How to get a diversified sexlife? Get a religious career !

Last weeks sex scandals were uncovered in both India and Belgium. And it was striking that in both cases high positioned religious functions were involved.
What can be the reason behind the obvious link between religion and sex?

It is clear that almost all religions promote a specific system of values regarding sex. If the focus of politics is on the public life of humans and the organisation of the same, then religion focuses on the individual lifes itself: how does an individual have to relate towards the powers bigger than himself. It seems like if sex is one of those aspects which is "bigger than the individual self" and thus humankind tries to regulate sexual behaviour through religious and moral regulations.
A very hard task indeed, so it seems!

In an expensive restaurant where my wife and I had a dinner two weeks back, I saw a nice looking Indian guy with a quality kurta and long beard. He must have been around his mid thirties. He had the movie star-look in all his presence. He was looking through his eyes with a deep sense of spiritual awareness and was showing the typical behaviour which often points to high spiritual conscience: sudden breaks in the behaviour; staring some moments into the void - or by preference focusing on the air above him. Also: giving an impression of what one could call serenity and confidence, slow motions which suggest peace of mind.
This typical behaviour I've often seen also with the Catholic priests I came in contact with during my youth. The higher the function of the priest, the more this behaviour was apparent.
These guys have power beyond the regular power mechanisms you find everywhere like: aggression, money, status symbols. The technique they are specialised in is called 'charisma'.

In the restaurant, I immediately thought by myself: this is such a Godman.
He was accompanied by two young people. A girl, sitting opposite to him and a boy (her boyfriend ?) sitting next to the girl. Between the Godman and the girl there was a clear mutual understanding - they didn't have to talk any more to understand each other. All the Godman had to do was to show off his spiritual awareness in the behaviour I described above. The girl looked at him with eyes full of adoration.
This behaviour was not enough to keep the attention of the guy though, who seemed a bit sceptical to me. Every now and then, the Godman started a long monologue, and then he only looked at the guy. Probably he explained then the spiritual and religious concepts, promoting his religious views. The boyfriend listened quietly and affirmed regularly by shaking his head the Indian way, which seems like a mixture of affirmation and negation.
When I asked the waiter in the restaurant about the scene, he confirmed me that the Godman was someone from an ashram nearby. "They collect money from believers and all kinds of things are going on in these ashrams", he told me, "I don't like these guys, they spend the collected money in the most expensive restaurants. Only God knows what else they are doing with their followers behind the scenes."

In Belgium, where I have been myself in a renowned Catholic-organised boarding school, students knew exactly which priests were homosexual. We all knew what it meant if such a guy told you to "visit me in my room this evening". I know of several people having been the victim of these practices. My own experience is luckily limited to getting some indecent proposals from a Catholic layman who was speaking in front of the church weekly to read the Gospel during the masses.
Perhaps he was inspired by the enlightening examples of his superiors and trying to get his share. What else a catholic layman can do than trying to get laid - the word implies it so to speak.

Politicians create laws to organise the society. But often they use their knowledge to bypass these laws for personal benefits.
Religious leaders tell us individually what to do and how to behave. But apparently they use their power to bypass their own promoted rules.
Why is it so difficult for human beings to consider, propose, discuss and accept rules and obey self-created and approved rules?
There's a good advice to give to kids: always be aware of people trying to influence your behaviour on the basis of moral rules; instead learn to think about your own life, define your own moral rules and obey those instead; stay open for insights coming from different viewpoints and learn to choose your direction yourself.

For articles regarding these issues:

In India:
http://www.indianexpress.com/news/godman-7-held-in-sex-racket/584978/
http://www.bangkokpost.com/feature/culture/170689/sex-scandals-a-bad-week-for-india-godmen

In Belgium:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8576268.stm
http://knack.rnews.be/nl/actualiteit/nieuws/belgie/commissie-adriaenssens-kreeg-120-klachten-op-een-week/article-1194725069491.htm

For an overview of the attitude of various religions toward sex:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religion_and_sexuality

Letter to Sonia

Gurgaon, Sunday 21 March, 2010

Concerning: Request to correct erroneous spelling

Dear mam Sonjaji,

I am A humble but Proud citizen of India. My name: A. P. Dalit.

I have a humble request.

Every day I collect 125kgs of old Hindustan Times papers, perhaps you know that one. And each day with the money I earn from that activity, I buy me a fresh Hindustan Times. And because I am illiterate, every day I find myself a good man Arijit willing to tell me what's in the paper.
Because I have only one room in my hut, my six kids gather around us and they also listen to what is written in the paper. I thank you for allowing these papers to be published, as they are the only education I can give my kids.

Unfortunately I have to point you to an error which I think explains a lot which goes wrong in our beloved republic. So I asked the good man Arijitji to write this letter in my name, which is A.P. Dalit.

We often hear about big amounts of money spend to the "BACKWARD CLASSES" in many of the articles in the paper. And you must know, dear Sonjaji, every time I hear this word "BACKWARD" I look at my kids and think by myself: "Who are those 'backwards'? Who can they be talking 'bout?".

Sonjaji mam, when I look at my kids then I always see them being so very clever to be able to survive amidst the stinking sewages and the rich wastebelts that are left by the other peoples. But no mam, I cannot think of those good peoples allowing us to live here as being "backward", since they are far more succesfull in our beloved country than my family is. If it can't be them, who else could it be?

My kids are also intelligent enough to avoid falling in the numerous pits everywhere in our beautiful city. These life-threatening pits are left by the professional people working for you. Those pitwallahs too cannot be called "backward" as they all are earning a better salary than all members in my family together. It can't be them neither.

My kids are surprisingly healthy even when they take a daily bath in the Yamuna or any other waterpool that is available. Don't tell me "backward" refers to the industrywallahs using our rivers as sewage systems. That's impossible. They are too much clever, just as clever as the medical doctors and high profile staffmembers of the hospitals who are always able to cure the few diseases my kids still get from bathing. I just can't belief that you want to address those good healthwallahs.

My last thought was that perhaps you want to send some money to the kids of these pitwallahs, industrywallahs and healthwallahs in our esteemed society? I can understand that this would help the parents in buying them a good diploma in one of the outstanding private schools, so that they could escape being "backward".
I have to tell you, dear Soniaji mam, that I would never dare to call those kids "backwards". I think their parents would not like that. Perhaps even the admission fees to enter the good schools would be raised too high if the school administrations came to know that the kids were "backwards"!

Well, Sonjaji mam, I have thought about it, talked and discussed about it. And I have asked around about this word "backwards" and the people it could refer to. I've looked everywhere but nobody seems to know these peoples. I asked at least a thousands peoples: "Are you backward?". And their answer was indifferently: "How dare you? Go back where you belong." I could not find a single one!
I really have no clue which peoples are referred to with that word.

So very probably the reason why all your good money and intentions to help these "backward" peoples is not reaching them, is due to this sole and simple fact: BACKWARD peoples DON'T EXIST in our beloved Mother India.

With permission but I really think "BACKWARD" must be a typographical error which has lead to wasting a lot of money from the good and caring netas. Probably the typo is caused by the increasing use of computers in the production of our daily papers. And pardon me but I think it is used now unknowingly and unintentionally.

My dear Sonjaji mam -- I feel an urge to call you 'auntie' now, may I? --, I am humbly asking for nothing more than the correction of this word "BACKWARD" and replace it everywhere by what I think was the correct intended word to use: "BACKYARD".

I'm hoping to hear the good man Arijit speak out loud tomorrow: "10.000 crore are assigned to the "backYard peoples".

Dear Sonjaji mam, I'm gathering my kids, leave my hut and I will be waiting for you.

You know where.

Thanks in advance and till tomorrow ?

A.P. Dalit
Citizen of India

The end of publishing?

See this video at http://scienceroll.com/2010/03/17/the-end-of-publishing-on-a-creative-video/.
For a good blog about self-publishing (which is mentioned here), read http://reviews.cnet.com/self-publishing/

Nowadays there's a lot to do about the future of publishing. In the past 10 years in Europe commercial printers have been struggling to keep their businesses alive. It seems now it's the publishers who feel they are entering the economical battlefields.
Though in general most publishers are doing fine if you look at their balance sheets and financial results, nowadays discussions are going on between them about what their role will be in the future. Everyone in the sector is worrying about what impact the digitalisation and globalisation will have on their business. What will be the role of the publisher in the future?

For myself I think that the main principle which is often forgotten by publishers, is that INFORMATION is not the same as KNOWLEDGE.
My point is that for publishers, value must be added in the transformation of information to knowledge.
According to me, publishers who forget this difference will make themselves obsolete on the long run.

Some observations:

1) Upscale and downscale. Globalisation and localisation.
More and more mergers are taking place. The bigger the resulting groups, the more life space and market there will be for smaller players in the field. But at the same time more and more smaller publishers with niche markets will start new and small-scaled initiatives. Struggle to survive will be common to everybody in the field, just like it is for every other business. This evolution towards downscaled niche-markets is inevitable because it's also very much supported by the technological evolution.

2) Democratisation of publishing.
Like professional typesetting was brought to the individual desktop around 1990, publishing itself is brought within the reach of every individual. Printing on demand and digitalisation are just offering this: a cheap accessible way of producing a book.
Various initiatives already make clever use of these "new" techniques. "Publish Yourself" is the new adagio. And there's not much that existing publishers can do against it.

3) The disappearance of added value.
Before some time typesetting and producing content ready for print was kind of an art. It required tacit knowledge how to present the content of a book in the most reader-appealing way, keeping into account the author's desires. Value was also added in terms of correct use of language and content-related corrections, adding value to the knowledge that was presented by the authors.
Nowadays publishers are talking about all the technological possibilities and conceived future evolutions on the basis of the information they process and distribute. They are not busy with knowledge any more, their attention has shifted from knowledge to the more easy-to-measure "information".
However, because of the democratisation of production and distribution of information, this will not and cannot be the role of the publisher. A publisher - if he wants to survive - will need to define himself as more than an information-processor and distributor.
Authors cry for knowledgeable publishers who understand and valuate their knowledge.
Readers are nowadays internet-aware. If they want to access information only, then they surely don't want to pay a publisher coming in between them and the source of information.

4) It looks like everyone in this sector is trying to find a new theoretical model which enables them to predict and secure future developments. They think this is needed as they feel they have to take decisions for the long term. Unfortunately the vast majority of these efforts is in vain. The paradigms are shifting and the economical world is undergoing major changes in terms of power and wealth distribution. One can try to understand what is happening, but trying to grasp the future can not deliver more than some ease for emotional restlessness. It's only giving a false sense of security.
What I feel is that at this moment there's no new business-model in place or even developing for old-fashioned publishers who don't want to "miss the train of globalisation and digitalisation". Publishers tend to limit their role to the buying-and-selling of information and are overwhelmed by the technological changes which take place in those processes.
But this is just out of their range of activities as these evolutions are not in the field of "knowledge". They are merely limited to how information is produced and distributed. The added value of the publisher should however be in adding value to author's knowledge.

5) The role of the established general publisher is slowly becoming void. To cut costs they start to save on editorial and redactional efforts. Doing this, they force themselves to a mere role of production, distribution and marketing. But precisely these processes are becoming so cheap and within reach of every individual now, that there hardly can be a role for the publisher any more.

The main question publishers should always ask themselves is: how can I improve the knowledge presented by the author.

The end of publishing?
There's a very bright future for small, niche publishers.

At least they look into the (almost) opposite direction !

I took this photograph in MGF mall on MG Road in Gurgaon. Fyi the 'MG' in the names stand for Mahatma Gandhi.

I learned that Hitlers Mein Kampf has extremely good sales in India. At first sight however, the pile of Gandhi books lets you think that Gandhi's book sold at least 1 copy more... Until you really start counting.

Interestingly on the cover, Hitler firmly is looking to the right, while Gandhi seems to doubt if he has to look to the left or to the center. Anyway, it's clear that he doesn't look in Hitler's direction.

For an interesting article about the two letters Gandhi wrote to Hitler before Worldwar II really got launched, I refer to Koenraad Elst.

India nowadays is the home for Gandhi-worshippers as well as Gandhi-haters. The former idealise him as "Father of the Nation", which became his political correct and official name. Nevertheless according to the latter, Gandhi stands for the undecisiveness, lack of Realpolitik and lack of efficiency of Hindu culture confronted with globalisation.

What most Indians might not know is that at least in Belgium, but probably this applies to the whole of West-Europe, you may have and read Mein Kampf but publishing it, going to public places to give the book away for free or sell it, will without doubt get you in contact with Justice. In other words: 'Mein Kampf' is a forbidden book.

The (co)(s(m)et)(ic)(al) identity of the Hindu

1. The "cosmic" identity of the Hindu
While the world is ruled by countries and geographical areas dominated by the so-called 'book-religions' like Christianity and Islam, any of their individuals become shocked when confronted with the Hindu religion.
All of a sudden you realise that here is a religion that has nothing to do with power and economics (well ... this can be discussed), with trying to win souls or convincing others by any means.
Hinduism offers over 300000 supernatural beings to choose from. Each individual can choose almost completely free which avatar of the supreme Brahman or which deity he/she wants to worship. Each individual is as well free to define for himself how far he wants to follow the worshipping rituals.
All these deities represent a specific human experience of the cosmos.
For westerners it is very hard to understand how a religion being so diffused, without the use of power as we understand it, without central organisation and without clear personifications of the deities, can be so successful that it binds 1 billion people for thousands of years.
Though one may perhaps dislike many of the aspects of Indian society that seem to go along with Hinduism, for me, Hinduism presents itself as a far more realistical and truthfull faith in comparison to other religions. To my feeling (IF any faith is still needed), Hinduism gives answers for a lot of modern-day individual questions.
Hinduism should be cherished by the world and Hindu culture on its own should be called one of its wonders.

2. The "comical" identity of the Hindu
I cannot say I'm an expert in Hindu psychology at all. And the longer I reside in India, the lesser I dare to say anything about it also. Each time you think you 'understand' something, another thing happens which proofs you didn't understand it.
The beauty of it is that mostly Indians don't care themselves too much about their identity. Identity is for them something which is defined by others, and as such is subject to eternal change caused by the everlasting changes in the environment.
As a consequence they almost accept every change or situation without second thoughts.
For westerners, who usually try to build up their identity on the basis of principles which they try to keep as long as possible, this often gives the impression that Indians 'are not serious', that they are 'playing games' with you (and with themselves).
There's no "hard" or "principle-based" center to find in Hindu individuals. In the same way it is very hard to find arrogant (in the common sense of the word) ones. (What a contrast with Americans and Europeans here !).


3. The "cosmetical" identity of the Hindu
Could it be that the non-organised and cosmic orientation of Hinduism results logically in a mind which has an aversion of self-definition, is reluctant to choosing principles and plainly hates to have enough arrogance to take decisions and bear responsabilities.
Could it be that the lack of self-definition causes an overweighted attention for cosmetical identity building as is shown in the fact that half of the daily "quality" papers consists of reports and photos from the lifes of Bollywood actors.
Could it be that the choice of M. Gandhi (with his agression-free and often vague and unrealistic ideology) as "the father of the nation" is a consequent (but perhaps not so fortunate - because too vague) choice for a society based on Hinduism ?
Could it be that in the modern globalised world, Hinduism will become a threat to its own survival, because of its refusal to take itself serious when confronted with other cultures ?

If you look at where the budget spendings go, the US brand is based on "military and economic power", the European identity defines itself then as "social (security) and cultural (historical) power", the Chinese as "organisational efficiency".

What is the India-brand?

That is what we in Belgium call: "Nearshore Outsourcing of our Social Security"

I came across this small article in the Times of India on Sunday 7 January 2010.
The problem of shortage of cells and prisons is already existing for 20 years in Belgium. The problem could never been solved, partly due to the very complicated communautarian political organisation.
Of course, one cannot deny that "nearshore outsourcing" is a very creative solution for this problem.
As a Belgian I'm so happy to read that the Dutch were so extremely friendly to offer this service to us "at cost".

I have some other tips for Belgium where outsourcing could solve the problem. What about:

- nearshore outsourcing to Germany of the few production jobs in the private sector that are still there in Belgium? The advantage would be that then we could collectively cancel all productive jobs, turn 100% into a service economy and become easily the greenest, ecological savvy country in the world;

- a bit-further-nearshore outsourcing of our Belgian pension obligation. What would you think of a "sell and lease back" operation for the whole of the ageing problem? To be able to make some profit in this operation, I think this type of oursourcing should be done in Poland. I'm quite sure they can handle Pension obligations cheaper than we can do in Belgium;

- a third proposal is: Why not "offshore outsource" our complete unemployment service system. I'm sure any member of the BRIC countries can make us an appealing offer for that !;

- then ... now that we begin to see the advantages of outsourcing more clearly: We could outsource the Governments and Administrations of the French speaking part. It's costing us too much money now and I don't have any doubt that Sarkozy can do it cheaper.

- and last but not least: Why couldn't we outsource our King and his family ?
If The Netherlands agree to take our inmates, then why would the UK have objections to host our Royal family. If I recall right ... they're related anyway. So ... in fact they should take them for free !

View on some official Indian languages ...

Urdu

Telugu

Tamil

Punjabi

Oriya

Marathi

Malayalam

Kannada

Hindi

Gujarati

Bengali

Assamese