KARMA IS NOT BLAMING THE VICTIM

Hinduism with all its derivations that have their own interpretations is a confusing quagmire for Westerners. But also Westerners have taken bits and pieces of Hinduism and Ayurvedic medicine (open any yoga magazine . . . ) and have created various blends of this and this and that. Even with all the writing about love and acceptance people end up still relating to “karma” as cause and effect, i.e. “something you did caused this bad thing to happen to you”. I have even heard Western alternative doctors and philosophers espouse the theory that people are causing their own illnesses!

Someone who read my novel Karma said to me that she felt “that the message that what happened to our heroine was somehow the result of her own actions, that is her karma, was just too unsettling.”

Whoa Nelly! Either she was reading Karma very late at night or decided to skip the ending altogether, or most likely all she did was read the title of the book and made up her mind about the book’s message.

Blaming the victim is not the message of the book. It is exactly the opposite. The reason the novel ended up with the title of Karma was because of the venue Meredith Fitzgerald finds herself in—India. As a medical doctor Meredith would naturally interpret the psychological aftermath of what she went through as “post traumatic stress disorder,” but because she is in India—living in the thick of all things Indian—it’s logical that she would be curious when both her oppressor, Mrs. Pawar, and her accidental spiritual teacher, Mr. Jhombarkar begin talking to her about karma. Westerners have the cause and effect interpretation of karma ingrained in our heads, and Meredith is suffering from PTSD (and one of the hallmark manifestations of PTSD is self-blame), so she would naturally feel that what happened to her is her “karma,” i.e. her fault.

Meredith is in India, carrying around a copy of the Bhagavad Gita. The Gita is a summary of all the knowledge contained in the Hindu holy texts, the Vedas and the Upanishads. Hindus consider the Gita is a guide to life. Those who are not properly educated in the Gita believe that people bring bad things on themselves by their actions. But karma isn’t isolated to each individual. Rather, the world rebounding continually with the karmic activities of everyone. Bad things happen because life is harsh, according to the Gita, we can only control our own actions and reactions. It’s our choice to contribute in a good or bad way to the karma of the world.

A student of Buddhism emailed me, “Blaming the victim is indeed a misunderstanding of karma, but it is regrettably how many people use the concept—as an excuse not to help suffering people. Quite simply, the law of karma presents us with the opportunity to act, here and now, in a way that yields a better future. The notion of karma can be used to empower ourselves, to add insult to injury, or to succumb with resignation. Perhaps human nature is the problem, not the idea of karma?”

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