Talk:Sita Ram Goel

message: Hornplease seems to belong to the same cabal of Marxists who are in a state of permanent hysteria with regards to Hinduism/Nationalism. A reader of his comments and edits would not leave even a simpleton in doubt with regards to his 'objectivity'. Same old censorship game, be it the Romila Thapar page or any other page dealing with History. 
God! Why do such people not get gainfully employed somewhere? Pity you, Hornplease. If you want, can suggest a good Doc for your illness  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 203.196.249.242 (talk) 06:28, 29 September 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: Hornplease edits

message: He was a marxist, he then converted to Hinduism. "Why I Became A Hindu", he had to have started from somewhere. Bakaman%% 23:10, 26 July 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  Read that book once more.he never relinquished his dharma. Bharatveer 04:07, 27 July 2006 (UTC)

text: Marxist has nothing to do with religion or being an atheist really. At worse I hazard Sita Ram went through a phase where he "lost" his religion before he refound, lots of people undergo it and it does not mean conversion. You can be a marxist, communist and a religious person. The suppression of religion in the communist world is to prevent unauthorized gatherings so that the dicatators can prevent ideas non conducive to them from propogation.--Tigeroo 05:10, 27 July 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Convert from what?

message: looks like certain users are vandalizing this page Bakaman 19:04, 23 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Your ill-considered interventions will be ignored until you understand that accusations of vandalism in content dispute are considered personal attacks.Hornplease 10:25, 27 December 2006 (UTC)

text: Removing large portions of material is defined as vandalism. Doing it for an extended time despite opposition from one or more other editors is tendentious.Bakaman 16:19, 27 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  See above. On a related note, congratulations on discovering the policy on tendentiousness! Are you attempting to avoid being tendentious these days? (As if I didnt know...) Hornplease 19:13, 27 December 2006 (UTC)

text: I never was tendentious. I read up on it so you couldnt use false canards to lecture me and misrepresent my edits. Perhaps arbcom didnt teach you a lesson. Apart from banned trolls, you are the only user on wikipedia who harbors fantasies of this sort.Bakaman 19:17, 27 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: You clearly learnt nothing from arbcom. As I have pointed out elsewhere, your active and rather pathetic solicitation of 'votes' even from very inexperienced editors does not serve to cancel out - oh, whatever, you probably arent even reading this far. In any case, I was given very strong indication that the ArbCom would not consider your behaviour, as the case was getting too messy. I fully expect you'll be up there sometime, though. In expectation of that glorious Judgment Day, perhaps a certain moderation of tone would be in order? No? Well, your decision. Have fun! Hornplease 19:26, 27 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Funny considering this and this and . Considering Seadog is a member of MedCab, and the majority of the other votes were from Admins or near-admins I'll do the "charitable thing" and ignore your comment. 1 vote doesnt account for the consensus. Dont forget your "vote" put you in the same category as such pillars of the project like , and  (even BhaiSaab was of a different opinion). I would think that even when a banned anti-Semite disagreed with you a point would have been made, but its "your decision". Even the one user that you seem to have a productive relationship with (Rama's Arrow), decided he would support constructive editors against distinguished experts in the art of harassment.Bakaman 19:51, 27 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: deletions

message: "(...)The forfeiture is exactly the sort of thing which had landed us where we are: where intellectual inquiry is shut out; where our traditions are not examined, and reassessed; and where as a consequence there is no dialogue. It is exactly the sort of thing too which foments reaction. (...)"Freedom of expression which is legitimate and constitutionally protected," it [the Supreme Court] declared last year, "cannot be held to ransom by an intolerant group or people." (...)The "victories" in having Shah Bano reversed, in having Rushdie banned - "victories" which were loudly applauded by the "secularists"; the success in convincing political parties - with maps and lists - that Muslims would decide their fate in hundreds of constituencies; to say nothing of the "victories" of the violence in Punjab and Kashmir - the reaction is the cumulative result of these distortions in our polity" is a long, off-topic quote that does not discuss Goel. So too the other quotes, which together create a degree of imbalance in the article; this is not a soapbox, particularly for fringe views.
That he attacked Romila Thapar is possible, but he attacked all mainstream Indian historians, so why single out Thapar? Also, Meera Nanda is probably relatively nn at this point. Finally, he is known for his polemics, is he not? 
I trust this is satisfactory, please discuss each point in turn. Hornplease 10:25, 27 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Requested explanations

message: These were the paragraphs that were deleted or shortened in your last edit. We'll see what we can make of them. 
*Goel has also criticized the work and research methods of Marxist historians like Romila Thapar. 
This may be notable because of the famous letter he sent to Romila Thapar.
*:No one has ever refuted him on facts, but many have sought to smear him and his writing. They have thereby transmuted the work from mere scholarship into warning. (...)The forfeiture is exactly the sort of thing which had landed us where we are: where intellectual inquiry is shut out; where our traditions are not examined, and reassessed; and where as a consequence there is no dialogue. It is exactly the sort of thing too which foments reaction. (...)"Freedom of expression which is legitimate and constitutionally protected," it [the Supreme Court] declared last year, "cannot be held to ransom by an intolerant group or people." (...)The "victories" in having Shah Bano reversed, in having Rushdie banned - "victories" which were loudly applauded by the "secularists"; the success in convincing political parties - with maps and lists - that Muslims would decide their fate in hundreds of constituencies; to say nothing of the "victories" of the violence in Punjab and Kashmir - the reaction is the cumulative result of these distortions in our polity. Fomenting Reaction by Arun Shourie. 8 November, 1990. Freedom of expression - Secular Theocracy Versus Liberal Democracy (1998, edited by Sita Ram Goel) 
*The case has been criticized by Elst, who wrote: "Conversely, banning this book would send a signal that the present establishment will do what it can to prevent Hinduism from rising up, from regaining self-confidence, from facing the challenge of hostile ideologies."Freedom of expression - Secular Theocracy Versus Liberal Democracy (1998, edited by Sita Ram Goel) 
*The American author David Frawley wrote about Voice of India:While Voice of India had a controversial reputation, I found nothing irrational, much less extreme about their ideas or publications. They were simply doing for the Hindu religion what intellectuals in other religious traditions had done for theirs. Their criticisms of Islam were on par with the criticisms of the Catholic Church and of Christianity done by such Western thinkers as Voltaire or Thomas Jefferson. In fact they went far beyond such mere rational or historical criticisms of other religions and brought in a profound spiritual and yogic view as well.  
*Sita Ram Goel has often been described as an "intellectual kshatriya".e.g. in India’s only communalist: In commemoration of Sita Ram Goel; Edited by Koenraad Elst; Voice of India, New Delhi. (2005) 
*The Belgian writer Koenraad Elst met Sita Ram Goel in India and wrote about his work: "The importance of Ram Swarup's and Sita Ram Goel's work can hardly be over-estimated. I for one have no doubt that future textbooks on comparative religion as well as those on Indian political and intellectual history will devote crucial chapters to their analysis. They are the first to give a first-hand "Pagan" reply to the versions of history and "comparative religion" imposed by the monotheist world-conquerors, both at the level of historical fact and of fundamental doctrine, both in terms of the specific Hindu experience and of a more generalized theory of religion free from prophetic-monotheistic bias. 
*K. Elst also stated:  "Come to mention him, I found that in moral stature and depth of scholarship, he completely dwarfed the Stalinist "eminent historians" and other icons of "secularism". Which is why I cannot help frowning when I see Meera Nanda forget her limitations and berate a towering personality like Goel." 
*David Frawley said about Goel that he was "modern India’s greatest intellectual kshatriya", and "one of India’s most important thinkers in the post-independence era". According to Frawley, "Sitaram followed a strong rationalistic point of view that did not compromise the truth even for politeness sake. His intellectual rigor is quite unparalleled in Hindu circles..." Frawley, David. How I became a Hindu --Bondego 10:05, 29 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Deleted/pruned passages 

message: This article could be a good "Good Article". See here for guidelines:  --Bondego 15:01, 5 January 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Please note that the article as it stands nowhere states that Goel was not an accredited historian, includes no evaluation of Goel by any academic authority, and does not explicitly state that all his work was, in effect, self-published. Hornplease 09:34, 26 January 2007 (UTC)

text: I will respond in a few days. --Bondego 22:03, 31 January 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Note that you have agreed with all the points I have raised above. (a) He is not an accredited historian inasmuch as he appears to have received merely an undergraduate degree in the subject; (b) the article does not make clear that all the academic authorities that can spare the time to consider such a marginal figure make it clear that he is not considered anywhere near sufficiently reputable, which you make clear above; (c) He ran Voice of India, which published all of his books, as well as the festschrift that you seem to think is a reliable source. Hornplease 08:57, 10 March 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Khuswant Singh does not have a degree in history and studied law in England. His work 'History of Sikhs' is rated a one of the best works written on Sikh history. Cunnhingham and Colnel Tod et al were military officers and their books are still used as reference on Indian history. What about Solzhenitsyn ? Should his historical works/essays on the communist Russia be discarded because he did not have a Ph.D in history? Your point about this author's competence to write history is a mute one. History writing is not such an esoteric art form as you make it sound, especially when people who oppose Goel - people like Romila Thapar et al-  are even citing Nehru's works (who was a politician first and foremost with no background in histriograhpy)  as 'historical research' which are of dubious academic worth. The NCERT books in India are littered with Nehru's personal opinions as if they were the work of some "accredited historian". I read a lot of crap in Nehru's 'history' books- like Gengiz Khan being a Buddhist etc and other such nonsense. The point is Nehru is quoted by all these historians (who oppose Goel)  with the likes of VA Smith et al . Nehru's  academic credentials as a historian were non-existent in the strict academic sense of the term, especially in the sense these Marxim-trained academics question Goel's credentials (who atleast had a degree in history). So there is a lot of hypocrisy and double-standards flying around. Thanks. --Internet Scholar (talk) 18:16, 29 January 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  Good article 

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message: This article has serious NPOV issues. For example the only two comments in the Legacy section are from two prominent prominnents of Hindutva, neither of which are historians (except perhaps by their own fancy; but the scholarly community does not consider them as such). One of them (David Frawley) is an astrologer for Christ's sake. Who cares what a third rate pseudoscience-promoting quack thinks of this guy? Brusquedandelion (talk) 11:35, 14 March 2024 (UTC)
thread_title:  Serious NPOV issues