Augusto Pinto wrote: > Having said that, I would like to praise you once again as at least you > have the courage to say you are distressed. But I feel sad for people > like Frederick Noronha.... and others who otherwise like to wax > eloquent on all and every subject.
Dear Gusto, I don't think you can provoke me into getting hot under the collar here, by mentioning my name (above). In any case, I don't feel any sense of obligation to comment on any point which someone else wants to draw me into. On the contrary, I enjoy the freedom to join exactly which debates I choose to, and ignore others. You could construe anything from this silence; you are free to. As for myself, I know exactly where I stand. It could more probably be not having much to say myself, wanting to hear others, or simply feeling the argument is too "flame-baitish" to generate more light and less heat. But I don't have to justify myself on that.... Some comments nonetheless, without any excitement, with a cautionary note though that there's every possibility that you might not succeed in further dragging me into this debate :-) (1) The book is in Devanagari Konkani, and I don't have the translator's fluency (or even less) that you have to understand the issues adequately. Fact. (2) Secondly, my familiarity with the Ambaulim reality is obviously far too limited, for geographical and domain reasons, which is why I don't take it on myself to sit in judgement on what one party is saying about the other. Obviously, Adv John's point needs to be heard and appreciated. Frs. Conceicao D’Silva and Luis Coutinho are, afaik, not on Goanet, so we don't know for now what their perspective is. You have take the trouble to post John's views on at least three networks which I have been closely associated with (Goanet, Goa-Book-Club and SecularGoa), as a founder member in two cases. My commitment remains to create space for alternate (or even unpopular) perspectives to emerge, so what are you grumbling about, men? Don't feel sad. Be happy. (3) I'm a bit confused: John names two specific priests. Is his case then against them, or the Church as a whole? It's a fact that some priests are more hardline, conservative and unforgiving in their views compared to others. I have seen some play party politics at election time, sometimes to benefit one politician or another in the most shameless way. Is this their individual initiative? Is this something institutional? We need some clarity on this. If there are institutional problems here, then it needs to be taken up at a wider and more meaningful level... rather than just naming and shaming two priests. (4) Even assuming, for argument sake, that this is a stand officially taken by the entire Church in the year of our Lord 1994, very overtly and in black-and-white, I would not be very surprised myself. This is in keeping with the logic-system of a monotheistic religion. While the Advanis may suggest that polytheistic faiths are more "tolerant" on this point alone, I frankly don't expect change to come in a hurry... You could call me defeatist and pessimistic here. But we could either accept the reality as it is, reject it, or work to reform it. (5) And when you translate Adv. John as saying that all this happened to the Gawdas of Ambaulim (are other recent cases documented too?), may I humbly point out that anyone who doesn't fit in within official Church teachings has either to reform or move on. This has been true of Liberation Theologists, gays, women campaigning for a more meaningful say in Church affairs, those promoting differing views on contraception, Freemasons, even our own Anthony de "The Pray of a Frog" Mellos, and so on. So I would not say the issue is of Gawadas alone; let us see the issue in context. (6) Finally, given your interest in sociology, I understand your concern about the alleged disruption of the cultural space of the Gawada community in as late as the 1990s itself. However, to my mind, there are probably even more serious concerns about this significantly large, aboriginal yet deprived community who seldom make it to the public discourse. They are used by politicians (of varied hues, and almost all parties) very effectively to bag votes at election time, when their issues are suddenly remembered. They have tasted so little of the fruits of "Liberation" and "Independence". Just a handful have gained access to the portals of higher education, though that is changing slowly. Anita Haladi has done some interesting work -- quite some time back -- on how the "developmental" process has eroded the settlements of this very aboriginal community. Orlando da Costa's "O Signo da Ira" is about the Talsanzor locality of Margao, and today we are shouting about "illegal houses" there, without even understanding what Costa wrote of in the early 1960s! Dr Bernadette Gomes has an interesting PhD thesis on the ethno-medicine of the Kunbis of Baradi (Velim), correct me if I got my details wrong, though that is not widely accessible yet. We know so little of them, and yet the treatment of the Little Tradition by the so-called Great Tradition (whichever the religion involved) has been abysmal. Who can deny this? And yes, while alleged forcibly disruption of the community's cultural production is definitely worthy of concern, what about the decay of their culture because of market forces, "modernization", the Bollywoodisation and Hollywoodisation of younger Goan generations, and steadfast cultural erosion of a more insidious form? But I will not "feel sad" for an August who wants us to get hopping mad about his latest piece translated, while forgetting the many other issues surrounding this (and other equally discriminated) communities of amchem bhangaranchem goem. FN