beatting women

[Guest guest]

>

> > For the same reason it would be OK to beat (ordinary) sudras.

> Well I have seen at Kumbha Mela and other such events, the only way to

> manage the crowd is the police waving sticks as ninety percent are simple

> villagers (who are also mentioned in the original verse along with

> sudras). Mostly I see them waving their sticks but hardly ever beating,

> and I haven't seen any other succesful method to keep order under those

> circumstances, except the barricades that they put up everywhere to keep

> everyone in line, that also happen to be made of sticks.

 

One other thing I forgot to add in reference to this comment you've made; I

watched at the installation of Sri Panca-tattva here in Mayapur where a

crowd of literally thousands rushed into the temple when the doors were

opened. They had barricades up, and chowkidars everywhere, but many of these

people -- local villagers -- had been lining up and went rushing into the

temple, disregarding the barricades and the chowkidars. One devotee -- not

necessary to name him here, perhaps -- snatched a long bamboo stick from the

chowkidar and started beating at the crowd. The strikes from that bamboo rod

must have hurt like hell; watching him (he is a big man) my initial reaction

was one of shock -- it looked like an extremely violent action. But within

*seconds* he had stopped the crowd -- literally seconds. It was the most

intelligent, swift-acting remedy for what could have been -- definitely

WOULD have been -- an extremely dangerous situation that would have caused

injury to so many.

 

That, to me, was the understanding of these statements by Srila Prabhupada,

in living action. I'd like to see someone who "objects" to these statements

stand in a room in that situation -- or at the Kumbhamela as you've also

written -- and try and "talk" someone out of doing what they're doing

 

Your servant

Braja Sevaki dd ¾