Should devotees adopt politically correct usages like “senior citizens” for old people or “medical termination of pregnancy” for abortion?

Transcript

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Question.
Should devotees use politically correct words, like say, senior citizens for old people, or paraplegics for physically handicapped people, or medical termination of pregnancy for abortion? Answer. It depends on what is devotionally correct. Devotees don’t have to campaign against political correctness, nor do we have to campaign for political correctness.
We have to see what is best for us to present Krishna’s message to, and Krishna’s culture to the world. So for example, when a person passes away, even in devotee circle, we say that he’s gone back to Krishna. Now that is true, but that is also a gentle way of speaking that a person has died.
So there are sensitive ways of speaking, even in devotee circle. So in devotee circle, if we see Chaitanya Charita Amrit, Lord Chaitanya is very sensitive, very careful when he speaks. So when Damodar Pandit criticizes him, indirectly saying that he should not do a particular thing, so Lord Chaitanya explains that, actually, you know, you are so straightforward that you can even correct me.
But then, of course, he says this is not appropriate for you, therefore, it is best that you go back to Navadvip. So the point which I’m making is that Chaitanya Mahaprabhu, when he says that Damodar Pandit is not doing correctly, he does not chastise him. He just says that, actually, you are, you are so straightforward.
So he glorifies him and then also rectifies him in his, what is his, we could say, Maryadavati Kraman. He is going beyond his position. So in principle, it is not wrong to use addresses that are respectful and sensitive.
We see in the Bhagavad Gita also, Krishna and Arjuna refer to each other in very respectful terms, Mahabaho, Purusha Vyagra and Parantapa. So these are respectful addresses. So referring to each other respectfully is compatible with devotional principles.
So, yes, referring to old people as senior citizens, there’s absolutely nothing devotionally incompatible with it. Now, yes, we don’t want to hide the reality that there is old age and in old age there is going to be suffering and inevitably all of us have to become old. But if that kind of language is seen as insensitive in society today, then we don’t have to use that kind of language.
The important point is that we present Krishna consciousness in a way that people can see that we are also sensitive, we are intelligent, we are respectful. So that’s the important point. How we present it will vary.
So, yes, similarly, physically handicapped people can be referred to as paraplegics. So there the point is not to conceal the reality, but to be sensitive about the reality and our presentation of the reality. But elsewhere in our philosophical presentations, we will talk about how there are miseries of material existence, where there’s old age, where there is disease, how there is old age, disease and death.
And therefore, we have to transcend these miseries. At the same time, these euphemisms are not the same as abortion being called as medical termination of pregnancy. That’s a different kind where the whole purpose is to conceal the reality so that the reality can be perpetuated without any rectification being sought or thought about also.
So, actually, abortion, old age and disease, old age and disease, they are the facts of life. Whereas abortion is something which is voluntarily chosen and it involves a conscious, it involves a chosen ending of a life. So that is a very brutal thing.
And the whole idea of using words like medical termination of pregnancy or tissue removal, the purpose of these is just to make sure that people don’t understand the harshness of what is happening. And many people actually, if they are shown sonographies and other technological pictures or technology produced pictures of how the child in the womb is a person, is a baby, just as there are other living babies outside the womb, then many people actually decide not to abort. So concealing the reality over here leads to people doing a serious, grievous misdeed, which they would not do if they knew the reality.
So the point is, here, people want to perpetuate the culture of abortion. It is a very demonic culture. And perpetuating that is extremely grievous.
It is going to have karmically serious consequences. And beyond that, it is such a terrible insensitivity for a mother to end the life of her own child or to mother to not be informed enough to know actually what is being done. So often, when euphemisms like these are used, if they are used to conceal a harsh reality, a grievous reality, that would have been avoided if the person knew that reality, then that is devotionally undesirable, because this sort of perpetuates bad karma.
On the other hand, using other euphemisms like, say, paraplegic or senior citizen, that doesn’t necessarily perpetuate any bad karma. That simply is a sensitive way of addressing certain realities of life. So whether devotees should use such euphemisms or not, that will depend on what is best suited according to time, place, circumstance for properly presenting Krishna Consciousness in a way that intelligent people can understand and accept.
Thank you. Question from Manoj Prabhu.