Thanks for the infinitely compelling excerpts...
Ketan_ <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
India's Slow Descent Into Homophobia
By Amara Das Wilhelm
Ancient India's acceptance and accommodation of many forms of
eroticism within its culture, including homoeroticism, has been well
documented in early Sanskrit writings, art and architecture. This
makes modern-day India's sexual puritanism and homophobia, which
reached its zenith in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, all
the more astounding. In today's world, India has been relegated to
the level of the most backward countries in the sphere of personal
liberties, and one might wonder how such a drastic change could ever
have come about. Through careful examination, India's long and
troubled past reveals a gradual descent into puritanism and
homophobia due to caste consciousness and foreign religious
influence. The following is a brief timeline that summarizes the
history of India and its deteriorating attitude toward people of the
third sex.
Vedic India
Generally assumed to have ended with the dawn of the Kali Yuga age
or just over five thousand years ago. At this time, many forms of
sexuality are accommodated within India's native culture such as
polygamy, prostitution, sexually explicit art, courtesans, etc.
Homosexuality is recognized as a separate and third nature (tritiya-
prakriti). Third-gender citizens are fully incorporated into
society, most notably within the artisan and monastic communities.
Post-Vedic India
Vedic culture slowly declines over several thousands of years. A
strict caste system develops based on birth and body type, causing
the social structure to become very rigid. Priests are more
ritualistic and less humanistic. They are known as smarta-brahmanas
and become extremely arrogant and abusive of the lower classes,
declaring them "untouchable." Scriptures such as the Manusmriti and
other ritualistic texts are corrupted during this time. The ancient
Vedic rites are misused, and sacrifices are employed as an excuse
for rampant animal slaughter.
The Buddhist Period
Beginning approximately 500 B.C., Buddhism gradually spreads
throughout India. Vedic culture has degraded to such an extent that
the population of India eagerly embraces Lord Buddha's teachings of
nonviolence and human equality. Buddhist teachings reject the Vedas,
and Buddhism itself reaches a peak in India around the time of
Christ.
The Gupta Period
This period begins about A.D. 300. The influence of Buddhism over
India gradually wanes and is eventually driven out by Sankaracarya,
who reinstates the authority of the Vedas. That authority is later
reinforced by other great acaryas such as Ramanuja and Madhva.
During this period, a renaissance of India's Vedic philosophy and
culture blossoms. Resurgence in the construction of Hindu temples
begins around the sixth century, where one invariably finds a
multitude of openly erotic images, including many depicting
homosexuality. The temples of Khajuraho and Chapri serve as striking
examples. The sage Vatsyayana also recompiles the Kama Shastra
during this time.
Islamic Invasions Begin
In the closing years of the tenth century, armed Islamic migrants
begin to move into Northern India from regions west of the Hindukush
Mountains such as Afghanistan and Persia. This starts an invasion
that culminates in the establishment of kingdoms in North India
ruled by Muslim overlords. The meeting of Islamic and Hindu cultures
is gradual, and each ethnic group flourishes. The construction of
Hindu temples climaxes between the twelfth and fourteenth centuries,
particularly in Southern India where Islamic influence remains
virtually non-existent.
Hindu-Muslim Coexistence
Originally confined to military centers, Muslim migrants carrying
Perso-Turko-Arabic traditions quickly disseminate into large
urbanized areas within Northern India. This is further accelerated
by a mass migration of scholars, poets and elite administrators from
other Islamic kingdoms to the west. These migrants are seeking
refuge from the depredations of the Mongols who are ravaging much of
Western Asia during this time. Hindus and Muslims coexist peacefully
during this period, and there is a great cultural exchange between
the two ethnic groups that lasts for centuries. Muslim clerics are
free to interpret religious doctrine according to their own
discretion and rarely punish homosexuality. On the contrary, it
flourishes and is well documented within popular poetry from that
time. Muslim migrants also introduce the Middle Eastern practice of
castration among homosexual slaves and servants. Domestic slavery
existed to a small extent in pre-Islamic India but now becomes an
enormously profitable enterprise. Early sultans are heavily
dependent on slaves as both soldiers and laborers. Alauddin Khalji
(1296—1316) of the Sultanate of Delhi, for instance, is recorded as
owning fifty thousand slaves, and Firuz Shah Tughlaq (1357—1388)
owned 180,000. Of these, a good number are castrated eunuchs who
command a high price. They are considered to be the most reliable
and trustworthy of servants since they did not marry and raise
families of their own. By the late 1400s, India is world renowned
for its exotic treasures and wealth, and European kingdoms clamor
for a way to reach her lands. During the time of Sri Caitanya
Mahaprabhu, the Spanish entrepreneur, Columbus, accidentally
discovers the Americas while searching for a new shipping route to
India.
The Mughal Empire
The Islamic Mughal Empire, established in Northern India in 1526,
ends much of the peaceful coexistence between Hindus and Muslims
with its new brand of Islamic extremism. Enforcing strict religious
codes that have already suffocated much of the Middle East and
Western Asia, these invaders forcibly convert or kill Hindus,
plunder their wealth, and destroy villages, temples, and religious
Deities. Not surprisingly, they also begin to mistreat women and
criminalize homosexuality during this period. Homosexuals are
punished under extreme Islamic law by flagellation or death, and
this is accomplished by burning the victims alive, stoning them,
collapsing walls upon them, or impaling their rectums with hot iron
rods. Fortunately the Mughal Empire, along with the rest of the
Islamic world, soon declines in the 1600s when new advances in world
commerce through ocean shipping rob them of their formerly
prosperous monopoly on India's trade.
The Trading Companies
Bypassing Muslim traders, European shipping posts along India's
coastlines flourish and establish powerful trading companies and
ports. In 1757, the British East India Company becomes the dominant
European trading company in India, a reign that will last for an
entire century. After losing America to the colonists, the British
are free to focus all of their attention on India. At this time in
Christian England and Europe, the criminalization of homosexuality
has reached its peak, and "unnatural fornication" is routinely
punished by torture and the execution of both men and women. People
accused of homosexual acts are often locked in the public pillory
and pelted with garbage until half dead.
British Rule
In 1857, widespread rebellion breaks out in India against the
British East India Trading Company. The rebellion is brutally
crushed by the British Navy, and in 1858 India is officially
incorporated into the British Empire. Two years later, the anti-
sodomy law of 1860 is enforced upon the entire empire that now
includes India. The law, which remarkably is still in place in India
today as Section 377 of the Indian Penal Code, reads: "Whoever
voluntarily has carnal intercourse against the order of nature with
any man, woman or animal, shall be punished with imprisonment for
life, or with imprisonment of either description for a term which
may extend to ten years, and shall be liable to fine." This law was
taken to be an improvement for Great Britain, which had previously
punished homosexuality by execution and torture, but for India it
was a great step backward since Hindu culture had never previously
criminalized homosexuality. The British also enact legislation
outlawing castration and cross-dressing in an attempt to eliminate
the eunuch class that had thrived under Islamic rule. Despised by
the British, eunuchs are forced into the darkest shadows of society
where they must now live as outcastes. Also during this time,
puritan scholars translate India's Sanskrit texts into English, but
they omit or hide any reference to homosexuality because it is
shocking to them. By British estimation, India was a backward
country with a barbaric culture and primitive religion. The British
Empire would impress upon the Hindus their Christian values and
educate them in proper, civilized behavior while simultaneously
exploiting their country's resources for another full century.
India's Independence
In 1947, after considerable struggle through civil disobedience,
India achieves political independence, and the British Empire is
dismantled. However, as a country, India is culturally scarred in
many ways. Most Indians believe that their ancient Hindu culture is
inferior to modern Western civilization. They take their heritage to
be something shameful and worth abandoning. Mahatma Gandhi, educated
in England, sends squads of his disciples to smash the erotic
representations on the ancient temples of Khajuraho and Chapri. Only
the poet, Rabindranath Tagore, manages to stop them. Pandit Nehru
attempts to halt the publishing of photographs that depict
sculptures showing homosexual relations, claiming that such vices
are due to Western influence. In fact, it is his own perception of
vice that has been influenced by the West.
On to the Future
In 1967, the United Kingdom repeals its outdated anti-sodomy laws,
effectively decriminalizing homosexuality for all of its citizens.
India, on the other hand, continues to cling to such laws without
considering its own native culture or traditions. Imposed labels
upon homosexuality such as "deviant" or "unnatural" are of
relatively very recent origin in India and not rooted in traditional
Vedic or Hindu thought. Indeed, the very inventors of these labels,
Euro-American psychologists, have already retracted them and come to
the conclusion that homosexuality is natural and normal behavior for
those born of that orientation. As Western culture and science
gradually adopt a more open and realistic approach in dealing with
its homosexual citizens, it is expected that India will eventually
follow.
(From the book "Tritiya-Prakriti: People of the Third Sex")
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