as a singh whos family was displaced by partition, i could definatley relate. My grandmother (nuni) told me stories of how woman would kill themselves in fear of being raped or kidnapped during those time. This movie shows how it was, and how religions can tear appart people :-/
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Its so crazy. Religion is an instrument of love, humanity and brotherhood. When misinterpreted and misused by mortals, it can have a devastating effect on society. It converts the society in to what was meant to be averted by the religion in the first place.
shareReligion CAN be used to tear people apart but so can anything else in the world. There's nothing wrong with religion itself. The problem is fanaticism, which has other roots. Political elites will use religion to divide people but this creates a deceptive picture, as most religious people are perfectly content to live alongside their neighbors. It's the loud minority we pay attention to while ignoring the rest.
This doesn't only happen with religion. Look at Germany and Italy, where the Nazis and fascists exploited the bitterness and suffering of the people to rally them around their cause. There were other interests behind this, rich and powerful people who benefited from the new order and exploited the grievances of the people to build it. This is called demagoguery. Demagogues manipulate people and brainwash them, using them for their own interests. This can happen anywhere, and not just with religion. Religion played little to no part in what happened in Germany and Italy.
Someone like Saleem, in the movie, who has no direction in life, is susceptible to being led in the wrong direction by manipulative demagogues like the ones we saw in the movie, who use people for their own interests. Saleem joined the fanatics because he had no prospects; all he saw in his future was the life of a poor peasant farmer. He wanted something bigger and more meaningful, and then these fanatics came along with an explanation for what's wrong in the world and how to make it better, and promised him a role in building their new world, giving him a chance to be something. Can we blame him for taking that chance when it was handed to him? Is it really his fault? Or is it the fault of the unjust way the world is structured, that gave Saleem no future except the one offered to him by extremists?
To avoid things like this happening, we can't just look at religion. Religion can be used for positive or negative things, like anything else in life. Take religion away, and you'll only take away one vehicle through which this can happen; it won't address the source. To avoid things like this, we need to look at something deeper: poverty, oppression, and the unjust way the world is structured. People are susceptible to demagogues when they have nothing else to turn to, when they have no opportunities, or grievances they are unable to address by other means. In Saleem's case, it was poverty and lack of opportunities. For many others, it's grievances, for example anger at the American bombs dropping on their countries and killing their families and their people, that drive them into the arms of extremist demagogues like the ones we saw in this movie. We have to address the source. Take religion away, and people will just find something else.
"The comfort of the rich depends upon an abundant supply of the poor."
- Voltaire