Advocate Lawrence Liang, part of the Bangalore-based Alternative Law Forum, has issued a legal notice to Penguin India, claiming that the publisher has violated freedom of speech laws and readers’ rights by agreeing to destroy all copies of Wendy Doniger’s book The Hindus.
The 30-paragraph legal notice was sent on behalf of Liang’s clients, Shuddhabrata Sengupta and Aarthi Sethi, to Penguin earlier today, and argues that because Penguin has agreed to withdraw the book from India and destroy all copies, after a legal dispute with a religious group, it has “effectively acknowledged that it is not longer interested in exercising” its ownership in the work and should surrender its copyright to the Indian public.
[Read full annotated copy of the legal notice]
Sengupta is a Delhi-based artist and writer, while Sethi is an anthropologist with a “deep interest in Hindu philosophy”, according to the legal notice. Both are “avid bibliophiles” and were apparently “delighted” when Penguin published The Hindus: An Alternative History, “and as people who have closely followed the scholarly contributions of the said author they regard this book to be a significant contribution to the study of Hinduism. They consider Ms. Doniger’s translations of Indian classical texts and her work on various facets of Hinduism from morality in the Mahabarata to the erotic history of Hinduism as an inspiration for their own intellectual pursuits.”
The notice adds that Penguin withdrawing the book:
despite the fact that there is no court order that mandates such withdrawal is shocking and in absolute contravention of your responsibilities as a publisher- to the author, the book and to the reading community upon whose goodwill your fortune and reputation depends. In effect you have withdrawn the book on the basis of a legal threat thereby granting unauthorized groups and individuals the right to censor books. These groups and individuals believe that the threat of force is the best way to counter the written word and when publishers succumb to such pressures they perhaps need to rethink why they are in the book business at all. While they may both be birds, there is a world of difference between a Penguin and a chicken and the last time my clients checked, the penguin had not changed his feathers in the natural world.”
Liang also writes that by Penguin acceding to the demands of a minority in pulping the book, they have discriminated between different readers by “conveniently choosing to acknowledge the claims and allegations of one particular class of readers who claim that their religious sentiments have been hurt by this book while ignoring the rights of many others who have found the book to be informative, enjoyable and insightful”.
That YOU NOTICEE have agreed to the aforementioned terms on the condition that Shri. Dinanath and the other busybodies shall withdraw all civil and criminal cases and complaints filed against you and the author is indicative that if not in the natural world, then at least in the publishing world the Penguin is mutating into a chicken. And furthermore by claiming that the aforementioned agreement has been entered into by YOU NOTICEE on your own ‘free will’, you insult one of philosophy’s favoured concepts.
The legal notice concludes:
28. Accordingly my clients demand that YOU NOTICEE rescind on the contract that you have entered into with miscellaneous busybodies and immediately commence the publication of Wendy Doniger’s “The Hindus: An Alternative history” and leave the messy act of pulping to those better suited for it - juicers and grinders.
29. That in the event you choose to betray our sanguinity about your judgment by abandoning your Penguinity then you have effectively acknowledged that you are no longer interested in exercising your rights as the owners of the copyright in the said work and that you shall license the said work under a general public license, which will enable any person to copy, reproduce and circulate whether in print or electronically within the territory of India without the risk of infringing your copyright or hurting your sentiments.
30. My clients understand that under normal circumstances if a publisher chooses to relinquish rights assigned to them by an author such rights revert back to reading public and as such it is only fair that you return to the public what you have taken away from it- the right to read and dissent.
Historic parallels
The language and structure of the legal notice mirrors parts of the notice sent to Penguin in 2010 by the Shiksha Bachao Andolan Committee, the original petitioners against Penguin, who claimed that Doniger’s book was “written with a Christian Missionary Zeal and hidden agenda to denigrate Hindus and show their religion in poor light”.
They also claimed in their 47-paragraph legal notice that the book had “hurt the religious feelings of millions of Hindus by declaring that Ramayana is a fiction”, had breached section 295A of the Indian Penal Code (IPC), citing the book’s line that “placing the Ramayan in its historical contexts demonstrates that it is a work of fiction, created by human authors, who lived at various times”. The petitioners had also taken objection to the illustration on the cover of the book:
That on the book jacket of the book Lord Krishna is shown sitting on buttocks of a naked woman surrounded by other naked women. That YOU NOTICEE have depicted Lord Krishna in such a vulgar, base perverse manner to outrage religious feelings of Hindus. That YOU NOTICEE and the publisher have done this with the full knowledge that Sri Krishna is revered as a divinity and there are many temples for Sri Krishna where Hindus worship the divinity. The intent is clearly to ridicule, humiliate & defame the Hindus and denigrate the Hindu traditions.
Precedents relied on in Liang’s notice
- Regina v. Penguin, [1961] Crim LR 176: Also for a fascinating account of the trial, see The Trial of Lady Chatterley: Regina V. Penguin Books Limited: The Transcript of the Trial
- Secretary, Ministry of I & B vs. Cricket Association of Bengal AIR 1995 AIR SC 1236
- Deepak Theatre v. State of Punjab, AIR 1992 SC 1519
- State of UP v. Raj Narayan, (1975) 4 SCC 428
- Life Insurance Corpn. Of India vs. Prof. Manubhai D. Shah AIR 1993 SC 171
- Francis Coralie Mullin vs The Administrator, Union. AIR 1981 SC 746
- Gajanan Visheshwar Birjur v. Union of India
- Punjab National Bank v. Surendra Prasad Sinha
- M.F. Hussain v. Raj Kumar Pandey
- Himsa Virodhak Sangh v. Mirzapur Moti
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Great show Mong!! Will be very interesting to see the outcome.
Some people have too much time on their hands. The notice smacks of immaturity.
Arka
This notice, therefore, is sadly nothing but a case of verbal chicanery. The essential claim being made by Liang as the subject line states is that there has been a “violation of the rights of Readers.” This is fundamentally wrong since, his clients are not Readers, not yet, they are merely Prospective Readers. Now why is this important? It is important because being a Reader i.e. buying the book establishes a contractual relationship between the Reader and the Publisher, which might enable certain claims being made. For instance, if I ordered the concerned book by paying the due consideration but the same would not be delivered to me as Penguin has decided to pulp it, then a semblance of legal claim does arise.
Sans any contractual obligation as is the case here, there is no cause of action. Not even the claim of violation of Right to Freedom of Speech and Expression shall stand since, Fundamental Rights can be claimed only against the State or bodies so designated. This principle of not allowing enforcement of Fundamental Rights beyond the pale of Governmental action is based upon sound reason as allowing Fundamental Rights enforcement into the private realm would open a flood gate of bizarre claims. One is certainly there for us to see; might I add another one: My favourite news show, which no one watches now a days, stopped airing one fine day. This show was a great source of news and information for me and as such its closing deprived me of my Right to receive information. So, should I file a claim for violation of Article 19(1)(a) against them?
Having said this, I still wonder what was intended out of a notice that is not even speciously legal and would certainly be hefting Penguin’s trash tomorrow?
Am sure Asaram would agree with your views.
She is without a doubt one of the top living scholars on Hinduism, and it drives the mysoginists in their brown shorts mad that a white woman knows the canon with such command.
Perhaps this will awaken the average educated Indian to the quiet cultural war being fought against history and science.
Here is an extract from the book:-
"If the motto of Watergate was "Follow the money,???? the motto of the history of Hinduism could well be "Follow the monkey. Or. more often, "Follow the horse. ""
Read some more here
www.amazon.com/review/R2BDMXF32OLZ2V/ref=cm_cr_dp_cmt?ie=UTF8&ASIN=1594202052&nodeID=283155&store=books#wasThisHelpful
www.amazon.com/review/R15O4GR4A5HABO/ref=cm_cr_dp_cmt?ie=UTF8&ASIN=1594202052&nodeID=283155&store=books#wasThisHelpful
Doniger's renown does not make her automatically correct, naturally, but it is a measure of her standing in the greater academic community and is a proxy for the stature of her research. The hatred heaped upon her by the Hindu Right is also one measure of her influence - if she didn't matter, they would not have waged an international war against her for the last decade or so. Certainly Osama bin Laden or some other zealot has said much more hurtful and hateful things about Hinduism and actually killed people. Doniger is not hated because she is ignorant of Hinduism but because she knows it too well for the class who prefers to control aspects of the religion.
But, hey! It's morning. Better get those cute khaki shorts on and start your little exercises, bhai!
Typical "liberal" response to any proposition that makes out a particular text or boor or article as hurtful to a section of persons. When all else fails, indulge in a foolishly heavy dose of sarcasm.
Liberalism does not mean the right to write or speak anything that gets your fancy. It is a fact that people's feelings can and do get hurt. S. 295A and the restrictions in Article 19 are designed to prevent such hurtfulness. This is not peculiar to India alone. Try writing a book alleging that Christ was a gay, black and a paedophile in the south U.S. based on "alternative" interpretations of the bible and see how long that book remains in publication.
The government has a duty to ensure the safety of people. If tomorrow a riot breaks out due to sale of this book and Mr Dazed and Confused's parents are killed in the ensuing stampede for having bought a copy, I wonder whether he will be as quick to pass such sarcastic comments.
You have to learn that freedom of speech is not a license to spout whatever floats your boat.
What's next? Jain scholars from Palitana suing to have all geography books banned because they believe the earth is flat?
I would defend zealously, with utter sincerity, your right to publish such drivel as you espouse. That's the difference between a "Liberal" and you - we think everyone has the right to be heard and assessed for what they are. Nothing like sunlight to scatter the cockroaches.
Nothing like an overdose of graphic metaphors and adjectives to cover up a shortfall of substantive argument.
If a lot of people in some parts of India are indeed Jain Scholars and are indeed showing a propensity for violence on account of a geography book, then it is a fit case for controlling sale of that book, if for no reason than to maintain law and order.
A ban on the sale of the book is not an endorsement of the views of the complainant. At most it is proof of the fact that not doing so would cause a greater amount of damage, of a degree well beyond 'outraged sensibilities'.
Being a liberal also includes not forcing others to be liberal. Maybe you can make something of that.
You confuse the idea of liberalism with tolerance. Tolerance is not tied to a political leaning, but it's telling that you conflate liberalism with tolerance, and leave tolerance outside of your political and spiritual scope. It's tolerance we demand and require. Too often in India we mistake indifference and apathy for tolerance, and these saffron extremists take advantage of this. Wake up before it's too late. In case you haven't noticed, the good guys are not winning this war.
Arrest a thousand people ? Ten thousand ? A million ? Is that practical ? I doubt it. Is controlling sale of the book practical ? You see the point?
This is similar to the 'outrage' expressed by some whenever a suggestion is made that women should dress conservatively in areas where incidence of sexual violence is high. Does the suggestion mean that the suggest-or is a male chauvinist and subscribes to the theory that women should not wear 'revealing' clothing, etc. etc. ? No. Is it a suggestion borne from practical common sense taking into account the ground reality that policing is inadequate ? Yes
The same with the ban on the book. To the extent that the ban averted violence and saved lives and property, I believe it was a good call. To the extent Penguin feared for damage to their premises, staff etc. their decision to not print the book in India was a good call. At the end of the day, I think it is stupid to rely on the arrest and conviction of offenders after damage to life and property is already done. A jail sentence will not get back a smashed windshield or a burnt office or a murdered friend.
As an aside, your second para on tolerance and liberalism is faulty on several levels. I suggest more reading.
Your comment betrays a very shallow understanding of what I have written. In some ways it is at par with Arnab Goswami's barbs which are keyword based. Use a word or phase in any context and bang - pat comes a stock reply without context. As such it's very hard to carry on a meaningful conversation.
"Holi, the spring carnival, when members of all castes mingle and let down their hair, sprinkling one another with cascades of red powder and liquid, symbolic of the blood that was probably used in past centuries"
"Its (Ganesa's) trunk is the displaced phallus, a caricature of Siva's linga. It poses no threat because it is too large, flaccid, and in the wrong place to be useful for sexual purposes"
Hindu reverence for Agni, Indra and Surya evidenced a fascination for passing gas, as these deities are associated with passing enormous amounts of wind, Vedic chants emulated the act of passing gas, and 'Atman' was really a pseudo-metaphysical façade for the Hindu "flatus complex".
It was the obsession with lower-caste sexual rites that led to the development of Tantra; it was the castration anxiety of men that evolved into worship of Devi, 'the mother with a penis'.
None of the above luminaries have addressed scholarly critique of their mistranslations and use of discredited methodologies.
Some equally legitimate lines of inquiry for their school of thought would then be:
-the ritualistic worship of cadavers in the form of the dead body on a cross, and the bloodthirsty obsession with human sacrifice of the "other" in the purported quest for making the world a safer place.
- the alternate american culture: repressed histories and marginalization of strippers and porn stars and resistance to their mainstreaming by their exploiters.
- the autoeroticism of electricians and plumbers and their daily usage of male-female couplings and nipples.
Rather than discuss what suppression of thought means for all Indians, the Hindu Right places a straw man on a cross and says, "See how they treat us!"
They of course would prefer the return to some mythical Hindu Caliphate. It's only the Constitution and the will of good people that stands between them and their version of nirvana.
It's not a coincidence that Penguin is ultimately owned by a German conglomerate. Germans have a proud history of inventing the printing press and burning books to protect a hateful political ideology. No way an American publisher would have backed down.
Factual truth does not provide a full defense against criminal defamation in India. Factual truth would certainly not provide a very good defense against a S. 259A complaint either.
You appear comfortable with a society where protecting someone's "sentiments" is more important than protecting the right to speak the objective truth. You should not shrink from the implications of your stand.
And it may be as much an "objective truth" to you as it is a deliberately provocative bundle of fanciful lies to me. Ms Doniger is no Copernicus. Learn some real tolerance, it might do you good.
The one-sided chanting of "free speech" without allowing the examination of the matter in any detail or facing up to its real lived implications is good for you, so long as you continue to live in your ivory tower.
You may continue to use pejorative epithets. You have the freedom to act according to your nature.
It's a short step from your arguments to torching the Staines children.
It's your comfort with suppression of thought, your willingness to legally protect sentiment and willingeness to punish facts, that places you comfortably on the side of the house occupied by Swami Aseemanand and across the aisle from Amartya Sen. That factual sorting is an accusation only if you choose to see it as one.
What a load of turd!
Bertelsmann has a very slight majority in Penguin, about 53%, the rest is owned by the Pearsons of London. The majority arrangement came into existence only in July 2013.
The way this fool comments would have everyone believe that Penguin was a german subsidiary for decades and had rolled back untold millions of titles.
A turd-ish statement it most certainly appears to be, like a lot of his/her other statements. This one in particular is a bit of hot air with no research other than a 'gut feeling' about the general tendency of german v american publishers no doubt.
It is this kind of misinformed blanket generalisation that misleads people.
The comments are not merely based on crude caricatures of alleged national characteristics.
Both the UK and Germany have far weaker freedom of speech traditions than the US. The UK is well known for its oppressive use of libel laws, and the Serious Fraud Office recently restrained news sources from publishing already disclosed names of co-conspirators in a case. Germany punishes so-called Holocaust deniers.
Say what you will about the US on other counts, but it does not allow prior restraint against publishing in almost any circumstances, and would certainly not offer any relief for the complainants in the Doniger case. Snowden's revelations could hardly be more damaging or embarassing, yet the government has not moved to suppress those revelations. Somehow, with a much more diverse and well-armed populace than India, the US is are able to allow a barely fettered freedom of expression without inciting religious riots. Perhaps we could learn something from them, rather than continuing restrictive laws from the British era. Or are we too smart (or proud) to learn from anyone?
You are truly naive. And your research is slightly better than a fourth year NLIU Bhopal kid (at the risk of being harsh to NLIU)
Do you believe Penguin (or any book publisher) is really interested in upholding unrestricted freedom of press? Are they a Section 25 company or a branch office of an ACLU-like body? Not to the best of my knowledge.
A publisher (or any other smart businessman) will do whatever they believe is in their best interests and whatever appears to be in sync with their profit targets, taking into account the book, the target audience, the relevant market and so on.
A book like the Satanic Verses is clearly not targeted at a middle eastern audience. Neither does Penguin or Viking have any office or presence in the middle east. India, China and SA are the only G-8 countries where it does. And while I cannot prove it here, I think it is safe to assume that the middle east and Iran account for a very small amount of Penguin's profits compared to Penguin India which is a lucrative market (They have acknowledged as such in their annual statements over the past 3 years) There was never any business sense in
withdrawing Satanic Verses. On the other hand why risk alienating the Indian bookworm with what might turn out to be a fiasco, especially if it was revealed that Wendy was wrong after all.
Anyway, all this talk of pre-Bertelsmann and post-Bertelsmann is rubbish. For your information, even pre-Bertelsmann ,Random House has been very careful about publishing inflammatory books. Read about Sherry Jones' 'The Jewel of Medina' if you get a chance. To start making generalisations based on apparent nationality of the publisher is a ludicrous claim.
Your attitude on this issue seems to indicate wanting to argue for the sake of argument. Do you believe there can be such a thing as an inflammatory article or writing? Do you accept that lives and property can be lost as a result of a law and order problem that is sparked due to a book however unjustified. Do you give precedence to a right to free speech over safety to life and freedom to protection of the law? The Penguin episode (or any ban under 295A) is a reflection that certain freedoms have priority over others.
No reputed publisher would publish a book without taking an indemnity from the author against all consequences arising out of content that is obscene, defamatory, infringing or otherwise unlawful. A well-drafted indemnity clause would also cover settlement made out of court without the accusations having been proved in a court of law!
May be they can read this:
'When Westerners make fun of our gods, they're instigating trouble'
www.rediff.com/news/slide-show/slide-show-1-when-westerners-make-fun-of-our-gods-theyre-instigating-trouble/20140217.htm#6
Depending on one's bent you'll either warm to his cause or recoil in disgust.
Now, has anyone publicly identified Penguin's counsel in this matter? Perhaps we can get back to discussing law rather than sentiment.
www.dnaindia.com/mumbai/report-praful-patel-descent-of-air-india-and-the-killing-of-a-critical-book-1951582
www.moneylife.in/article/bloomsbury-withdraws-the-des-of-air-india-with-an-apology-to-praful-patel/35972.html
articles.economictimes.indiatimes.com/2014-01-16/news/46264258_1_air-india-v-thulasidas-bloomsbury
The pulping of this book is a big scandal that needs to be highlighted.
This interview with Doniger from 2009 is also worth reading for an insight into where she comes from with her books and the kind of resistance she is aware surrounds her subject:
www.outlookindia.com/article.aspx?262348
Thanks for the link Kian. Very revealing interview. It shows to a large extent what I suspected - that like a lot of "orientalists" Wendy's thought process is essentially a translated version of sanskrit writing. In doing so, the meaning of many words and phrases which only someone born, raised and immersed in Indian culture (as usually only Indians are) is lost. A good example is 'kama'. Wendy keeps parroting the meaning of kama as 'indulgence in sex' which is one possible meaning. But kama like many sanskrit words has a variety of meanings in different contexts, notably 'desire', 'love', 'longing' and is not restricted to sex alone. A more accurate translation would be a desire for something material.
This stuff is very difficult to teach people, unlike a language.
Maybe even you Kian, being Irish (as I guess) can understand what I mean when foreign learners of Irish cannot get the subtleties of certain words despite being excellent speakers of Irish.
Similar is a westerner writing about certain rituals such as the thread ceremony or a shradh puja. No amount of book-ish gyan can imbibe a person with what it means to undergo a thread ceremony or how it feels to perform shradh for a loved one. Just as Harsha Bhogle, despite being a fine commentator, can never understand how it feels to be on guard with 6 runs needed to win of the last ball of a match.
It's a safe bet that no one who is not steeply immersed in Hinduism from birth, undergone the rituals of Hinduism, lived among Hindus his or her whole life can ever understand its true meaning.
"Sri Ramakrishna, the 19th century Hindu saint, has been declared by these scholars as being a sexually-abused homosexual, and it has become “academically established” by Wendy Doniger’s students that Ramakrishna was a child molester, and had also forced homosexual activities upon Vivekananda. Furthermore, it has become part of this new “discovery” that Ramakrishna’s mystical experiences, and indeed those of Hindu mystics in general, are pathological sexual conditions that need to be psychoanalyzed as such. Furthermore, these scholars have concluded that the entire Hindu society needs to be psychoanalyzed in terms of sexual deviance, in order to understand modern Indian society and politics objectively."
rajivmalhotra.com/library/articles/risa-lila-1-wendys-child-syndrome/
Separately:
"After reading only a few pages of this book, I was reminded of something I did in my greener days. In late teens, when I had enough Sanskrit to read Valmiki, I went to my village educated mother, hoping to shock her, with my discovery that Valmiki’s Rama when in exile used to hunt the deer, roast the meat and offer it to Sita. My mother, though not pleased at this great news, watched me intently to study my intentions and quickly took away my sadistic pleasure by quoting a line from Tulsidas, of whose Ramayana, she was a daily reader. “Naanaa bhaanti Raam avataaraa/ Raamayana shata koti apaaraa” (Rama has taken many kinds of avatars and Ramayanas are hundred crores in number).
Today I marvel at the profound meaning this rural untutored woman had deciphered from the text of Tulsi that some of us are unable to grasp even though we may have spent a life time of reading and teaching heavy classical texts in Sanskrit and that too sitting on the cushion of a salary. She not only kept ‘her Rama’ intact, but showed no antagonism, distaste or horror of the ‘hunter Rama’ who was just another avatara, and not somebody who would threaten her faith, demolish the ‘myth of the holy cow’, endanger notions of Hindu vegetarianism, create doubts about the historicity of Rama, or give a boost to the tension between Hindu attitude to violence in sacrifice and the Hindu ideal of non-violence in life, a favorite theme in Doniger’s book."
The full critique of Doniger's "Hinduism":
centreright.in/2014/02/a-critique-of-wendy-donigers-portrayal-of-hinduism/#.UwXEJLdhjTp
Some of the statements made by this woman, who is on paper a highly educated person, is hard to attribute to someone of her seeming intelligence.
She says that "the true villain of this piece-the Indian law that makes it a criminal rather than civil offense to publish a book that offends any Hindu, a law that jeopardizes the physical safety of any publisher, no matter how ludicrous the accusation brought against a book" with very little idea or qualification on how Indian law works or why a section like 295A is on the statute books for so long in India.
Can she not understand that not having such a law could result in someone publishing hate speech that leads to an innocent family from some community or race being killed in some agitated corner of the country. Should the the author of that piece be permitted to walk away by paying "compensation" in a "civil" trial?
Next she says that "The book is much more popular than it ever would have been before. ... Copies are circulating in India and Kindle is available in India. There's just all sorts of ways that one can get a book. One can read this book in all sorts of ways." To me that's a blatant disregard for the moves by her publisher who has sole rights for publication in India in any form. Lucky for her there is no formal court order since this would amount to contempt of court.
Our laws on sexual offences and violence against women give paramount importance to the testimony of the victim. This is so because women being historically oppressed in India (across most religions) are very vulnerable in a traditional criminal trial. Tomorrow Wendy-amma will be saying that the real villain of the piece is Section 376 and 498A because they shift the burden of proof onto the accused.
If Wendy Doniger who claims to be sufficiently knowledgeable about Hinduism (and by implication Indian culture) cannot appreciate what a potential disaster an admittedly unorthodox book on Hindu culture can cause in India, she is not fit to write on the subject.
It is not for nothing that Michale Witzel, a former tenured professor of Sanskrit at Harvard University (and one who is himself no a keen friend of the Hindu groups) termed her as "idiosyncratic and unreliable".
Go figure
I don't share your or Lord Mccaulay's view that we Indians are so emotionally excitable and inherently uncivilized that discussion of alternative ideas will lead to violence, any more than a short skirt leads inevitably to rape.
For now, 259A, like 377, stands as the law of the land, and that offers its own commentary on the state of contemporary India. The world is free to draw its own conclusions.
The more you write, the more apparent your poor research and reasoning becomes evident. The attempt to club 295A with 377 belies your inability to appreciate each of the offences they deal with and is a good attempt to deflect attention. I wonder whether Wendy's lack of familiarity with Hinduism is as bad as your lack of familiarity with Indian law. If so, it might explain her views. Read on below.
For starters the Baron Macaulay cannot take any credit for Section 295A - he died 67 years *before Section 295A was inserted (which was in 1927 and on the basis of a committee comprising a majority of Indian lawyers and civil servants as it happened). The Constitution (that was in 1950) itself uses the expression 'public order' as an exception to Article 19. As far I know, no member of the drafting committee for the Constitution was of any nationality other than Indian or comprised any Englishmen - so a view that Indians are emotionally excitable is apparently shared by a lot of eminent persons.
But your inaccuracies dont stop here.
Your model countries - both the USA and the UK have plenty of legislative and judicial curbs on free speech to prevent law and order issues. Go read up on exceptions to the US freedom of free speech and press (Hint - 'imminent lawless action'. In the UK, they even have a tidy little legislation devoted to this called the Public Order Act, passed a mere 30 years ago. Maybe a good idea to read that as well (see Sections 18 to 23).
Get the picture?
Moral of the story - think just a little more before you rush to post a response. At the least you wont make typos like '259A' in place of '295A'. At most you'll avoid making a fool of yourself (even anonymously)
When you try to browbeat someone by telling him that his English is not good, don't you think you should at least use correct English?
P.s. When you do get well do let me know. A Wren & Martin awaits you.
His bad english may be intentional but his bad arguments are not. LOL No wonder he calls himself dazed and confused. Very fitting indeed.
I think we'll delete this 'your english not much good' sub thread in the comments, since it doesn't add much to the debate, yes?
The Brown Short exhortations stay (including "turd," used at 13.1.2.2 above), but a line of mild irony gets struck? My line became funny only when the next writer obviously didn't get it, which was a hoot. The writers objecting to my reasoning won't even get the irony in the first line of my reply here. You could properly call my comments ad porcus rather than ad hominem, anyway.
Very clever change of subject, good job really. It's amazing how so many Indians, being the beneficiary of good 'convent' or 'public' school education can recite classical quotations from memory, know their latin better than their sanskrit (and are proud of it at that), love causes that sound and appear to be anti-establishment or anti-majority and get a high by peddling a little sarcasm and innuendos - but are at a loss when it comes to providing substantive reasons (at which point having an argument and winning becomes an end in itself). Maybe a continuation of the 'debates' they loved in school and college.
Anyway, time for D&C to introspect why his or her posts on this topic (of Wendy's book) ended up looking foolish. Maybe a little better research on facts, a reduction of the sarcasm, less stereotyping and greater willingness to see what others are trying to say? Certainly writing a obfuscatory line or two like a bad loser after being proven silly wont get him very far (at the very least on LI forums).
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