Birmingham)

I suppose to be truly authentic in the practice of Yoga people should kill their daughters like so many "Authentic" Indians do every day...


There is nothing wrong with saying Namaste or whatever, it may make you look a bit of a spoon to some people, but that's their problem.

a reply to: Dark Ghost

This article might seem insignificant in itself, but the deeper issue it touches upon is of extreme importance: denying rights to white people on their skin tone alone is socially permissible.

That is NOT what the article is about at all. In fact, the article touches on a deeper issue, which you have seemed to miss:

The act of selectively choosing what works in popular Western contexts, while ignoring aspects of yoga's core philosophy and historic practice is telling. It shows an ironic attachment of one's ego to a desire for ownership over an ancient practice of material denouncement that emerged from an altogether different, South Asian tradition."

In many western countries, Hinduism is treated as a mystic and ancient tradition and India as magical - ignoring the fact that Hinduism is a living, breathing contemporary religion practised by millions of people in their everyday lives around the world,

Yoga, in Western cultures, has been watered down to become an exercise for the sake of profit despite there being so much more to Yoga than stretching, poses, and meditation. This other aspect of Yoga (which completes it) is being ignored due to the inability to profit money wise from it. Imagine taking as aspect of Christianity and turning it into a sport for profit and leaving the rest out where people actually do not understand what they practice as a sport is actually an aspect of a religion...

To be fair, it is relatively new to the Western world and I personally believe that in a few generations it will evolve to incorporate the entire doctrine the way it was meant to be. For now, I see what is taking place as simply being a subtle introduction to it all, which should be embraced despite the bastardization of Yoga taking place within studios across the Western world at the moment. It will eventually evolve within Western cultures to the point of full understanding and garner the respect it is presently lacking due to ignorance.

The unfortunate reality is that Yoga is being used for capitalistic greed (commodification) in Western culture, whereas, in Eastern cultures, it is a practice that does not derive or seek any materialistic gain from it. In fact, to do so, to try to profit off of Yoga, conflicts with the core doctrines of Yoga.

Also, the article touched on many deeper issues revolving around the psyche:

Though, to this Hindu girl who migrated to Australia in the 1990s, the appropriation of yoga by western audiences goes further. It exists alongside a wider ignorance about Hinduism and South Asian culture which, when you've spent a fair amount of your formative years being othered, can hit home hard.

In other words:

In a nation such as Australia, that has a history of deep racism and bigotry, despite many being decent and accepting people, it sure does make one indeed want to laugh, or lash out with frustration, at the irony of culture and religious appropriation being used in such a distorted manner for materialistic greed. Which brings me to your ironic thoughts expressed in the OP:

guess all you can do is...laugh? If the author of this article, Kamna Muddagouni, feels so strongly about denying white people the right to practice yoga in its Western form and using the word "namaste", she should either return back to India where she will not be in danger of experiencing either, or she should also be campaigning for non-Western countries to stop adopting Western cultural practices.

There is a difference between cultural practices and religious practices. You have seemed to blur the two concerning this issue and therefore have missed the point entirely in doing so...

What Australians do in their own country is their business, the same as what Indians do in their country is theirs.

Fair enough.

I grow weary of minorities being offended at every opportunity they can.

That is a generalized statement. Are you implying it is only those of ethnicity that become offended at every opportunity they can?

You are obviously easily offended as well - you took the time and energy to create this thread despite not understanding the crux of the issue...

This video sums of the crux of the article that you have seemed to miss:

a reply to: darkbake

In the grand scheme of things....what does it matter?

Human "cultures" are a thing in flux, just waiting on the next upheaval to be completely changed. Even without that, cultures drift, ebb, and flow. American culture today is barely recognizable to that of 100 years ago. Of course, a couple of upheavals will do that (WW's I and II, civil rights, great depression, technology)

But to pretend that our culture really even matters, on the grand scale of something more than just a passing dream, seems to be nothing but a macro scaled ego stroke.

originally posted by: Sublimecraft
a reply to: Dark Ghost

So, the white fella is now dissin yoga because white?

The only imposition on her identity exists in her mind because the last time I checked, skin color was not a prerequisite for the successful practice of yoga, the origins of which derive from Hinduism, which is not about to loose one iota of it's identity any time soon due to humans with differing skin colour practicing aspects of it.

Well, this is not true.

Hinduism changes indentity as fast as all the other "Christ Consciousness Energy" religions have.

And yoga has absolutely NOTHING to do with Hinduism, they just adopted SOME of it into their religion.

Too bad, they will never actually find out that the Yoga itself is not the key, but an exercise to *enhance* what needs to be done.

originally posted by: Raxoxane
a reply to: auraofblack

I am of the opinion that one can have whatever tattoo resonates with one for any reason.Why should it look silly or inappropriate for ethnicities other than Japanese to have a Japanese calligraphy tatt? How absurd,imo.

It just does , does not need a reason why.

originally posted by: Dark Ghost
You have to understand that this "self-hatred" isn't programmed into their DNA. It's been conditioned into the collective psych of white people as a whole through the promotion of white guilt.

Some white people, not all. Usually the ones with no grounding in history, or lacking self-esteem.

Words aren't only for certain people or a certain race. They're words. Which are just sounds used to communicate.

That being said, I think everyone should stop using Namaste simply because it's annoying. But that's just my opinion.

Use whatever words you want.

Stop being language Nazi's ya bunch of racists.

Why humans should stop existing; we are parasites to this earth with our egocentric notions of privledge and entitlement.

originally posted by: Dark Ghost
You have to understand that this "self-hatred" isn't programmed into their DNA. It's been conditioned into the collective psych of white people as a whole through the promotion of white guilt.

No, it's been programmed into their minds from too much BS propaganda. Nobody's DNA is coded with "White Guilt".

Even the theory that it is programmed in DNA is yet another example of propaganda which has been put in your mind now too.

originally posted by: prepared4truth
It's just that White people never truly understand the things they appropriate before they appropriate it. .

Cultural appropriation is the micro agrressive keyword that allows discrimination against white people.

originally posted by: modified device

originally posted by: prepared4truth
It's just that White people never truly understand the things they appropriate before they appropriate it. .

Cultural appropriation is the micro agrressive keyword that allows discrimination against white people.

These days in America, *anything* allows white people to be denigrated. Because race.

I just read an article on the internet about a GAP advertisement that was getting flack for it's depiction of a group of young acrobats with a shorter African American kid who was under the arm of a Caucasian American. Apparently, African American people were upset that the black kid was ''bearing the weight'' of a white kid. Uhhh... they are kids for crying out loud, one shorter than the other.
People get so bent out of shape over race, and IMHO cultures of a geographic origin can have more than one exact "race''.... in an anthropology class, I learned that there really aren't different races... we are all human beings!

Okay that being said, saying Namaste is annoying to me too, I didn't grow up using that word though and I never took to it because it seems out of place coming from me.

When I watched Napoleon Dynamite, I laughed at the very American dojo instructor wearing American flag pants because it struck me as funny how ''American'' martial arts are these days... with many ''white'' instructors teaching ancient Asian techniques.

In seventh grade, I was taught that because there are so many Asians in the world, humans will all look Asian one day... and we as humans will loose our pinky toes... because we don't need it.

What we do need is to realize, we are all humans with ups and downs and that we should help each other along in this roller coaster ride called life... no matter what words we use, practices we practice or what we look like... as long as no one is hurting one another.
Peace

So is this when I get to go make an angry ranting post somewhere about how the Japanese and the Cubans are stealing baseball from we Americans and they just don't get it and need to stop playing our sport already or something?

Seriously, if this gal is so offended, then she needs to go find a truly spiritual yogi to take her yoga from, and then she can feel all proper saying namaste.