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I am a Hindu as well as an Indian. You say you're a Hindu as well as an Indian. But WE are neither Hindus nor Indians.

Over my one whole year of this site, I have found that certain users have been finding it difficult to comprehend the scope of this site. There's undoubtedly a sense of "insider-outsider" mentality prevalent among a considerable number of users, both newbies and old users. I'm not gonna show them here because I don't want to make any user look bad publicly. Of course, this sort of mentality is ingrained in many of ours' psyche but that doesn't mean that should affect how we use this platform. I admit I myself have been guilty of such ideas in the past and I hope I don't make such mistakes again. I'm not expecting this post will make drastic changes immediately but I do expect some changes gradually in this area, among certain users.

So here's what I want to make crystal clear: this platform is intended not only for Hindus or Indians but also non-Hindus and non-Indians. That includes Muslims, Christians, Jews, Buddhists, Americans, Europeans, researchers, etc. Don't let the URL or the name of the site fool you. We're a secular site sponsored by a secular company. However, we might dislike that, we need to accept this fact. In fact, I feel this is important aspect this site has to deal with if we want it to graduate. Also, we must appreciate questions that have been written with a critical point of view.

If you think you have been fooled, maybe you have been. But it's not definitely not by Stack Exchange but by you yourself. We need to remember that this forum is unique and absolutely incomparable from what we expect from other forums.

Consider the definition of this site:

Q&A for followers of the Hindu religion and those interested in learning more about Hinduism.

The site definition is completely clear that this site is not for Hindus exclusively but for anyone who is genuinely interested in learning more about Hinduism.

As Hindus/Indians, we need to take a step back and realise this is somebody else's commercial venture that they are inviting us to participate in. They are cooperative in tailoring it to our specific community needs but we still have to play by their rules.

If you are more inclined to resent rather than rejoice the differences between us, then this may not be the site for you.

P.S. I'm not discouraging people to participate here. My point is this site is not only for Hindus and Indians exclusively. At the same time, non-Hindus are expected to respect the sentiments of Hindus and Indians.

Note: This post was inspired by a similar post on Christianity Stack Exchange.

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    Did not expect this from you; but this is an excellent post. Would have expected a moderator to do this. I wrote a similar post here. The site is reluctant to define what it means to be a Hindu. After several years someone finally asked Who is considered Hindu? on the main site. Everyone has their own definition and thinks they are "correct." One user is found to be openly joking on the site saying "I probably got annoyed about anti-orthodox elements here and made an account to downvote them". Wonder what the site owners make of such jokes! Commented Nov 20, 2018 at 17:32
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    @SuryaKantaBoseChowdhury Can you show me such comments?
    – The Destroyer Mod
    Commented Nov 21, 2018 at 5:34
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    @sv, , take a look at your profile page - a martian comic mocking jyotisha shastra - Wonder what the site owners make of such jokes! Most users here follow a no-first-strike-policy.
    – ram
    Commented Nov 21, 2018 at 7:05
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    @SuryaKantaBoseChowdhury, if someone already knew everything to know about hinduism, they won't be asking questions on this site. so it is obvious that this site is not ONLY for hindus. But we need to draw a line between innocent curiosity with open-mindedness, and whatever is the opposite of that. if someone go to a christianity SE site and repeatedly question/mock mother mary, they shouldn't be surprised when they get the advice "If you are more inclined to mock rather than inquire the differences between us, then this may not be the site for you."
    – ram
    Commented Nov 21, 2018 at 7:09
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    @TheDestroyer Are you asking to show fanatic comments? If such comments exist, the way is to flag them and they go to mod's queue only. They should not be exhibited publicly. If someone says there are abusve or fanatic comments, they must have saw that. Asking here on comments is not a good way. Moreover, how can he show deleted comments? Checking rude or comment would help. I am aware of this situation because people here took Mahatma Gandhi as religious figure and Indian Independence as important for Hindus. Commented Nov 21, 2018 at 8:47
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    @The See, his reply was to Pandya's comment. Pandya asked to say where he saw the situation.OP said he saw some boasting comments that Indians are the best & other are less. In my experience, I saw many comments and message which take modern science as grain of salt. Also answers where Hindus/Indians found everthing 3000 years ad ago and Science is nothing. Agree or not, this all comes under fanaticism only. Atheists are given one treatment and believers are given one treatment. It is a personal definition who to be a Hindu same old "Britishers gave the name", we are great, eternal. Commented Nov 21, 2018 at 9:16
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    @Sarvabhouma Now you added the phrase "& other are less" while his original comment doesn't. Is that your assumption or really what Surya saw? "I saw many comments and message which take modern science as grain of salt." "this all comes under fanaticism ". If you go to Skeptics SE or Physics SE you might find message saying Religion to be taken as grain of salt. Treatment will be given to you based on how you treat others and this is universal rule. Anyways, SE has some guidelines are Mods are there to interpret them and implement them. If we say Hindus are good doesn't mean others as bad.
    – The Destroyer Mod
    Commented Nov 21, 2018 at 9:23
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    My Point is simple. This post is redundant. This site (users of the site) never behaved in way which would hurt Non-Hindus or Non-Indians. This post might show our community in bad way to outsiders.
    – The Destroyer Mod
    Commented Nov 21, 2018 at 9:29
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    True @TheDestroyer I hv also never seen the users of our site behave in such a manner over the years that would make this post needed or relevant. So, I was thinking what happened all of a sudden..
    – Rickross
    Commented Nov 21, 2018 at 9:33
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    @TheDestroyer I can understand if a normal user says there's no problem on the site. It's surprising a mod says they saw nothing I don't speak without any examples. There were comments were a user said Westerners are inferior to Indians. Westerners are damaging. I flagged them. But they were moved to chat by a moderator (unfortunately you) without checking them. If one has a score of 10k, they can even check now. The room is frozen. That's what caused me to write a post mods should check flags before moving to chat. That's still unanswered. Commented Nov 21, 2018 at 9:49
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    @Sarvabhouma Again "Westerners are inferior to Indians. Westerners are damaging" Can't say anything without seeing exact comments and context of discussion. Mods generally check "too many comments flag" and if discussion is no longer relevant to post, they move it to chat room. Unhealthy discussions will be deleted.
    – The Destroyer Mod
    Commented Nov 21, 2018 at 10:01
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    @Sarvabhouma "This post is redundant...This post might show our community in bad way to outsiders" - there lies the problem. Classic denial of the problem. There have been users who used "white" and "mleccha" in a derogatory sense. Maybe the mods should publish a list of all rude & abusive comments that were flagged and deleted with the user names hidden. The truth will come out. Commented Nov 21, 2018 at 16:48
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    @sv - "That comic/meme still stays on my profile and yet your "joke" comment on the site is deleted.Why?" - because this site does not allow profiles to be flagged, whereas comments can be flagged.
    – ram
    Commented Nov 21, 2018 at 18:29
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    One thing I want to say, "Denying the existence of the problem will not solve it". One more. If Pandya and The Destroyer don't know, I have to say Keshav Srinivasan is very active in handling flags. :P Commented Nov 22, 2018 at 9:46
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    @TheDestroyer I was mod on two sites (including this) and we do have to handle many flags but the repetitive one do stay in our memory. And I remember seeing those comments so it's either you are in denial or you were not present tehre and other mods handle those comment flags. Commented Dec 10, 2018 at 8:45

4 Answers 4

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I've been thinking about this site a lot since this question came to my attention. I tried to figure out the best way to respond to this without having the benefit of a shared reference. If this was merely the same situation as what Christianity was dealing with to cause Caleb to ask his question there in 2011, we could easily copy and paste the thesis of Shog's answer there and edit the references to Christianity to say Hinduism instead.

Right... The site is named, "[Hinduism]", not "[Hindus]". It is, like most of the Stack Exchange sites, intended as a vessel for Q&A on a specific topic; who contributes to filling it, what they believe or how they identify themselves... We have no control over these, nor should we.

What he's saying here that I think is important to emphasize is that we seek to identify sites based on their subject rather than the people who might be experts in that subject. About a year ago we renamed the Writers site to Writing. While a site about writing may attract anyone who writes - including people like me who only write posts on Stack Exchange sites - a site called "Writers" makes people who do not identify as writers - including me - feel that it's not a place that fits them. This could be a disservice to that community!

So, the first pass, surface-of-the-water answer to this question is that we do not expect the users of this site to be Hindus or Indians. While it is quite likely that the majority of users here are in one or both of these categories, it is not required. What we expect is that everyone using this site comes here to ask and answer questions about Hinduism in an honest and open way with the goal of learning.


But, based on the comments and discussion and talking with users and reading what's been going on in some of your chat rooms and looking through some of the flags I've seen and reading emails from at least five of you, I think the actual post you meant to duplicate wasn't Christianity's but Islam's from 2012.

Why sectarianism is ruining your site

I wasn't around on the network at the time but I am pretty sure that things here aren't nearly as bad here as Aarthi makes Islam sound in her post. That said, I think her post and Jon's answer are worth reading because I fear there's a risk of the site heading in that direction and I think the solution recommended there is one y'all should consider.

We need the users of this site to recognize that, much as the Christianity site isn't only for Protestants or Catholics or Baptists, your site isn't only for Shaivism, Vaishnavism, or Shaktism and it might be a good idea for you all to make some changes in how the site is run to emphasize that so that visitors to the site know that discussion of all sects is welcome.

Every religion that's been around more than a few years has different groups with vastly different beliefs and yet they all consider themselves to belong to that religion because there's some common elements the groups share. Often sacred texts serves as basis for practice, but it could also be traditions handed down from one generation to the next. This is expected and can make for a complex, diverse and interesting exchange of beliefs. It can also lead to argument, anger and name calling.

While some groups may be mainstream and others more niche, this site isn't here to decide which qualify as Hinduism and which do not. Every one of you who identifies as a belonging to a specific sect likely disagrees with parts of other sects. Therefore you must be contextual in your disagreements, focusing on helping others learn the teachings of the sect or tradition they are asking about, even when it is not your own. I know this can be difficult, and in some cases you may not be comfortable participating in such an activity - but the choice then must be between participating in helping the asker accomplish their goal of learning and not participating at all.

Let me give you a non-religious example that might help:

On our parenting site, they have a strict rule of not writing answers that disagree with the premise of the question. This is particularly visible when it comes to corporal punishment for children. There are people and cultures who believe it is a valid form of behavior correction for their children and there are people and cultures who believe it is not - and on top of being invalid, abusive.

If someone asks a question about spanking, the site requires that answers actually accept spanking as a solution and not insist that other alternatives be used instead or write posts or comments about how spanking is child abuse.

What this means in practice is that people who are very opposed to spanking have to either accept that it is an allowed subject on the site and ignore those questions or they find somewhere else to ask questions about parenting. If they can't ignore them, they will likely be forced out by the moderators.

So, as with the Parenting example, you must recognize your own beliefs and biases and where they differ from those of others. Their belief may be wrong for your sect's teachings, it's not absolutely wrong to all sects.

In addition to this, please remember to assume good intentions. If a question is asked that seems to target the beliefs of one sect, make an effort to help make the question more neutrally worded if you can but don't change the question entirely. Don't use the comments to accuse the asker of sectarianism and avoid retaliating by asking a question that targets another sect.

Because of how different the teachings of the Hindu sects are, it is likely that questions about one sect may ask things that you find offensive to yours. This doesn't make the question offensive in general, it is a function of how this site works and the fact that it should accept questions about all Hindu groups.

How to scope questions to avoid arguments and set expectations

Part of what's becoming clear is that you can't make absolute statements about Hinduism. The answer to many questions depends on which sect you're interested in.

So, as I hinted at briefly earlier, I'm going to suggest you take another cue from the Christianity site and you all start requiring that questions are contextualized to a specific sect (or sects if the question is asking about the differences) rather than asking unbounded questions that will lead to arguments about which is the "correct" answer. If a question doesn't mention this, request it.

Here's an example of a comment you might leave on a post without context:

Good:

It's not clear from your question which tradition you're asking about; I suspect it is Vaishnavism, but can you edit to clarify?

Bad:

Those Vaishnavists teach all sorts of stupid crap. You should totally drop that and try Shaivism.

If a question is looking for an answer from one sect and gets an an answer from another, flag it as not an answer and leave guidance for the person answering:

This question specifically asks about Shaktism but your answer seems to be based on Vaishnava dharma. Please note that we expect answers to address the answer from the teachings of the sect the question is about.

To help you get started, here are some of the posts on Christianity's meta where they determined how to scope questions and what questions work for them. They seem to be very well-suited to your needs and the Stack Exchange format:

  • This question is an excellent guide to the types of questions they allow and how they're scoped.
  • This question addresses the concerns of not knowing what denomination you're asking about.
  • This question focuses on how the Christianity site is different than other forums and what they expect from participants there.
  • This question is specifically about whether tags are sufficient indicators of a question's scope - specifically in relation to indicating denomination.

You don't need to adopt their policy 100%. You're a different site and a different religion with different concerns but these posts and others on their meta site do a lot to help shape what users can expect and how moderators are expected to moderate the site - if mods know what's expected of them, they know how to handle flags.

You all have a lot of work ahead of you to address some of these issues. We're here to help and guide but, in the end, keeping your site inclusive and welcoming to all Hindus and anyone interested in learning about the various traditions of Hinduism is part of the work of maintaining this site as much as asking and answering, voting, closing, and editing are.

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    +1 for jQuery reference ;-) Commented Feb 14, 2019 at 7:19
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    Excellent answer!
    – user9969
    Commented Feb 14, 2019 at 8:31
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    Thank you for taking out your time for this great answer. I think it's very well explained. Every user of this site should read this answer once.
    – TheLittleNaruto Mod
    Commented Feb 14, 2019 at 9:25
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    "If a question is looking for an answer from one sect and gets an an answer from another, flag it as not an answer" - do you agree with the answer here which appears to say as long as there is some useful information in the answer it should be retained? Also, there's a decline reason "flags should not be used to indicate technical inaccuracies, or an altogether wrong answer" - so there is a high chance mods will reject NAA flags with this reason. Commented Feb 14, 2019 at 19:06
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    @sv. If the question asks what color an apple is and someone says "bananas are yellow"... that's NAA. It's the same thing. We need to not hide behind "this is related information, so should be retained" in preference of actually answering the question asked. I don't care what colors bananas are. Don't use answers to control the narrative. As to mods declining the flags, if flagging answers that are not addressing the correct sect is considered NAA, your mods should be handling those flags correctly or explaining why.
    – Catija Staff
    Commented Feb 14, 2019 at 19:08
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    @Catija Not according to this answer. FYI, a lot of NAA flags on this site get declined because the answer is "useful" in someway to the rest of the community even if not to OP. Commented Feb 14, 2019 at 19:27
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    Regarding declined NAA flags, I was going to point to this example but I see now it's moved to History.SE. You can still see my comments there on how two of the answers do not address the question yet were allowed. Commented Feb 14, 2019 at 19:34
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    @sv. This is an outline of what I think y'all should do moving forward. Looking at existing posts on meta is sort of pointless. The last paragraph of this pretty much makes that clear. We, the CMs, are here to offer guidance but how you want to actually implement this is up to you... and part of that will require y'all revisiting old meta discussions and seeing whether old policies need to change. Looking back and pointing at "this wasn't done based on this new guidance you've given"... really is a waste of time.
    – Catija Staff
    Commented Feb 14, 2019 at 20:38
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    I've given you an outline and some hints but y'all will have to make that happen and decide what of this you want to implement. I'm not making an edict. If y'all don't want to require answers to actually answer the question with the context of sect, I'm not going to force that but if you do want that and y'all decide to require it, your mods should respect that decision. Mods don't make policy; they enforce it and if they're not willing to enforce it, they need to explain why. On top of that, y'all can help the mods by voting down answers that don't meet guidance and voting to delete.
    – Catija Staff
    Commented Feb 14, 2019 at 20:42
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    You don't actually need moderators to handle NaA flags in most cases. They go into review and users can either recommend deletion or delete vote. Mods can handle them but they should handle these flags based on your site policy.
    – Catija Staff
    Commented Feb 14, 2019 at 20:43
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    Any opinion on private chatrooms made to spread hate chat.stackexchange.com/rooms/88724/… used to insult Abrahamic and vaishnavas. Commented Feb 15, 2019 at 6:40
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    @Ankit you already had a talk with one of the mods and should continue there only. This is unnecessary to bring this here IMHO. Catija tried to put an answer which can be helpful for us to follow. Just continue that in the chat I would suggest.
    – TheLittleNaruto Mod
    Commented Feb 15, 2019 at 7:00
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    @TheLittleNaruto you might need to check timestamp next to msg first. And that guy asked himself and he is neither hindusim site moderator nor CM just a curious person. Commented Feb 15, 2019 at 7:02
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    @AnkitSharma I am sorry I didn't find any message as such. Also the message you had shared in moderation chat, you could have raised a flag. That should have done your job. Discussing further in chat and then under this post, dunno what do you want to accomplish here.
    – TheLittleNaruto Mod
    Commented Feb 15, 2019 at 7:07
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    @TheLittleNaruto It's important to remember that moderator flagging in chat goes to all of the network's online mods, not only the mods of the site the room is parented on. If you want to be sure that the mods on a specific site see something, a flag isn't going to do it. Y'all have a room for talking to the moderators - that seems like a reasonable place to ask about things, at least in general.
    – Catija Staff
    Commented Feb 20, 2019 at 15:16
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Well, in theory, a lot of the divisions we have should matter less than they seem to here.

Folks sometimes ask me for opinions. I'm a hindu, though one who kind of takes a less nose in scripture view of things. My viewpoint isn't any less or more valid than someone who's trying to take a more literalist, or even a deeper understanding.

I'm also more familiar with the tamil, rather than sanskrit tradition of things. I probably know the bare minimum of scriptures (I know my gayatri and can muddle through the abivathaye... ), but I don't think that makes me any more or less.

Quite honestly any religion related sites is going to have diverging views. We have dozens of different traditions, and many practices that have various levels of acceptance in the modern era.

The original post is taken from the christianity meta. That said, we have a different and unique set of challenges -

I do know that sometimes there's differences between northern and southern traditions. Saivites and Vaishnavites (Even if I'm a southern "Iyer" with Tirupathi Vengadajalapathi as my family deity, and I admire the passion that folks in vaishnavite temples in the south have for telling their stories). At the end of the day though "My way is better than your way" isn't the SE way.

Rather than focus on the differences, we can learn from each other.SE's always been a place to teach and learn. Arguments happen but they need to be constructive.

And well, we can always learn from others - the judaism site is actually a great example of a place where people with different traditions and the same faith ask questions about their faith, and how it works around their lifestyle. They do get technical - and site a dizzying array of sources.

If someone has an honest question in good intent, even if they're not hindu, It should stand. On the other hand, sometimes the politics of (ethnic) indian society can be complex and folks may need to make decisions - and hard ones.

Something that concerns me is how much hostility I see towards mods. I guess the same can be true of saints. If you have an issue with a mod (or a saint, which is rarely the same thing) - you might, rather than focusing on the person, make a case for why something should be, within the framework of the site and SE.

You think something shouldn't be closed? Dig out the rules. make a constructive case to why it would be a good fit for the site.

I personally think that, well, the circumstances behind the original post are pretty different from what we have, but eh, we all need to get along better.

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    "Something that concerns me is how much hostility I see towards mods." I have never seen such behaviour since I joined. That problem doesn't exist at all. So, I am downvoting this one ;P Commented Dec 15, 2018 at 9:37
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The word 'Sindhu' was given by foreigners to denote people who lived east of Sindh river in Pakistan, which over time became 'Hindu'.

By common definition, the word 'religion' implies belief in God, and some way/faith/worship system to express that belief.
The followers of the religion currently known as Hinduism, would likely tell you that they believe in Gods (usually Shiva/Brahma , Vishnu) and Scriptures (usually Vedas , Ramayana/Mahabharata).

The Sanskrit term for our religion is Sanatana (or Vaidika) dharma, and such believers are called 'Astika'. The term for a sect or book or guru who does not believe in Brahmam and Vedas is termed 'Nastika'. There are many such schools of thought within Bharat, like Buddhism, Charvakam etc. Muslims/Christians believe in God, but not in Vedas.
Note - There are schools which believe in Vedas but not in God although they do believe in Atma, who are also called Astika, but that's a separate technical discussion for a small minority of academics.

So, this is who I consider a 'Hindu' - belief in Vedas, and Bhagavan

Whether they know the Sanskrit terms for Bhagavan / Vedas or simply seek their local deity or temple or priests in matters concerning faith, or whether they follow the instructions of scriptures exactly or partially etc. is a different discussion. Laymen may not have even heard of the term 'Vedas', but indirectly through words of elders and acharyas, or by worshipping a Vedic God, they end up believing & following tenets of Vedas.

Now, let's come to this site. I'm going to put words in your mouth and say that the point you want to get across is:

This is not a social network for Hindus

Most of us here understand that, because it's obvious.

What is also obvious is that the people who visit a site called 'hinduism' will in majority be Hindus, or minority who are not but are genuinely interested in learning more about its intricacies, or a tiny fraction who will be intent on deriding it.
This happens in every community, whether political, religious, sports etc.

Now, let's come to your next point:

"We're a secular site sponsored by a secular company... we must appreciate questions that have been written with a critical point of view."

This is a 'secular' site, because we don't restrict entry to 'Hindus only'.
This is NOT a 'secular' site, because we restrict questions to 'about Hinduism only'.

This is a 'secular' site, because we tolerate critical/derisive questions. (Some upvote, Some downvote, Some flag).
This is NOT a 'secular' site, because we don't tolerate repeatedly derisive criticizers (first timers get flagged, repeat offenders get derided back, continuous attackers get banned).

Again, you'll likely find above pattern in any community, more so in religious ones where faith is involved.
Any question that has been asked with sincere academic curiosity, in high likeliness, has been answered with academic responses. Any question that had opinions inserted into it (with or without intent), will invite similarly opinion-inserted answers.

For any 'community' to thrive, the ratio of appreciaters to criticizers, of flag-bearers to pitch-forkers, of believers to skeptics, must be high. If you go to a christianity SE, and more than half the posts are from skeptics, either the users should migrate to skeptics SE, or rename it to skeptics SE. It's simple numbers.

Finally, the underlying belief in Hinduism is on Bhagavan & Vedas, which can easily find other online expressions if one particular site's policy doesn't suit it. The site serves Hinduism, not the other way around.

P.S: We're fine. I don't think there is any major issue with the health of this community, nor with the way the moderators run this site, nor do I think the site owners have an issue with our SE.

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    Good points. Loko binna ruchi. I personally feel there's no need for the question at all. "This is not a social network only for Hindus". This is obvious. And secular word might be subjective. For example. meta rules of SE including HSE might not be influenced by any religion and impartial. But small correction. traditionally Astikas are the one who only believe in Vedas. You can see Samkhya doesn't believe in existence of Ishwara but accepts Vedas.
    – The Destroyer Mod
    Commented Nov 21, 2018 at 9:17
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    @TheD Any Meta post can be used to prevent fanaticism. If a meta post should be only written when there is really a problem, the situation will be out of our hands. The problem definitely exists. The policy "focus on user not the post" is way less followed. Making joke of user's profile and their own beliefs is tolerated I guess.That is why this post is needed. There are crores of Hindus who don't even know the names of Vedas and practice religion.There are crores of people who go to temple without knowing a mantra. Which category do they fall? Belief in Vedas is a wrong definition Commented Nov 21, 2018 at 9:30
  • @Sarvabhouma, that's why I added the part about "Whether they know the Sanskrit terms for Bhagavan / Vedas or simply seek their local deity".. i don't see why there should be a distinction between user and post. If Hitler wrote a book on Jewish religion, will you read it with same sincerity?
    – ram
    Commented Nov 21, 2018 at 18:17
  • @Sarvabhouma, belief in Vedas is not wrong definition. I'm not talking about knowing Vedas. By your definition, people who believe in God, but not Vedas, like muslims/christians can also be included in Hindu. I'm not saying a strict definition of learning Vedic mantras. If I visit a temple which worships a Vedic God, then I'm a Hindu because indirectly I believe Vedas even if I never heard the word 'Veda', or know a mantra. 3 year old kids also don't know name of Veda, does it mean we don't call them Hindu ? Either following a Vedic god, or believing in Vedas is required.
    – ram
    Commented Nov 21, 2018 at 22:01
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    We're fine. I don't think there is any major issue with the health of this community, nor with the way the moderators run this site, nor do I think the site owners have an issue with our SE. -- Exactly. But the post, on the other hand, is giving the impression to any visitor, who is not quite aware of what's going on on the site, that something is terribly wrong with the site which needs to be addressed but that's not at all the case. I am sure if the Q asked is "What triggered ur post?" no satisfactory answers can be given. @ram
    – Rickross
    Commented Nov 22, 2018 at 7:10
  • @Rickross, i later found out that a lot of the points in OP's post, even the wording resemble a similar one from christianity SE
    – ram
    Commented Nov 22, 2018 at 7:15
  • Oh you mean CNP along with minor adaptations? Grt initiative have to say. @ram
    – Rickross
    Commented Nov 22, 2018 at 7:28
  • They must hv had some genuine reasons which made that post necessary (on CSE) but what are those reasons here? I am clueless... Even Mods are clueless but few users are better aware of the situation it seems. @ram
    – Rickross
    Commented Nov 22, 2018 at 7:31
  • @Rickross, based on comments above, i think there were couple comments commenting on superiority of Hindus/Hindu-religion, which other users felt were alienating/deriding..
    – ram
    Commented Nov 22, 2018 at 7:34
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    Good point..." Finally, the underlying belief in Hinduism is on Bhagavan & Vedas, which can easily find other online expressions if one particular site's policy doesn't suit it."... Commented Nov 22, 2018 at 7:59
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You could have just posted this link from Christianity Meta, after all, everything in this post is copied word by word from there.

Posts on every site should be specific to the issue on that particular site only, since I joined this site, I've never seen what you described. All users of this site are aware about the scope, it may be a problem on other sites like Christianity but not on this one.

This post creates an impression that similar things are happening here as well which is not the case. They created the post because it was required but here, this post is extremely pointless. Maybe the intention was to post it here just because it exists there regardless of the fact that nothing is actually wrong.

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    @Rickross How are they active if they don't know the problem exists and more than 3 or 4 users are aware? Perhaps they were meditating on Brahman and meanwhile the comments disappeared. Commented Dec 3, 2018 at 8:10
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    "since I joined this site, I've never seen what you described" - take a look at this chat. Commented Dec 3, 2018 at 18:47
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    @Rickross lol. If that happens, then half of the support posts here will be deleted. 3/4 of your questions will be deleted. They are only trivial support questions. Also, who should delete the post? Christianity mods or Hinduism mods? How is this question even copy? The wording and meaning here are different. @@Chinmay - It should be known that meta sites have many discussion posts in common. They are called canonical posts. Hinduism also adapted its policies from Christianity and Islam. It is fine if that happens. First know this and later we can talk what is fit and what is not on meta. Commented Dec 3, 2018 at 20:49
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    @Sarvabhouma Common policies have nothing to do with this post. Posts like this are created based on ongoing issue and there isn't one on this site. Just look at the post, because it is copied word by word, it is proved that the only intention was to have it here because it exists there. Creating an issue out of thin air is unfit for any site.
    – Pinakin
    Commented Dec 4, 2018 at 5:00
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    @sv. In that link, the only violation I can see is of Be Nice policy, nothing to do with understanding the scope of site.
    – Pinakin
    Commented Dec 4, 2018 at 5:05
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    @sv. I think we can count the number of people who read your linked chat conversation and the comments I wrote in the comments showing examples on fingers. Moderators know the flags. I have seen more than a couple of instances. First they say nothing else. After showing an example, it's a random one unrelated to site. Later, they're called isolated examples. Bottom point is denying that the problem exists. I think you are also doing the same @@Chinmay . That chat conversation was about a non Hindu and calling fool on our site comment section. Imagine the same calling some one in Hinduism. Commented Dec 4, 2018 at 5:11
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    Also who said that this question posted is about understanding the scope of the question? It is about conduct or behaviour towards Non Hindus and non Indians. This has nothing to do with what is on-topic and off-topic. You thought it's a scope post? Commented Dec 4, 2018 at 5:13
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    @sv. Concerned person in that chat is simply angry at those people because he doesn't agree with what they did in their life. Of course calling them fool is wrong which is why Be Nice policy exists. Violation of Be Nice policy happens on all Stack exchange sites including Stack Overflow. It should not be linked to someone being non Hindu and non Indian.
    – Pinakin
    Commented Dec 4, 2018 at 13:09
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    Uff, the problem is lack of awareness of CoC in people. There r comments hanging out calling Non Hindus as wrong and fools. If they are flagged, it takes a lot of time to handle. Sometimes, they also get declined. I can also say everything is fine but in practice it's not the case. There are open comments saying why should there be a distinction between user and post. When one knows calling someone fool is ok, what happened to message or comment? Is that deleted? If I have problem with a Hindu saint, can I still call them a fool? People go gaga if it is done. In former case, nothing. Commented Dec 4, 2018 at 16:50
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    @Sarvabhouma "If I have problem with a Hindu saint, can I still call them a fool?" That's the reason why Code of Conduct exists, it tells people how they should behave on Stack Exchange network. Lack of awareness of Code of Conduct has nothing to do with different behavior towards Non Hindus and Non Indians as Code of Conduct is applicable to all sites. Some users may have called other people fool which may turn out to be Non Hindu and Non Indian but we cannot group them together and assume that all of them are called fools. If there are comments which are in clear violation of Code of Conduct
    – Pinakin
    Commented Dec 4, 2018 at 17:08
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    @Sarvabhouma one should flag them and if flag gets declined, one can directly ask the moderator for their reasoning. Violation of Code of Conduct cannot and should not be linked to having some issue with Non Indians and Non Hindus.
    – Pinakin
    Commented Dec 4, 2018 at 17:11
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    That's what I said in my earlier comments. When some example is shown, that will be ruled out as isolated examples.Do you know these posts hinduism.meta.stackexchange.com/q/1033/5212, hinduism.meta.stackexchange.com/q/1122/5212 and hinduism.meta.stackexchange.com/q/937/5212 I have never posted questions targeting beliefs. I haven't participated in sectarian debates and hurt anyone. Meta posts were written. According to your logic, they should be known from help center pages and reading faq. They're redundant.Mods could have just closed/deleted. Why did they write meta? Commented Dec 4, 2018 at 17:15
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    @Sarvabhouma The links you have posted are based on real issues which everyone is aware of like we know Shiva vs Vishnu comes up quite often, posts with sectarian flavor etc.. Where does the issue exist for this non Hindu and non Indian post to be justified?
    – Pinakin
    Commented Dec 4, 2018 at 17:27
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    Sorry. Me Surya, sv. and others were dreaming or saw visions. There was this problem in our dreams and visions. Don't you think it is strange that many people are having the same dream at once? Commented Dec 4, 2018 at 17:32
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    @Sarvabhouma Well unless you can backup your claims, it will only be looked upon as a dream. Not everyone is having the same dream, no such issue was ever discussed in even chats which makes one sure that this post was created out of thin air.
    – Pinakin
    Commented Dec 4, 2018 at 17:48

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