Part 1: Casteism

Some of the casteist quotes by the 'monk'->

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Vivekananda did not fundamentally reject the caste system. He cites statements attributed to Vivekananda describing caste as a “natural” or useful social system and argues that Vivekananda defended Brahminical hierarchy.

Sources:

https://en.m.wikisource.org/wiki/The_Complete_Works_of_Swami_Vivekananda/Volume_5/Interviews/The_Abroad_And_The_Problems_At_Home

https://en.m.wikisource.org/wiki/The_Complete_Works_of_Swami_Vivekananda/Volume_3/Lectures_from_Colombo_to_Almora/The_Future_of_India

Non-Brahmins/Shudras: Vivekananda advised non-Brahmins to improve their position by acquiring Sanskrit and “culture,” rather than directly challenging Brahmin dominance.

"I have seen castes in almost every country in the world, but nowhere is their plan and purpose so glorious as here. If caste is unavoidable I would rather have a caste of purity and culture and self sacrifice than a caste of dollars."

Needless to say the 'purity' and 'culture' belong to the Brahmin and self-sacrifice on the part of shudras. Vivekananda was an apologist and defender of this sanctified slavery which have kept the toiling masses down for millennia. 

• He also writes, "Caste is good. That is the only natural way of solving life."
• He makes his position clear when he says, "Caste is a salutary system. We must obey it. Not even one in a million understands what is really is."
• Vivekananda exhorted the restive Shudras in a pontifical language, "To non- Brahmins my advice is -- wait, don't be so clamorous. Don't attack Brahmins all the time... Who prevented you from learning Sanskrit and acquiring culture?"

Supporting caste.

Caste should not go.

Here, he is not asking brahmins to give up on their privileged position, rather telling shudras on what to do.

The best way to improve their condition is to learn Sanskrit ,the sacred language! Rammohun Roy, a great Sanskritist rejected Sanskrit as a dead language and considered learning the language ,a sheer waste of time. Curiously enough, Vivekananda who had only smattering of Sanskrit recommended it to Shudras as a means to raise their "cultural standard".

Swami Vivekananda’s ideas fail to challenge the foundational structure of the caste system. Vivekananda did not/never rejected caste altogether. He did not raise the issue of political representation, demand the redistribution of resources and power, or propose dismantling the Brahmanical monopoly over knowledge. His approach sought to preserve the Brahmanical religious structure while merely reforming its moral surface. He did not call for the destruction of the caste system.

He also argued that society naturally produces different types of people and that Varṇa represented psychological and occupational diversity. In his view, complete social equality was neither possible nor desirable. He further argued that all societies have caste-like divisions and that modern class systems are merely new forms of caste.

Moreover, Vivekananda treated untouchability primarily as a “moral sin,” whereas Dr. B. R. Ambedkar viewed it as a structural injustice and a crime requiring legal and institutional remedies.

Vivekananda and Dr. Ambedkar:

• Vivekananda criticised Birth-based caste as degenerated Varna but Dr. Ambedkar saw it as a structural system of graded inequality.
• Vivekananda defended the Varna system whereas Dr. Ambedkar completely rejected it.
• Vivekananda treated Untouchability as a moral sin whereas Dr. Ambedkar saw it as a crime requiring law.
• Vivekananda saw spiritual reform as its solution whereas Dr. Ambedkar stood for Annihilation of caste and law.
• Vivekanand said that Hindu scriptures required to be reinterpreted whereas Dr. Ambedkar rejected them as creators of the caste system.
• Ambedkar famously argued that reformers like Vivekananda underestimated the structural violence of caste.

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Part 2: Misogyny and racism/colourism, using sexually derogatory language, indirectly supporting sati and child marriage.

Women and gender: Vivekananda held conservative views about women, emphasising their roles as mothers and sisters rather than supporting complete individual and social freedom. It contrasts him with reformers such as Rammohun Roy and Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar.

Racism:

··· “Even the prettiest Indian woman will look like a black owl”

Primary source: Letter to Manmatha Nath Bhattacharya
Date: 5 September 1894
Place: Annisquam, Massachusetts
CWSV: Vol. 7, Epistles—Third Series, Letter XXIII, “Mr. Bhattacharya”
Page: commonly cited around pp. 82–84 in the standard editions.

That occurs in a letter to Saratchandra Chakravarty. In the same passage Vivekananda contrasts American and English women and attributes American beauty partly to the blending of European “blood strains.” Vivekananda praised the appearance of American women while disparaging Indian women, saying even a beautiful Indian woman would look like a “black owl” by comparison.

Source : Letter

**Narendranath Datta and Swami Vivekananda are the same person. "**Swami Vivekananda” was the name he adopted before traveling to the West.

When Narendranath Datta, alias Swami Vivekanand, toured the United States in 1893, he conducted several public and private lectures and classes. He spent many years there, was well-received, and gained popularity, especially among Western women.

Datta/Vivekanand charmed and mystified American and English women with his 'attractive aura, deep baritone, colourful silk robe and turban, and sweet chanting in exotic Sanskrit.' Slightly more than five feet eight inches tall, 'plump, and cherubic, to ladies, the thirty-year-old monk seemed not only tall and magnificent but also enigmatic and holy.'

Despite Datta's/Vivekanand's enormous popularity with American women, his attitude towards them, and femininity in general, was demeaning, even disdainful. Given his larger-than-life image, people usually disregard the undercurrent of gender prejudice that lurks beneath his sermons, lectures and remarks. When the young monk came to the United States, women were enchanted by his presence. Christina Greenstidel, a New York woman who met Datta/Vivekanand in Detroit, saw him as a 'powerful saint' full of 'ojas.' He exuded, she wrote, a 'mysterious power which comes when the physical forces of the body are transmuted into spiritual power.' Some American women who met Datta/Vivekanand also gave similar testimonies.

At first, Datta/Vivekanand was overwhelmed with the adoration he received from American women. However, he soon began to dread it as it caused suspicion and paranoia of eroticism. At the time, he believed 'female sexuality was the greatest danger to male continence.'

Evidence indicates that the Datta/Vivekanand was frightened even by the adoration and love he received from his female students. So, Vivekananda recommended 'de-sexualizing' women by elevating them to the role of mothers.

Get educated just to become mothers?

He was frightened by female sexuality and used derogatory language for them:

"In many texts, women are idealised as pure, spiritual, and nurturant when they are de-erotized and placed in clearly defined and sexually tabooed blood relationships such as those of mother, sister, or daughter. In other words, when emphasis is placed on their sexuality, they are often vilified for this aspect of their nature and condemned as temptress, seductress, or whore."

He claimed Christian women sought luxuries and recreation, such as wealth, social power, operas, novels, etc. and told his pupil, Saracchandra Chakrabarti, that attending his lectures sexually excited American 'sluts' and 'buggers.' He labelled the ladies who followed him in Boston as 'all faddists, all fickle, merely bent on following something new and strange.'

Vivekananda also believed that a woman’s pining for her beloved (reminiscent of the mythical Radha in Vaishnava folklore) represented the highest metaphor for God realisation. As a social object, however, the woman still needed to be handled carefully.

Obsession with fair skin:

**Dutta/Vivekanand was also a product of a culture that was 'heavily obsessed with fair skin.' His letters reveal that he was initially charmed by fair-skinned women. In a 'strictly confidential' but 'disarmingly candid' letter to a friend, Dutta thought American women were so beautiful that the women from India, no matter how attractive, would look like a 'black owl.'

Despite his cringeworthy comments on American women, his denigration of Indian women, and his patriarchal ideas, he was often venerated and portrayed as a larger-than-life image.

He praised American women as pure:

Primary source: Letter to Maharaja Ajit Singh of Khetri
Date: 10 June 1894 (the letter is dated from Chicago; editions sometimes give slightly different editorial dating)
CWSV: Vol. 6, Epistles—Second Series, “XL Maharaja of Khetri”
Page: approximately pp. 288–292 in the standard pagination.

Letters from Dutta/Vivekananda also show judgemental and demeaning comments made by him that portray his emotional conflict in his views regarding Western women. For example, he had called the American ladies 'pure as the icicle on Diana's temple,' but he changed his mind and regarded them as excessively materialistic with no spirituality.

Source : Women

Datta/Vivekanand demonstrated that, for him, the idea of a woman fluctuates between maternal and carnal extremes. He believed that cultivating purity of mind was dependent on virginity. Unsurprisingly, Swami's favourite ideals were Sita, who voluntarily endured every test of fidelity, and Savitri, whose unwavering love ostensibly brought her dead husband back to life. In his words, 'the ideal womanhood of India is motherhood-that marvellous, unselfish, all suffering, ever-forgiving mother.'

Source: Interview, “On Indian Women—Their Past, Present and Future”
Publication: Prabuddha Bharata, December 1898
CWSV: Vol. 5, Interviews
Page: approximately pp. 229–231 in standard editions.

For Datta/Vivekanand, education was the most essential step toward women's emancipation. However**, he also advocated for a particular kind of education based on what he defined as 'true womanhood,' that is, 'women fit to be mothers of heroes.'**

Source : Women

Vivekananda asserted that the greatest virtues of Indian women happened to be modesty, devotion, sacrifice, maintaining household chores, child rearing and humility.

His discourse on women was marked by conflict and ambiguity. His discourse promoted female education while denying educated women the freedom to live independently. By putting them in the pigeonhole of a 'mother' or 'sister,' the women were merely reduced to an apparatus to produce great men and placed them right under the control of men.

Vivekananda mentioned that women in India considered every other male, except her husband, as her child and every male should treat women, other than his wife, as a symbol of motherhood. 

Swami also felt threatened even by the doting affection and admiration he received from his most celebrated female pupil, Sister Nivedita.

Like his guru, Sri Ramakrishna (1836–86), Vivekananda advocated the idea of de-sexualising the woman by conferring upon her the status of the mother.

He also had gender-specific expectations, such as cooking, sewing and domestic responsibilities for women. His emphasis on sacrifice, motherhood and traditional virtues could reinforce existing gender roles.

Views on child Marriage and Sati:

Once, he supported the child marriage as he believed that the proximity between the partners at a tender age would be favourable for a stable conjugal relationship.

Once, when answering accusations made by an American audience about the ill treatment of the Hindu widow, he denied that they were at all subjected to ‘any particular hardship’. The self-immolation of the sati, he claimed, was no worse than the burning of witches on the stake by the church in medieval Europe.

Vivekananda had great admiration for Padmini, the ‘brave’ Rajput princess who, rather than surrender to another man’s lust, chose to immolate herself in the husband’s funeral pyre.

Child marriage

Source : Child Marriage

Femininity versus masculinity: Vivekananda frequently equated femininity with weakness, passivity, emotionality, and even cowardice, while associating masculinity with strength, courage, independence, and spiritual power. He therefore frequently urged people, including women—. to develop “manliness". He also espoused that self-suffering and sacrifice were the greatest moral virtues to be followed by women. The busy, workaholic, and independent women of the West enthused him to a large extent. But the "masculine" attitude of the Western women disheartened him.

Femininity and Masculinity

Sexuality and Celibacy:

This same regressive attitude colours his ideas related to sexuality and gender. He had normal sexual drives, and it seems he struggled all his life to control it. The monastic ideal is based on the cruel repression of sexuality. Vivekananda made much of 'brahmacharya ' or total abstinence from sex with less-than-satisfactory consequences for himself as well for his followers. 
He had a belief that a brahmachari attains almost divine attributes by retaining the seminal fluid and ultimately transforming it into grey matters in the brain. If one goes through his conversation with one of his disciples, one can only be highly amused: 

"Chandibabu: Does it help one to control his sexual impulse if one wears a tight undergarment?
"Vivekananda: Hardly ever. Do you know once it was so strong that in desperation I sat on a brazier with live cinders to teach it a lesson? I was badly burnt and it took me quite some time to heal up the burns."

It reminds me of J Krishnamurti's real life story of a sudhu who castrated himself with a blunt knife to get rid of it once for all. So by rejecting Rammohun Roy's ideal of a spiritual life within family life, Vivekananda only made himself miserable .To overcome it, he struck a more defiant masculine pose which took its toll on his mental life. He bequeathed this abject fear of the feminine to his followers. 

The monks of Ramkrishna Mission remain busy to protect themselves from 'lust' and transform their valuable seminal fluids into overflowing grey matters. In order to protect their very sacred educational institutions from feminine invasion, they moved court and sought a minority status. All their educational institutions are male preserves, insulated from any feminine interaction. A noble achievement indeed!

**Unlike the Brahmos or Vidyasagar, he was no enthusiast for female education. He wanted to see them as sacrificing mothers and sisters -- pure and dutiful but never as a beloved or an individuals pursuing their own ends.**This led him to gloss over worst patriarchal tyrannies and oppressions before his Western audience and denounce those who were fighting against heavy odds to redress them.

Pandita Ramabai, one of the early feminists dared to call the bluff. Despite all this, he was far from the projected Hindutva icon who didn't hesitate to take beef to live frugally and considered playing football better than going to a temple. Despite the self-imposed asceticism, he loved to be surrounded by plump white women of wealth and refinement .He was humanist at war with himself.

Tagore in his novel "Gora" models the protagonist unmistakably after Vivekananda, a tormented Hindu fanatic, febrile, struggling desperately to resist love. At the end of the novel his world collapses but he is redeemed by love.

Swami Vivekananda’s Views on Marriage:

"...but let me tell you now that the ideas behind our marriage system are the only ideas through which there can be a real civilisation. There cannot be anything else. If a man or a woman were allowed the freedom to take up any woman or man as wife or husband, if individual pleasure, satisfaction of animal instincts, were to be allowed to run loose in society, the result must be evil, evil children, wicked and demoniacal. Ay, man in every country is, on the one hand, producing these brutal children, and on the other hand multiplying the police force to keep these brutes down. The question is not how to destroy evil that way, but how to prevent the very birth of evil. And so long as you live in society your marriage certainly affects every member of it; and therefore society has the right to dictate whom you shall marry, and whom you shall not. And great ideas of this kind have been be hind the system of marriage here, what they call the astrological Jati of the bride and bridegroom. And in passing I may remark that According to Manu a child who is born of lust is not an Aryan. The child whose very conception and whose death is according to the rules of the Vedas, such is an Aryan. Yes, and less of these Aryan children are being produced in every country, and the result is the mass of evil which we call Kali Yuga. But we have lost all these ideals..."

Source : Marriage

You can read more about this in detail on : Swami Vivekananda's Perspective on Women and Womanhood

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