FQnama: is this the end? - Page 4

Originally posted by: Foucaults-qalam

My only friend, the end.

This whole thing was so horrendously bad from start to finish that I can't even make fun of it. I think my patience is exhausted. Goodbye, Madhubala.

Originally posted by: Nietzsche

Thanks for initiating a discussion on "Religion in soapland". To follow up on my previous comment, here are a few fragmentary thoughts from my end:

To go beyond my personal 'godlessness', I am cognisant of the important mobilising force religion has been in anti-colonial struggles, for example, the role played by Christianity in the anti-Apartheid stuggle in South Africa or the role of Islam in Algeria. So it would be disingenous to condemn it as being solely regressive. Furthermore, the powerful force of religious affect is a crucial factor to consider when analyzing socio-cultural phenomena, whether individual or collective, private or public.

With the promise of triumph of reason over superstition and belief, secularization guarantees modernity, liberalism, tolerance, emancipation and peace. However, state enforced secularism violently targets religion, as under fascist and communist regimes (without meaning to equate the two). Thus "the secular imperative" ushers in its own coercive agendas. I am not for purging religion from the public sphere by privatizing it, rather would emphasize the urgency of contesting the religion versus secularity antinomy.

I am curious about popular culture and thus my interest in a soap like "Madhubala", an excellent example of heteronormative coding of desire, fantasy and pleasure (although there are unintended homosocial interventions in this staging, for instance, through Bittuji). Similarly, when I first started watching the soap, I was pleasantly surprised that the Hindu woman (Padmini), who is fleeing from feudality (her zamindar husband, Balraj Chaudhary) is shown to find refuge with a Muslim family (Shamsher Mallik). Her 'rescuer' is none other than a single woman, who enjoys her drink after a hard day's work, namely, Roma. An unconventional potrayal of gender, class and religious identities.

I completely share your frustration and can only hope that the show interrrupts its own normative agendas. In any case, it would be a great loss if you were to discontinue your posts as I really, really look forward to my daily dose of laughter thanks to your razor-sharp wit.

P.S. The "How to share a bathroom w/a superstar" was inspirational!

Originally posted by: Foucaults-qalam

Showing religion as a plot-point opens too many uneasy questions. Who is going to be a mediator in matters of faith? This is completely irresponsible tv making. And not even clever or beautiful or moving. Talk about ticking zero boxes!

SD, EHMMBH is now showing Virman shaadi track.. Is that why MEIEJ is showing this track now? When I came to MEIEJ forum, I had almost decided to give up (cant really.. I am too fida over Virman!!!) watching EHM.. But thanks to this bakthi track, I am back to watching repeats of EHM... EHM fans is never going to give up watching it for bakthi track, are they? The PH can hope to attract neutral people, no one else..

If TRP was the logic behind this track, we will know next week how successful it was.. If it were not for VD and DD, I would not have even watched this track... How true is TRP really?

Originally posted by: Foucaults-qalam

Thank you for bringing up the issue of religious mobilisation and struggles against colonialism. I have argued this often-- in academic fora as well as in slightly bemused company who just wanted to watch a good ol' 19th c adventure movie-- I DO consider such mobilisation to be deeply regressive, exploitative and ultimately, extremely harmful to the society that fosters it.

I had thought that I might point out the antecedents of the Bappa cult in Mumbai over the weekend, but somehow never got round to it. If the mass-hysterical, rabble-rousing qualities of religion are to be used to garner fevered and ill-reasoned mass support for ANY movement, however noble it may be, I will oppose it most strongly. Because the question once again is that of intellectual exploitation: the priests do it to foster status quo ( opiate of the masses) and the new Mahdis use exactly the same tools to take away the power of informed decision-making to get bodies ( not minds) behind their causes. The faceless masses are exploited in both scenarios.

Ergo: strongly oppose. If possible, exterminate religion from the public sphere. If impossible, trivialise.

Originally posted by: Nietzsche

But we have had historical instances of purging religion from the public sphere in the name of protecting the masses, and look at the trail of violence it has left. Think of the thousands who died in the Soviet Gulags for their religious beliefs.

Take the case of Ambedkar (a great fan of the American pragmatist philosopher John Dewey), who nonetheless aligned himself with Buddhism to further the Dalit cause against the hegemonic Vedic religion.

Terry Eagletons warns us: "As with bad breath, ideology is always what the other person has"

I am completely with you on the critique of saffronisation, but unfortunately history provides us with counter-intuitive examples on the complex dynamics between religion, secularity and violence.

Originally posted by: applenpeaches

FQ, You know my real opinion about this track.. Have said it many times.. I am hoping once this track is over, it will improve... So dont give up..

PS. Are you very busy with work?

Originally posted by: Foucaults-qalam

Failed communist states, as Hobsbawm put it (rip), are not a good example of secularism in practice. Totalitarian states are aware of the mobilising power of religion and do everything they can to expunge it as a variable in statecraft, using, as the Soviets and the Chinese did, extremely badly thought out and always ill-executed plans to do so.

Anti- religiousism is not the same as secularism. I am more in agreement with the kind of secularism practised in what is, on paper, an overtly C of E state, i.e the UK. Religion here is crassly commercialised ( which allows us to see its true face) has few hard-core adherents, and people keep it in the house where it belongs. Except for the recent incursion of fundamentalist Islam into our enlightened multi-cultural society. In my eyes: total win.