RE: Remove the Gandhi statue from Richcraft Hall Nov. 9-15
The premise of the letter calling for the removal of the Richcraft Hall Gandhi statue dissolves under factual review. It makes the assumption that any distinction made between different groups are based on the race of people who make up those groups, ignoring their adaptedness and culture which make people from different environments unique to each other independently of their race.
Judging adaptedness as predetermined by a person’s race, instead of by the environment they adapted themselves to, denies their agency and potential as a person.
For example, many Indian immigrants had begun willfully integrating into the merchant trade in South Africa—a practice antithetical to the traditions of native South Africans—but familiar to those from industrialized India. The other letter implies this difference in ability to integrate was based on race, instead of the adaptedness of the Indian people. This logic attributes the difference between groups to race, which is the definition of racism.
Gandhi argued the different adaptedness of Indians and native peoples to an industrialized environment was not due to race, but to cultural norms. This distinction put a dent in the armor of white supremacism dominating South Africa by showing the ability of all, regardless of race, to adapt to an industrial environment. Contextualizing Gandhi’s words and actions elucidates why Nelson Mandela, Martin Luther King Jr., and Barack Obama cite this alleged racist as a hero and formative influence in the struggle against racism.
But what of the allegations of misogyny, sleeping naked with his niece, and dedication to a cruel caste system? Unfounded—he was by no means a misogynist, as Gandhi opposed all sexuality not in the service of creating life, not just women’s. This is unsurprising coming from a man who renounced all possession and pleasure.
Moreover, he had many of the most capable women in India in his entourage and at the vanguard of his movements, advising women to live safely in a society where they were often correctively raped with no justice, merely for keeping their hair ‘immodestly’. Gandhi fought against the practice of forcing modest dress upon women through opposing the purdah, the mandatory veiled dress of women.
The girl he allegedly slept naked with wrote a memoir about being raised by Gandhi, titled “Bapu, My Mother” doting over his maternal and loving nature.
Still not convinced? As referenced in Gandhi and His Critics, the original accuser, Gandhi’s secretary in 1946, affirmed there was no impropriety on Gandhi’s part in a letter clarifying that he, “ . . . never slept in any room of his own . . . Or even if he slept in a room, if there was no verandah in the house, there were others like Parsuram etc. [Gandhi’s stenographer] who slept in beds beside him.”
In the same way as the other allegations, his cited support of India’s caste system falls apart quickly under scrutiny and could not be further from the truth.
When the British sought to segregate the lowest caste, the untouchables, from the rest of India, Gandhi began a fast until death. His concern was justified, as when the Muslim caucus split, it lead to bloody civil war and the division of the country. News of his fast inspired people to open up temples, wells and public places to the untouchables. This provoked the leaders of caste Hindus and untouchables to devise an integrated alternative to replace the British partition. Gandhi said this about his actions:
“I am undermining it completely,” he said, “by my tackling untouchability . . . If untouchability goes,” he said, “the caste system goes.”
The basis of equality is that individuals be judged not by their skin colour, but by the content of their character. No one’s character stands up to scrutiny better than Mahatma Gandhi’s—so I refuse to support calls for the removal of the Gandhi statue in front of Richcraft Hall.
