Prabhupada 0862 - Unless You Change the Society, How You can Make Social Welfare?



750521 - Conversation - Melbourne

Director: Just to look after those who are in trouble. That's our policy.

Prabhupāda: Well, everyone is in trouble.

Director: Why?

Prabhupāda: At the present moment even the ministers are in trouble.

Director: Yes, but that is not what our function is. Everybody's in trouble. (laughter)

Prabhupāda: "Physician, heal thyself." You see? They are also drunkards, they are also woman-hunters, meat-eaters and gambling, that's all. They require to be rectified.

Director: But you can't help that. That society... You have to go and change society, then society tells us to act differently.

Prabhupāda: No, no. Unless you change the society, how you can make social welfare? If you keep them as it is, then where is the question of welfare?

Director: Give it a different interpretation to the word.

Prabhupāda: Inter... How the...? I don't...

Director: Does he understand me?

Prabhupāda: Basically, basically one must be first-class ideal man. That is wanted.

Director: That's why it's so very difficult. You have to work on your own, and you have to see that you're fit for the work. If you can convince enough people to...

Prabhupāda: No, no. Our own program, it is not vox populi. You find out fault with us.

Director: What?

Prabhupāda: You find out what is our fault.

Director: I don't say any fault.

Prabhupāda: Then you can disagree. But when you see everything is nice, how you will not accept it? Unless you are biased.

Director: Of course I'm biased. I've been brought up differently.

Prabhupāda: Yes. Just like our...

Director: Just as you're biased against my life.

Prabhupāda: No, we are not biased. Just like... We are not biased. We are allowing. We say that if you want to be first-class man, then you must not commit sinful activities. That is our propaganda.

Director: But I, as a public servant, I'm not here to change society.

Prabhupāda: But we are also public. We belong to the public. You must become our servant also.

Director: Yes. What?

Prabhupāda: We are public, members of the public. So you should become our servant also, if you are public servant. (laughter)

Director: A public servant is, in our philosophy, is a man who serves a minister elected by the people, and this way he serves the public. And what the public decides, he acts accordingly.

Prabhupāda: Therefore we are reforming the public.

Director: Yes, that's what I mean.

Prabhupāda: They select a man...

Director: When you reform the public, then you cannot act differently.

Prabhupāda: Yes. So the public select a president, Nixon, and they became disturbed, again drag him down. This is going on.

Director: Yes, but that is how society works. You must want society to change, and we have to change. I just do what I'm asked to do. Otherwise I lose my job.

Prabhupāda: No, if you actually want to do some social welfare, then you must take this standard formula. And if you manufacture your own way, that will never be successful.

Director: I might agree with you that if all of us will be Kṛṣṇa...

Prabhupāda: Not whole. We don't...

Director: Then we would be..., then social welfare would mean something different.

Prabhupāda: Now, just like we are proposing here. I am not proposing—Kṛṣṇa says—that one must be peaceful. So how to become peaceful? If his mind is always disturbed, how he can become peaceful?

Director: You're quite right.

Prabhupāda: So that is the secret of success. You want to make the people peaceful, but you do not know how to make him peaceful. So therefore you have to adopt this...

Director: Yes, you have a competitive society.

Prabhupāda: We say that you chant Hare Kṛṣṇa, eat here sumptuously, live here comfortably, and you become peaceful. It is guaranteed. If anyone, even a madman, agrees to these three principles, that let him chant Hare Kṛṣṇa mantra, take whatever nice foodstuff we prepare, take, and live peacefully, he will be peaceful.