5mo ago

You don't have to fear these things

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Coffee and Yoga?
- Mormons are anti coffee
- My ex-mother outlaw wouldn't do yoga because she thought it was a religion or witchcraft or something (ETA: and thus thought it imperiled her eternal soul because she might pick up some beliefs) and she was a mainline Baptist so yeah, yoga.
  
  I know it's a typo but an ex-mother outlaw who won't do yoga sounds pretty cool. "In a world where yoga was required by law. She said no. Rated R"
  
  Not a typo, actually. She's my ex mother outlaw because I never married my ex, her other title is "my kids grandma". She is great, though has the oddball conservative ideas you'd expect for an old person. Like the yogaphobia.
  
  It is technically part of a repressive religion itself so the placement in the list does seem a bit odd to me, but the nuance is that nonpractitioners can use it to stretch and exercise without any spiritualism.
  
  I think I read that originally yoga was a mental and physical practice that later on had all these layers of religiosity added. Someone more knowledgeable feel free to correct me.
  
  originally hindu meditation for seeking.... well... I'm not sure I understand it.
  in the modern era there's both the traditional, religious yoga, and the people doing it for generic mindfulness and physical fitness. it's also in Jainism and Buddhism, but it started in hinduism.
  
  Yeah I realized after writing that, it's a little flippant. My favorite yoga teacher once described American yoga as an unholy mashup of British calisthenics and ancient Indian spiritual and contemplative practices, and that sounds about right. I do know it's orientalist, and that's problematic, but goodness it is a great physical practice, the way we do it here.
  
  thought it was a religion
  It absolutely started as a religious practice. There are various forms of yoga that are used as mediation practices in Hinduism.
  That said, Westerners almost never practice yoga that way. They'll sprinkle in a generous helping of, "namaste" but they're basically doing it as a form of light exercise.
  It's like if a bunch of Indians saw a Catholic ceremony and said, "That's a pretty good workout. Stand up, sit down, kneel, sit, kneel, stand. It's not a religious thing, I just go to mass for leg day."
  
  The church I grew up in offered "yoga style stretching class" that did not have any heathen influences like gongs or deep breathing or Sanskrit names for stuff, was separated by gender, did not allow yoga pants or bare midriffs and avoided any postures that flaunted the privates. You know.. to avoid giving Satan(TM) a foothold in your nether bits.
  
  do be fair, their church probably has a fair number of predators that... uh... well. look, don't ask why they just don't get rid of the creep, s'okay?
  
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Missing_stair
  The missing stair is a metaphor for a person within a social group or organization who many people know is untrustworthy or otherwise has to be "managed," but around whom the group chooses to work by discreetly warning newcomers of their behavior, rather than address the person and their behavior openly. The "missing stair" in the metaphor refers to a dangerous structural fault, such as a missing step in a staircase; a fault that people may become used to and quietly accepting of, that is not openly signposted or fixed, and that newcomers to a group or organization are warned about discreetly.

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