If yoga is freedom, why has it been used to justify war, uphold caste systems, and mask state violence?

In this deep conversation, activist scholar Sheena Sood, PhD unpacks the shadow side of yoga — from its weaponization and “Omwashing” to its long history and present entanglement with state violence among supremacist entities. We explore how governments, militaries, and nationalist movements co-opt yoga, and we dare to ask how to reclaim it for justice, anti-oppression, anti-imperial values, and collective healing.

If you’ve ever felt uneasy about the commercialization, appropriation, or politics of yoga, this episode will nourish both your critical mind and radical heart.

A full transcript and show notes are available on the blog at shaynagrajo.com/podcast

People & Mentions

Lenni-Lenapehoking people · Baba Ramdev · Hindutva ideology · Highlander Research and Education Center · Movement to Free Mumia Abu Jamal · George Floyd · “Little Israel” in Himachal Pradesh · Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank · Narendra Modi · Magnolia Zuniga · Nissim Amon · Tejal Patel · Hadeel Gharbawi · Al-Jawad Camp · Donald Trump · Mariame Kaba

Key Takeaways

* Decolonial yoga does not stop at BIPOC representation — it demands radical ethical frameworks.

* “It’s important to talk about the harmful weaponization of yoga by the Zionist entity and other members of the far right who are in alliance with Israel right now.”

* The liberatory potential of yoga includes organized political action — even militant political action — in the face of injustice.

* A truly decolonial approach is built in the present toward the future; it can’t simply be reclaimed from the past.

* Recognizing yoga’s entanglement with systems of violence invites more intentional, politicized practice.

* Naming contradictions creates the space to birth more liberatory ways of practicing and teaching yoga.

ABOUT SHEENA SOOD, PHD

Sheena is an Assistant Professor of Sociology at Delaware Valley University; and a Philly-based activist scholar, yoga practitioner, and healing justice visionary. She earned her yoga certifications at Kailash Tribal School in McLeodganj, India, and her research “Omwashing Yoga: Self-care and State Violence among the Global Far-Right” examines how right-wing movements in India, Israel and the U.S. appropriate yoga to advance ethnonational, colonial, and supremacist agendas. Her work appears in Jadaliyya, Race & Yoga Journal, Al Jazeera, and multiple edited volumes, such as Practicing Yoga as Resistance: Voices of Color in Search of Freedom and The Yoga Teacher’s Survival Guide: Social Justice, Science, Politics, and Power. She co-founded Yogis for Palestine and created Yoga Warrior Tales, a social-justice–oriented yoga program for children. Read more here →sheenashining.com

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