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Culture War Roundup for the week of November 11, 2024

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What do you make of the old anthropologist’s argument that the varnas are sublimated remnants of an ancient, long forgotten cow/bull sacrificial cult, with the Brahmins and accordant ritual purity taking the role of the bovine? (Sam Kriss is awful, but he has a brief summary here)

Incorrect, varnas are from Aryans, jati or caste from IVC, other Aryans and their descendants also had it, Scythians, Germanics etc. There is very little out there is honest about it though Razib Khab is pretty good.

Ancient germanics had a distinction between Noblemen and commoners, with nobles having priestly privileges, just like Ancient Rome. There’s no evidence for some kind of hardcoded up and down social hierarchy like the Indian caste system.

Survive the Jive (Tom Rowsell) would disagree. Germanics and Scythians especially had some kinds of castes not too far from the normal aryan way. He unlisted a few videos recently Aryans and their descendants absolutely had castes which did inspire even the Japanese later on.