Tamil Brahmins: Lost in Tamil Nadu.

[prasad1]

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My disclaimer:

There is thread about organizing community. I did not want to post this in that thread.
I am a TB (what ever that means). I belong to the group because of birth. I never stayed in Tamil Nadu. I still have family there and visit it periodically. I belong to Tamil groups in my town.
I have nothing to be ashamed of being a born-brahmin. I do not thing I am special because of being a brahmin. I have refused to be a member of North American Brahmin Forum, as I have nothing in common with them. I do not believe in caste based superiority/inferiority etc.
This article is dated, ground realities may be different today.
This thread is an introspection in to the group.
I am not a BB (LOL), I know I will be labeled as such. Oh well. :Cry:

Years ago, well-known Tamil actor and political satirist Mr Cho Ramaswamy had remarked tongue firmly in cheek – “Tamil Brahmins are people who fight with each other, degrade themselves and paint the entire community in shades of dark.” If you look at the events (in literary and movie circles in Tamil Nadu and the political climate), you will realise that Mr Ramaswamy was absolutely right then, he is right even now. We talk about Kashmiri Pandits becoming strangers in Jammu and Kashmir. The Tamil Brahmins find themselves alienated in their own land. With more than 75% of the younger generation of Tamil Brahmins having moved to foreign land in pursuit of job / education and others scattered across different parts of India, it is an easy guess that population of Tamil Brahmins in Tamil Nadu is steadily waning. The increasing trend of inter-caste marriages is a further threat.


Thus, three factors contributed to degradation of Tamil Brahmins in Tamil Nadu.

• Negative influence of movies
• Negative influence of Tamil literature
• The Dravidian rule in Tamil Nadu
​

Ask any like-minded Tamil Brahmin settled abroad or settled in other parts of India, whether he would like to relocate to Chennai. The answer would be a strict no. Chennai auto drivers are notorious but they are particularly harsh on Tamil Brahmins. Some of my cousins who studied in Chennai have shared anecdotes of how they were ragged for speaking the Brahmin language.

A Malayalee will always support a Malayalee, but a Tamil Brahmin, will always work against other Brahmins. The people whom I have mentioned in the above paragraphs are classic examples. The net result of all these is that Tamil Brahmins are slowly losing their identity in Tamil Nadu.

2010. A village in Tamil Nadu. A street that houses Brahmins called as “Agraharam”. Unlike the past, where “Agraharam” was symbolic of “Brahmins”, today the “Agraharm” is a mere prop. Not a single house in the “Agraharam” belongs to a Brahmin.

- See more at: http://www.boloji.com/index.cfm?md=Content&sd=Articles&ArticleID=9570#sthash.EnP3mMYD.dpuf
http://www.boloji.com/index.cfm?md=Content&sd=Articles&ArticleID=9570

I do not agree with the article, but it might point to the true image, and as to why younger TB are not motivated to join.

 

[prasad1]

It could probably be a selection bias. If you belong to that community, you are more likely to tune into discussions related to that community. That being said, it is indeed true that there was a perception among people of previous generations that this particular community was different from others. This perception had both good and bad parts to it, ie there was admiration as well as envy. In some ways it was due to the fact that the levels of professional success achieved by this community was considerably higher than other communities. But post-liberalization and due to years of affirmative action, other communities are fast catching up. If a proper statistical study is done, it would probably reflect a scenario where we would see a much broader community-wise distribution among professionals, than is commonly acknowledged.

By now, it is common knowledge in academic and professional circles that all those theories of some communities being genetically more intelligent are all humbug. It was only a question of access to skills and a proper environment to develop the skills. Once both become available to a broader section of people, there is no particular dominance of any one community. People who are ahead in the technology curve - students of elite institutions, people working in cutting edge research/startups already know this. I did study in a top engineering institute and as far as I remember, the toppers were split across all kinds of communities. But there will be some inertia as people had mistakenly believed for several decades that this community was likely to be far more intelligent than others. If the current trends continue for a few more years, all such false notions will disappear and beyond that no one will bother about your community or any other community name for that matter.
https://www.quora.com/Why-are-Tamil...-in-India-Why-dont-people-just-leave-us-alone

 

[prasad1]

I don't agree that we are the most discussed community.
I belong to the community and have never felt so. I am perfectly cosmopolitan in my thinking and behaviour and mix closely with people of all communities. I become a Brahmin, only on rare occasions like a religious ceremony at home.

Here are some more thoughts that come to me that I would like to share.

l liked this term "Collective Narcissism" quoted by Mohan Vanamaalai.

I have experienced it in a yahoo group of over 6000 members (mostly senior citizens) belonging to the Iyer community. That group is now defunct but I was a member of the group for several years.

Most of the members of the yahoo group I mentioned above, had constructive discussions and wrote about issues like the significance of our religious rites, Classical music and dance, raagas, and artists and performances, debates on the relevance of some of our customs, discussions regarding Geeta, RaamaayaNa, and the Mahaabhaarata, the clash between Shaastras and modern practices, advice on pilgrimages and information on transport and accommodation facilities, exchanging news about boys and girls of the community eligible for marriage, appeals for donations for temples, anecdotes about the Kanchi Shankarachaaya, personal glimpses and interesting facts about prominent members of the community, old age, pension and health problems and advice, cribbing and whining about modern Vaadyaars (priests) and their exorbitant demands balanced by posts supporting the vaadyaars, explaining that they too need to live a decent life in these days of high costs, heated and stormy discussions on whether it is proper for a Vaadyaar to use a cell phone, etc etc.

But a set of die-hard members of the community, would write long posts reeking of caste snobbery! Reading their posts, it was clear that they considered themselves among God's chosen few and brooked no opposition to this belief. They would curse modern girls for being "too independent" (and not "adjusting") and being too choosy during arranged marriage negotiations and the parents of mediocre boys, struggling to find brides for them, would bemoan the parents of the girls becoming arrogant due to the economic independence of modern girls, and their not being given the "respect" they were accustomed to(and entitled to earlier)simply by virtue of their being "laDke waale". (The boy's party). They also declared girls choosing Non Brahmins as spouses as a great calamity and would seek solutions on how to prevent it and save the pure "gene pool" of the community nurtured over centuries, from being "polluted". Some were so orthodox that they even declared those of us who have been abroad as defaulters and no longer pure Brahmins. They declared adoption of kids as "Non Brahminic" and deplored them. Some of their views would even make fanatic Muslim Mullas appear modern.

When I moved to North India, everything changed. No one discussed us or took any notice of us. I was just a "Madraasee" for my North Indian friends. During my brief stints abroad, my Brahmin identity receded further into the background. I was happy to be recognised simply as at least a South Asian, if not Indian.


https://www.quora.com/Why-are-Tamil...-in-India-Why-dont-people-just-leave-us-alone

 

[prasad1]

The brahmins were given education. Spiritual processes and religion were in his hands because the word ‘brahmin’ itself comes from this, that it is somebody who has realized that he is the Brahman or the ‘Divine.’ So a brahmin comes from an ultimate sense of responsibility, an unlimited sense of responsibility. Only a person who has an unlimited sense of responsibility should handle education and religion because they were considered as the most vital aspects of any society.
Difference vs Discrimination

So accordingly, the caste system was made in India. It was a good arrangement for those days. It is just that over a period of time, you became a brahmin by birth not by worth; that is when the trouble started. That is so with every system. Whatever system we create, we must constantly work to keep it clean and make it happen well otherwise every system, no matter how beautiful the system is to start with, can become a source of exploitation.

When there were no IITs or ITIs, when there were no training centers, your family was the only way to train, isn’t it? So it was very important to maintain a blacksmith culture, a goldsmith culture or a cobbler culture; otherwise there would be no skills.
But now the knowledge is democratized, any body can acquire knowledge. So the family/clan/caste is not protecting the "special" knowledge.

This whole caste system in India came when there were no formal training centers for any particular profession. Suppose your father was a blacksmith, so at the age of 6, the moment you were ready, you started playing around with the hammer and anvil. By the time you were 8, your father saw that you anyway wanted to hit it, so it was better to hit it with some purpose. By the time you were 12, you were on the job. By the time you were 18 or 20, you had some craft and expertise on your hand to make your own living.

It is over a period of time that it became a means for exploitation. We started saying that a man who runs the temple is better than a man who runs the school. A man who runs the school is better than a man who runs the blacksmith shop. These are differences, everybody has to do something. But we established differences as discriminations over a period of time. If we had just maintained the difference, we would have been a nice, colorful culture; but we made it discriminatory.
http://isha.sadhguru.org/blog/lifestyle/why-we-do-what-we-do-the-caste-system/

 

[V.Balasubramani]

'The angst of the Tamil brahmin: Live and let live'

By Badri Seshadri

When Narendra Modi expanded his cabinet and made Manohar Parrikar andSuresh Prabhu cabinet ministers, journalist Rajdeep Sardesai tweeted thus:"Big day for my Goa. Two GSBs (Gowd Saraswat Brah min), both talented politicians become full cabinet ministers. Saraswat pride!!" The last bit"Saraswat pride" indicating brahmin caste affinity and pride caused considerable stir in the media.

Brahmins may be at the top of the archaic social hierarchy, but in reality they hold little or no power across the country. They are numerically insignificant inmost states and are not found in the public sphere at all. This is more so in Tamil Nadu than any other state.

Read more at: http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/...in-Live-and-let-live/articleshow/45408151.cms

 

[Vaagmi]

'The angst of the Tamil brahmin: Live and let live'

By Badri Seshadri

When Narendra Modi expanded his cabinet and made Manohar Parrikar andSuresh Prabhu cabinet ministers, journalist Rajdeep Sardesai tweeted thus:"Big day for my Goa. Two GSBs (Gowd Saraswat Brah min), both talented politicians become full cabinet ministers. Saraswat pride!!" The last bit"Saraswat pride" indicating brahmin caste affinity and pride caused considerable stir in the media.

Brahmins may be at the top of the archaic social hierarchy, but in reality they hold little or no power across the country. They are numerically insignificant inmost states and are not found in the public sphere at all. This is more so in Tamil Nadu than any other state.

Read more at: http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/...in-Live-and-let-live/articleshow/45408151.cms

post #1 to 4 -- the usual cutting/pasting job. Nothing original. we have been hearing all this and more in vitriolic Tamil in Tamilnadu for long. There is nothing here to impress us. These are coloured opinion usually from the "regretful brahmins" and for them regret is the oxygen on which they live.

 

[prasad1]

post #1 to 4 -- the usual cutting/pasting job. Nothing original. we have been hearing all this and more in vitriolic Tamil in Tamilnadu for long. There is nothing here to impress us. These are coloured opinion usually from the "regretful brahmins" and for them regret is the oxygen on which they live.

Vaagmiji,
Everyone here in this site Know your (should capitalize it) opinion, you have been sharing it in the other post.
I did not post in that thread, so there can be counter point of view. Of course in your thread you have YOUR ORIGINAL PURE thoughts. I have given the source of my posting. Do we need your snide attack?

 

[Vaagmi]

Vaagmiji,
Everyone here in this site Know your (should capitalize it) opinion, you have been sharing it in the other post.
I did not post in that thread, so there can be counter point of view. Of course in your thread you have YOUR ORIGINAL PURE thoughts. I have given the source of my posting. Do we need your snide attack?

Prasadji

That was not intended to be an attack. That was a counterpoint expressed forcefully.
Why this regretful posts? Who don't you and others like you whom you have quoted come out of the regretful position and join the mainstream. The mainstream is least bothered about what happened in the past generations. They are here and now. They are keenly aware of their distinctive strength and expect to be treated for what they are. People like you want them accept that they have nothing special to offer, they are just an insignificant molecule in the homogeneous aggregate. However hard you and your friends try the yathaarththam will prevail.

 

[CHANDRU1849]

How long we are going to say this without doing anything concrete? Each and every community has its own ups and downs. B is not an exception.

The total worldwide population of Parsis is less than one lakh. Despite that, they are dominating in all fields. The major reason is unity and helping each other.

Can't we follow Parsis and achieve, instead of begging and shouting against Govt. What is the major hurdle to achieve this?

 

[tbs]

How long we are going to say this without doing anything concrete? Each and every community has its own ups and downs. B is not an exception.

The total worldwide population of Parsis is less than one lakh. Despite that, they are dominating in all fields. The major reason is unity and helping each other.

Can't we follow Parsis and achieve, instead of begging and shouting against Govt. What is the major hurdle to achieve this?

hi

nothing....no hurdle...but we tamil brahmins are more self oriented and self centered than as a community...we have great

achievements as individualistic but as whole community ...we are NIL...sorry to say..my personal opinion that its hard to unite...

we are some much greedy/selfish attitudes....another reason ....we dont have single leader/archarya as a whole community...

even our ACHARYA system itself is so divided...

 

[CHANDRU1849]

Let us form common code in religion and practice to avoid confusion and conflict. This can be accomplished only thru educated person who have interest in religion and caste. Acharyas both Smarthas and Vaishnavites have no role to play in the unification of caste for achieving common goal.

Some sacrifices have to be made to swim the current.

 

[auh]

Let us form common code in religion and practice to avoid confusion and conflict. This can be accomplished only thru educated person who have interest in religion and caste. Acharyas both Smarthas and Vaishnavites have no role to play in the unification of caste for achieving common goal.

Some sacrifices have to be made to swim the current.

An educated person, not just of the literal, who has an interest in religion and caste, will not go against tradition. The fear of the unknown is strong in humans.

 

[auh]

post #1 to 4 -- the usual cutting/pasting job. Nothing original. we have been hearing all this and more in vitriolic Tamil in Tamilnadu for long. There is nothing here to impress us. These are coloured opinion usually from the "regretful brahmins" and for them regret is the oxygen on which they live.

Socially and economically/financially, how would you place the brahmins - those of the era of hostility and those in the current times?

 

[CHANDRU1849]

Socially and economically/financially, how would you place the brahmins - those of the era of hostility and those in the current times?

Bs are not very affluent right from the days of Varna period, as Bs have to depend on somebody for their livelihood. Pshtriyas ruled the place and Vaishyas had land and business. Hence, Bs and the last Varna had to depend somebody. Some Bs would have been successful, once they come out of dependence and start thinking independently or within the group. At present, the Bs, who achieved, stood on their own legs, instead of begging - IT, Legal, Industry, Finance etc.