My post yesterday on the Burger King-Lakshmi idiocy appears to have sparked a tangential, and fascinating, discussion on religion in the comments section. Abhi, who started this, had asked some questions; I’ll reply later in what is proving to be a very busy day but in the interim, weigh in with your thoughts: What does religion mean to you?
Update: Incidentally, Burger King has pulled the ad in question. A company statement reads:
“Burger King Corporation values and respects all of its guests as well as the communities we serve. This in-store advertisement was running to support a limited-time-only local promotion for three restaurants in Spain and was not intended to offend anyone. Out of respect for the Hindu community, the in-store advertisement has been removed from the restaurants.”
Not enough, says the irrepressible Rajan Zed: Burger King should now form an in-house team to assess all publicity material. And as and when this team is set up, he is willing to educate its members on the intricacies of the world’s religions.
Oh well.
10 comments
Religion means nothing to me other than a blank space in the forms that i try my best to avoid filling up.
@Liju – Well said
What I don’t still get is why a ‘secular’ country like India still has govt. forms that ask me my religion. They should have an option there called ‘mind your own god-damned business’
Sujeet – LOL 🙂
Priceless comment!
I think, all religions are there for people to find solace to the eternal truth – death.
As a Hindu I did not feel offended by this ad. But that is me. It is clear that many Hindus would be offended by it.
Now if I were CEO of BK I would not care if the protest against this ad is valid or not. The CEO would be more concerned to know which Idiot allowed a religious symbol to be used in a BK ad. In marketing one of the basic things that is understood never associate your brand with any religious symbols.
I used to work in a software distribution company . We put out an software AD depicting Hitler. We were in big trouble, as it turned out that the publisher of the software being advertised was Jewish, who was offended of using Hitler’s image along with his brand. Sometimes a company unintentionally ends up using a religious symbol for example when Mohamed Azaruddin signed his name on a shoe all the shoes with his name on it had to be withdrawn.
Prem, you need to be careful before throwing around allegations and projecting your political biases onto statements of facts. I clicked on the link you provided and nowhere does it claim that the “acclaimed Hindu statesman” said that most Hindus are vegetarian. That was the reporter’s claim.
Earlier, I responded to another post where your political biases colored facts. You did not respond to it, but in that instance too, you did not do what a good journalist ought to do before making assertions – verify facts.
As I said in that post, I like your style in general, and please don’t take the criticism personally. I’m only providing such feedback so you can be more careful in future.
Oh wait, go back and read the sequence. I said “the related reportage” was absurd, and quoted that bit about all Hindus being vegetarian.
I then link to Zed’s views, in his words. I say I am in agreement with the first part of his comments. I then quote the second bit, about Hindus, ahimsa, non-meat-eating, and disagree with that.
No question here of letting my “political biases” color facts. And while on that, I don’t have a “political bias” with ref Zed, and I neither know nor care what his politics are. From first hand experience of the man, I found him a publicity-hound, a man intent on taking an accidental moment in the sun and parlaying that into a leadership position in my religion — a position I believe he does not merit.
Prem,
This is what you wrote.
If an “acclaimed Hindu statesman” says so, then I guess he must be right, and my breakfast must in fact have been grass, tricked out as a sunny-side-up [It is all Maya, didn’t Krishna say?].
I clicked on the link just to get entertained and found that Rajan Zed never uttered that sentence, but you ridicule him for saying the sentence. I have no idea who this Zed character is, but this was the second time in a short period where I sensed some sort of political potshot on your part. See my comment I posted on the California textbook issue.
I was surprised you ran them down without even reading what they are about. The group that sued consists of one of the most objective set of people who actually did something innovative – they challenged biblical indoctrination in history textbooks in USA.
When I saw this comment from you, it felt like I saw two errors in a very short span of time.
*Sigh* Okay, here goes again. The first sentence, about all Hindus being veg, I clearly attribute to the reportage. And the second bit as clearly refers to the Zed comments that are *subsequently* appended. RZ did not say *that* sentence. What he *did* say is subsequently quoted — about Hinduism being anti-meat eating, encouraging vegetarianism, etc. I am a Hindu, and am not aware of any such thing. That is my only agenda.
As for the California textbook issue, try reading the transcripts of the two suits brought by HAF and CAPEEM, and the court judgement, you’ll get a better idea of what I am about. Notice I did not say anything about HAF — which incidentally was first to file suit, and whose position on the issue I thought was both merited, and rational.
One other thing: there is no “error” here. These are points of view. You have yours, I have mine, and that is fine — it does not follow that we need to go back and forth till one is *proved* to be erroneous and the other right, according to some arbitrary yardstick. Discussion is good, mate. So is individual points of view.
Hi Prem,
Absolutely no disrespect to you. I mostly agree with you when you write stuff. I did not mean to upset you and am sorry if I inadvertently did that.
CAPEEM filed its suit a few days *before* HAF. This is what I meant by verifying facts. I don’t mean that you do not verify facts, just that this issue has a lot of rumors attached to it and requires more caution.
While HAF represented Hindus, CAPEEM did not impose that restriction on their supporters and they got a couple of well known atheists on their team as well as leading expert on Christianity. They took on the chapter on Christianity and pointed out many examples of indoctrination in history textbooks.
I have spoken to some of those who know the CAPEEM folks very well and have a better understanding of the case than most people who get excited by posts made on the internet. The reason you were wrong on the ruling is that the court did not rule on the merits of the CAPEEM case. The facts are as follows:
1) The judge cited an earlier case about the court refusing to rule against a book using the n-word for blacks on the grounds that if he ruled against it, he would have to rule against every book. The same argument was made in the CAPEEM case. In short, the court will not touch any lawsuit alleging discrimination based on contents as it would open the floodgates.
2) The challenge to the Christianity chapter was an innovative and terrific challenge and was my point of interest in the lawsuit. That was not allowed on a technicality on the grounds that their objectives don’t explicitly state it as an objective. This technicality can be fixed and I hope they fix it and use the money to launch another attack on this issue.
3) The judgment that went in CAPEEM’s favor clearly states that CAPEEM had lots of evidence to prove discrimination in procedure as well as the way specific edits were handled.
Having said that, all the above happened in a preliminary motion and not in a trial. (2) was appealable IMO, not (1). I actually agree with the judge on (1). (3) was a winner in the trial, but CAPEEM made the call to settle the case. That is of course their call, but I hope they pursue (2) in future. IMO, (2) was appealable as the judge was wrong by interpreting CAPEEM’s objectives too narrowly to escape ruling on it.
The fact that they involved atheists in their lawsuit was a masterstroke and I hope they continue with this line of attack over the long term. Why they settled instead of putting the indoctrination arguments before the 9th Cir. is beyond me, but as I said, it is their call.
I read George Joseph’s report in India Abroad on this issue and he seems to have done his homework pretty well. It was refreshing to read that report. Congratulations to him and IA!
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