Headache and Heartburn

``Worked out quite nicely for the Punjabis for a long time. ``
So the Punjabis are not as simpleminded and sincere and straightforward as I thought. That is one of the qualities I admired about the Punjabis - but apparently all feudal lords and their gods are one.

I have now officially lost track of the argument. Briefly : Sir Syed Ahmed Khan good - but AliGarh University should be just that not AliGarh Muslim University (and the texts should not be just in Urdu or Arabic because knowledge and science is the property of no one culture, religion or race).

Gandhi & Co. good - but I wish he had resisted the seperatists and nationalists strongly. I like Jinnah for his secular views AFTER the creation of Pakistan and his love for life (wining , dining and womanizing) ... besides that I would put the blame of the wars and the separatist violence on his head.

thats all ...

Almira,
So what is wrong with Pakistanis dancing?
Anyway I liked the reflective ending here.
And next time you do run into Mohsin Hamid, let
him know that some of us are eagerly awaiting
his next novel. ``Moth Smoke`` was just brilliant.
On the other subject of discussion here, let me
add that Sir Syed has been the ONLY REAL POSITIVE thinker for Muslim South Asians in the last 200 years. Pakistanis need to revisit his ideas if they want future success. Iqbal had more depth
but his views have been distorted and have now also become tools in the hands of fanatics.

Ras

Re: Solitude

Ooooohhhh, now you`re gonna get it. Wait till Mullahs KRashid and Omar see this.

sac #11, ``The search for a desi soulmate in

the city of lights........maybe someday!! Good luck.``

Oops, I guess I missed the purpose of it altogether. By the way, the two words, desi and soulmate don`t go together.

Fuzair #13, ``I am simply saying that all religions need to be firmly stamped out from public life

because they are all bad in their own way.``

Why go to such extremes? There are many public religious organizations who do a lot of good for society, Catholic Schools, even some Mosques. They give aimless young people direction, counsel, and discipline. As long as violence is not taught, not all organized religion

is ``bad.``

As for arguing with Solitude about Islam, you`re banging your head against a wall. The guy`s prejudiced beyond belief.

I must say that this kind of atmosphere happens in most Indian/Pakistani functions where people need to go out of their way to prove to everyone else that they`re somebody. Fragile egos abound in kids of both communities, much due to the same mindset of their parents. But what can you do...I haven`t deduced whether my fellow ABCD`s or my FOB cousins and all their friends are worse at exhibiting this.

As for religion, let`s look at it this way. You can interpret religion any way you want to and therefore whichever ``word of God`` you take as your own, you can make that religion into a thing of beauty, inner-peace and spiritualism, or you can make it into a dark, violent, purely riutalistic intolerant beast. Sadly, a disheartening number of Muslims chose the latter route since they could never fully disassociate Islam with their native, violent/intolerant pre-Islamic cultures. But I take one look at a Muslim convert here in the US who is just reserved, always smiling, and just at peace with himself and with everyone else that I think, ``Well, thankfully it`s not all that bad.`` I`m not going to go out of my way to defend Islam, but it surely need not be demonized more than any other religion. For all the karma and nirvana and om shanti om talk of Hindus, you have elements such as the RSS, you have HUGE elements of intolerance in India, you have Bal Thackeray admitting in an interview that he is a strong admirer of Adolf Hitler. Did Hinduism initially preach such ugly human behavior? Probably not. But have many Hindus in India used elements and interpretations of Hinduism to further their own personal and communal needs? Yes. As have followers of every religion, from the Christian fundamentalist yokels in the deep South (with George W. Bush as their edifice) to right-wing Jews who keep calling for the destrcution of Al-Aqsa mosque to Buddhists and Hindus slaughtering each other (eh? how`s THAT possible?) in Sri Lanka and to Muslims in many places around the world hell-bent on taking ``jihad`` (even though they completely forgot what true ``jihad`` is) against everyone else; religion gets caught up with politics and then the screwed up result starts streaming down to the masses. Does Islam call for a woman to be jailed if she is raped? No. Does Islam state a woman should be killed if she marries someone she wishes to marry instead of whom she is supposed to marry according to her family? No. BUT do many Muslims believe the opposite? Yes, and I really can`t explain where the intolerance comes from - but it is not the religion itself. When I have Christian friends born here in the US telling me, ``You know, I really like you as a friend, it just too bad that you`re not `saved` and you`re eventually going to hell`` you know that EVERYONE, not just your people, is warped.

Solitude (various posts):

[The greatest enemy of a cause is its most fervent disciple.]

--Yes. And I don`t see how your attitude is going to help further your ``cause`` of creating ``magnificent human beings``. As I see it, you`re being just as bigoted as the ``jihadi`` elements belonging to the various religions you`re going around bashing. You`re just as blind in your hatred for them as they are in their hatred for people like you. Religious orientation is a VERY sensitive issue for MANY. Attacking others for what they believe in will only earn you their wrath. I mean, why do you hate the mullahs so much? You`re just emulating them at the other end of the spectrum. How can you talk about ``love`` and ``tolerance`` - which to me are all-encompassing elements - while you yourself are making them conditional by condemning those who happen to believe in something YOU perceive as ``wrong``? Labeling a person as a ``sheep`` or as being ``warped`` is not going to get anyone anywhere. They`ll just turn around and throw the same stone back at you and the war will continue.

[The reaction of the educated and civilized has always been restraint and temperance and moderation.]

--Well maybe that`s where the fault lies? Instead of adopting this somewhat aloof attitude, instead of ``compromising``, how about some EMPATHY? The first thing any teacher learns is how to empathize with the students. Once he/she fully comprehends the students` faculties, he/she is then able to adopt the appropriate teaching methods to get their point across to them effectively. Ignorance as to why/how a person is the way he/she is and intolerance have never been effective tools when it comes to teaching anything to anyone.

For the sake of whatever you believe in, please pull your head out of the stinky flush you`ve got it stuck in and use your ``talents`` to try and work WITH the people you hate so much instead of working AGAINST them. Religious practices aside, many of them are decent ``humans`` as well - try and reach their humanity? Attacking their beliefs is like attacking their armor - how about reaching for the person inside? I personally know many people who`re ``capable of charity`` and are ``willing to share their talents, their knowledge and their efficient skills with others - for the betterment of the poor`` and for the betterment of others but hold strongly to their beliefs at the same time. A person`s beliefs are a personal issue - let`s leave it at that. We are in no position to tell others what is wrong and what isn`t - if we do, then we shouldn`t be complaining about the other religious fundamentalists enforcing their beliefs upon others. I`m not trying to preach here - in no position to - and I don`t want to sound like some Miss Goody-two-shoes - am not - just trying to point out the fallacy of your argument and suggesting ways you could maybe help your ``cause``. I just don`t see the point in HATING anyone because of what or whom they believe in or practice. ``Hate`` is a very strong word. I`m not worried about my kids suffering because of any of this - I survived and I`m sure they`ll be able to learn how to survive as well.

I`m not even going to bother with some of the unsubstantiated ``facts`` you`ve presented. You`re just like ``them`` - so selective in your interpretations of various issues. Hypocrite.

Fuzair:

[...the true tragedy of Islam is that ijtihad ended about 800 years ago and we are incapable of restarting it.]

--Why are we incapable of restarting it? We can start on a personal level and work our way from there can`t we?

scout:

I`m sorry for taking up so much space on your board. Wish I could say more about your piece - I hope you can understand if I say I couldn`t relate to it - we have no such events (or cab drivers :)) here. But it was interesting to read about the experience of others.

solitude #1,#5,#7,and#15

The guy sounds like Bala Saheb Thackrey.

Any relationship?

Sorry for the diversion, but since this thread is evolving in its own strange way...

From the current issue of The Week @ http://www.the-week.com/20Nov26/life7.htm

The forbidden land

When an AK-47 is thrust into one`s face, the most illogical diktats of the Taliban appear reasonable. As the writer found out recently

By Sergio Trippodo/Kabul



The Order threw everything into confusion. Children stopped playing. They were no longer allowed to smile. At every moment it was forbidden forbidden to enjoy life, to joke, to laugh, to kiss each other in the groves. Forbidden, all what the Great Conqueror disliked, was forbidden.

Afghan poet Said Bahaudin Majrouh

Now you can add the shaving cream and razor to the list. Last fortnight, ordinary Afghans were drawn to a notice pasted on the gates of various ministry buildings in Kabul. The word `forbidden` was not used but the message was clear: cut the morning shave out of the schedule. Men without a beard would not be considered for jobs or provided any services by the government, said the decree from the reclusive leader Mullah Mohammad Omar.

More than four years after it took over the country, the Taliban is determined to push ahead with its agenda to make Afghanistan the world`s ``purest`` Islamic state. For the people who are used to the repressive diktats of the Taliban, the latest decree is one more in a long list. After the capture of Kabul in 1996, the Taliban issued a slew of fatwas, the Islamic rules decided by the ulema or scholars and implemented by the munkrat or religious police. One of them is to `prevent` music. Literally translated from the original text in Dari language, the fatwa reads, ``In shops, hotels, vehicles and rickshaws, cassettes and music are prohibited. If a cassette is found, the vehicle and the driver will be imprisoned. If five people guarantee, the vehicle will be released and the criminal released later.``

Music and dance at wedding parties are `prevented` too. The Taliban has banned even Nawroz, the traditional Afghan New Year festival as ``anti-Islamic``. Women are not allowed to work. Or go to a tailor. Says fatwa number 14: ``If women or fashion magazines are seen in the shop, the tailor will be imprisoned.``

Only men can work. They earn a monthly salary of Rs 100 if they are lucky enough to have a job in Kabul. Farmers can till a stony field with a simple shovel and risk starvation, or cultivate poppy. Most of them go for the second option and produce opium, even if they have to work on a terrain that hides 10 million landmines.

Just a few kilometres from the border with Pakistan, heads bob from the huge green expanse dotted with rose and white flowers. In a few weeks, the rose poppies will give low-quality opium, which will be sold at (Pakistani) Rs 1,400 per kg. The white ones will yield Rs 4,000 a kg.

Farmer Ahmed knows that his work is illegal, but says he has no other means to feed his family. ``When the UN or the Taliban give me an alternative, I`ll be glad to avoid spending ten hours a day under the hot sun. But this will never happen, because those in Kabul earn much more than us in this deal.``

The Afghan opium production in 1999 was 4,600 tonnes, nearly 120 per cent more than what was produced the previous year. In fact, Afghanistan has now overtaken Myanmar and produces 75 per cent of the world`s opium. That`s good for the Taliban regime which generates some 60 per cent of its estimated $100 million war budget from `taxes` on smuggling and drugs trafficking.

The clergy in Kabul claims that ``drugs produced in Afghanistan go to the kafirs in the west, and consequently, do not harm the Islamic community``. Statistics from neighbouring countries give a different picture: 58 per cent of the produce is consumed in Central Asia. Pakistan, which did not know this phenomenon till 1979, has five million addicts. Iran`s official data for 1998 showed a population of 1.2 million addicts; NGOs put the figure at over three million.

Avisitor to the `forbidden` land learns about the restrictions the moment he applies for a visa at the embassy in Islamabad. There is a notice for journalists, a special fatwa that forces a reporter to notify the ministry of foreign affairs in Kabul on arrival, and to stay at the gloomy Inter-Continental Hotel. One can rent a car only from the GarzandoiÑthe former Afghan TourÑwhich is now a state-run machinery of control. And since any visitor requires an interpreter, one gets a guide-cum-spy from the government.

It is strictly prohibited to take pictures of any living being. Once in Kabul, the journalist learns that a living being is also a goat or a camel, even a house because ``human beings are living inside``.

The application for a permit to travel out of the capital takes a few days. The application goes from the foreign office to the ministry of culture and back to the foreign office, to the sub-section for foreign affairs in the ministry of culture, then back to the foreign office where the permission is mostly denied. Luckily, in this case the daily reports of the interpreter-spy do not show any irregularity in the visitor`s behaviour and a permission is granted.

A day-long ride on a bumpy apology of a road brings one to the almost deserted town of Bamiyan, which boasts fabulous statues of the Buddha. The welcome is cool: curfews, checkpoints every 200 metres, Toyota pick-ups with rockets ready to shoot, mujahideen with their Kalashnikovs pointed at your face, wanting to know who you are, why you have come.

Just seconds after the first click of the camera, a roar emanates from the feet of the buddha and black turbaned men run towards ME. A 14-year-old holds an AK-47 at my face and shouts, ``Photos are prohibited!``

It is forbidden to stay overnight in the only lodge in Bamiyan because it is run by a Shia while our Taliban guide is a Sunni Pashtun who does not want to spend the night worrying about the safety of his throat. So, to protect the foreign journalist, it is deemed better to stay at the Taliban HQ. It is safe I am told; only a few mortars have to be moved out of the room, but ``there is no danger as they have expired since long``.

Early next morning the sunrise uncovers the beauty of the golden hills where the Buddhas have been carved. Just seconds after the first click of the camera, a roar emanates from the feet of the Awakened and a group of furious black turbaned men run towards the foreign infidel. A 14-year-old mujahideen holds an AK-47 at my face and shouts, ``Photos are prohibited!`` My explanation that I hold a special permit signed by Wakil Ahmed Muttawakil, the foreign minister and number two in the Taliban hierarchy, does not impress him.

The commander, an 18-year-old, looks at the papers and delivers his sentence: ``OK, when all my boys will evacuate the military base inside the cave of the Buddha, you will have ten minutes to shoot some pictures. Then you will leave and go back to Kabul. Right?`` One protests that the permission is for a whole day, but pat comes the answer: ``That`s it! Ten minutes now, plus twelve hours by car to reach Kabul, make a whole day. Right?`` Facing an AK-47, the explanation seems extremely logical.

Inside the metal wreck of a taxi, a tape-recorder is playing some music: it`s terrible yet much sweeter than the roar of the black knights of the Taliban.

Solitude (various posts) You are just ranting on, and trying to make up for your lack of anything logical or original with disgusting phrases like ``but are you the type that wipes his arse with leaves and stones``.

I read Sherdil`s post too, and his dignified post, even though I may not agree with all of it, places him in a different class than you. People like you are the real Sudras (untouchables) of any society.

Fuzair, your dad has a very simplistic view of history like my dad. My dad usually says that Punjab was beaten up for several hundred years, looted, twisted and turned and converted and raped while none of our brothers on the East side bothered to help us fight this. And then it was their turn beyond Panipat. Why should Punjabis had prevented invaders anymore? They were majority mulsims by then anyways. When Temples of Multan were being broken and leveled our brothers in Panipat were probably enjoying the virtues of Kathik dancers of the village.

But it is interesting that now even invasion by foreigners was a fault of Punjabis.

From what has happened to Punjabis of various religions after British left, I don`t think our forefathers were that wrong in their sympathy and support for British. Those were relatively peaceful and harmonious years amongst various Punjabi communities. But that was long before we fell under the paws of Congress and Muslim League.

Imagine a world without mosques or churches but a world with charitable, humane organisations who give NOT to s_uck up to Allah or Bhagwan but to help humanity.

Imagine a world without deeni madrassahs but an earth populated by gardens of books where students learn and discover each other all in love (not in the name of Allah or Bhagwan because some of us do not follow either).

Imagine a world without Hindu rituals or Islamic Eids but FESTIVE celebrations of love where the only qualification for membership is : humanity. Why ? because it is not necessary to shed blood of an innocent animal to prove your love for God (or present the poor as an excuse).

Imagine a world without countries - ONE world, where you do not need visas or citizenships : just a love for the native people (for as you can see many people can get visas & citizenships and still abuse the native population , calling them ``dirty``, kafirs, ``promiscuous`` when your own kill and pillage and maintain a harem of for e.g. 13 wives, some concubines and a child bride)

Imagine a world where you can find love in every arm instead of bitterness and holy wars and holy sites and holy men and holy books.

How can you make that world happen by being able to criticize your own religion, move away from your own holiness and reaching out and embracing those who are willing to do the same.

I have given up my religion (the fanatical, bigoted tone of mine comes from years of practice as a Muslim preacher) and I stand with my arms open for all who will give up :

misogyny, (hatred of women, segregation , veiling, half inheritance laws, half witness, imprisonment till death (Al Maeda))

homophobia, (hatred and fear of homosexuals)

xenophobia (hatred and fear of outsiders foreigners, non muslims)

crucifixions, circumcisions, chopping body parts, stoning

discriminating betw. muslims and nonmuslims (categorizing people based on their religious affiliations)

So my facts are wrong, so I am wrong about everything else - give me this much : Islam has never been able to and can never embrace and accept peace, love and the forsaking the above phobias.

Again I am sorry if I was cranky. I love you all (with the exception of the Muslims who have in the past and continue to abuse me - for them and their behinds I have reserved a special corkscrew - just kidding).

Solitude #28,

You missed, ``you may say I`m a dreamer.``

You should have been born under the seventies` sun, in San Francisco smoking weed right out of the womb.

On second thought, in case you missed it, go back and read Lubna`s post #24.

You hate a group of people and you speak about tolerance.

Ras Siddiqui #18, ``So what is wrong with Pakistanis dancing?``

Nothing :). It`s just annoyance at seeing too much of the same thing over and over again.

``And next time you do run into Mohsin Hamid, let

him know that some of us are eagerly awaiting

his next novel.``

I did tell him that. And he was so ``hush hush`` about it, so it must be something good :).

Rsaxena #10, ``Yawn....this is boring..what`s the point of this article? Good writing doesn`t need to have a point but this isn`t even good writing.``

I regret to say this, but I agree with you on this.

Solitude. Yaar, you are like a broken record.

How many times have you said the same

thing. I would be impressed and yell rah rah

shish koom ba from the sidelines cept for one

itty bitty detail. You are so caught up in your

own philosophy that you will not allow for

others to meander through yours. Your arms

are only wide open for those who follow your

specific mantra. No exceptions and no

changes to your rules. That, my dear, is close

minded.

c-gal

dulla bhatti & others

``Javaabay jahilaan baashud khamoshi``

They deserve our pity & sympathy rather than our scorn.They are screaming for a mental cure.