--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Share Long wrote: > > Well, Judy I'm not young and I think I'm cute rather than > beautiful. And I'm a pretty good swimmer. You remind me > of the young monk who's still holding on to an event that's > long passed. Flow on!
Since we segued into this stream of thought via the issue of feminism, isn't it interesting to note the sexism in the story? One of the guys looked at the person needing to cross the river and saw only a person, with a need. He stepped in and filled that need, and then wandered on, the event forgotten. The other guy carried the girl for quite a while (according to the original tale), and got his monk's robes all in a twist because another monk had touched a <spit> girl. I ask you, which of these guys acted in a manner that indicated more respect for women? The guy who believes that -- being female -- she carries some kind of weird monk cooties that will infect you and lure you off the path, or the guy who just gave her a ride across the river, and then left her on the other side? On another level, it's an interesting tale to examine from the point of view of another -ism. As has been pointed out, the girl is young, and thus potentially hot. What if she'd have been an old woman? Would the second monk still have gotten his robes in a twist? If not, why not? Then again, if the person getting a piggyback ride had been an old woman, this story would probably never have been remarked on, and thus probably never repeated enough times to become the spiritual staple it has. It's the fact that it's a *young* woman that drives the story. How ageist is that? :-)
