The Public Eye

There is a move afoot by many states to regulate and license yoga teachers and yoga schools, proving that governments too are capable of a big stretch.

The deep breathing, however, sounds more like heavy panting over the possibility of being able to regulate one more thing that doesn't need it. There is no way to explain it except to say that it might be like British mountain climber George Mallory said when he was asked why he wanted to scale Mount Everest: "Because it's there."

So, why do many state governments want to impose licensing and other nonsense on yoga instructors? Because they're there.

Of course, a year after Mallory issued those immortal words he died trying to do it, proving that mountain climbing is just as dangerous as poorly done yoga exercises. Yet, no one has attempted to regulate mountain climbing. I say that is curious indeed.

I know that I have listened to the emergency scanner for weeks at a time expecting to hear that chilling crackle of words, "We have a yoga incident."

Officials in the various yogaunfriendly states, however, will tell you they are only trying to protect the public from fly-by-night yoga felons, who no doubt travel in bands with the aim of fleecing unsuspecting souls by calming them into a state of deep Zen and then talking them into letting their unsavory yoga associates pave their driveways for big bucks.

It was just the other day, in fact, that - and I can't verify this completely - an elderly man was accosted by a group of yoga desperados, who said, "Assume the Bird of Paradise pose or else, oldtimer."

That is just going too far. I mean, while it is true that most yoga instructors are women, they are STRONG women capable of tying you into a square knot with the flick of a relaxed, yet powerful, finger.

The next thing you know, we'll hear a report that a gang of yoga thugs robbed a bank by getting everyone to assume the lotus position, thus rendering them unable to untangle themselves in time to thwart their mad scramble through the cash drawers.

So maybe these state officials are right and we must stop unscrupulous yoga marauders before they have us all helplessly snarled. And maybe that is the real problem. It could be that the would-be regulators are victims of yoga assault and have been twisted into so many shapes that they don't know which of their ends is up. If that's true, we really shouldn't blame them for talking out of the wrong one.