Socialism and Vaishnavism

[Danielle Field]

I don't know what it is going to take to clean up the planet and make it fit to be offerable to Krishna but I do feel that it is possible because Prabhupada said it was. When I stop believing that then I stop believing in Prabhupada and I don't want that because I need to believe in Prabhupada.

I am speaking from personal experience mostly and trying to get some input as to how to understand my current position. Also I wanted to spark off a discussion between advanced devotees regarding this issue and not necessarily get everyone to change to my way of thinking. I have been wrong about many, many things in the past and I'm not so confident as to demand everyone accept my thoughts without analysis, discussion and feedback.

Living in an ISKCON temple was beneficial for me in that I leant about the practice of Krishna consciousness and I still know lots of bhajans and have a strong attachment for chanting the holy name. I am certainly grateful for that. The temple was very damaging for me in many ways, however, because what drove me to ashram life was an utter conviction in the inherent good in all living beings which I found mirrored in Prabhupadas writing. This ethic was utterly absent in the temple.

I am aware that most people are selfish but I know from my own experience that I was a very individualistic person before I joined the temple. It was the study of sociology at college that drove me to spiritual thinking and commitment. it opened me up to the belief that people could change, the world could change and that social systems prescribe perameters on people's awareness that prevent them from understanding themselves at a fundamental level.

When I left the temple I studied social policy and this was such a welcome relief because it helped me understand why living in an ISKCON temple had hardened my heart as opposed to softening it. I have spoken at length about this a few pages ago so it feels incredibly self indulgent to go over it here again. I'm sorry you think i speak in slogans. I don't, I speak from the heart. I don't quote Marx or even Prabhupada for that matter because I am a very passionate person and things flow out of my head with very little in the way of control or premeditation. Anyhoo, the boss is coming. Got to go.

Just squeezing in another bit. Capitalism as I've said previously is an anachronism. It is not natural or normal. Whatever way we overthrow it I don't mind. I am a socialist but there are many people out there who are anti capitalist without being socialist and I'm fine with that. In the Srimad Bhagavatam we learn about how Ksatriyas have historically overthrown the brahmin class and the kind of chaos this reaked on society. What I am proposing here is that we have misunderstood what capitalism is. In the middle ages we were ruled by kings but is was the merchants who overthrew the kings and created a world according to vaishya principles. When I was a part of ISKCON we were told that all the trappings of varnashrama dhama were there except for the brahmin class but I don't think we do have kings now. Our royal family in Britain are a tourist attraction and as such they have affiliated themselves with the vaishya class. I hope you can have a think about this and get back to me about this thought specifically.

[celina12]

Originally Posted by Danielle Field I don't know what it is going to take to clean up the planet and make it fit to be offerable to Krishna but I do feel that it is possible because Prabhupada said it was. When I stop believing that then I stop believing in Prabhupada and I don't want that because I need to believe in Prabhupada.

I still haven't heard back from you in a while!

[Danielle Field]

Hello, sorry. How are you?

[kbdas]

please do not be offended by my remarks. i am trying to answer according to the teachings of Srila BR Shridhar Maharaja and Srila AC Bhaktivedanta Swami Maharaj Prabhupad.
hmm, i see this interesting thread is still going on.
Yes, no revolutionary sets out to be a muderous swine, yet it happens every time.
"Our hearts were so pure, we really wanted to do good for the people. If anyone had told us, on that first day of power that in 12 years we should come to this we would have considered them insane"-Dr. Frick, NSDAP Minister of Justice, Nuremberg trials, 1946.
I have no problem with socialism lite--say as practiced in Scandinavia. but when you start talking about Marx, Engels etc you are advocating the VIOLENT overthrow of society. Mao says there cannot even BE the potential for communism without violence. Are you so POSITIVE your way is the right way and don't mind people getting hurt/killed to prove that you can turn this world into a paradise. Don't be like those Che Guevara tools who say they are against capital punishment or censorship and fail to admit that their hero #1 executed thousands, made homosexuality illegal, banned a free press etc etc.
Birth. old age, disease and death are the truths of the material world, and this applies to planets as well as individuals. Srila Bhaktsiddhanta Saraswati said overcoming THAT is so important that everything else can wait-"let the world burn". The world is full of people screaming "I. Me, Mine!!!!" that's how we got here in the first place. Do you really think it is possible to get them all to work towards some idealistic, communal society without force? Srila Prabhupad said that this world is basically a lunatic asylum run by Srimati Durgadevi. As far as a fit planet to offer, unless we live like folks did 5,000 years ago, or all take up the search for the Absolue Truth ( whose attraction is by "love and beauty, not coercion and force"-B.R. Shridar ) I can't see it hapenning. Have you seen the pollution problems in socialist countries-it is horrendous.. The forestry programs in capitalist countries are better. The best conservation, safe, clean work environment laws, anti-animal vivisection laws were actually passed by the friggin NAZIS!! Anyway, I am sorry to go on and on. but the arguments of the communists are so annoying, they go like this:
1. USSR, China, Cambodia and Cuba are( were) horrible, coercive dictatorships. Argument: they are not really communist.
2. What about all the executions? They deserved it. ( who decides that?)And the capitalists are just as bad nyaah nyahh!!!!
3. people in this world are inherently selfish and clannish. Argument--no they are not!!!!!! Once their brilliant intellects ( the same folks who can't wait to vote for American Idol or buy a Hummer ) grasp the truth of Marxism they will WORK FOR FREE!!!! And love it! Just ask the Cubans who can't wait for Fidel to die how they like working for free on their vacations. But their literacy rate is almost as high as costa ( capitalist ) rica's.
Lenin predicted the end of nationalism in the USSR within 10 years. Now look at all the breakaway republics. It's human nature. As Eric Burden and the Animals said "We gotta get out of this place!" or Tim Leary "when will we quit getting bogged down in mammalian politics?"
I am sorry about being such a windbag-but no philosophy has brought as much grief to mankind as Marxism. Anyway, I respect your desire to make this world a better place, and the planet is certainly being run by a##holes now, but Marx isn't going to save it, Marxism is a proven 19th century failure that belongs in the trash heap of history. Please read "Against All Hope", "Gulag Archipelago 1-3" or "Black Book of Communism" if you do not want to accept the word of our archaryas.

[Danielle Field]

OK. I'll try and respond to that in due course. I have done already if you want to just look at the rest of the conversation that has gone before though. Maybe I'll just cut and paste it sometime. I've really lost my drive to get into this though. I came here for answers and I'm just not getting any so I'm not really so inclined to keep it up I'm afraid. I haven't got enough time to keep going over the same territory and not get any answers. Believe what you want about socialism. I really don't care. I'm not a zealot, I'm just a lost soul looking for answers and I've got the "my guru was just a fat bloke in a dress" blues. Best wishes xxx

[CCC]

Krsna is the Perfect Communist. all in common. all centered in HIM all are his possessions and He is the Suprem Controller.

In vayu purana it said that varnasramadharma was created by Lord Brahma after satyayuga because people started to fight each other for material possessions. (In satya yuga there is no "this is mine, or I am this body" all is in common, all are realized soulsand all is shared in common, there is no selfishness)

Marx said: Religion is the opium of the people.

Krsna said: Abandon all varieties of religion and just surrender unto Me. I shall deliver you from all sinful reaction. Do not fear.

[CCC]

Capitalisms is a demoniac system of life, not divine, there is no such thing in the scriptures.

Spiritual Communism is the way all centered in God

[CCC]

Today the world is ruled by bogus kshatryas (materialistics leaders and armies) bogus brahmanas (institutionalized religions who don't follow their scriptures) and Bogus vaishyas (businessmen, merchants, etc), all of them are linked and working together for their own aims, and sadly we the sudras are the exploited and oppressed. The kaliyugic history is ever the same.

[theist]

Originally Posted by CCC Capitalisms is a demoniac system of life, not divine, there is no such thing in the scriptures. Spiritual Communism is the way all centered in God

Exactly. The simple reality. Just as Capitalism is the vaisya mentality unbridled and run amock to the point of hellish hedonism in an attempt to have heaven (happy land) without God so is materialized Communism an attempt to develop heaven as a happy land for everyone without God.

Wet stool or dry stool, take your pick but they are both filled with disease causing germs.

Here is the scripturally revealed central point on how to structure a human life, and by extension a human society, that produces a peaceful mind as well as seeing to the material needs for all.

Sri Isopanishad Mantra 1. Everything animate or inanimate that is within the universe is controlled and owned by the Lord. One should therefore accept only those things necessary for himself, which are set aside as his quota, and one should not accept other things, knowing well to whom they belong. Mantra 2. One may aspire to live for hundreds of years if he continuously goes on working in that way, for that sort of work will not bind him to the law of karma. There is no alternative to this way for man.

[ganesh_g81]

Very nice ideas. Thanks.

[Vikram Ramsundar]

I am sorry about being such a windbag-but no philosophy has brought as much grief to mankind as Marxism.

Well put. To any thinking person, communism is the most repressive and murderous evil in the entire history of mankind. In excess of a hundred million human beings were taken out in Central and Eastern Europe by the minions of Lenin and Stalin. I have no time or inclination to develop a lengthy thesis here but the initial motive behind Marxism of the variety espoused by Leon Trotsky and his cohorts was nothing less than the overthrow of Czarist Russia.

Socialism is passe, and is an ideology which has failed on all counts. Those are are futilely attempting to revive it from the dustbins of history are only wasting their own time.

[Danielle Field]

There is a system that has brought about more misery to human culture than any other and that is Capitalism, beginning with the slave trade and the subsequent commodification of human life that has attended all of capitalism's history. It is a murderous and bloody system. It is perpetuated through warfare and yet I hear devotees always defending the principle tenets of capitalism as if they are arcane and divine. it is this I am challenging.

Yes attempts to overthrow capitalism have been bloody and yes Stalin's regime was bloody. Stalin was a psycho and the Russian revolution failed to extend internationally largely due to Stalin's successful efforts to subvert the revolution and resume the Russian Imperial project to his own advantage, much as Napoleon did to France after the French revoltuion.

Yet again I am not here to convert you to socialism only to open your eyes to the fact that capitalism is an abhorent economic system for all the reasons Marx laid out in his works. The dominant economic order needs to be overthrown in order to allow devotional life to develop (as previously stated) and socialists are more committed to changing the world than self satisfied little "devotees" who are only interested in the development of their own spiritual advancement and don't concern themselves with the project of revolutionising society along the lines of devotional principles.

Capitalism is in crisis and the tenure of human beings on earth is under great and real threat. Do you agree, or do you think, as many have suggested in this discussion that capitalism rules OK?

[Samia]

Originally Posted by Danielle Field There is a system that has brought about more misery to human culture than any other and that is Capitalism, beginning with the slave trade and the subsequent commodification of human life that has attended all of capitalism's history. It is a murderous and bloody system. It is perpetuated through warfare and yet I hear devotees always defending the principle tenets of capitalism as if they are arcane and divine. it is this I am challenging.

So the world was a cheerful and there were butterflies and rainbows, then out of the darkness came an evil beast named capitalism
Man has always enslaved other men and animals, it is one of the symptoms of our diseased state. Call it whatever you want but I stand by the fact that if you blame misery on a system you are in reality to scared to confront the true source of that misery.
I am a follower of no system created by man I address misery at its true source, Other Humans. Wake up ok

[Vikram Ramsundar]

Originally Posted by Samia So the world was a cheerful and there were butterflies and rainbows, then out of the darkness came an evil beast named capitalism Man has always enslaved other men and animals, it is one of the symptoms of our diseased state. Call it whatever you want but I stand by the fact that if you blame misery on a system you are in reality to scared to confront the true source of that misery. I am a follower of no system created by man I address misery at its true source, Other Humans. Wake up ok

Excellent. Capitalism certainly has its numerous flaws but Communism hasn't a single virtue to its merit worth mentioning. It is a perverted, utopic notion which has not, can not and will not succeed, ever. As for Marx, he was the son of a converted Jew whose prime interest lay in setting the foundations for his own people to control the political and economic instruments of the European, and predominantly Christian, societies in which they dwelled. The Das Capital was written with this in mind, much in the same way that Freud for his part came up with his bogus theories about anal fixation and potty training. This ought to be evident to anyone who has done his homework.

[Danielle Field]

Ah! The reek of predjudice. Anti semitism, Islamaphobia as well I bet and some choice opinions on people of all creeds that differ from you own sectarian interests I'll warrant. You two really are filled with fear of your fellow humans aren't you? Fear for your own lives, you wretched fools! Prabhupada didn't fear the hippies but everyone told him they were demons and that they deserved to go to hell. You will never know true love like Prabhupada taught until you learn to confront those fears. By the way Samia, where's BDM these days? Good to see you striking out on your own, or has he still got his finger on your controls?

How exactly are you going to "wake me up" when you are wedge deep in the myre of predjudice? You really should be ashamed of yourself for harbouring so much hate.

[Vikram Ramsundar]

Originally Posted by Danielle Field Ah! The reek of predjudice. Anti semitism, Islamaphobia as well I bet and some choice opinions on people of all creeds that differ from you own sectarian interests I'll warrant. You two really are filled with fear of your fellow humans aren't you? Fear for your own lives, you wretched fools! Prabhupada didn't fear the hippies but everyone told him they were demons and that they deserved to go to hell. You will never know true love like Prabhupada taught until you learn to confront those fears. By the way Samia, where's BDM these days? Good to see you striking out on your own, or has he still got his finger on your controls?

You know what, bla bla bla, bla bla bla. I am ready to bet that I mix and mingle with a more heterogeneous posse of friends and acquaintances than you do. I treat individuals the way they ought to be dealt with, i.e. with consideration and respect. That doesn't alter the fundamental truth about how communities behave as groups. Try living in an Arab land for a while, and you'll see what it means to be female in a Mohammedan context.

On another note, the role played by Semitic intellectual villains such as the two I cited earlier in the decline and weakening of the West is undeniable. Come on, use your brains Danielle, there are o