dalsingh101

Well yeah, but the argument is that that men don't let women explore identities outside of that role. They don't want to be solely or even primarily defined in that capacity. Plus there is whole thing about male dominated societies defining women in terms of their sexuality (like in the west), or suppressing the expression of this side of women from society (like most eastern societies do, including ours). Muslims probably do the latter with most success. All things said and done. Sikh society could do with A LOT more to make more things fairer for women. Whilst Sikh women themselves need to take action to develop a positive contemporary female identity instead of trying to follow behaviour models of other communities women - usually gorian. Truth is, if we don't help and support them to do this, they'll probably only become disgruntled and cause more problems. Do we have a choice?

There may have been an element of alienation from Sikhi by politicised apnay at that time too, seeing as what was being pushed as mainline Sikhi had become, to all intents and purposes, subservient to British colonial interests. Not everyone succumbed to this though, as the example of Bhai Randhir Singh (AKJ) illustrates. One of the major gripes of feminists seems to relate to all thing related to the kitchen and the very word is often used to suggest male oppression! "Expecting women to be tied to the kitchen all day" is a common accusation by feminists towards men they perceive as misogynistic. So I'm not surprised they play down these other potential role models as they probably see them as examples of conservative women who have succumbed to male domination. The other complaint is being seen as baby producing vessels.

What is interesting is that Sikhs soldiery seem to have seriously bought into the idea that it was their religious duty to stand by the King of Britain. Obviously, other Sikhs (like the Ghadrs) saw things differently.

?? The leading section of the invaders (the Anglos) cleverly caused prominent Sikhs (whom they patronised in both senses of the word) to distance the faith from anything even remotely smacking of what is called Hinduism. These Sikhs seemed to identify with and aspire to the perceived world view of the new overlords. Which shouldn't surprise us as they were educated in their institutes. Hence these Sikhs pushed for gender equality more vocally than at any other time previously (post 1708). Seeing as whitey (even now) uses the gender issue to beat men of colour with, it's no wonder Singh Sabhias reacted in this way. Their acts, were, in effect, attempts to identify with the invading culture, not distance themselves from it.

I think this sell out bastard's name was Kirpal.

Is it really as simple as that?! Many Sikhs kept on fighting. They just didn't do it for themselves as a nation. Probably more appropriate to discuss this here? http://www.sikhawareness.com//index.php?showtopic=13952&pid=122252&st=0&#entry122252

This coded letter sent by a Pathan is very interesting. The writer seems to believe that the Urdu will be readable by the censor whilst the Pashtu section would not: A Pathan to a dafedar of the 19th Lancers in France. Omissi believes the phrase 'not such a war' means 'not a religious war'.

KDS asked the above question on another thread and I think some of the material I came across in this book may be helpful in relation to it. Most of us here will be familiar with (at least) the broad contours of the British 'Martial Race Theory' that heavily influenced policy during the Brit colonisation of our heartland. As KDS points out, the 'martial' epithet wasn't solely limited to Sikhs and other communities of North India fell under this rubric. Some of the information gleaned from this book seems to highlight very different attitudes towards 'fraternity in faith' by the Muslim and Sikh soldiers in WW1. The following is a footnote from letter 1: When you read the letters of Sikhs it shows a complete subjugation towards the British cause, usually hinged on a perceived relationship with the King. The letters are almost childlike in their simplicity and political naivety. To paraphrase Omissi they [the soldiers] had become exactly what their overlords wanted them to be. The ways the various subgroups competed with each other (along religious, ethnic, caste fissures) tells us a lot too. This obviously worked to imperial advantage. What is telling is how, the mere idea of fighting other Muslims caused serious problems from Pathan soldiers whilst the Ghadr movement (of which the soldiers seem aware) didn't seem to have the effect of 'swinging' the Sikh soldiers in a similar way? A Gurmukhi letter from a Khatri Sikh to friend in France (dated 30/1/1915) says: KDS. What this suggests to me is that by this time, lumpen sections of Sikhs had totally shaken off the psychology of independence that characterised the original Khalsa and a large part of this was down to the Brit supported version of Sikhi that was being propagated. In this, complete loyalty to the British sovereign was cleverly packaged into the faith so that maintaining this subordinate position actually came to be perceived as synonymous to following the faith itself. That is writ all over the letters written by Sikh soldiers in the collection. Plus we also have Macauliffe's statement that by this time, the Amrit ceremony that British soldiers undertook included a vow of loyalty to the English King, highlighting just how cleverly the imperial agenda had become intertwined with what these people believed was Sikhi. In short, despite the fact that they were fighting in a war, most [??] of those Sikh soldiers seemed to have lost that important psychological and religio-theological construct of 'independence' which characterises the conspicuously difficult to control. It's hard to explain.

There is something quite important relating to this in the Omissi book. I'll try and post it later tonight.

As they say in England: You're damned if you do, and you're damned if you don't. Personally I feel the situation is too far out of control to be quickly reversed now. The solution will have to be a long term one.

That was lame because for all the more grey areas of puratan rehits, the issue with halal is one of the few that is almost unequivocally persistent throughout them. This is going to be an ongoing concern as there is no definitive, set in stone, unchallengeable rehat. You can see it that way. I think it can also be conceived in terms of Sikh society's understanding of the faith could become more developed and in depth as we build up our body of knowledge and experience of it over time and interrogate it with more precision and answer more and more questions in this way. To me this one is simple. True independent Sikh martial spirit was suppressed after the Anglo-Sikh war and only a controlled version which worked in an adjunct way to the British imperial agenda was allowed to be manifest. Outside of this, the martial culture was largely subverted into symbolism as opposed to real life practice which kept one militarily prepared in the modern context. Only small amounts of people tried to resist this (mostly unsuccessfully) like the Gaddarittes and those who joined the antiBritish movement during WW2. Most Sikhs became preoccupied with securing employment or functioning in the new economic environment created by the invaders. This obviously didn't value military prowess outside of those that maintained colonial interests. The psychology of Sikhs changed in all this, to one of subjects, instead of the free spirited revolutionaries that emerged in 1699.

It just seems like you accept all things in the panth as inevitable, no manner how backwards they are. I agree that people have a tendency to mould Sikhi according to their preferences/understanding. You should factor in that even the writers of those puratan rehits may have been doing this. I think Sikhi is going to be constantly explored and interpreted in the context of changing environments. There is a danger that failing to do this will make it stagnant and irrelevant to the everyday experiences of everyday people.

A long time ago I 'blogged' with some West London feminist apnee on the Pickled Politics forum (I know, I know...) about this very topic. My best friend and flatmate for a long time was an educated African lady who was what she described as a 'Black feminist'. She explained to me how this differed from mainstream (read white) feminism. She told me how the issues that affected females like her with markedly different to the ones effecting white women. Their wants/needs and world views were different. One eye opening thing she said to me was that "not only are we dealing with sexism but we are also dealing with white racism and exoticism at the same time, this makes our cause different from white women". She didn't relate to white feminism at all. Going back to that apnee. When we spoke of the Sikh women's struggle, I mentioned these things (as many mainstream/white feminists blogged there too). I suggested that Sikh women too need to define and create their own customised form of feminism instead of jumping on the white version. It's my belief that mainstream feminists end up working in an adjunct way with white men and their agendas, including the attempted domination of ethnic men. You can see this in how whitey constantly uses 'womens rights' as a plank to beat nonwhite men with and even as partial justification to invade their countries. So I agree with your suggestion but this is something Sikh women need to do themselves. We should fully support them in this. Otherwise they just dimwittedly jump onto the white slag version. That is what that apnee seemed to do in the end. When they do that they get bundles of support for it too! That's what I think too. Many white feminists still seem to have an inferiority complex over men and think that only by being exactly like 'men' (as they know them) will they be something. I think it's more complicated than that. Like all men have the potential to be a complete kunjar, all women have the potential to be slappers given the right stimulus/environment. England is one of the worst places for this. Don't underplay the strong social needs of women and the abject terror they feel at being 'different' and the way this can dictate their behaviour when surrounded by the majority culture. I disagree, it's more complex than that. I remember when the instances of Sikh men behaving like this were minimal. In my parents generation infidelity was very rare. Even in my generation we didn't have hordes of he-slags. Apneean didn't have slutty role models either. That didn't stop them getting a terrible rep for these things. Personally, I think you are on some solid stuff here. If it has got that bad, instead of running around after girls that don't want to be with apnay, Sikh men should go with those that do. Actually having competition would probably make them (apneean) act differently too, what with way female psychology often makes them so competitive with each other over men.

Though evidence does seem to point at much more freedom with Sikh women than many of their nonSikh contemporaries of the time, let's not even mistakenly give the impression that any such freedoms where akin to what 'modern' women are clamoring for now. i.e. financial and sexual. I agree. KDS in back home and has that accepting mentality towards the order of things that frequently characterises Indians. You have to try and get used to it. KDs you could do with trying to think outside this Indian box yourself. I always hear words to the effect of 'that's just how it goes' from you about most social/cultural things that need reforming.

I tell you what, a lot of those Arab women still aren't openly whining like many apneean are about their blokes. Even if what you say is true, we still have to deal with that. Plus we kill off a lot more jananis than them through foeticide anyway.

I thought the same thing but her footnote relating to that statement is thus:

Exactly. Now consider the impact of this on the culture of region that has experienced this type of stuff on a sustained basis. Reflect on how a region like Panjab has experienced invasions compared to say England or Mongolia.

Whilst I agree that there is a reoccurring problem with some people of Sikh backgrounds projecting post enlightenment type thinking onto Sikhi, which essentially seems to lead to a conflating of Sikhi with modern liberal values, I do think that some of the threads outlined in the piece are interesting and may well have a measure of truth about them. One thing we have to face is how women have indeed been on at the forefront of various abuse throughout all of the conflicts that have inflicted the Panjab, past and present. In this context it is interesting to remember accusations of kurimaaring by even high ranking past Sikhs such as Jassa Singh Ramgarhia and Sukha Singh (the one who helped slay Massa Ranghar).

Thought I'd share this sisters work on gender inequality amongst apnay. What do you guys make of it? The author lives in Toronto with her Sikh husband and son, both of whom she loves dearly. For over ten years she has worked in the highly discriminatory (in terms of gender, ethnicity, social background, economic status) environments of international physics research. She is one of the founding members of SAFAR, Institute for Sikh Feminist Research.

Me nah deal wid dem batty bwoy business and ting bredren! lol

Stop flirting man!! lol

He certainly looks like a kuka?

Sorry can't recall any direct source right now. The topic makes me realise how one who has been interested in various aspects of Sikhi from childhood, picks up so many scraps of information from such a wide variety of sources over the years, that ideas can become firmly embedded in one's consciousness, and that from long forgotten sources. However, it wouldn't surprise me if the idea may have originally been highlighted by the McLeodian school accounts. Check Harjot Oberoi from some leads in this department maybe?

I've got a feeling that (at least) a part of the equation involves perceived 'material benefit' in this society, with some socially competitive parents/apnay in the diaspora (and back home too), probably viewing some of the more conspicuous external Sikh identity markers as detrimental to their desperately desired 'upward' social/economic mobility. Hence the hostility? What I find weird (on reflection) is how western society will tolerate other outlandish external 'cultural' markers [if that description fits?] like goth dress, facial piercings, trannies and whatnot but have this very subtle but deeply rooted, almost passive/aggressive hostility to virile, overt ethnic male religious identities? Plus I do think they like to toy with this stuff in their society (of late), almost as if they are testing the boundaries of how much they can dictate to those of foreign extraction in their lands. The British are the most cautious about this, and I believe this is due to their experience during the 'mutiny' in India, since which they seem to have made a decision to not overtly interfere with religious practice at a micro level - in fear of some sort of backlash/disturbance. The French don't seem to give a shit about this at all.

I'm sure Kaur was around preSingh Sabha, If anything they probably just standardised it and did away with the use of devi?