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Facial hair or none. Hat or no hat. Long hair or shaved head. Religions dictate much about our culture’s gender norms.
“A picture snapped surreptitiously and posted to Reddit’s r/funny thread has drawn attention to a little-known tenet of the Sikh faith. “Yes, I’m a baptized Sikh woman with facial hair,” Balpreet Kaur, a college student, wrote in response to her picture. Kaur, an Ohio State University sophomore studying neuroscience and psychology, is a baptized Sikh, and as such follows the so-called “5 Ks,” or five physical symbols that date back to the creation of the faith by Guru Gobind Singh in 1699, according to BBC. One of the tenets is kesh, or uncut hair…”.* Cenk Uygur and John Iadarola (host of TYT University and Common Room) break it down on The Young Turks.
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Photo credit: YouTube/Young Turks
While religion certainly played a part, I posit that was because a long time ago, religion relied on young men to go forth in battle to protect the faith. Then we became enamored of the individual. Think the political armies, or the westerns. At least here in America. That has carried us to today that makes no sense anymore. Wars will be fought by drones controlled by nerdy folks behind computer screens. That’s a plus for humanity. Weaklings if you will. Doesn’t matter. Specialized small human teams in specialized insertions. The human costs will be small in relative terms. So… Read more »