Anyone who thinks Christine Fair is professional and is in anyone's camp apart from Christine Fair's is mistaken IMHO. She has her own agenda and it may change tomorrow.
"Hardcore Hindutva types" and "cow urine" jibes were exactly what that terrorist who attacked the Pulwama CRPF guys used. Its a slippery slope, as is the use of the term bhakt to describe people who subscribe to a different political ideology. Its a slippery slope. The term bhakt means devotee in Hindu religious parlance. The fact that it has been used extensively by the left who are Hinduphobes and brought into common usage by all of us should still make us more aware and careful. Especially since that ilk would bristle at us appropriating similar religiously charged terms to describe people of other faiths yet they trade on our acceptance to mock our own belief systems.
Similarly, the cow urine jibe has become a terrific self-goal by Hindus who have ended up giving bigoted propagandists a huge tool to mock Hindus, because we allowed it to become widespread and have not done enough to put across a viewpoint which takes into account the context.
For instance, how many here know the drug
Premarin commonly prescribed by doctors, is made from horse urine (
https://www.peta.org/about-peta/faq/my- ... this-true/ and
https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/premarin/). And what of
Insulin itself - for many many decades it was derived from the pancreas of pigs and cattle. (
http://www.animalresearch.info/en/medic ... f-insulin/)
Fact is without the ability to screen for active ingredients, it was very common in indigenous/nativist medical systems to use the entire raw material itself. And in the local context, it has been demonstrated that cow urine does contain compounds that have medical benefit.
I do know that in rural India, cow urine has been successfully used as a disinfectant for skin infections with rapid effects!
Ironically, any attempt by Indian scientists to screen cow urine for active compounds is attacked by the western media and their local support crew in our left/media gang as evidence of how deluded, primeval Hindus are.
Similar attempts were made by the usual suspects to attack the Modi led GOI's attempts to use Ayurveda in the modern context, and its body screening types. The charge was led by Brit based "scientist bloggers" and gleefully lapped by up local media. Reality? A very senior Doctor, a non Hindu btw, engaged in research, recently noted to me & several others, that our ancients had done yeoman work in classifying body types and how they were specifically susceptible to particular diseases, and it now needed to be tailored with genomic analysis to correlate with drug effectiveness. Yoga and Yoga Day were widely mocked by desi websites like Firstpost about how it was being prescribed for anyone and everything, and it was basically a fraud. Not a peep from the same folks, about US Army treating veterans with Yoga for PTSD. Oh, wait, vagus nerve. (
https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/ne ... s?from=mdr)
Guess who, by constantly mocking and disparaging attempts to seek answers in nativist medicine and even its mere evaluation to discern the wheat from the chaff, is seeking to block any and every possible advance that leapfrogs the current western dominance in healthcare. Whether by intent or otherwise, the lead is sought to be maintained.
And understand this, this jibe applies at ALL Hindus, irrespective of whether you are fair, dark, thin, fat, upper or middle or lower caste, or rich or poor, or are a doctor, or an educational professional or a CEO or a veteran. You are a Hindu, you will be tagged with this. No westerner or Paki, will care for your nuance that you are not a cow-urine type and in fact criticize your peers for the same. Some chap does not like your business proposal, this is the jibe that will be going on behind your back. Irrespective of the fact that camel urine is widely used in Arab countries and has religious backing in Islam. (
https://islamqa.info/en/answers/83423/t ... amel-urine)
Its in *your* best interest to fight back, as much as possible, disarm this jibe, and point out that cow urine *may* have significant benefits but it requires additional research, and extreme positions regarding its possible benefit may be due to its widespread usage in native health systems, and citing the examples above push back, stating its our choice to ensure serendipitous medical discoveries are not ignored.
Coming back to Fair, she refuses to consider any and every evidence until it meets her agenda to the nth and coincides with her belief system. Right now she has a bee in her bonnet regarding Pakistan and is hence anti-Pak to a degree, tomorrow she well might flip.
KLN Murthy, IMO is utterly correct in his assessment of her. Her single and total purpose is pushing the western agenda and considering them and by consequence herself sui generis, far above whatever Indians are, and are capable of. Three recent cases provide ample evidence of her thought process and
how she disregards any and every evidence until and unless it meets her agenda.
First, she was particularly sneeringly dismissive of the IAF's Balakote strike, based on the same logic, and the IAF's F-16 claim. No amount of evidence provided by the IAF was enough for her, once IAF made the F-16 claim. She dismissed senior IAF folks and veterans as propagandists, routinely uses the term bhakt for anyone who disagrees with her and provides evidence, and has in the past used the cow urine jibe as well. Its ok to disagree, but the disagreeable manner in which it was done, spoke volumes.
In recent days, when the CAB/NRC issue came up, she started name-calling Indian security analysyts who supported it as bigots, in effect trying to shame them into silence. Of course, she keeps utterly silent about US operations in Afghanistan unless it meets her political agenda (anti-Trump). For instance, she named called Sushant Sareen as an anti-Muslim bigot *merely because he supported CAB and NRC*. He took the high road pointing out she is abusive to everyone and her name-calling was pathetic.
Third, her support for many folks who are Hinduphobes. A casual perusal of her TL reaffirms her enthusiastic usage of Hinduphobe terms, jibes at anyone who disagrees with her on *any* topic. Its important to note that even other academics, who may hold far more extreme positions than her on other topics are rarely so disagreeable. It is completely mistaken IMHO to divorce what these folks personal beliefs are versus Hindus, Indians as merely their personal foible and not consider the impact it has on their public behavior and so called analysis.
In short, enjoy her support re: Pak and the schadenfreude as much as possible when Pakistanis confront the fact that an asset they sought to cultivate backfired spectacularly, but we need to keep our own counsel and push the Indian POV by improving the stature, capability and reach of India based sources.
Unfortunately, most of the analysis published by many desi think tanks etc is pedestrian compared to what even a biased western scholar may turn out. Even apart from the optics of an Indian writing on Pakistan, our quality in official journals is hit and miss.
I have learnt more from SSridhar's top notch posts on BRF, than from those who are doing this on a standard basis.
curiouser and curiouser
