Why does the RSS not admit female members?
Because Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) is not a unisex organisation.As one of the senior RSS member mentioned in one of the TV interview RSS has been made only for men because of two main reasons.RSS shakhas are held morning and evening which were not suitable for homemakers (women)Usually evening shakhas will be having young crowd where many games are played and most of the game involve intense physical activities like pulling one another, climbing on ones back/shoulders [2], Pass through gap between ones legs[1], Fall on one another while playing Kabaddi on mud fields. Imagine both girls and boys doing this together. Don’t you feel it will be quite impossible ?This is why for women a separate similar organisation was started and its called Rashtra Sevika Samiti - Wikipedia . It works almost similar.As answered by Dattatreya hosabale (One among 4 Top 2 level RSS leaders) to a question in india today conclave [3], in future boys and girls may participate in RSS’s shakha activities together. (Please don’t ask me how)PS : What is the difference between Rashtriya Sevika Samiti and Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh?[1] Like this[2] somewhat like this - Tourists wave and climb on each other's[3] Dattatreya hosabale India Today Conclave 2016. I had seen 1 hr long interview of him (Don’t remember exactly). I got two related videos of 20+ minutes each. I don’t know whether it includes my point. (Sorry for that)Hope I answered you.
Is it quite common for people to be liberal and idealistic when they are young and more conservative as they get older?
I've heard this before too. Lies, damned lies, and statistics…The world is hardly ever that simple.What Is Really Going On:I'll explain how someone could arrive at that conclusion using true facts and why that conclusion is highly misleading.Note: data and images used below are from the Pew Research Center[1]It's true that older people are more likely to be conservatives[2]47% of people ages 69–86 identify as/lean republican and only 43% as democrat. Not a huge difference, but significant.51% of millenials (18–33) identify as/lean democrat and only 35% as republican.In fact, if you look at party lean across generations you'll see a very consistent trend: older generations are more likely to lean republican and less likely to lean democrat.Note: I’m focusing on the “lean” charts because we aim to compare liberal and conservative more than party affiliation.Aha! So people do get more conservative as they age! Well… noThis does not mean people become more conservative as they age because they are different people. The worlds these two groups grew up in are wildly different. There's no reason to think that age is a cause rather than a correlating factor.In fact, if you look at the “lean” charts over time, within each generation, you'll notice that for younger generations the blue line is actually trending upwards and red downwards.There's a blue spike in 2008 corresponding to Obama’s election. Once you correct for that, the trend is a little more clear.So why did someone tell me people are idealistic and liberal when they're young and get more conservative as they age?Perhaps they just heard it somewhere or saw the numbers and didn't look at them very carefully.Or perhaps they have their own bias. After all, “People tend to realize we are right as they get older and wiser” sounds a whole lot better than:Our voter base is old and dyingYou'd understand us better if you had been around for the Jim Crow laws.I can't find where on the email to put the stamp.Okay, those are harsh and satirical, but the point is that the data does not support, and actually refutes the idea that people get more conservative as they age.Footnotes[1] Search[2] A Deep Dive Into Party Affiliation
What do Mormons think about the excommunication of Kate Kelly?
I endured a somewhat similar case. First, a little history.I was a trans woman, and was excommunicated. The LDS Church, for those that are unaware, has very stringent rules about being LGBTQ, and is uncompromising. In my case, for reasons I’ll not get into here, I was trans and knew it for the three years I was LDS. I came out to my bishop and the stake president before I did any temple work however. I knew that would be an unforgivable transgression. My point being that it served to point out to me that I really was trans, that I wanted the surgery, and that I was a feminist.I didn’t harbor any grudge toward the LDS Church, nor were they anything but courteous to me at my hearing. But it was a foregone conclusion to me that I’d be excommunicated, so I moved on. I was firm in my convictions to transition, and that’s what I did almost 24 years ago.In Kate Kelly’s case, not that I endorse her backing down, because I don’t, but creating change from within can take a long long time, if ever. The LDS Church is very patriarchal. I’m not endorsing that patriarchy. I’m very much anti-patriarchy. But Kate knew in what direction she was headed before it ever happened. Still, if she wanted to fight for women’s ordination or making any other major change in the religion, chipping away at the wall is the only way that will ever happen. But it will have to be an effort by more than one woman, or even group of women. It will happen only if women from every ward, stake, and country come together, and only if they have men’s support. That’s likely not going to happen in the LDS Church, certainly not anytime soon.
Why do so many people hate Ayn Rand? Why are she and her books so unpopular? Why does objectivism raise passions so?
Honestly?All this hate directed to Ayn Rand (author) comes from plain misunderstanding. Her view of the world is complex (I do one hour a week of discussions of her theory, and have still not understood her completely), and very weird at first contact. Therefore, whoever looks at it superficially may be tempted to hate it and regard it as stupid and childish.What I discovered is that Ayn Rand is a lover of The Human Race. She loves humans, their capabilities to transform the world, and the difficulty on accepting their nature, their preferences, their passions, their flaws and virtues, and living connected to them.Take for instance her take on egoism. People start to feel uneasy just by hearing the term Egoism. For instance, why someone gives money to charity? People will say "To help the others". She will counter that with "You help others because you like to help others/it makes you feel better". It's truth, plain truth. But it is scary, it exposes people. She is not telling you to be a selfish stupid person. When she defends Selfishness, she is just saying to you: "don´t be a lawyer because your dad wants it"; "don't be unhappy with your wife because you pity her"; in sum, don't go against your nature. You are beautiful, skilled in some way, peculiar, enjoy it.Basically, once you accept yourself as you are (think Howard Roark), you are above everything. To me, it relates a lot to Buddhism. Hank Rearden, for instance, is someone who struggles with his nature accross almost all the Atlas Shrugged story, and does not know where his melancholy comes from. Once he accepts who he is, and accepts the nature of his wife (who does not accept his nature nor his virtues and flaws), he liberates himself.If you hate Ayn Rand, please take time to discuss it with someone who really understands her ideas.