Meme Dump

Oh Alabama

A bill making its way through the GQP-controlled Alabama Legislature would lift the state’s nearly thirty-year ban on teaching yoga in public schools.

Stop there. Alabama has had a ban on teaching yoga is public schools for thirty years? Yes, because in 1993 the state’s Board of Education bent to the will of conservative asshats over yoga’s Hindu roots. But now they have a new bill, though, because it’s still Alabama, the bill will allow the teaching of yoga to schoolchildren if, and only if:

“All poses, exercises, and stretching techniques shall have exclusively English descriptive names.”

“Chanting, mantras, mudras, use of mandalas, and namaste greetings shall be expressly prohibited.”

So Alabama, the only state in the union to ban yoga—because it has roots in Hinduism—is now thinking of allowing it, as long as you don’t say “Namaste.”

For the unenlightened—see what I did there—means “the light in me bows to the light in you.”

Seriously.

Baptists Are Against It

This just in from ISBL correspondent, and Round-The-Way-Gay, Neal:

It seems that Southern Baptist Seminary President Albert Mohler is calling for all Christians to avoid......
The Gays?
The Democrats?
The Scientists?
The Other Religions?

None of the above.

Mohler wants Christians to stop doing.........yoga. He says the stretching and meditative discipline derived from Eastern religions is not a Christian pathway to God, and he objects to "the idea that the body is a vehicle for reaching consciousness with the divine," and adds, "That's just not Christianity." 

Huh? WTF? Huh?

Mohler says that Christians who practice yoga "must either deny the reality of what yoga represents or fail to see the contradictions between their Christian commitments and their embrace of yoga."

And, as it happens, Crazy Like Mohler has some friends.

Nutjob and Chief Wack-a-Doo Pat Robertson has taken to calling the chanting and other spiritual components of yoga "really spooky," while California megachurch asshat pastor John MacArthur says yoga is a "false religion." 

And, get this, even Muslim clerics have banned Muslims from practicing yoga.

Muslims and Baptists agree on something?

See, I thought yoga was mostly about exercises and stretching and not just about Eastern mysticism. And even if it isn't, well, really Mr. Mohler, really?

source

Yoga Away The Gay

It's been mere minutes, it seems, since the Delhi High Court ruled that homosexuality is not a crime, and it's already being challenged.

Swami Baba Ramdev, a yoga guru, filed the challenge saying homosexuality was a "disease" and could be cured by yoga. He says, "It can be treated like any other congenital defect. Such tendencies can be treated by yoga, pranayama (breathing exercises) and other meditation techniques."
Ramdev, quite popular among middle-class Hindu families, also believes yoga, can cure diseases such as AIDS, cancer and leukemia.

His is not the only challenge to the court's ruling.

An astrologer, Suresh Kumar Kaushal, also filed a petition against the decision saying that, if gay sex is legalised, "tomorrow people might seek permission for having sex with animals".

Even in India they have the same tired arguments.

Doesn't wash here, won't wash there.