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Nevada (US), Jan 22 (ANI): Jews have come out in support of Hindus, who are disturbed over the portrayal of Lord Ganesh as a sex act on NBC’s Saturday Night Live (SNL) and want apologies from all those responsible for it, including actor Jim Carrey and NBC.

Rabbi ElizaBeth W. Beyer, Jewish leader in Nevada (USA), in a statement today, said: “Portrayal of a religious group’s deity in a form that is condescending and low is a serious affront to the many Hindus who worship Ganesh. Making fun of someone’s religion or god is not within keeping with our ideals as members of a civilized community. So, this skit, ‘The Wrath of Ganesh’ should be removed from the NBC website. Hollywood star Jim Carrey, NBC and others responsible for lampooning Hindu Lord Ganesh should provide public apologies.”

“We Jews fully support Hindu leader Rajan Zed’s protest initiative on this issue and urge others involved in television and film industries to be more considerate to the feelings of devotees of all religions in the future”, Rabbi Beyer added.

Reverend Larry Edward Schneider, a Unity Church leader, in a statement today, also sought public apologies from Jim Carrey, NBC CEO Jeff Zucker, and SNL Executive Producer Lorne Michaels for hurting the feelings of Hindu faithful. Although we were for speech, but faith was something sacred and attempts at belittling it hurt the devotees. Television producers and filmmakers should be more sensitive while handling faith related subjects, as television and cinema were very powerful mediums, Schneider argued.

Swami Pooja Saraswati, a well respected spiritual leader, called this SNL skit “disgusting”. “I condemn such outrageous degradation of consciousness. Out of support for human decency I feel that the NBC network and sponsors of the show should be boycotted”, she added.

In a skit on NBC’s SNL (January eight) titled “The Wrath of Ganesh”, Jim Carrey (as erotic shaman Lee Licious) and Kenan Thomson (as Grady Wilson) demonstrate a sexual technique, mocking elephant-headed Lord Ganesh and his trunk in the process. Grady has traveled the world to find new sexual techniques to spice up the bedroom, the tagline of the episode (1587) “Grady Wilson’s Tantric N’Tasty” says.

Distinguished Hindu statesman Rajan Zed, talking on this issue, has earlier said that Lord Ganesh was highly revered in Hinduism and was meant to worshipped in temples or home shrines and not to be thrown around loosely in reimagined versions for dramatic effects in TV series for mercantile greed. Such absurd depiction of Lord Ganesh with no scriptural backing was hurtful to the devotees.

Such trivialization of Lord Ganesh was disturbing and offensive to the one billion Hindus world over, Zed, who is President of Universal Society of Hinduism, said and requested NBC to immediately remove it from all its websites and other links.

Rajan Zed also asked Golden Globe winner actor-comedian Jim Carrey (Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind), actor-comedian Kenan Thomson, NBC Universal President and Chief Executive Officer Jeff Zucker, and SNL Executive Producer Lorne Michaels to tender a public apology for it and urged them not to inappropriately drag Hindu deities to advance the commercial or other agenda in the future. (ANI)