There are claims that the roots of democratic institutions can be found in ancient India. Studies have shown that such institutions have existed not only in India but also in other parts of the world. No one society can claim it was the ‘mother’.… There were two mutually contradictory strains in Western thought about India… Read More Was India the Mother of Democracy?
Only political leadership can bring about peace in Manipur; but, the Modi government and the BJP are hog-tied by having links with both camps engaged in the violence. Bharat Bhushan Since ethnic violence began in Manipur two months ago nearly 50,000 people have been displaced, nearly 130 lives lost, and hundreds injured from both the… Read More Manipur vs Kashmir: Different strokes for different folks
Mother of Cities to me / For I was born in her gate,Between the palms and the sea / Where the world-end steamers wait Rudyard Kipling, To the City of Bombay “Few people who have criticized England from the inside have said bitterer things about her than this gutter patriot”: George Orwell IT WAS a pity that Mr.… Read More On Rudyard Kipling: by George Orwell (1942)
The failed coup by the Wagner Group has exposed the Russian president’s fatal weaknesses. By John Feffer | June 29, 2023 The former hotdog salesman rose about as high as he could. He became a caterer to the Russian elite and a confidante of the president. He led his country’s premier paramilitary force. He was one of… Read More The Beginning of the End for Putin?
NB: Is India an empire? The British Raj certainly was, and the RSS/BJP ideologues who constantly denouce the Macaulay tradition in education; don’t seem to mind the continuance of colonial police codes and the divide and rule method of governance. Do they imagine that a combination of communal ideology and colonial policing will keep them… Read More Modi preaching peace abroad as Manipur burns reinforces historical alienation of the North East
Last week, the Wall Street Journal’s Sabrina Siddiqui faced trolling after she asked Narendra Modi about discrimination against minorities in India. The White House on Monday said the online harassment of journalist Sabrina Siddiqui, who asked Prime Minister Narendra Modi a question at a press conference last week, was completely unacceptable. On June 23, Modi had taken… Read More White House condemns harassment of journalist who questioned PM Modi
By Richard Wolin Martin Heidegger’s influence has been enormous. Richard Rorty once justifiably claimed that it would be impossible to write the intellectual history of the 20th century without acknowledging Heidegger’s titanic impact. But these tributes to Heidegger’s prodigious achievements are question-begging in one crucial respect: they neglect to consider what we are actually reading when… Read More To Sanitize the Master’s Corpus: On the Heidegger Hoax
I myself have spent some time in the past trying to show “‘the lack of scientific certainty’” inherent in the construction of facts. I too made it a ‘primary issue.’ But I did not exactly aim at fooling the public by obscuring the certainty of a closed argument – or did I? After all, I… Read More Bruno Latour: Why Has Critique Run out of Steam? (2004)
Collected on the Internet, 2000 Source: http://www.snopes.com/politics/religion/drlaura.asp#gCkiqQ1dEXDJYwra.99 In her radio show, Dr Laura Schlesinger said that, as an observant Orthodox Jew, homosexuality is an abomination according to Leviticus 18:22, and cannot be condoned under any circumstance. The following response is an open letter to Dr. Laura, written by a US man… Dear Dr. Laura: Thank… Read More “Homosexuality is wrong because the Bible says so” etc., etc.
Andrew Roth The extraordinary events of the past 48 hours – Prigozhin’s armed mutiny, Putin’s call for “brutal” reprisals, an 11th-hour peace deal – might appear to have resolved themselves. The leader of the Wagner mercenary group has halted his armed mutiny and march on the Russian capital, apparently in exchange for an amnesty and… Read More Putin and Prigozhin avert bloodshed, but their feud is not over /24 hours that shook Russia
After the truth-shower 