Ponniyin Selvan Varalaatru Peravai

I think you're mistaken. I'm not religious and am not accusing or
comparing one religion over the other.. I do think there is a
serious problem in trying to enforce rules by following every
letter of some documents written thousands of years back..Agreed
that there is a lot of good stuff in there, but it also comes with a
lot of bad stuff.. The ideal thing to do is to open up the documents
of debate, find what is relevant and agreeable today and ditch the
rest..
Naren,whatever you perceive as bad is
perceived as good by many.Its all perception.Lots of debates have
happened for centuries about this topic and we always find that
reformers lose out in the end.The only reason is there is nothing to
reform in hinduism.When periyar opposed casteism he was only
duplicating what ramanuja did in 11th century.Our life is limited to
a generation.HInduism has seen thousands of generations.Many
reformers end up as theists at the later part of their
life.Kannadasan,annadurai and karunanidhi are examples.Annas atheism
ended up as "onre kulam and oruvane devan".Karunanidhis atheism
ended up by making him wear yellow angavasthra.I believe that there
is nothing irrelevent in hinduism.If you can show how it is
irrelevent im willing to change my views.

"'You're talking about agama shastras, I don't know much about
those.. Do you know the reason why they don't want beef eaters to
come to the temple and killing of cows is prohibited.??.. Is it
because "cow" is considered a sacred animal?..If so why just "cows"
are considered sacred??.. and not other animals.. My line of
reasoning is that, because cows provide an important food resource
(milk/dairy products), people don't want the cows to be killed
for "meat"..and added that as a rule.. "Thou shall not eat beef"..
It holds true for those days.. but is it true now??.. This is just
one issue.."'

Hinduism is about total abolition of animal
cruelty.But it also realised that if it imposed total vegetarianism
people would not follow it.Buddhhism imposed total vegetarianism on
its followers.Now buddhists in china,thailand and korea eat even
snakes and rats.So hinduism followed a step by step approach in
imposing vegetarianism.People were prohibited from eating meat on
special occasions like puratasi,margali,aiyappa pooja
days,amavasai,fridays etc.Then as they age they were expected to
stop meat.Cows were banned from being eaten since they give milk and
hence they were perceived as equal to our mother.I only see the
greatness of a religion which perceived cows as mothers in
this.Vedas said "mathrudevo bhava" meaning "mother is god".And cows
are pervceived to be equal to our mothers.

If you feel this law to be unfair to other
animals you are welcome to stop eating all animals altogether and
become a total vegetarian.That is hailed even higher by hinduism.

What do you mean reformers lost??.. Do we still have women being
thrown into the fire after their husbands die..? or do we still
accept the "devadasi" system??..
Jumping into fire was advocated for ksathriya women who
had to save their modesty from invaders after their husbands die in
war.Chitoor rani padmini did that to save herself from alladin gilji.
Many rajput women jumped into fire to save themselves from muslims
earlier.Soon this became a prevelant habit.Vedas did not allow this
for all.Only queens did it that too willingly.Now since no queens
exist that system has automatically gone irrelevent.All over the
world many women still suicide to save themselves from goons.And
devdasi system was not in vedas.So these reformers did not protest
anything against vedas,but only protested against ills that creeped
in at later days.


"I don't get you.. Does that mean if somethings have been done for
thousands of years they have to remain the same.. Human beings
used to travel by walk for thousands of years.. So do you oppose
the changes that facilitated the use of modern and easy transport
of human beings..?.. I think you'd agree changing for the better is
good.."
I only said that periyar did not do any new reforms.He
only removed the ills which creeped later on into the society which
was against the religion itself.Just like abraham lincoln removed
slavery which wasnt mentioned in bible,periyar too did the same
thing here.

"I said I was not religious, dont know if that directly implies i'm
an atheist..maybe i can be called an agnostic.. Well, i think the
discussion was about not allowing non-hindus inside the temples..
You advocated that because you did not want the beef-eaters to come
inside a holy place bcos they'll pollute the temple.. I find it
similar to the muslims not allowing the non-muslims to even enter
their holy cities.. I find them both detestable.."

A questioning atheist is 1000 times better than
the blind devotee is my belief.Hinduism wanted all its followers to
abstain from eating beef.what is detestable in it?It reduces creulty
to cows and hence its welcome.And if muslims dont allow others to
enter their holy cities its okay for me.I wont want to enter any
church or mosque to admire whats in it.


"BUT, what I'm against is the discrimination that you're
preaching to prevent people from entering temples and learn abt
Hinduism based on their food habits.."

all discrimination aint bad.This is a small protest
against cow slaughtering.Asking people to abstain from meat on
amavasai and karthigai is a small form of protest against killing
chickens and goats.If that's discrinimation let it be.