 unmasks lust by declaring it to be an eternal enemy (nitya vairi) that devours our intelligence like an insatiable fire (dushpurenaanalena). Sexual images that offer visual indulgence serve as a readily combustible fuel for the fire of lust. When this fuel is fed constantly, the fire of lust becomes a conflagration that devours people's intelligence, conscience, common sense, even humanity. It is no wonder that the people who perpetrate horrendous sexual abuses are not some two-horned demons from another planet; they are humans like us, but humans whom lust has perverted into monsters.)
ased on Bhagavad Gita Chapter 03, Text 39
A tragic trend of our times is the glamorization of immoral sexual indulgences as fashionable, as slick, as cool. This is especially evident in soap operas that portray sexual immorality as bold and adventurous. The intoxication generated by such illicit sexual fantasies often blinds people to its real-life consequences that are evident in the increasing statistics of sexual abuses like rape, incest and pedophilia. Most civilized people feel sickened when they hear of such abuses, yet these same people rarely feel sickened by their causes: the ubiquitous sexual images that are displayed on billboards, fashion ramps and celluloid screens.
Gita wisdom makes explicit the cause-effect connection between sexual images and sexual abuses. The Bhagavad-gita (3.39) unmasks lust by declaring it to be an eternal enemy (nitya vairi) that devours our intelligence like an insatiable fire (dushpurenaanalena). Sexual images that offer visual indulgence serve as a readily combustible fuel for the fire of lust. When this fuel is fed constantly, the fire of lust becomes a conflagration that devours people’s intelligence, conscience, common sense, even humanity. It is no wonder that the people who perpetrate horrendous sexual abuses are not some two-horned demons from another planet; they are humans like us, but humans whom lust has perverted into monsters.
