How green is their valley?

My friend BJ#198

1. ``Can one be absolutely sure it’s a deliberate misrepresentation on the part of the author – not mere foolishness?``

I would have assumed it to be foolishness if it was limited to one or two articles. This lady has written 90 reports on chowk, and many more elsewhere. Her stance is same in all. And I will disagree with your suggestion that her ``foolishness`` should be permitted without anyone questioning her.

2. ``would you rather have a fighter who has independent views, and is not afraid to speak them, no matter how bright the spotlight ``

I would love to have fighters, but I would have fighters who fight for causes without any bias. This lady has shown biads in all her writings. Kargil happened and her complain was Indian army`s treament of captured Pakistani militia. Girls in Paris was asked to forgo burqa and this woman complaints about that. Bamiyan budhha are blown up and this woman suddenly starts comparing that to Babri. She skips facts where it suits her. This fighter does not have independent views. Here views are very much in alignment of a narrow faction.

3. ``Don’t you think that (even in her Civic Center type articles) aren’t there occasional moments of bright sunshine ``
Here I will agree with you.. But ``occasional moments`` are no reason for her to be allowed to go unchallenged. This article will soon be quoted by someone else as a gospel of truth.

googlmoogly

It is not good to talk to oneself using different nicks. It`s almost as unethical as pretending to be dalit (oppressed) when one is not.

As BeeJay requested, kindly let the discussion stay focused where it should.

#196 by googlymoogly

Dear googlymoogly, please stay on the topic. Also, I’ll appreciate it if you can give some feedback on my #191.

#197 by Friend

Dear Friend, I understand some of your concerns because I have shared (occasionally) some of them – especially this author’s ready willingness to accept at face value information (occasionally without attribution) from questionable sources not always well-regarded for their objectivity on specific political issues in which they maybe affected parties (i.e., having a “conflict of interest”).

You have EVERY right to set the record straight – I hope that Chowk would encourage you and others to do that! A couple of questions, though.

(1) Can one be absolutely sure it’s a deliberate misrepresentation on the part of the author – not mere foolishness? In other words, how can you not give her the benefit of doubt – at least not prove it “beyond a reasonable doubt”? (The fact that she is combative should not be used against the author – even the Queen of Jhansi was supposedly so, and is now held as a role model!)

(2) In India, would you rather have a fighter who has independent views, and is not afraid to speak them, no matter how bright the spotlight (even though some of those views may be utterly foolish or outlandish) or a pliant woman, cowering inside her burqa – too timid and scared to speak up? (Just to stretch the analogy a bit further – would you have a woman who meekly submits to organized mass rape or one who fights back for her individuality – providing the attempting rapist the educational benefit of a well-calculated full-impact kick into a carefully selected vulnerable spot?!)

(3) Don’t you think that (even in her Civic Center type articles) aren’t there occasional moments of bright sunshine (intelligence wise) visible? In other words (although perhaps few and far-between) aren’t there SOME instances when she actually makes sense?

If the answer to (1) is “perhaps no” and the answers to (2) and (3) are yes, then I would respectfully suggest to the enraged masses to (at least temporarily) forego this repast (no matter how much we may be ready and gung-ho to drool at the prospect of the delectable treat) – i.e., let’s not eat her alive just yet!! Thanks.

BJ janab#193

Kindly read ``Chowk`s`` introduction for this woman in ``The Mandir Mirage`` .. ``Farzana Versey is a widely read and respected author and columnist in India. She is particularly famous for her extremist and anti-establishment views.
At another site she describes herself as ``Farzana Versey is a freelance writer. Her work appears on Chowk, Rediff and Midday.``

I agree that banning anyone is not correct action. However, setting record straight is what I want. This woman has all rights to her views. But when she says that her views are based on facts, I will like to challenge her.

These lies, if left unchallenged, may get taken as future references by others. An example is her use of that spurious statistics from kashmiris.org, a site funded by Islamabad. Now someone will try to quote Farzana VErsey on Chowk and slowly those number will acquire a legitimacy.
This lady quote Chittisinghpora and says why there is no enquiry. My question is whose enquiry will she believe? She has no faith in enquiries made by Indian Government, or by anyone who is not muslim. Even among muslim she has no faith in anyone whose report will not conform to her conclusion. There was a report on this incident from ``Barry Bearak`` of NYTimes on Dec 31, 2000. Would she care to read that and report why she doesn`t agree?

She is part of a vicious circle of rumor-mongers who feed on each other.

HELLO DALIT,
I am not a Dalit, so please insult me first, and then we can talk, perhaps? I agree that you have every right to insult me because I have been the beneficiary of the injustices committed on your people.


You said:
``first they are atheist and agnostics…..hehehehe…then they are Christian….roman catholic…hehehehe …Now I am not hindu…..hehehehe..

Ashamed of your racist, uncivil and inhuman religion…heheheheh...bozo….``

Dalit, is it possible that non-Dalits and Dalits grow up with different ideas about who and what they are?? For example, privileged Hindus feel that ``Hindu`` is about what name you have. If you have a Hindu name you are Hindu. So, they don`t see it as related to what they believe about God etc. They may never have read any holy books and may even think its rubbish. But they know they haven`t read the Bible or Koran or Guru Granth Sahib or Buddhist works, and that the world therefore thinks they are Hindu. So you will in fact find atheist Hindus and agnostic Hindus and so on.

Secondly - most upper-caste Hindus who are not overly religious grow up revering ``unity in diversity``. They take this in the Gandhi sense where all religious practices are to be revered and handled with kid gloves, however dumb they are. Ambedkar fearlessly evaluated and considered many religions. Not like Gandhi who said all religions are to be handled like errrr sacred cows.

So when the ``Gandhi tradition`` upper-castes hear you maligning a religion, they immediately think you are ``communal`` and think you are really evil for being communal. Its not like they`re attached to ``Hinduism`` - they`re attached to ``secularism`` and ``pluralism``. This is the only language they have. Even I suffered from this affliction until some kind Dalits abused the hell out of me and brought me to my senses.

Anyway - just wanted you to know that some of us non-Dalits suffer from intellectual afflictions and faulty education. I understand your anger but please be patient. As more and more dalits speak their minds and hit us with the shoes we rightly deserve, more and more of us will become educated. Just as Buddha said we all have the seed of enlightenment in us, even the most senselessly stupid upper-caste can - sometime in the distant future achieve an understanding of Dalit issues.

Jai Bheem and metta!

#194 by cranberry

I understand your two points.

[We definiteley want most of the people to have lots of her virtues , except perhaps the dogmatic socialistic line of thinking. ]
Believe me, I do understand it. There are parts of her posts and articles that send me through the roof sometimes. But FV is a package – we can not split her up (don’t go by the split up picture on her interactor’s page). We can not keep parts of her that please us, and turn over the rest of her (unwanted) self to others (Subroto’s mutt, for example) to chomp over. She is ALL ours (and NOBODY else’s)!

[Another problem is internet. With internet, any person can put her/his thought on the internet and then soon gets bombarded from around the globe. … in good old days she would have first honed her skills on college/local level ….]
Yes, the internet has changed the way this game is played. But whatever “easier” access FV gets due to internet (and the way I understand it, she still uses a dial-up connection while many in the west (I included) enjoy the distinct advantage of high-speed) – is available to EVERYBODY else. Plus, the internet is here to stay.

Is it fair for me to assume that you do not have an issue with the rest of my points in #191?

#191 Beejay
`` ... When one expects a minority to toe a line, haven’t we already reduced our concept of democracy to a farce? The fact – that she is a member of a minority group – yet she does NOT toe the line – and feels comfortable expressing them – shouldn’t that be a cause for us to cherish the strength of our democracy? ...``

I think she is a minority of different kind ie the people with Leftisit/Socialistic or similarly line of thought. I read some of her old posts again, and she comes out to be a nice, honest sort of person. We definitley want most of the people to have lots of her virtues , except perhaps the dogmatic socialistic line of thinking.

I think socialists think that only they care about poor or equality and the other people are just out to suck blood out of the next person available.

Tonnes of discussion have taken place on this topic and its endless so no need to start again.

Another problem is internet. With internet, any person can put her/his thought on the internet and then soon gets bombared from around the globe. Assuming Farzana is a young jornalist/author in the making, in good old days she would have first honed her skills on college/local level and then would have come up on world wide level, if she would have overcome the competition along the way.

But the internet pitchforks us all right into the global arena whether we have yet undergone and survived the baptism by fire or not. So here we are all, with our dorm level exp of discussion , debate , knowledge and idea`s trying to win the world.

#192 Friend

Although I understand what you are saying, as far as I know, she does not call herself a journalist – merely an opinion piece writer. Some of her stuff (and I am not talking about the Civic Center necessarily) is actually quite good! (I have, in the past, called some of her work “third grade” but the janitor has quite a high threshold even for third-grade!) I suppose she is too opinionated and that really jars people, on many controversial contemporary issues! How does it matter, it’s just another person’s opinion! SHE is the one who probably ends up paying some price for her being “pig-headed”! She is the one who pays the price for not being well-balanced! She is the one who pays in terms of credibility – when she thinks that the simple rules of double-checking of sources do NOT apply to her! Life goes on, in every other respect.

Also, it makes for more energized discussions – as evidenced by the increased number of interacts!

I have the feeling that in spite of the controversy surrounding some of her positions and articles, even her detractors still want her around. After all, when the lion proposed a vote to throw her out of Chowk – NOBODY voted for it!

I also think that you should consider ALL the points I mentioned in #191.

Janitor saheb #191
Opinion are one thing. Claiming that opinions are based on facts is another thing. This lady claims to be a journalist. She also claims that what she write is based on facts.

Now in this article she described several facts as she saw them. I am questioning those facts. Her whole premise is based on those facts. If those facts are questioned than either she should set record straight or admit that her premise is wrong.

If you cared to notice, she has written 90 articles (stories..) for chowk. Read her story on Mumbai blasts. That sotry came within 10 hours of blasts. And conclusion of that story was that BJP had planned those blasts for getting votes.

Journalism should be based on facts. Otherwise she should call her write-ups a story, and put a disclaimer at the end stating that.

Okay, this has gone on long enough! The janitor and the lion have dozed off and it’s time for the “knight” to stick his neck out – with trepidation! (Chopped necks are NOT good things in life!) Obviously, I am no longer an Indian, but for the sake of discussion here, I’m going to put on my “Indian” hat! Also, let me step away from details and try to look at the overall picture.

(1) This author has certain opinions. As she said in an i-log, they are not written in stone (this is the closest to a concession that I have ever heard from her). But they are her opinions, and as citizens of a free democracy, she has every right to them.

(2) Her opinions are not mainstream opinions. There is little doubt on that. In a free commercial enterprise type of setup, there is a price to be paid for being on the ideological fringe (in this case, not so much a fringe as an outlier point). Such a price is a simple commercial reality – if your audience does not like you, you don’t have a job. Period. She appears to have decided to pay the price. That is a sign of courage (or foolishness, depending on one’s point of view)!

(3) She openly sympathizes with the Kashmiris. She does call Kashmiris (in a 2000 article) “freedom-fighters” (perhaps rhetoric, since the case she makes is for a pre-1953 state of autonomy – not of separation from the Indian union). When I read that article in question, I also notice that she makes a distinction between foreign fighters and domestic insurgency.

(4) She does blame the Pandits (unfairly, of course) for leaving the valley – and she also compares them to others who stayed put elsewhere (an unfair comparison, since the presence of foreign fighters makes ALL the difference). Impractical suggestions, but since when have literary figures and artists become famous for being practical?

(5) She does not hold back her words. Many of her words could have been worded differently to be less provoking and still communicate the same message. But that’s just her style! It’s not a crime to have a provocative style!

(6) She has virtually no constituency, and knowing her style for “making friends and influencing people” her constituency is unlikely to have an explosive rate of growth anytime soon.

Knowing all of the above,

(a) Aren’t we better off being aware of what her opinions are (however non-pragmatic), rather than she keeping quiet because of a “lynch mob” fear (I am not necessarily saying she subscribes to such fear (my guess is it is simple stubbornness (but then, reading thoughts is a dicey business)). If she actually were to quiet down out of fear (although I doubt it), can we still say that we are a successful democratic society where a member of a minority can hold up her as a proud Indian and speak up her mind the way SHE sees it (faulty or not)! And won’t that be the real tragedy?

(b) On the outside chance that SOME of her points do have merit, shouldn’t we examine her statements for any trace of validity? Isn’t it BETTER to have a dissenting opinion handy to validate one’s own decision-making? (Raheem’s poem – “Nindak Niyare Raakhiye….” comes to my mind.)

(c) If she did not belong to the faith that she does, would we be treating some of these positions she takes with the same outrage? That is a difficult question to answer and each person must honestly look inside his/her own heart and only such person would know the answer for sure. In my case, I have a feeling that if her name were (let us say) Buddhu Devi instead of Farzana Versey, it would probably not have the same incendiary effect on the lion! But then, that could be just me!

(d) From the Kashmiri Pandit point of view, how many people (journalists included) have taken the trouble to actually go and visit the refugee camps AND slums for other disadvantaged people? Who would have a better perspective (in comparing the plights of individuals and groups)? (Of course, she could have skipped some of her provocative words, and she should use more reputable references (and attribute them) in order to avoid having doubts thrown on her whole effort due to one lousy source (One person investigative squads without editorial oversight rarely do very well in real life!))

(e) Like I said earlier – this author is not the CAUSE of the problems, she just describes them as she sees them. (So does the janitor, by the way! Therefore, the janitor respects that consistency (inspite of his harsh words, on occasions)!)

When one expects a minority to toe a line, haven’t we already reduced our concept of democracy to a farce? The fact – that she is a member of a minority group – yet she does NOT toe the line – and feels comfortable expressing them – shouldn’t that be a cause for us to cherish the strength of our democracy? Thus restoring our faith in ourselves? Why should we worry that she speaks her opinion? Isn’t a policy made by the elected representatives of the overall population? What are we afraid of – that she will grab the wheels of power and declare herself the “Chief Executive of India”? (Does she even know how to drive – I doubt it somehow!)

In many ways, FV represents what I (in jest) call Mirchi – but she is OUR mirchi – and I’m glad that she does not get cowed down (whether or not we agree with her on individual statements on individual issues).

These are my REAL thoughts. Others are of course welcome to their own opinions! Your comments to mine are quite welcome. Please hold the viriol, for a change, because they do not contribute anything positive! I am personally very thankful for some of her (non-political) “stuff”! Thanks!

=== Interact Removed ===

This author spitted out an article on chowk almost 110 hours after Mumbai blasts. She was equally prompt after Ayodhya, and Akshardham.

Why should this calamity be holding her from responding?

Re: #185 by rainaajay

[Dear Ms farzana,
But, why are you silent now about receiving all the flak you much desreved.
If you want to take on a kashmiri pandit one to one, here I am on. BUT ATLEAST MAKE SOME SENSE. Ok.
lets have it! ]


It`s no use. Like all muslims, Farzana knows full well that she cannot defend the indefensible - be it Mohammed`s life-examples, be in Koranic injunctions, be it the Islamic legacy of barbarism, be it Partition or Jinnah, be it illegally occupying POK, be it terrorism in J&K, or in the rest of the world.

This is the reason Islam lays so much stress on absolute, unquestioning loyalty. Kill, before questions can be raised. Intimidate people into silence. Because there is much to be defended. And no logical way to defend ANY of it.

So do not expect logical debate from islamist types like Farzana, Tahmed32 or Romair. They will put up a facade of pseudo-erudition and studied civility, but under that thin veneer beats the heart of an islamist. Farzana for example, blames Pandits for their situation. Romair once told someone who upset him that he doubted if that person could tell him the same thing face-to-face in Lahore (shades of Dawood Ibrahim). And Tahmed32 is the type that will hold you down while others shout Bismillah and saw your head off with a hacksaw, IF he considers the whole thing done in the PRESCRIBED manner.

I used to try to argue logically with these idiots before. But now I realize why longer-term Chowk visitors like Kaurasch and Harimau resort to one-liners and sarcasm. It`s because there is no arguing with these people. When cornered in an argument they simply shut up and go to another forum and start all over again. Never will they say ``You know what, I have NOTHING to say to that, so I guess I was wrong``. Nope. Fanatics will be fanatics. So nowadays I try to get as much satisfaction as I can from throwing richly-deserved mud in their face. Long, protracted arguments are good for nothing here.

#186 Chowkstaff

Dear Chowkstaff:

Now that you have woken up (so to speak) I hope you will actually do your “job” (wages notwithstanding) and hold authors to the same standards (and I don’t mean this board (but I do mean one particular parallel board, still ongoing)), especially authors who have used well-recognized terms of abuse (epithets) to address interactors. Let’s see if you have the guts to go back and delete THOSE interacts, too! Otherwise, your impartiality and credibility will pretty much vanish (at least in my eyes)!

All replies that include personal attacks will be filtered across articles. Interactors are requested to focus on the message and content of the article. Misuse of the Interact process will result in removal of that reply. Repeated misuse will result in removal of the interactor.

Dear Ms farzana,
But, why are you silent now about receiving all the flak you much desreved.
If you want to take on a kashmiri pandit one to one, here I am on. BUT ATLEAST MAKE SOME SENSE. Ok.
lets have it!