"No unconditional love in South Asian families"

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ex-l

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"No unconditional love in South Asian families"

Post20 Sep 2015

An interesting quote from an article on familial abuse in South Asian families in the UK.

"South Asian" appears to be a euphemism for Pakistani or Bangladeshi, as they mention Imams.

I wonder how this would apply to the basic framework the Brahma Kumaris came out of? I know it's bad to generalise but is it the same in Hindu families? And does the value translate into BKism?
One woman who spoke to the researchers had been a victim of abuse as a child. She said: “There is no unconditional love in South Asian families. Honour is more important to them than their own child’s happiness. It’s down to the woman to keep her own dignity. The concept of honour is about honouring the family and the community at the cost of the individual.”

To be honest, it sounds more like an "orthodox" or just plain backwards value common throughout many more traditional religious communities, e.g. orthodox Jews as well.

The issue of keep face or honour being more important to them than their own child/follower’s happiness ring true, so too does the concept of "honouring the family and the community at the cost of the individual". Hence the "respect" ... I'd call it indulgence ... show to elder BKs and "not defaming Baba" nor bringing shame upon the BK family.

But what about unconditional love in pure BKism?
    Does the lack of it explain the unfeeling detachment towards children they encourage?

    Or indeed, the lack of procreation for children?

    Should we question what Lekhraj Kirpalani's childhood was like and how he prioritised his own god status with the cult, over his own family and normality'?
In BKism, the adherent's relationship with their god spirit is based more on transaction exchange; karmic commerce and deals, e.g. the god of the BK offers a 50% bad karma off deal if you tell him or the BK leaders what bad you did, and the more you give to him, the more you get from him and in the future. It's all about investment and reward.

Baba has the most love for the most surrendered BKs.

Is the idea of an unconditionally loving God and unconditional love between parent and children, or even strangers, a Western one?

I don't know so I am asking, however, I have heard of other cultures in Asia being described as "transaction ones", that is to say, that society is not bound together with ideas of altruism and charity, but on clearly valued exchanges.

quantum

Re: "No unconditional love in South Asian families"

Post21 Sep 2015

I think' Unconditional Love' was at the heart of Jesus and His teachings and what He displayed in His Life here on earth, e.g. if a woman committed adultery, he did not judge her therefor no punishment was sort. Just forgiveness, and not allowing others, (men) to stone her to death (honour)?? ... but simply stated, 'He who is without sin throw the 1st stone'.

That sorted that out.

Is there 'honour killings' for men who commit adultery etc in these cultures?? ... No! ... 'Stone The Crows'! ... Equal rights for man sluts should apply.

I guess the BK's main objective is to be and seen to be 'pure' at all 'costs' ... otherwise their judgement kicks in big.

That's the deep entrenchment of the teachings and expectations. But it is also just a "sterile" and distorted interpretation of what 'Pure" really means. They may like the idea of having a 'Test Tube' Baby. No sex as such required, and all kept sterile and detached. But there too, you run the risk of getting a 'scorpion or snake' baby in a test tube delivered at your service. lol.

Seriously, celibacy is, and has always been about 'Controling' the sheeple, and more disposable money for the Head Honcho's at the helm.
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ex-l

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Re: "No unconditional love in South Asian families"

Post21 Sep 2015

Here's BK Sister Shivani promoting their detachment theory and explaining "How to love unconditionally", likening love to being a siamese twin ... "attachment equals love plus pain".

quantum wrote:Is there 'honour killings' for men who commit adultery etc in these cultures?? ... No! ... 'Stone The Crows'! ... Equal rights for man sluts should apply.

Although there is some controversy surrounding it, a case in India gained international awareness where a village court found a young man guilty of eloping and marrying a women of a higher caste. She married him willingly.

And so as punishment, the elders decided that his two younger Sisters should be repeatedly gang raped, have their faces blackened and then be paraded naked. Apparently they've had to go to the Supreme Court for an appeal.

Of course, it would make them unmarriageable at 23 and 15 years old. The senior male members in the village just outside Delhi, pledged to "avenge the dishonour". Whose dishonour over what? Challenging the authority of the Panchyat?
"You people in the city may inter-marry, it's your custom," he said, slowly pulling on a hand-rolled cigarette.
"Not here, not in our village. We have our customs and our traditions and we will preserve them, at any cost."

Yes, I think cognisant of the level of attitudes in India, and following the reaction against his "free love" era in the early days of the Om Mandli, Lekhraj Kirpalani devised a holy facade that protected the women who had followed under his influence. But, like you, I think it is a fake and sterile one.

An avoidance of entanglement, distraction and expense for largely economic reasons. A state which left him at the centre of their attention.

No, I don't think we see any of the "Christian" attitudes of love, and certainly not forgiveness. If there is love, it is impersonal, conceptual. They may claim their Baba is the Ocean of Love, able to bliss out his adherents but it's an inward state of being.

And how is its expression limited? BKs can sit and do nothing and sending out "loving" vibrations. Does that really achieve anything?

They can express it in enculting new members and being patient with their "baby BKs". How else?

I would argue that BK mothers are left quite conflicted even as to how to feel with their own children and, instead, their children are translated into some kind of shame. Burden or bondage being the words used.

No love at all. Or at least human love being a very impure, entangling, negative thing ... "attachment", a vice or evil.

quantum

Re: "No unconditional love in South Asian families"

Post21 Sep 2015

I think Sister Shivani's explanation of 'unconditional love' here is just a polished PR performance similar to a used car salesman. She says if two people love each other, parent and child, and are not attached, if one falls down the other does not, and can help pick the fallen one back up.

Well, that is certainly NOT what happens within the 'BK Family'.

I know this personally myself, and have seen it with many others also, and it most certainly still goes on today.

If a BK becomes ill, or is struggling in any way in their humanness, and living in a straight jacket, presure cooker, (A CULT), Under the Hypnotic brainwashing of 'Shri God Himself and his Divine Family', at a young age, cut off from family, friends, and supports (SHUDRA'S - Impure devils of kalyuga) ... the divine family does not offer any help whatsoever ... but only sits in Judgement, Cold (detached). Aloof, "oh, they are having "Maya" ... like, "oh, they have a dirty disease, keep away from them, and just remember Baba". Yes, judge them but "send them good wishes" at the same time ... so that I/we feel comfortably superior, pure, and stable in our own efforts not to fall ... keeping up appearances within the divine family so as not to become ejected into the leper colony ourselves ... because deep down, beyond the facade, we too know this Insanity Is Hell ...!

They use the word "Detachment" in a distorted and buggarized way. Real detachment is being 'fully present' and able to participate as one with all others and 'all that Is', whilst being unaffected by the Happenings around you. BKs use the word detachment, to suggest that they have 'acquired an attribute' or something. On the contrary, they are cold and shut off from their hearts and their Humanity, all the while believing they are Superior, the chosen direct children of God!

If Baba was truly God, there would be No seperation, no 'us and them', lost souls.

I have never felt sooo lost as the time I spent in that hideous cult. Who the hell invents a 'Spiritual Class/Caste System'??

I love the old people. They are just the best. They used to say, "If someone shows you who they are, believe them". Well, too true. Baba appears to be some sort of 'Hindu God' when it's all said and done. His 'fairy stories' are not knowledge, just information used to lure and occupy the minds of followers. He proclaims to be the Ocean of Happiness, but he creates the Ocean of Sorrow for adherents. He did not invent the Soul as BKs like to project.
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ex-l

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Re: "No unconditional love in South Asian families"

Post21 Sep 2015

quantum wrote:If a BK becomes ill, or is struggling in any way in their humanness, and living in a straight jacket, presure cooker, (A CULT), Under the Hypnotic brainwashing of 'Shri God Himself and his Divine Family', at a young age, cut off from family, friends, and supports (SHUDRAS - Impure devils of kalyuga) ... the divine family does not offer any help whatsoever ... but only sits in Judgement, Cold (detached). Aloof, "oh, they are having "Maya" ... like, "oh, they have a dirty disease, keep away from them, and just remember Baba". Yes, judge them but "send them good wishes" at the same time ... so that I/we feel comfortably superior, pure, and stable in our own efforts not to fall ... keeping up appearances within the divine family so as not to become ejected into the leper colony ourselves ... because deep down, beyond the facade, we too know this Insanity Is Hell ...!

Wow. One of your better posts!

As I was reading it, I was thinking "fear and judgement" because they all fear it might be them next.

I don't understand the appeal of Shivani. To me, she comes across as a feelingless and slightly demented robot repeating lines and full of herself. A sort of Stepford Wife. These lines are just a kind of meaningless poetry, satisfying to some because of their symmetry ... "la de da de da de da, la de da de da de dum". BKs have been doing them for decades but they are groundless bubblegum for the mind. It does not surprise me to find out she was some kind of IT person.

Using her analogy, if two people were connected and one of them fell, and the other was a BK, the BK would stand there doing nothing but "remembering Baba", panicking at not knowing what to do and not wanting to create any more karma for themselves ... and then afterwards say, "everything was accurate according to karma, their fall was their own fault" to save them from having any guilt about it afterwards; while a normal mother would rush into a lion's den to rescue her child.

I can imagine the childless Shivani (funny how sexless, childless BKs are such experts on love, relationships and family) thinking, "Oh, I cannot do that. That's so impure. I'd get my nice white sari dirty".

GuptaRati 6666

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Re: "No unconditional love in South Asian families"

Post22 Sep 2015

Once during a visit to Madhuban, in the 1980s, the BKs went on a picnic and walking meditation. We were climbing one of the hills, when a Sister close to me was about to slip and fall. She called out to me and extended her hands towards me. I reached out to her, grabbed her hands and assisted her in regaining her balance and footage on the slippery slope. She was very grateful to me and I cared not for reprimands I might have gotten from the senior BKs for holding a Sister’s hands!

In another instance, in medical school, there was the banquet for us, the graduating Seniors. I was single at that time and observing Brahmacharya to its extreme. I was not however, going to attend the senior banquet alone. There was an attractive classmate, who was also one of my team mates for an elective surgery course. Though she was beautiful, she was eccentric like I was and wore odd clothing, including baggy military pants and odd colored pairs of socks. None of my male class mates wanted to ask her to accompany them to the senior banquet. I did and though she was surprised and happy accepted my invitation to be her date for the banquet. We had a great time at the banquet. We were both well dressed and dominated the dance floor! We almost got married on our graduation day from medical school. I am happy we did not, for both of our sake.

She became a successful doctor and now is the vice-president of a Fortune 500 company. Though we are still friends, she is happily married with a son who is attending medical school. A year ago, I returned to our alma mater as a visiting professor and also celebrated my 30 years of graduation from medical school. My date from the senior banquet was also at the alumni re-union. She has become a leading executive and I the doctor and scientist. It was a great meeting of friends who followed their destinies along different career and life paths.

because.parmeshwar

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Re: "No unconditional love in South Asian families"

Post22 Sep 2015

I know about Brother and Sister of same age (not real but alokik) staying in the center under one roof (only those two) and running the center together. Both ride in one vehicle for seva purpose.

I don't know (no one knows) how pure and un-touched they are?

Are they following Shrimat and is this allowed in Yagya?
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Pink Panther

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Re: "No unconditional love in South Asian families"

Post22 Sep 2015

I reached out to her, grabbed her hands and assisted her in regaining her balance and footage on the slippery slope. She was very grateful to me and I cared not for reprimands I might have gotten

This kind of dogmatic stupidity in the understanding of what love, detachment, service, etc actually are is not limited to BKs. A Buddhist teaching story ...

Two Buddhist monks came to a fast-flowing river. There they find a mother and daughter too scared to cross. One of the monks said, ”jump on my back and I will carry you across one at a time”. He does so and both parties go on their separate ways. The other monk says nothing for the next few kilometres but eventually cannot contain himself.

”You know it is against the rules of the sangha for a bikkhu to touch a woman!"

The other replied, ”I put them down at the river’s edge an hour ago".
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ex-l

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Re: "No unconditional love in South Asian families"

Post22 Sep 2015

Doesn't it end something like, "I put them down at the river’s edge an hour ago ... but you're still carrying them now".

I don't know how BKism is in India. I suspect it is still as strict as it has always been for cultural reasons. But certainly in the West, from what I have seen and heard, it has by necessity become slacker and more flexible and liberal.

I think in the 1970s and into the 1980s, the Kirpalani Klan really did not know what they were dealing with, with foreigners, and wanted to bang them into shape Indian style. Partly because of the size of expansion meaning they just cannot have so much control and do so much monitoring, partly because of losing so many "serviceable" souls, and partly because some BK taking matters into their own hands and experimenting successfully, the Kirpalanis have become more flexible.

Some times it works, sometimes it goes very badly, e.g. Hansa Raval or some other center in the USA where one "hang around" Sister slept with a *number* of the Brothers. Some BKs "serving" together very much have broken principles and gone off and partnered with each other, but in other cases, they've remain sensible and merged both Western values, e.g. house sharing with members of the opposite sex, AND BK principles.

My opinion is that the Kirpalani Klan's primary value is "whatever is useful or expedient to the cause goes" ... as long as it does not bring shame (bad PR) respective to the society they are within, and the BKs keep their pants on.

BKism has a chameleon like quality and disguises itself by adopting the language and garb of whatever society it infiltrates in order to exploit it without questioning it.

Please correct me if I am wrong and update our understanding of how they operate in various countries.

Some centres and center-in-charges are known as being "strict", others less so and more experimental.
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Re: "No unconditional love in South Asian families"

Post24 Sep 2015

ex-l wrote:Doesn't it end something like, "I put them down at the river’s edge an hour ago ... but you're still carrying them now".

Usually in Buddhist, Sufi and other such teaching stories, the implied teaching is tacit, thereby promoting creative thoughtfulness on the part of the listener.

It may be that many who retell these stories feel the need to add such tag lines to make it clear. But just as 'you can lead a horse to water but you can’t make it drink’, so too, spelling it out or not makes less difference than the readiness of the person who is hearing the story to integrate that lesson.

Alexandra David-Neel was the probably the first european female to visit Lhasa, Tibet. A story linked to her has her discussing various esoteric teachings with a lama. She jokingly says, ”you realise I will be publishing all this in a book” to which he replies ”You could stand at the crossroads or in a marketplace and shout it to the world, do you think it would makes any difference?”
My opinion is that the Kirpalani Klan's primary value is "whatever is useful or expedient to the cause goes" ... as long as it does not bring shame (bad PR) respective to the society they are within, and the BKs keep their pants on.

Even the pants on/off is irrelevant as long as it ”does service”.

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