Are all Women Witches?

I think shore is calling HP a CREIP? This is a RESERVED privilage ;-)

Farzana

Excuse my inexcusable tardiness in replying to a previous interact of yours regarding the epic article about ``a view from the bar``. I know I digress but interesting threads can be woven from your previous response to topics raised in this article. You will appreciate the symbolism. It is only hoped ?

Farzana wrote ``Isn’t it interesting that it is the gigolos who take charge of the fairytales and the women are left with glass slippers?``

Farzana spot on … that is why the unlucky ``Cinderellas``` of life reflected in your piece have to climb up mountains of ``glass`` in shoes made of iron. This is the harsh and frozen fate that befalls their glacial existence.

Farzana poses the question “Are all vices abusive to others?”

Not all are Farzana, but to be more précis, the vice you mention, that of exploiting prostitutes, is a spitefully abusive imposition by gargantuan gigolos of epic proportions. The “nuts and bolts” in their fairy-tale psyches ravage the ill-begotten Cinderellas`- institutionalised socially in the form of bonded labour.

Farzana you type “When the blood is blue and the wine is rose-hued, eking out a living ought not to even be a consideration”.

If only the blue blooded barons and baronesses stepped out of their ivory towers removing their “rose-tinted” glasses perhaps then would they begin to choke on their “rose-hued” wine and realise the fatal implications before that clock strikes 12. Slipper or no slipper.

Farzana most evocatively in your last para to me: “Alas, in the occasional London bar I have been to I spotted no popes and presidents…or perhaps I was too busy rubbing shoulders with a leather-backed chair, trying to remove the remnants of guilt…the “aspirations” had already been “jaded”. “

Interesting to note that you`ve been to the city of Big Ben and sipped the liqueur of life in London, you roused my curiosity, being a doyen of London hang-outs may I ask which bars? And which “aspirations” have been “jaded” ?

I only ask this

For in your tone and typing I sometimes hear a rare distant lament which is an echo of my own…………..

RSVP plzzz.......

Shoresahib,

Have you lost your marbles? I only implied that she might have. This is beyond your norrow knowledge and understanding of the world.
Grow up and start looking around you. You will notice things that will startle you.

Re: # 57
Your perverted conjectures are nothing but exactly that. Conjectures of a perverted old man.
You thinking it is so, will not make it so.
Were you in the Woman`s mind?
How did you come to your glorious conclusion that she must be having an affair.

You are a man, perverted and vile.

#56

I am disgusting for saying as it is? what world do you live in?

You go in Allah ki Pannah I am happy in hell!

Re: # 55
HP:

You are disgusting.

Allah ki panah.

#48 by FarzanaVersey
FV,
The story of Imrana!

Why do you think it was rape? Could it not be consensual sex, which is now being covered up, and in most likely scenario, local police knows that too?

Ten years ago on my visit to Pakistan, I was sitting in my friend’s construction company office (he is also a chunga muras(influential person) of the area) some people brought a couple, ostensibly, a FIL and DIL who were caught having sex. It was determined that they were doing that for some time and it was consensual. After beating up the guy, and some laanat malaamat to the girl, both people were let go. Police could do nothing here, as it was a family matter between the woman, her husband, and his father.

It seems to me that in Imrana case, both FIL and DIL, when caught made up the story of rape and the mullah and the local police know that. Her husband is not willing to divorce her or may do it under pressure from the local mullah and others who want to save the community from embarrassment.
These things happen and if caught, things are hushed up, as there is no law against the consensual sex in any society. Imo, this case is not even incest.

With this kind of publicity surrounding the case, do you think that police would have ignored it, if it were NOT a matter of consensual sex?

Re: # 53
YOu rock, Al Bundy!!!
Wooo HOoooooo, although only castrate the str8 ones like Cayenne. He thinks his penis makes him oh so superior. That way, he gets to keep his penis, but lose his nuts. Haha

On a lighter note .........

---

Lindsay Pereira in Rediff Diary


Long hair is for girls, Dude

It wasn`t my fault; I was paid to do it. Grow my hair way below my shoulders, that is. Paid to grow it long so I could wear make-up, don a pair of silver-tinted glasses and gyrate on stage for the amusement of little children (a whole other story). The rest of Mumbai, however, seemed to think it was incredibly funny.


First came the stares. From all quarters. At bus-stops. On the street. At department stores. From men, women, schoolchildren, cleaning maids, municipal workers, some of my aunts, pretty women, ugly men, men who thought they were funny, boys on motorbikes, and a whole lot of others. They simply had to stare.


The bold ones would comment: `Kidhar chal rahi hai?`, `Aati hai kya?`, `Hai hai` (all roughly translated into: I`m barely literate. I was born desperate. Would you go out with me? Would you? Would you?) They assumed I was female because, let`s face it, when you have a 21-inch waist and hair that almost reaches down to it (I did), most people under the sun would assume you weren`t exactly Sylvester Stallone in a wig.

When they did turn to look, my excuse for a French beard would catch them off guard (`Saala, aadmi hai`). It took me a while, but I managed to get thick-skinned enough to ignore it. The groping in trains was another thing; that took me months to handle.


I remember once stepping out of a swimming pool, where I was, well, swimming, with a female cousin. Me: slim, tall, with long, straight black hair. She: short, fat, with hair cropped close to her forehead. Most men sitting around almost fell into the pool that morning. The thought of a topless woman walking around 5 feet away from them was too much to handle. When they finally figured I was male (no breasts, idiot), the disappointment was acute. Again, that morning, an aunt I had never met thought I was my uncle`s daughter, assuming my cousin was my father`s son. Sigh.


It was a confusing time. I knew I was male, of course, but here I was, for six years, with access to what a woman on the streets of Mumbai felt. I came away more than a little scarred by the experience. I couldn`t understand how, for every waking day of their lives, women of all ages could walk down the street, get to work, go shopping and get back home, all while being at the mercy of the kind of men that stared, leered, sneered or groped me.


I came away with a tremendous sense of respect for the kind of strength it takes to live your life in the face of such blatant hostility (sexual advances can, after all, take on overtones of hostility in an environment of overwhelming repression). I also came away with a lot of anger, at the people who assumed it was their god-given right to behave the way they did.


I remember chanting every morning, at school, with thousands across the country, the national pledge: ` India is my country. All Indians are my brothers and sisters of brothers...` Remember?


I`d like to have most of the brothers of my sisters castrated.

Re: # 50
Prove it!

#1 by ELUSIVE

[In fact, being a witch or a b!tch would make life really easy for us, women.it would be so easy to hurt someone back when they tear our hearts apart or spew abuses at the tongues that spew hatred at us or slaughter that body, which assaults us, simply using the defence of being a b!tch/witch.]

Do you know the ones who really get away? In my country it is the typical Bharatiya Naari – she knows the rules of the game and has several aces up her sleeve, manages to get the keys to the tijori and a lot else. And she knows when to shut up. Hers is not the silence of compromise, but cunning. Male society calls her the ideal woman.

Btw, I have just realised that even being clairvoyant, which I think I am…as many women are intuitive…just makes me a witch.

And thank you for your kind words in the beginning…it does feel nice when what one writes manages to touch others in any which way…
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#5 by hush:

[Just giving some raw facts about victimized/targeted women doesn`t suggest/prove any thing.]

If facts do not prove anything to you, then nothing ever will.

[There are MORE examples of men treating women with a lot of respect, dignity and blah. Why don`t pseudo-activists like you ever mention those??]

We are not talking statistics here…and I am not sure about the “MORE” anyway…and the so-called respect is for the woman as devi, put her on a pedestal and forget about it…
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#25 by jang:

[hindus in their typicall all-encomassing seem to have formally recognized the witchy nature in their worship of the ``Shakti``. i have seem with my own eyes ``mahalaxmi`` show-up and possess a woman in an an apartment full of well-educated women doing some kind of witchy cult-stuff in mumbai. they were in a frenzy, and having kind of an overnight party, and in general had a good time apparently.]

That must be Ecstacy…that is the problem I have with people like Ipsita too…they do not understand the real abuse of the term ‘witch’.
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#28 by sajal:

[I believe women have extraordinary powers and strengths and it is evident in the daily lives of women. Maybe women are called witches because of their superior endurance, higher threshhold to pain or maybe simply because men dont want to understand them.]

Also, power. The power to give birth, to nurture…forget penis-envy, it is men who resent a woman her uterus and her fertile imagination.
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#29 by khamkhwa.:

I have no deadlines here...and yet I write. I am sure very many would be happy to keep me quiet.

[…next time, write something that raises the blood of the bloddless warriors...]

Let them just go blue in the face. Besides, I believe in a fair deal….if I look back and ahead in anger, I want to see the garam khoon waaley log.
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#31 by ballukhan:

[religions have actually learnt the notions of pure/impure from the bodily fluids............and associating women`s fluids with impurity is another way of justifying the discrimination and the imbalance in the relations of power between the two sexes........]

And yet, strange as it may appear, there are attempts to de-sexualise the woman, as though she has no fluids…the image of the harridan with a moustache, the feminist with a scowl…
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#32 by Nadia_Zehra:

You have touched upon various aspects in everyday life, and they are true – to this day, even in urban India, one gets to hear comments like “Woh apne marad ko khaa gayee…” when a woman is widowed. A wealthy man may fall for the charms of a woman, but she is accused of sorcery for finding a good “catch”. And yet we have people in denial…
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#35 by drlokraj:

[The sole reason why Ipsita Roy does not get persecuted for her acts is her socio-economic status which has given her the ability to convert her weaknesses into her strengths.]

What weaknesses? She is part fo an organisation that does black magic and she is a respected diva for it. I agree with you about socio-economic status, but as Nadia said, there are several instances of urban, educated women too being branded.

Re. Phoolan, she may have made men tremble, but it was not due t respect, but because of her witchiness…

[Why single out the female gender,are males not being exploited and killed in the name of caste,bonded labour ,child labour and so on….If some women are witches for them,lower caste hindus are still``chandaals`` and non hindus ``malechh`` for them]

I talked about women for a specific reason here…of course men are exploited too, but from the examples you have given it is clear they were killed for reasons other than their gender. By the same token, we have women in the backward castes, women child labourers, women bonded, women in prisons…

[Gender discrimination is still a global phenomenon--the differences are only quantitative accross the countries and cultures.Organized struggle is needed against this discrimination but not through beauty contests and ramp modelling or trying to out do man in drinking,smoking,drugs and being promiscuous. ]

Do you seriously believe that this is the feminist utopia? There is a minuscule population that is in modelling and beauty pageants…and why do you say that smoking, drinking and being promiscuous is only done to outdo men? These things are ‘bad’ for various reasons, but the element of vice cannot be attributed only to women.

You earlier talked about socio-economic perspective, would this not apply here as well…that these are part of consumerist culture? There are several groups involved in organised struggle, but besides being educated the men needed to be enlightened as well.
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#42 by nazarhayatkhan:

[A lot of truth in what you say. The `man`kind has been harsh on woman. Almost all holy scriptures, written by MAN, are not too kind either. God, Allah or Bhagwan are all HE. So are the Prophets, Pundits and Priests.]

Right. The did you have to go and spoil it by saying, “ So I guess, woman has to just rough it out :)-.”

No, she does not. God is a hazy entity, and prophets, priests, pundits can only do what we permit them to….it is upto us, men and women, to smooth things out. I am aware that individually, roughing it out is the only option for many women, but we cannot enshrine this thought in the collective consciousness.
- - -

And…a long while ago I had written an article on the B!tch….it was the anagram for Babe In Total Control Of Herself.

Re: # 47
Because i`m a MAN, you b*tch.

Re: # 48


that is truly disgusting.... is there a woman`s organization in india to rescue women like imrana from these despicable muslim men and panchaiyats?

these women need to be brought into bigger cities and taught trades with which they can earn money and fend for themselves

I would like to discuss some of the points raised later...

Scout, this piece was inspired by a `little woman` in a village, by some of my own experiences, by what one sees around...but I loved the song you posted.

Godot...I liked what you posted too...thank you. Subtle? I just wrote it the way it comes to me...could there be something like raw raw subtlety?
- - -
I will have to digress a bit now...since tahmed has introduced the subject of rape, we have recently had the case of a woman being raped by her father-in-law; the Muslim panchayat in the village in UP implied that the lady, Imrana, was a party to it. (The seductress/witch aspect...)A fatwa has been issued that she has to now marry her f-i-l. The news flash a while ago states that Mulayam Singh Yadav, the CM, agrees with the fatwa.

I reproduce below the report AND my letter to the editor -- it is on the Net now (since I know nobody will bother to reproduce such letters by me...)

The report

The Asian Age - News Worldwide June 27

Fatwa declares wife unfit for spouse

Lucknow, June 26: The Darul-Uloom Deoband, in a fatwa issued on Saturday night, has declared that Imrana, the young housewife who was raped by her father-in-law three weeks ago, is no longer ``fit`` for her husband.

The fatwa says that Imrana is now ``haraam`` for her husband and the couple cannot live together after the rape. Though the fatwa condemns the father-in-law for raping his daughter-in-law, it virtually puts its seal on the order given by the community panchayat in Charthawal, in Muzaffarnagar district, in which Imrana had been asked to live with her father-in-law as his wife and treat her husband as her son.

The fatwa given by Mufti Habibur-Rehman and read out before journalists by Deoband spokesman Aadil Siddiqui, however, directs Imrana’s husband Noor Ilahi to bear the expenses of maintenance and education of their five children. The fatwa also ``advises`` the community panchayat not to deliver judgments in situations that call for a in-depth study of matters related to Shariat.

The fatwa, meanwhile, has dealt another blow to Imrana, who had decided just three days ago that she would continue living with her husband. Noor Ilahi had also announced his intention to take her back as his wife.

On Sunday, Noor Ilahi told reporters in Muzaf-farnagar that he would now abide by the fatwa and severe all relations with Imrana as a husband. ``However, if the fatwa allows us, we will live under the same roof, not as husband and wife but as neighbours, and I will bear all expenses of the children,`` he said. Noor Ilahi said he saw no reason to divorce Imrana as of now, but if that is what the fatwa meant then he would willingly abide by the Shariat laws.

My letter

The Asian Age - News Worldwide, July 30
A criminal case

Sir, Why does civil society have to put up with incidents such as the one following Imrana’s rape in Muzzafarnagar district (Fatwa declares wife unfit for spouse, June 27)? The Darul Uloom Deoband has called the woman ``haraam.`` They had earlier suggested she live away from her family for a period of time to ``purify`` herself and, as she is now unfit for her spouse, she would have to marry her father-in-law and be her husband’s mother. The rapist has got away with a mild reprimand. A few questions need to be asked: according to which law does Imrana’s marriage stand nullified? Even if we were to see it as a worst-case scenario, has her husband Noor Ilahi pronounced talaq? If Imrana is fit to marry her father-in-law because it follows that the rape here is considered merely a sexual act, then would these clerics permit all kinds of pre/extra-marital sex if they think it is within their powers to force two parties involved to marry? Is it not time for the mullahs to look up their scriptures regarding what punishment has to be meted out to a rapist if they want to toe the Shariat line? Where does it say that a rapist is considered ``fit`` to be anyone’s husband? Does the Shariat permit non-consensual marriage? Would the father-in-law be in a position to keep his new wife happy in every way and provide for her children (incidentally, these are rules laid down by the Shariat)? What we are talking about is clearly a criminal case. The Uttar Pradesh police, and not a Muslim community panchayat and clerics, should be in charge of arresting the culprit, and the courts must ensure that justice is done.

Farzana Versey, Bandra, Mumbai

(www.asianage.com)

Re: # 33
So does a dog, a donkey, even a chicken! What makes you so special?

#42 ``So I guess, woman has to just rough it out :)-. ``

That is why we have Condi Rice - to take boys who share your attitude by the nose in the right direction.
:-)