Attn: Moderators

To Whom it May Concern at tamilbrahmins.com:

I am extremely disappointed (and rather dismayed) at the deletion of
the thread I so painstakingly wrote a few days prior. While I simply
stated my opinion that Tamil Brahmins are superior, I posted it purely
with the intention of opening up a discussion.

Perhaps you, the moderators of this fine board, disagree with my
stance as posted (might you be non-Brahmin, perhaps?)

Nevertheless, that is the very purpose of this board. At last count, there were 3 rebuttals to my post, all of which were well thought out and respectful in their disagreement.

In light of this, I ask why such discussions are surpressed. Why is
it OK for cinemas and newspapers to ridicule Brahmin life, yet when a
single poster writes on his opinion that Brahmins are superior, it is
immediately squashed.

Is this board run by Communists? The whole purpose of this board is
to foster discussion, not suppress it. If you, as moderators, wish to
hear only what you WANT to hear, please give up the domain
TamilBrahmins.com so that it can be used for a much better purpose.

Sincerely,

TKP

Dear Parthasarathy:

First of all, let me assure you that the people who maintain the site are highly dedicated Brahmins volunteering their time and effort (in spite of very busy careers) for the cause of Brahmins.

Secondly, may I ask you to visit the 'Mission Statement' and the thread by Praveen 'take a moment to read..', where we have clearly requested our members to refrain from using derogatory, inflammatory, vulgar, personal insults, and obscene language.

I respect your views about what you wrote. However, we, Brahmins as a community, while standing up united against all the atrocities committed against us, do not certainly want to fall into the same trap -- getting down to the level of those scums by screaming and throwing insults at each other!! You will agree with me that it doesn't serve our purpose at all. Besides, if you are to do that, then whatever you wrote about Brahmins being 'superior' doesn't hold water.
Let us be magnanimous in forgetting and forgiving people who have insulted and harmed us by showing them that we are above all their pettiness. Let us show 'superiority' (here I am using this word loosely) by our actions of dedication, standing up for what we believe is right, clean habits, civility and compassion towards everybody; let actions speak for themselves!!
I have forgotten most of my Tamil; however, this particular poem by the great Tamil Poet, Thiruvalluvar, always stayed with me:
"Inna saidaarai oruthal, avar naana nannaiyam saidu vidal"
I believe the translation is something like: The best way of insulting someone who did harm to you is to do something good to them.
My other friends, please correct me if I erred.

Parthasarathy, please go back and read all the references I have given and you will agree with what we, as a community, are doing.

Well articulated Silver Fox. Parthasarathy, this forum does not allow posting messages that promote differences between people on the basis of caste or community. We as a forum believe that all people are created equal and all should be treated equal.

We respect your personal views. But we should all abide by the forum rules. Besides, if we start allowing such threads, pretty soon we will be running into other issues too.

Let me assure you that, there is nothing personal in deleting any message or thread. Its all in line with keeping the forum clean and positive.

Ramki

Hello T.K. Parthasarathy:

In the US, there are always talk about White Supremacy and all that but if a White guy says that openly, he will be chided upon by his White fellows although sometimes it is quite the contrary. You get the drift, don't you? SO, take it easy sir!!

JS

T.K. Parthasarathy said:

To Whom it May Concern at tamilbrahmins.com:

I am extremely disappointed (and rather dismayed) at the deletion of
the thread I so painstakingly wrote a few days prior. While I simply
stated my opinion that Tamil Brahmins are superior, I posted it purely
with the intention of opening up a discussion.

Perhaps you, the moderators of this fine board, disagree with my
stance as posted (might you be non-Brahmin, perhaps?)

Nevertheless, that is the very purpose of this board. At last count, there were 3 rebuttals to my post, all of which were well thought out and respectful in their disagreement.

In light of this, I ask why such discussions are surpressed. Why is
it OK for cinemas and newspapers to ridicule Brahmin life, yet when a
single poster writes on his opinion that Brahmins are superior, it is
immediately squashed.

Is this board run by Communists? The whole purpose of this board is
to foster discussion, not suppress it. If you, as moderators, wish to
hear only what you WANT to hear, please give up the domain
TamilBrahmins.com so that it can be used for a much better purpose.

Sincerely,

TKP

Click to expand...

TKP, I was one of those who you have mentioned having a respectful disagreement to your earlier post. Thanks for your words. Sheer coincidence, last friday, i met up with all my friends over a drink, your post & the responses were debated in length with varying views. Infact one of them (all brahmins btw) had an objection to the site itself saying that it is casteist. My rebuttal to him was that there is nothing wrong in creating a forum for a community & all that this forum aims to achieve is to reach out to all the members of the community where our circle of influence is the highest. In this context, any messages which carry a casteist overtone is bound to create ill-will for the site & also to the cause the forum has been created. Yes, i do believe in freedom of expression but i hope you will agree the same has to be exercised diligently.

Dear Hariharan1972:

Your posting has indeed brought out an issue that we all have to endure when asking friends and relatives to join the orgn. Many of them say that they dont like anything caste-based; some others have said "why help only Brahmins; why not everybody?". I have tried to convince them by saying that all communities have their own groups except for Brahmins. We have the double-whammy - the Govt. itself doesn't help Brahmins and then many of our own kind do not support it.
I fear for the existence of this organization simply because most of our people are still living in utopia where everybody is treated equal and opportunities are equal to everybody! Worse than that, they don't want to buy into our argument that Tamilbrahmins.com is simply a non-political organization, trying to unite, propagate noble values of Brahminism, help out, as much as possible, the poor and needy in our community. The question of talking about other castes MUST NOT enter into this picture at all. We do believe that God has created all humanbeings equal and we don't need to go beyond that; it is not our realm.
In fact, in TamilNation.org, there was an implicit statement about how the Brahmins felt superior. Read the following quote:
"The Iyer Heritage Site (which appears to be no longer functional) served to show that even in the present day the self perception of at least some Brahmins is that they are "Aryans"."

Therefore, to answer Parthasarathy's posting, we as a community has to be very responsible citizens, watching and measuring what we say or write.

I also fail to understand why many of our people feel that this is 'castiest' (I honestly don't know what exactly it means!!). Our people talk passionately about everything and when it comes to action, I don't see many of them standing next to us!! It appears to me that very many of them are content going to work, come back to their families and have fun ... damn the community!
There is a story going around - it is like this: There were three crabs that fell into a well - one non-Brahmin and two Brahmins! (you simply change names! - and don't ask me how a crab be a Brahmin!!). The non-brahmin crab crawled out the well and got out. The two Brahmin crabs are still there. Each time one Brahmin crab goes up a step, the other Brahmin crab drags it back and it goes back and forth.

Until we unite and be serious about our commitments, we are not going to succeed as a community. It is easy to sit back and criticize everything; talk is cheap.
I am afraid this, too, might fall on deaf ears.

That is a powerful message, Silverfox.

You've brought out one very crucial aspect of the community - its blindness to its own plight. Media and public personalities have succeeded to such an extent that the community feels jittery about even thinking about its well-being, assuming that the idea of a community exists in the minds of Brahmins!

I too happen to have read the posting on the 'inherent superiority' arugment and did feel that was provocative. I concur with everyone who has expressed that this forum is not a place for such sentiments.

silverfox said:

Dear Hariharan1972:

Your posting has indeed brought out an issue that we all have to endure when asking friends and relatives to join the orgn. Many of them say that they dont like anything caste-based; some others have said "why help only Brahmins; why not everybody?". I have tried to convince them by saying that all communities have their own groups except for Brahmins. We have the double-whammy - the Govt. itself doesn't help Brahmins and then many of our own kind do not support it.
I fear for the existence of this organization simply because most of our people are still living in utopia where everybody is treated equal and opportunities are equal to everybody! Worse than that, they don't want to buy into our argument that Tamilbrahmins.com is simply a non-political organization, trying to unite, propagate noble values of Brahminism, help out, as much as possible, the poor and needy in our community. The question of talking about other castes MUST NOT enter into this picture at all. We do believe that God has created all humanbeings equal and we don't need to go beyond that; it is not our realm.
In fact, in TamilNation.org, there was an implicit statement about how the Brahmins felt superior. Read the following quote:
"The Iyer Heritage Site (which appears to be no longer functional) served to show that even in the present day the self perception of at least some Brahmins is that they are "Aryans"."

Therefore, to answer Parthasarathy's posting, we as a community has to be very responsible citizens, watching and measuring what we say or write.

I also fail to understand why many of our people feel that this is 'castiest' (I honestly don't know what exactly it means!!). Our people talk passionately about everything and when it comes to action, I don't see many of them standing next to us!! It appears to me that very many of them are content going to work, come back to their families and have fun ... damn the community!
There is a story going around - it is like this: There were three crabs that fell into a well - one non-Brahmin and two Brahmins! (you simply change names! - and don't ask me how a crab be a Brahmin!!). The non-brahmin crab crawled out the well and got out. The two Brahmin crabs are still there. Each time one Brahmin crab goes up a step, the other Brahmin crab drags it back and it goes back and forth.

Until we unite and be serious about our commitments, we are not going to succeed as a community. It is easy to sit back and criticize everything; talk is cheap.
I am afraid this, too, might fall on deaf ears.

Click to expand...

Thank you so much, Chintana. You have beautifully and succinctly articulated what I wanted to say, in a few words.

[Chintana - You've brought out one very crucial aspect of the community - its blindness to its own plight. Media and public personalities have succeeded to such an extent that the community feels jittery about even thinking about its well-being, assuming that the idea of a community exists in the minds of Brahmins! ]

Re:

Mr. Iyengar,

To a certain extent, your analogy is valid. Let me take your analogy further. If these white supremecists you speak of had their own community called "americanwhites.com" then that in and of itself would be considered exclusionary by most Americans.

I find it rather ironic that this board is called tamilbrahmins.com, yet advocates a caste-free society. Why not change the name to something more general?

We are trying to have it both ways here.

JSIyengar said:

Hello T.K. Parthasarathy:

In the US, there are always talk about White Supremacy and all that but if a White guy says that openly, he will be chided upon by his White fellows although sometimes it is quite the contrary. You get the drift, don't you? SO, take it easy sir!!

JS

Click to expand...

Dear Parthasarathy:

I think you got it wrong. We are NOT advocating caste-free society at all. We do say that all castes are equal and leave it at that. Please go back and read the Mission Statement.
What is wrong in stating that we are Brahmins? Everybody else is touting his/her caste and is doing everything they can for the benefit of their community.
Also, please read Chintana's postings, where she has beautifully explained this issue. Just because we declare that we belong to Brahmin community, doesn't necessarily mean that we are against other castes or we claim to be any better than anybody else.

By the way, Tamilbrahmins.com is open to a person of any caste. In fact, I believe we have a few members who are NOT Brahmins.

Parthasarathy, please also go to this thread "New Quota Bill" and read what Rxrajamo has to say. I believe he has answered all your doubts.

Parthasarathy, by any extent, please don't stop communicating your views. This is how we all learn or explain things. Thank you for your posting.

I second the idea that Parthasarathy should not stop posting his views. Thank you for bringing that up Silverfox.

Parthasarathy - as long as your views are supported by strong evidence that cannot be refuted they are admissible in this forum. Please be aware that opinions, particularly inflammatory/controversial ones will be particularly scrutinized. I think our community has lived for a quite a while now without developing a uniform awareness about its history, purpose and contributions. One of the goals of this forum is to rectify that.

silverfox said:

Dear Parthasarathy:

I think you got it wrong. We are NOT advocating caste-free society at all. We do say that all castes are equal and leave it at that. Please go back and read the Mission Statement.
What is wrong in stating that we are Brahmins? Everybody else is touting his/her caste and is doing everything they can for the benefit of their community.
Also, please read Chintana's postings, where she has beautifully explained this issue. Just because we declare that we belong to Brahmin community, doesn't necessarily mean that we are against other castes or we claim to be any better than anybody else.

By the way, Tamilbrahmins.com is open a person of any caste. In fact, I believe we have a few members who are NOT Brahmins.

Parthasarathy, please also go to this thread "New Quota Bill" and read what Rxrajamo has to say. I believe he has answered all your doubts.

Parthasarathy, by any extent, please don't stop communicating your views. This is how we all learn or explain things. Thank you for your posting.

Click to expand...

Re:

Dearest Chintana,

While I can see your point on inflammatory remarks and those that are offensive in nature, I do not at all see how you can simply make a blanket statement that all opinions posted on this forum must be (as you say) supported by strong evidence that cannot be refuted.

That sounds a bit riduclous.

By its very definition, a forum (in Webster's dictionary) is:

a medium (as a newspaper or online service) of open discussion or expression of ideas

Ideas are exactly what they are -- ideas. As such, they can be scrutinized and refuted as one sees fit.

Thanks,

TKP

Chintana said:

Parthasarathy - as long as your views are supported by strong evidence that cannot be refuted they are admissible in this forum. Please be aware that opinions, particularly inflammatory/controversial ones will be particularly scrutinized. I think our community has lived for a quite a while now without developing a uniform awareness about its history, purpose and contributions. One of the goals of this forum is to rectify that.

Click to expand...

Hi Guys!
I was thinking... why should we delete Parthasarathy's posting? First of all, an individual member's views DO NOT necessarily reflect the philosophy of the organization as a whole. Secondly, as long as the member doesn't use profane, vulgar or personal insulting language, why should he not express his views?
Anybody who sees Parthasarathy's posting will also see the other members' responses (against or for). After all, this forum is very democratic and every member has a right to say what they feel, minding their Ps and Qs.
Your thoughts?

It is true that any individual member's posting does not reflect the philosophy of the organization. But then we will be open to legal and other issues like getting banned because of casteist overtones. Some one might decide to sue us on some flimsy reason. It does not matter whether it will stand judicial scrutiny or not. We will get bad publicity and might even have to move the forum. Besides, we will then be opening floodgates for people to post anything against any community and the forum will turn into a free for all. We have to be politically correct and at the same time be postive about our goals.

This is something like articles in newspapers. Although all the newspapers have the disclaimer that all the articles reflect the opinion of the writer only, they do not allow anyone to write anything inflammatory. That is a part of the eidtor's job to scrutinize these.

So all the postings in the forum should follow certain rules and should avoid inflamming passions and divisions. We should try to focus all our energy towards helping the community.

Every member is welcome to post his or her views subject to these rules. As long as they are objective and do not inflame passions or target any community based on caste or otherwise, there is no issue. But we cannot allow postings that say that one caste or community is superior over others and create divisions among the communities.

Dear Ramki:
Understood and agreed. This is great that you have explained this so everybody can see our reasons.
My thinking was that we could show to the world that even when a member says something, there are others who will refute it; in other words, one member's view doesn't become the group's; other members do not agree.
But I see the bigger picture. Thanks for the explanation.

In any case, I am inviting TK Parthasarathy to continue to raise issues, his views and what not.

Dear Parthasarathy,

Thank you for your response. I believe I wrote, "as long as your views are supported by strong evidence that cannot be refuted they are admissible in this forum." I did not say all views. And I was specifically referring to inflammatory/controversial comments like the ones under discussion. If you have posted other opinions that are not inflammatory/controversial my comment will not apply.

Now that I think of it a bit more deeply your view is actually a claim. The idea that "All Brahmins are inherently superior." There are enough confounds to weaken this statement. Research has proved that environment is atleast as powerful as the influence of nature/genetics. I came across a landmark study a few years ago where identical twins were raised in different environments and grew up differently (I forgot the year and the authors). Brahmins lived and grew in a specific type of environment with specific types of orientation. This does not mean that others will not perform well if they are given the same type of environment. So if you are saying that Brahmins are inherently superior you will definitely have to come up with some kind of an evidence to support it.

As you have generously admitted in the last line of your posting, "Ideas are exactly what they are -- ideas. As such, they can be scrutinized and refuted as one sees fit."

The way ideas can be scrutinized is if you can go deeper into it by taking it apart. That can happen only if ideas are based on evidence. Then you display that evidence for public scrutiny and if it stands the test of everybody's sense of assessment then it passes. In other words to scrutinize ideas one must present solid evidence. Again the term ideas I think correlates with the term claim in this specific case.

I'd like to take this one step further as a case in point. Assume we roll with your argument - that nature is superior to environment. If this is true then Brahmins should not have lost their orientation towards seeking God and leading a spiritual way of life. We see them fall prey to all kinds of habits proscribed for Brahminical way of living. If they are so untouched by environment then all of us should be replicas of Kaushika, Haritha, Kashyapa and all of those great sages we believe to have descended from.

Hope this clarifies some of what came up last time around.

T.K. Parthasarathy said:

Dearest Chintana,

While I can see your point on inflammatory remarks and those that are offensive in nature, I do not at all see how you can simply make a blanket statement that all opinions posted on this forum must be (as you say) supported by strong evidence that cannot be refuted.

That sounds a bit riduclous.

By its very definition, a forum (in Webster's dictionary) is:

a medium (as a newspaper or online service) of open discussion or expression of ideas

Ideas are exactly what they are -- ideas. As such, they can be scrutinized and refuted as one sees fit.

Thanks,

TKP

Click to expand...

Re:

THANK YOU Silverfox, that is precisely my point. I made a statement that I believed in and posted it on the forum for the very purpose of seeing counter arguements. I think it opens up aa discussion that many can learn from -- a learning experience otherwise not had by suppressing the thread.

silverfox said:

Hi Guys!
I was thinking... why should we delete Parthasarathy's posting? First of all, an individual member's views DO NOT necessarily reflect the philosophy of the organization as a whole. Secondly, as long as the member doesn't use profane, vulgar or personal insulting language, why should he not express his views?
Anybody who sees Parthasarathy's posting will also see the other members' responses (against or for). After all, this forum is very democratic and every member has a right to say what they feel, minding their Ps and Qs.
Your thoughts?

Click to expand...

Hi Guys,

I have been a silent spectator to this thread for the last few days simply because of my busy work schedules and requirements.

Let me put this clear,

Mr.Parthasarathy and To everyone,

As ramki and silverfox said, we respect your personal views and we have nothing personal against you.
But because of where we are and in the context of the political situation we find ourselves in, We can do away with those topics/postings which might bring in unwanted attention eventually leading to legal hassles.

As silverfox said, we allow anyone and everyone to join the forum. So anyone can see what we are doing and what we are discussing.

to clarify even more, let me quote couple of phrases from the replies here

why should we delete Parthasarathy's posting? First of all, an individual member's views DO NOT necessarily reflect the philosophy of the organization as a whole

Click to expand...

unfortunately internet law does not work in this manner, there have been many cases where a website/forum has been brought down because of one or 2 topics started by its members.

Anybody who sees Parthasarathy's posting will also see the other members' responses

Click to expand...

we hope they sees the other responses but we cant be sure that they will read all the replies.

Perhaps you, the moderators of this fine board, disagree with my
stance as posted (might you be non-Brahmin, perhaps?)

Click to expand...

this i do find "abusive". you are jumping to a conclusion that a non-brahmins do not appreciate the values of a brahmin which is wrong. i personally know many who appreciate our values and who at any given time would love to learn more about us.


Ramki has explained this here
http://www.tamilbrahmins.com/showpost.php?p=1377&postcount=14


At this moment of time, none of us (or personally, i do not) have the time and money to fight a legal battle with someone pissed off against tamilbrahmins.com because some members decided to post their personal views.

And having gone through the deleted thread in question, i am fully behind the deletion of it as those are the kind of views which has brought Brahmins to a near non existent situation in TN.

Ps: I am a Tamil Iyergar brought up in a orthodox Brahmin way of life.


In anycase,
I do appreciate you taking the time out and helping us clarify this for our members and also to our future members.

And i hope you will continue to raise non-sensitive issues in future and i look forward to reading more of your views.

Regards

Re:

Praveen, with all due respect your logic is rather asinine. The internet is NOT censored and there is no reason to fear a legal battle, especially with respect to my post. Posting an opinion that a certain race, creed or gender is inherently superior is NOT subject to any law that could lead to the termination of this site.

Is it irresponsible to do so? Perhaps.

It is not illegal.

Please stop being a dramaqueen. I have posted my personal views... I suppose this site will cease to exist as a result... a foolish assertion on your part.

praveen said:

At this moment of time, none of us (or personally, i do not) have the time and money to fight a legal battle with someone pissed off against tamilbrahmins.com because some members decided to post their personal views.Regards

Click to expand...

Dear TK Parthasarathy

Easy! Big Fellow!! Go easy on Praveen! You must appreciate the fact that Praveen has single-handedly founded this forum and has volunteered hundreds of hours to maintain the servers, site, etc. He obviously speaks from his personal experience of certain sites being shut down. So, why create problems for us?
Continue to write but please don't be harsh!

T.K. Parthasarathy said:

Praveen, with all due respect your logic is rather asinine. The internet is NOT censored and there is no reason to fear a legal battle, especially with respect to my post. Posting an opinion that a certain race, creed or gender is inherently superior is NOT subject to any law that could lead to the termination of this site.

Is it irresponsible to do so? Perhaps.

It is not illegal.

Please stop being a dramaqueen. I have posted my personal views... I suppose this site will cease to exist as a result... a foolish assertion on your part.

Click to expand...

I must say that your approach needs a lot of refinement and you def dont know the meaning of polite behavior.

Internet is not censored!!! in your dreams buddy. then you have not been exposed to those grey areas where censorship is the way of things.

I do not have to answer to every tom, dick and harry on how to conduct a discussion forum and i certainly not going to reply to each and every one of your "arrogant" views.

If you think that i are censoring your views, please go ahead and start a new website and talk about it there.

this topic is now closed and any similar threads started in this aspect will be deleted and the member will be banned.

if you dont like it, no problem. i have more better things to take care of than this.