Protest In Edinburgh

[GurSa Singh]

Waheguru Ji Ka Khalsa Waheguru Ji Ki Fateh!

jaa rahnaa naahee ait jag taa kaa-it gaarab handhee-ai.

Since one is not destined to remain in this world anyway, why should he ruin himself in pride?

mandaa kisai na aakhee-ai parh akhar ayho bujhee-ai.

Do not call anyone bad; read these words, and understand.

moorkhai naal na lujhee-ai. ||19||

Don't argue with fools. ||19||

(Asa Di //)

Maharaj tells his Sikhs not waste time on arguing! We are all the moorakh, the fool. We are all full of pride. Someone once told me "When GurSikhs are talking about Gurmat it will always be a conversation (vichaar), only when Manmat creeps in will it become an argument."

Waheguru Ji Ka Khalsa Waheguru Ji Ki Fateh!

[TavPrasad Singh]

Alot of egos have been bashed on this thread. if people have other ideas then it doesnt mean that they are personally attacking your beliefs. We need to stop putting our guards up and actually discuss a way forward.

The issue has not been resolved. We need to look beyond getting Justice for the young boy whose's kesh were killed. We need to look at the issue from a Panthic angle and how Sikhs educate wider communities and combat such problems. No doubt this cannot be resolved in one afternoon.

More has to be done. Thats a fact. Now lets get on and do it.

[ParwinderSingh]

this beautiful thread about the people who went to the protest , which made people proud and encoraged people to make an effort if they didnt go has been spoilt...........by alot of people............carm your passions people.

[papoo]

papoo was there and it was cold

[Sikh Soldier]

Nice beginning and a nice conclusion, shame bout the stuff inthe middle

:e:

[Guest Bass Singh]

VJKK VJKF

pictures of scotland protest is up, go 2 www.sikhsoul.com then to gallery and click on the picture!!!

Enjoy

VJKK VJKF

[AK-47]

Scenario 1: Sikh organisations organise themselves and arrange an event to support a victim of racial abuse.

Reaction: They are only doing this for political gain!

Scenario 2: Sikh organisations do nothing and do not arrange an event to help show support for the victim.

Reaction: Sikh organisations are useless and never do anything!

Scenario 3: Sikhs organise themselves quickly and efficently and show up to support a victim.

Reaction: They rush things and messed it up, why didnt they take longer to prepare for it properly!

Scenario 4: Sikhs take a good couple of weeks to arrange something, by which stage its old news.

Reaction: Why did the organisations and sikhs take soo long! why couldnt they arrange something sooner!

Sceanrio 5: Sikhs make use of the press to raise awareness of the issue.

Reaction: why use the press, people are only going to forget in a few days!

Sceanrio 6: Sikhs dont make use of the press.

Reaction: sikhs are stupid and dont know how to use the press!

Scenario 7: Sikhs show a solid display of unity by turning up and encourage others to get off their backsides and also help.

Reaction: These guys are full of ego and its mob mentality!

Scenario 8: Nobody bothers doing anything.

Reaction: there is no unity amongst the sikhs, if only things were like they were in the good old days when people cared!

Sceanrio 9: Sikhs decide to take a stance against forced kesh katal and travel hundreds of miles over 3-4 days finding out the truth of the matter and then spending every available hour speaking to the authorities, families, organisations etc.

Reaction: Its a knee <admin-profanity filter activated> reaction! your just a bunch of evil muslim-wannabbes!

Scenario 10: People just shrug their shoulders at the incident.

Reaction: Oh this wouldnt have happened in the 80's, singhs were real singhs back then! things would have got sorted out overnight ... if only things were like that ... oh and ps i love sant ji and i jump around about 1984 and i wish i had been there!

Point is, you can never please everybody. Either way you will get attacked and criticsed, best thing is to just continue with your seva, and try and accept the insults and criticism with nimrata. Those who make a stand do so for SIKHI, not for personal gain.

Oh and ps the singhs spoke to the gurdwara committee before they returned to england regarding the hall next door as they only found out about it when they got there. Hopefully they decide to do the right thing so the singhs wont have to travel another 12 hours to go and try sort this out.

[GuruManeyoGranth]

Scenario 1: Sikh organisations organise themselves and arrange an event to support a victim of racial abuse.

Reaction: They are only doing this for political gain!

Scenario 2: Sikh organisations do nothing and do not arrange an event to help show support for the victim.

Reaction: Sikh organisations are useless and never do anything!

Scenario 3: Sikhs organise themselves quickly and efficently and show up to support a victim.

Reaction: They rush things and messed it up, why didnt they take longer to prepare for it properly!

Scenario 4: Sikhs take a good couple of weeks to arrange something, by which stage its old news.

Reaction: Why did the organisations and sikhs take soo long! why couldnt they arrange something sooner!

Sceanrio 5: Sikhs make use of the press to raise awareness of the issue.

Reaction: why use the press, people are only going to forget in a few days!

Sceanrio 6: Sikhs dont make use of the press.

Reaction: sikhs are stupid and dont know how to use the press!

Scenario 7: Sikhs show a solid display of unity by turning up and encourage others to get off their backsides and also help.

Reaction: These guys are full of ego and its mob mentality!

Scenario 8: Nobody bothers doing anything.

Reaction: there is no unity amongst the sikhs, if only things were like they were in the good old days when people cared!

Sceanrio 9: Sikhs decide to take a stance against forced kesh katal and travel hundreds of miles over 3-4 days finding out the truth of the matter and then spending every available hour speaking to the authorities, families, organisations etc.

Reaction: Its a knee <admin-profanity filter activated> reaction! your just a bunch of evil muslim-wannabbes!

Scenario 10: People just shrug their shoulders at the incident.

Reaction: Oh this wouldnt have happened in the 80's, singhs were real singhs back then! things would have got sorted out overnight ... if only things were like that ... oh and ps i love sant ji and i jump around about 1984 and i wish i had been there!

Point is, you can never please everybody. Either way you will get attacked and criticsed, best thing is to just continue with your seva, and try and accept the insults and criticism with nimrata. Those who make a stand do so for SIKHI, not for personal gain. :D :lol: :lol:

Oh and ps the singhs spoke to the gurdwara committee before they returned to england regarding the hall next door as they only found out about it when they got there. Hopefully they decide to do the right thing so the singhs wont have to travel another 12 hours to go and try sort this out.

[papoo]

Scenario 1: Sikh organisations organise themselves and arrange an event to support a victim of racial abuse.

Reaction: They are only doing this for political gain!

Scenario 2: Sikh organisations do nothing and do not arrange an event to help show support for the victim.

Reaction: Sikh organisations are useless and never do anything!

Scenario 3: Sikhs organise themselves quickly and efficently and show up to support a victim.

Reaction: They rush things and messed it up, why didnt they take longer to prepare for it properly!

Scenario 4: Sikhs take a good couple of weeks to arrange something, by which stage its old news.

Reaction: Why did the organisations and sikhs take soo long! why couldnt they arrange something sooner!

Sceanrio 5: Sikhs make use of the press to raise awareness of the issue.

Reaction: why use the press, people are only going to forget in a few days!

Sceanrio 6: Sikhs dont make use of the press.

Reaction: sikhs are stupid and dont know how to use the press!

Scenario 7: Sikhs show a solid display of unity by turning up and encourage others to get off their backsides and also help.

Reaction: These guys are full of ego and its mob mentality!

Scenario 8: Nobody bothers doing anything.

Reaction: there is no unity amongst the sikhs, if only things were like they were in the good old days when people cared!

Sceanrio 9: Sikhs decide to take a stance against forced kesh katal and travel hundreds of miles over 3-4 days finding out the truth of the matter and then spending every available hour speaking to the authorities, families, organisations etc.

Reaction: Its a knee <admin-profanity filter activated> reaction! your just a bunch of evil muslim-wannabbes!

Scenario 10: People just shrug their shoulders at the incident.

Reaction: Oh this wouldnt have happened in the 80's, singhs were real singhs back then! things would have got sorted out overnight ... if only things were like that ... oh and ps i love sant ji and i jump around about 1984 and i wish i had been there!

Point is, you can never please everybody. Either way you will get attacked and criticsed, best thing is to just continue with your seva, and try and accept the insults and criticism with nimrata. Those who make a stand do so for SIKHI, not for personal gain.

Oh and ps the singhs spoke to the gurdwara committee before they returned to england regarding the hall next door as they only found out about it when they got there. Hopefully they decide to do the right thing so the singhs wont have to travel another 12 hours to go and try sort this out.

Papooo agrees with the above

[sikhlionz]

This issue isn't over yet - pressure needs to be kept on the Police to ensure justice prevails

http://www.sikhsangat.org/publish/article_1543.shtml

Racist Attacks Cause Sikh Youth to Question What They Believe?

Western intolerance of religious symbols and a series of street attacks are prompting young men to shed their hair and turbans. Many Sikhs cut their hair when they become teenagers in an effort to fit in with their local surroundings. Sikh students say that increasing numbers of racially motivated attacks have had a significant impact on their attitudes.

Dalwinder Singh, an executive board member of a student group, said: “We do get a lot of young kids trimming their hair because they see how they are treated.

“For example, they find that they can’t take part in certain things at school and they just don’t want to stand out. And the attacks that have been in the news have definitely had an effect. Teenagers just want to fit in with what society is doing,” Mr Singh said.

Harwinder Singh, a representative of the Sikh Education Council, said: “In the past five to ten years, especially after September 11 terrorist attacks, more and more younger Sikhs began to trim their hair.

Meanwhile in a discreet corner of the northwest Indian town of Amritsar, Harkirat Waraich is about to do what would have been sacrilege to his father and every other male ancestor for the past 300 years.

He is sitting in front of a cracked mirror in the inappropriately named Modern barber’s shop. And he is about to have a haircut. As a 34-year-old baptised Sikh man, Mr Waraich is supposed to grow his beard and his hair long and to wear the turban in public at all times — one of the five core tenets of Sikhism.

According to the rules laid down by the 10th Sikh Guru, Gobind Singh, in 1699, he is also obliged to carry a sword and a wooden comb, and to wear loose cotton underwear and an iron band on his wrist. But half a millennium after the founding of Sikhism, attitudes are changing among its 23 million followers, some 90 per cent of whom live in India.

The Shiromani Gurdwara Prabandhak Committee (SGPC), the community’s decision-making body, has spoken out. “This is a challenge to the traditional Sikh identity,” Avtar Singh Makkar, president of the SGPC, said. “Young boys are doing this because they want to look smart. They think this because of the influence of modern culture through the Western media,” he said. “It is our task to educate them about the sacrifices that have been made for their religion and to bring them back to their faith.”

The crisis at the heart of the Sikh community is one indicator of the social changes that are challenging traditions across India some 15 years after it began market-orientated economic reforms.

It also reflects the growing intolerance in the West towards overtly religious clothing — especially veils and turbans — five years after the attacks on America of September 11, 2001. Many young Sikh men who have cut their hair say that they did so to escape the humiliation of turban searches at Western airports or to avoid being mistaken for Muslims.

They cite Balbri Singh Sodi, a petrol station owner shot dead in Arizona on September 15, 2001. His American killer, bent on revenge for 9/11, thought that Mr Sodi’s turban indicated that he was an Arab.

The community was shocked again this month when a gang of white youths shouting racist abuse, beat up and viciously assaulted a 15-year-old Sikh boy and cut off his hair in a public park in Edinburgh.

The racist attack was met with a large candlelit vigil (pictured) by Sikhs and members of other faiths to encourage peace, tolerance and respect.

But worrying as racist attacks are, Sikhs are even more concerned by a broader official crackdown on overt expressions of religious identity in the West, especially in Europe.

Turbans have been banned from French state schools, as have Muslim headscarves, under a “secularity” law that came into effect in 2004. Last month a court in Denmark upheld a ruling that an Indian Sikh had broken the law by carrying his ceremonial dagger, the kirpan, in public.

Sikh community leaders now fear that the turban could be banned in Britain — home to about 500,000 Sikhs — after the recent impassioned debate about Muslim headscarves. The SGPC wrote to Tony Blair and other Western leaders this week to ask them to protect Sikhs’ right to wear the turban.

“Sikhs in turbans gave their lives by the thousands to defend France and other Western countries in the First and Second World Wars,” Mr Singh, the SGPC leader, said. “Why should they be denied the freedoms that they fought and died for?” Sikhs have suffered popular and official persecution in India too, most notably after Operation Bluestar in which the Golden Temple was attacked and thousands of Sikhs killed in June 1984. Thousands more innocent Sikhs were killed in the many days of the Anti-Sikh pogroms that followed in November 1984.

Patricia Uberoi, a professor of sociology at Delhi University, said that one of the main cultural influences on young Sikhs was the bhangra pop music that emerged in the British Punjabi community in the 1990s. Many of its stars are Sikh but do not wear the turban. But she said that the Sikhs in India are worried that the population of the faith being less than 2 per cent of the country — would be swamped by the Hindu majority. 'If Sikhism is not followed properly, then what do they end up with but Hinduism again?'