Fight Hudood, Protect Women

#244 so ``islam is evil and pakistan is doomed.``

this is the recurring delusion beyond which you are incapable of going. a kind of an infinite loop in a java program until someone mercifully presses the break key. take a tea break.

DOS (1) :
1) Stop hair-splitting. Stick to the article which is a good one in itself. But inadequate for Pak in general.
2) Stop comparing Pak with India or the west. Pak is Pak, land of the pure.
3) Stop loosing heart. Though near, Kayamat ka din has not yet come.
4) Stop shying away from truth. Truth will take hold of you and prick its sharp nails into your eyes.

DOS (2)

1) Get to the real issue. Discuss basics and think of how should Pak go about it. E.g : Will scrapping of Hudood law make any difference?
2) In socio-political terms you can compare Pak with erstwhile Soviet-Union. Either remain PURE and wait for the Kayamat or like China, make way for the pollutants to come in. Resist their entry but don`t close the door, i.e. filter.
3) Pakis are a confused lot. Real patriots must act fast. Clear the smoke and get started.
4) Try to invent your own political system but crush religious fundamentalism at any cost. Remember, they are the carriers of Kayamat. Pak has already stripped it`s shock-absorbers away. Dilly-dallying is meant only for open societies.

Samar

The introduction of hudood ordinance as well as the removal of a part of it now are both actions of the same nature: Both are `dramas`. Both are malafide in their intent, both were never meant to either persecute any crime nor to prevent miscarriage of justice against women. Both were meant for the sole reason of fooling the people and obtaining political gains. My argument is as below:

The hudood defined in Islam with respect to fornication and adultery are moral offenses punishable by the defined process (e.g. four witnesses) and do not include rape. Rape is a criminal offense which is not treated seperately from other criminal offenses such as assault, battery or murder. It was wrong in the first place to lump rape and fornication together because these are NOT the same kind of offenses. It was just shabbily and hurriedly done to enact Zia`s Nizam-e-Mustafa for legitimization of his regime. The `thana` police culture took advantage of it and used it to their own ends towards extortion and/or pleasing local influentials at the village/tehsil level. Still, even though many women were charged and imprisoned under this offense, none was ever found guilty and awarded the prescribed punishment because the judiciary was aware of the flaw. Thus, the root of victimisation lay at the `thana` police level, and not with the law itself which was flawed just as many other laws are flawed, and which are only corrected after having been tested.

As for the recent women`s protection bill, that too is as much of a `drama` as the foregoing. This bill removes rape from hudood and puts it back in the criminal code (tazeer) exactly as it was before. So far so good. But does it `protect` women? Or address the `thana` culture`? All it does is to deprive the police from just `one` lucky windfall of a tool to use for extortion. That`s no big deal. They have plenty of others and are using them.

In the meantime there is a whole Federal Ministry devoted to women and waxing eloquently on their huge achievement. And the Federal Minister (who may even become PM sometime and the author of the bill) is about whom I had alluded to in my article of yore named ``Empty Vessels and all that Jazz``. Her dream had always been a nice Land Cruiser, which I guess has since been achieved many times over.

#243 by tahmed32

[hamidm: no doubt indians (and the secular hindus like nehru in particular) deserve credit for building an orderly society within a framework of laws while in pakistan - well, the general (a paid servant of one branch of the executive) fired the Chief Justice of Pakistan yesterday (the head of a separate branch of government whose, in any civilized society, would be untouchable by the executive, let alone a tinpot ruler who violated the sacred trust a nation places on its military to defend the nation, not use it to gain power himself)!!

your ``scientific research`` that makes you think that hindus are less attached to their religious ritual than muslims is less convincing though. as many hindus show up for khhumb mela as muslims for hajj, both convinced no doubt that this is a short cut to wash away their sins. and there is no denying the simplicity of islamic rituals (related e.g. to birth, death, marriage and everyday prayer) relative to hindu or christian traditions, e.g.

as for maudoodism, like i said, this will be washed away when we have a civilized society in pakistan. if there was no military interference in pakistan, the lack of ground roots support for maudoodism would be exposed (as it routinely is when these rascals are trashed in elections by the pakistani people every time). ]


Pakistan was built upon a false premise, a lie - which is that Muslims are better people than Hindus.

This is the logic that said that a Muslim minority in an undivided Hindu majority India would be mistreated, therefore the necessity for Pakistan, but a Hindu minority in Pakistan would be treated much better by the majority Muslims.

Other than being an absurd logic in itself, it flies in the face of available factual historic evidence - a brief perusal of the court documents of the Islamic rulers in India over the ages exhibits abundantly how the Hindus were mistreated over the centuries under Muslim rule.


A nation based on a lie is doomed at birth. As is a religion based on lies.

hamidm: no doubt indians (and the secular hindus like nehru in particular) deserve credit for building an orderly society within a framework of laws while in pakistan - well, the general (a paid servant of one branch of the executive) fired the Chief Justice of Pakistan yesterday (the head of a separate branch of government whose, in any civilized society, would be untouchable by the executive, let alone a tinpot ruler who violated the sacred trust a nation places on its military to defend the nation, not use it to gain power himself)!!

your ``scientific research`` that makes you think that hindus are less attached to their religious ritual than muslims is less convincing though. as many hindus show up for khhumb mela as muslims for hajj, both convinced no doubt that this is a short cut to wash away their sins. and there is no denying the simplicity of islamic rituals (related e.g. to birth, death, marriage and everyday prayer) relative to hindu or christian traditions, e.g.

as for maudoodism, like i said, this will be washed away when we have a civilized society in pakistan. if there was no military interference in pakistan, the lack of ground roots support for maudoodism would be exposed (as it routinely is when these rascals are trashed in elections by the pakistani people every time).

Feroz writes <<< It is a facile argument to suggest that rapes go unpunished in United States and so we should not bother about the conviction rates of rape crimes in Pakistan. Women are raped and the rapes might go unpunished in the United States, but the women do have right of justice and the due process of the law in the United States and at the very least, they are not victimized on the basis on religion and are not treated as third class citizens on the basis of a religiously created apartheid of social, economic and political disenfranchisments. >>>

Ignoring the jibber jabber of your long post that is totally devoid of facts but relies on moralizing in the usual Western elite`s hypocritical sloganeering manner, try to deal with what I had written as fact. It is a very potent argument on my part when I suggest that even in the absence of Hudood Laws in the US, the results produced as shown by victimization data of women, are much grander than any that the Hudood Laws have produced in Pakistan. You would also claim that African American males have due-process in America when as fact they are disproportionately incarcerated and punished in that system. Further any and all data are missing from your article. Show me that maternal mortality in Pakistan has religious cause and then I will show you other third world countries where similar numbers are found in the absence of hudood laws. How will you prove me worng? You can`t because your thinking is sterotypically circumscribed in favor of the Western model of domination and misery generation and then distraction by using slogans.

IF the slogan of de jure ``due process`` is all you care about and not the results, and then using them you want to obfuscate from the real issues that affect Pakistani women things like poverty, healthcare, maternal mortality and their related results in the form of status in the economy and the home, then you my patheticlly ignorant friend are quite foolish. The real reasons behind a crime are not ``religion`` but has to do with the wider social structure, the power to assign labels and the distribution of resources, these are what affect women`s status and distractions that are offered as explanation by devious illiterates. Religion is a dependant variable in our society and not the independant determiner. The problems of women and the problems of men in our society are much greater than the Hudood ordinances, and I still stand by my claim that those who shout and wail against those are merely part of a cat and mouse game of distraction from the real issues...

Re: # 242

``Religion is a dependant variable in our society and not the independant determiner.``

A very thought provoking observation indeed, but as Iqbal says:

`He kabhi jaan aur kabhi tasleeme-jaan he zindgi``

kaalchakra #232 I am glad you agree then that hinduism is in fact even more riddled with primitive superstitions than islam. lets take a step forward from here.

these superstitions stem from the same primitive tribal culture as sectariansim whereby goats seek security in numbers by affiliating themselves with one group (shia, sunni, ahmedi in islam e.g., or hindu-muslim communalism in india, or islam-west fanaticism that exists in pakistan or the middle east). so, the root of the problem is (drum-roll): primitive cultures. and, to twist the saying, you can take a man out of his primitive culture, but you cant take the primitive culture out of the man. and that is why you have educated babus on chowk getting their jollies by throwing mud at muslims and islam (as in case of indians on chowk) or by throwing mud at other muslims sects or the west (as in case of pakistanis on chowk).

With these encouraging and uplifting thoughts, I end this post with best regards. :-)

Re: # 240

tahmed,

........ you are missing an important point ..... hindooism might be riddled with more ptimitive superstitions than islam, but the horrible hindoos don`t base their constitution on those superstitions ........ whereas our constitution is the koran - the book that you worship ....... ask any muslim and he will tell you that without any hesitation - sure, some will throw in the bukhari and shafi and a little bit of hambal and malik, but by and large all agree that we must follow the book ......

....... on the other hand, other than the silly hindoo scholars on chowk and one or two rather strange brahmins, i have yet to meet a hindoo who seems to have any idea of what hindooism is all about ........ and i know a lot of hindoos - too many, because mrs hamidm is convinced they have been instrumental in my headlong plunge towards hell ........ after many years of ardous research over many gins and tonics, i have reached the conclusion that there is no such thing as hindooism - nobody in their right mind would worship a steak instead of eating it ..........

......... i think islam is in a league by itself when it comes to practicing primitive superstitions ......... but, you can save us all by displacing bukhari and maudoodi ........

Re: # 241

[........i have yet to meet a hindoo who seems to have any idea of what hindooism is all about ........ ]

BTW, do you have any idea of what Islam is all about?

Re: # 338

``BTW, do you have any idea of what Islam is all about``

........ of course i do ..... i was circumcised at a very early age and have yet to recover from the trauma of that bloody ritual ........ i `finished` the koran at the age of eleven and then again a year later - the maulvi and his wife received a jora and there were great festivities with halwa for all ...... i can tell you all about the trials and tribulations of the prophet and his band of merry men in mecca, medina and back in mecca ........ i can tell you about abraham, the crazy old man who almost killed his son from hagar the concubine because his wife sarah got jealous (see, i know the fine details) ......... i know i am supposed to avoid contact with women, pigs, ahmedis and hindoos ........ i know all about the five pillars of islam and live in morbid fear of going to hell for not following any of them ........... so what else is there to know ?

........ on the other hand, most hindoos cannot tell hanuman from their first cousin ....... and then they turn around and blame poor george allen for making the same mistake ........

Re: # 340 hamidm

These are legends and rituals and symbols associated with Islam. So again...my question remains there.

Re: # 343

You would be better off asking a nazi to tell the virtues of judaism or a Clan member to deliver a speech on racial equality

#235 by - - -...- - - on March 10, 2007 1:21am PT

[Is a type of Brahminism on the rise in Islam and amongst Muslims? …The internal consistency is vanishing from within Islam itself, which requires multiple interpretation based on hair splitting meanings of words and phrases and contexts etc.]

Brahminism, as you describe here, refers to an absence of conflict – not through the recitation of peaceful shlokas, or through promptly leaving any scenes of conflict upon the first signs of conflict, but it refers to the forever occurring conflict within the self. Such conflict is a permanent state of being, and the present day status of the great thought process of what is generally understood as “Islam” has evolved in – and continues to evolve in – even as many in the world (with the clear exception of a few wizened souls on this web-site (not I)) – fail to appreciate its internal consistency being the source of its strength. Such consistency is especially unique because of its all-absorbing nature – as well as its ability to permanently retain in its embrace all that it absorbs. You may have a point about man feeling the need for power and control – but the way you explain it, perhaps these “true” Brahmins of the world, now just emerging on the world stage and making their presence well-known and understood (or, as some would say here, misunderstood) – will be someday seen in their full glory as a mere natural extension of the thought-process initiated in 600 BC! I must admit that this is a completely new way of looking at things – one may disagree whether the world at large is fully ready for these up-and-coming Brahmins – but it does put them in a different light.

[A religion is born every day. An interpretation is created every day. And internal consistency vanishes into thin air for the external observer.]

Sometimes, along with the observers!

#226 by kaalchakra on March 9, 2007 8:03pm PT

The crux of the matter is that the cutest cuts are those which carry to the core of the crap with considerable kindness.

Re:235

[...A parallel here for Islam - Buddhim is like Islam, which then broke into many schools and many interpretations. Both negate orthodoxy of one form or the other. Extremely simple in their beginnings. They became complex over time, and both esoteric and nebulous over a period of time. ....]

You are describing the typical evolutionary cycle for all major religions. Every religion starts out simple, with a simple message and a simple set of rituals. Early Islam, Vedic hinduism, early christianity or early buddhism were all simple messages. As time goes by, the message splinters into multiple entities. The question is why does this happen?

The main reason is that religion can give you a mental crutch, perhaps a social structure, but it cannot protect you from uncertainty. Consider the Taliban for instance. They felt that they were doing God`s work, and were paragons of virtue. Yet, God didnt stop them from getting thrown out in less than a month in Afghanistan. For all their piety, they are stuck to hiding in mountains and making suicide attacks. So what was all that piety for? Why didnt God help them? If God cannot protect his most ardent believers, why should the rest of us even bother? Decades from now, the Afghans will realize that all that praying and shoving women into burqas led to didly squat difference in their own lives. If at that time, someone offers a new interpretation or a new message, they will listen. That is how religious message s become diffuse - uncertainty is the root cause of people`s disillusion with the existing message.