Of Section 377 and Valentine's Day

So Valentine's Day finally ends, with happy endings for some people, and some people left saying "मैं आत्महत्या करना चाहता हूँ। " How ever it might have gone for people, their stories of love, either requited or unrequited, it was the same - girl loves boy, boy loves girl, yada yada. But amidst all the gooey stuff, not to mention the lust, we've forgotten that Valentine's Day is meant for celebrating the love that you share with your lover. When Section 377 was reimposed, it didn't just prohibit sex between people of the same genre. It meant that two people of the same gender who love each other deeply, now shy away from public displays of affection, even communication with each other. This is not only hurtful to the people concerned, it is 'against the order of nature', as gay or lesbian sex is purported to be. If two people love each other, then there is nobody who humanly has a right to separate the two. So homosexuality is against Indian culture? Then do tell that from whence some of the sculptures found in the Khajuraho temples, as well as some verses of the Kama Sutra sprung forth? Unless moral policing is stopped, ignorance is wiped clean off the slate that is India, homosexual lovers can't live without fear. And where lovers can't live without fear of death by the state, Valentine's Day is incomplete.
On a slightly unrelated note, one may quote Rabindranath Tagore:

Where the mind is without fear and the head is held high 

Where knowledge is free 

Where the world has not been broken up into fragments 

By narrow domestic walls 

Where words come out from the depth of truth 

Where tireless striving stretches its arms towards perfection 

Where the clear stream of reason has not lost its way 

Into the dreary desert sand of dead habit 

Where the mind is led forward by thee 

Into ever-widening thought and action 

Into that heaven of freedom, my Father, let my country awake 

The father of our nation would be turning in his grave now, had something called the soul existed in the first place, and immortality of the soul would be a given. Not such a free land anymore, eh Gandhiji?

End Cruelty Towards Animals

Now before some of you vegan hardliners get any ideas, I want to make one small disclaimer: This post is not about 'cruelty' towards those animals that are commonly used as food. But the ranting that I'm about to do was triggered by an outrageous incident in Noida. A pregnant female stray dog lived close to a traditional sweets shop, a halwaai ki dukaan. The bitch gave birth to a litter of pups not far from the vicinity of the shop. One day, searching for food for her pups, the lactating dog strayed a bit too close to the shop for comfort. Rather than shooing her away like a normal, civilised man would do, the shopkeeper did an abhorrent act of cruelty - he spilled hot oil over the poor dog's mouth. Writhing in pain for hours, the dog succumbed to the severe burns, and when a team of humane people brought her to the nearest vet's, she was declared dead on the spot. It is only small comfort that the pups are in good care. They'll never know their mother's love.
  Dogs are usually used as symbols of weakness or inferiority in many age-old phrases and colloquialisms. When a woman says that all men are dogs, she is clearly abusing the opposite sex. Saale ko kutte ki maut maaroonga literally means, "That bastard will die a dog's death at my hands." There was a time when dog was considered man's best friend. Man hunted animals only for food and attacked them in self-defense, only when in mortal peril of any sort. But now it seems that the sands of time have erased that inherent nature in us, and made us selfish and inconsiderate beings. Now many of us hurt and even hunt animals, not for self-defense or food, but either to satisfy the sadist within us, or for our own luxurious living. Like seriously, what the hell is wrong with today's world? Can't we learn to respect each life as it is? Can't we learn to treat the fellow beings we share this earth with, excluding those below us in the food chain with the kindness and reverence they deserve? Seriously. Just because you want to look fashionable doesn't mean that you have to buy an outrageously expensive fur coat for yourself, not only wasting your money, but also promoting the killing of innocent animals in the process! As a Buddhist and a dog lover, I was filled with outrage when I read about the Noida incident in The Times of India. Stop becoming slaves to your inner demons, people! Wake up, before the earth becomes living hell! Let us strive to make this planet a better place to live in, for all living organisms.