Gandhi a racist?

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malhotraraul

malhotraraul

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Monday, 04 October 2010, 16:33 IST

Non-violence preacher Gandhi a racist?

San Francisco: Gandhi is the man who is identified for his powerful weapons - truth and non-violence. But in San Francisco a group of activists advocating for minorities in India want to remove his statue alleging racism and sham non-violence, reports John Cote from the San Francisco Chronicle.

The bronze statue was erected in a plaza at the Ferry Building in 1988. Since then, vandals or souvenir hunters have removed Gandhi's glasses four times, but no one until recently has demanded the statue of one of the world's most admired men be removed.

"The popular image of Gandhi as an egalitarian pacifist is a myth," Bhajan Singh, a member of the Organization for Minorities of India, said in a statement. "We plan to challenge that myth by disseminating Gandhi's own words to expose his racism and sham nonviolence." Singh and his colleagues say Gandhi's political views are responsible for the oppression of Indian Muslims, Christians, Sikhs and other minorities.

P.J. Johnston, Head of the City Arts Commission, said he expects Gandhi to remain where he is. "I would just say that in my professional career, I've had no greater honor than having to defend Gandhi," according to Johnston, a Professional Crisis Manager.

In Flint, Michigan, a statue of Gandhi was unveiled on his 141st birth anniversary on Saturday in a "peace garden" on the University of Michigan-Flint campus.

SOURCE
 
read wikipedia article on him ...some of his statements were controversial ...its based on that .. even i didnt know those things about him ... but he is not a racist for sure ..
 
Bah!!! They just want to be famous. History of the media itself is a proof that they have a skills to conviniently misintrepet a statement which can be twisted and manupulated so that it can offend some groups of people. This is what happens when people are usually unemployment and let their imagination stray around.
 
khanvis2009 said:
but he is not a racist for sure ..
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And how are you so sure about that?

If we define racism as any form of discrimination against a group of people and not limit it to racial discrimination (i.e caste, race, religion etc), then most traditional Indians during Gandhi's period were racist by nature of our Indian culture which encouraged such discrimination. I don't think Gandhi was any exception. Gandhi was not born great. People made him great by idolizing him. People do not feel the weight of discrimination till they are at the receiving end themselves and Gandhi had a taste of that in South Africa. The racist writings mentioned in the Wiki link sound pretty natural coming from an Indian during that time period and I don't think there would be doubts about the genuineness of those writings either. After all those writings were form just a 100 years back and there would be enough proof in existence to allow those references to remain on the Wiki link. Gandhi might not be the only freedom fighter to have racist inclinations either. Subhas Chandra Bose associated himself with Hitler who believed that Aryans were the most superior race of humans and that they should dominate over everyone else.
 
Lord Nemesis said:
And how are you so sure about that?

If we define racism as any form of discrimination against a group of people and not limit it to racial discrimination (i.e caste, race, religion etc), then most traditional Indians during Gandhi's period were racist by nature of our Indian culture which encouraged such discrimination. I don't think Gandhi was any exception. Gandhi was not born great. People made him great by idolizing him. People do not feel the weight of discrimination till they are at the receiving end themselves and Gandhi had a taste of that in South Africa. The racist writings mentioned in the Wiki link sound pretty natural coming from an Indian during that time period and I don't think there would be doubts about the genuineness of those writings either. After all those writings were form just a 100 years back and there would be enough proof in existence to allow those references to remain on the Wiki link. Gandhi might not be the only freedom fighter to have racist inclinations either. Subhas Chandra Bose associated himself with Hitler who believed that Aryans were the most superior race of humans and that they should dominate over everyone else.
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i am not vouching for that buddy .. but i dont think a person like him could harbour feelings of hatred towards anyone .. maybe he didnt have complete knowledge about certaoin things when he made some of those comments ..
 
khanvis2009 said:
maybe he didnt have complete knowledge about certaoin things when he made some of those comments ..
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LOL.. That's exactly what racism is. Narrow minded views arising out of lack of knowledge or because of peoples reluctance to accept such knowledge.
 
he came back to India just to join the struggle for freedom, he chose a path of non-violence & people followed him, one maybe blind to follow him, maybe 10, or 100, but millions followed .........................

there were 100's of leaders who also took part in this cause, why were they not followed just like gandhi ???????
but finally we won & people made him father of the nation.
ok, i do not agree that he ever was racist, no one is perfect, he may or may not have made any comments unlike today's politicians who claim to be the secular & openly make comments on cast & language & millions follow him blindly & take law in their own hands & disturb peace resulting in heavy loss of public property which is clearly made from our tax money.
someone also mentioned Hitler & yes he did not compare Gandhi to Hitler but if he really was a racist then he had all the might to become president or prime minister of this country & no one would have opposed him on that unlike Hitler who wanted to rule the world.

as far as the partition thing is concerned, no one knows the situation in which he had to take this decision, as it is clearly mentioned in the transcripts that the Britishers succeeded in changing Jinnah's mind about making another country, there were religious riots in this country but Jinnah was looking at this as a national problem & not a religious problem, but he was also another victim of the master mind British.
ok, let me say that did gandhi alone made this decision ?????????

no, it were the British who were the master mind behind this & who they chose to put the blame on .................. Gandhi.
and now someone wants to get famous & yes, HE CHOSE GANDHI :D

why not Nehru, who was selfish enough to become the first PM of this country & later on he was the one who divided language & religion with states.
 
panther said:
Well people respect narendra modi a lot too, hitler, mussolini, etc
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nope only a few do.. narendra modi and hitler are not respected everywhere .. Gandhiji is respected worldwide .. read a bit about him and ull know y.. anyway to each his own .. to u he may be a racist to me he is not
 
one can clearly see how much are Indian politicians respected, needless to say

injustice to include Gandhiji amongst Modi, Hitler & Mussolini etc

Hitler & Mussolini are not even respected in their own country, so forget Modi too
 
Lord Nemesis said:
People do not feel the weight of discrimination till they are at the receiving end themselves and Gandhi had a taste of that in South Africa. The racist writings mentioned in the Wiki link sound pretty natural coming from an Indian during that time period and I don't think there would be doubts about the genuineness of those writings either. After all those writings were form just a 100 years back and there would be enough proof in existence to allow those references to remain on the Wiki link.
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But they are quoted verbatim without any surrounding context. That context is very necessary wouldn't you say. What was his state of mind when they were said etc.

In the end can they point to any racist actions, given those speak louder than a just few words ;)
 
Sorcerer is right. This is all unemployed people who have nothing better to do.

Frankly, none of knew Gandhi so lets not try and presume or assume or conclude if he was or was not racist.

One needs to know what happened before any action to understand the situation and then come to a judgement.
 
^^

Precisely. I also respect the man a lot. let him be the racist of the lot. still that man did great things for that i respect him.

and yea on the great things there were lot of negatives too. but still.

But i am happy that he has a flaw. so that means he was just a ordinary man like me but that did great things. for him and others.

not born great but made himself great.
 
m-jeri said:
^^

Precisely. I also respect the man a lot. let him be the racist of the lot. still that man did great things for that i respect him.
and yea on the great things there were lot of negatives too. but still.

But i am happy that he has a flaw. so that means he was just a ordinary man like me but that did great things. for him and others.
not born great but made himself great.
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Well said :)
 
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