Murder Most Foul

Zeejah: every now and then when I feel ther is no hope for the land I grew up in, along comes some body, SOMEONE, like you.

Hold that light high for night is in it`s darkest stage. Hold that light up for the downtrodden need to know that some body cares before they fall. I salute you. Shine on.

PS

The heartless comments of ahle-watan break my heart.

RE: AA and Godot

That oft quoted line by me was just a form of expression; it did not have any deep meanings attached to it.

AA: Godot: Feroz:

Yaraan-e-Chowk let us agree to disagree and move on.

regards

Godot asks a eprtinent question: ferozk has used the phrase raw-cold reality in his posts. The following is an exact quote, but he is taking a break from raw-cold reality until Monday, so don`t expect a response till then. Or perhaps he`s fixing some raw-cold political crises in raw-cold areas, while we live our fatanstical medium rear-lukewarm lives..

===
``Being in politics, I have to deal in raw-cold reality and do thing with which I do not agree with,because I have to seek a compromise between my intentions and my limitations daily in order to ``grease the wheels``.
===

Re: Feroz, #44

I`m going to get out of this `conversation` because I feel my post may turn it into a ball of hair. Due to time constraint, I cannot go back and read and analyze the pertinent replies. If it`s not your quote and/or it`s been quoted out of context by me, I apologize. However, if I don`t stand corrected, then...

Re: Godot

Your post had the following line, wrongly, attributed to me, ``this is the world of politics - raw-cold reality -so get real`` That line was orginally used by AA in reply to an earlier post of mine and was a re-phrasing of what I had said. Please re-read AA`s post # 39, second last para, and line eight for a clarification to the context of what it suggested.

As to what I meant by it, please read my post below yours and you will have an understanding of what I meant by that term.

Re: AA

Before I try to an answer some of your points, I would just like to say that I am sorry if I did not answer your questions/comments. I think we both were heading the wrong way real fast by turning this into a grudge match. AA, one of these days, I will have to tell you why I try not get emotional over anything, but it will have to wait for another time and another place. Let me start from the end and work my way to the top vis a vis your post.

Concerning the revolutionaries making bad administrators; just look at the example of Newt Gingrich and Republican revolution. Yes, the Republicans under Newt won the Congress, after 40 years, but they were so used to confrontation that they paralysed the government and failed to realize that one has to compromise with the status quo not only to preserve power, but to work within and not against system to get things done.

Historically, only two people (revolutionaries) have successfully co-opted their aims with the status quo and got things done. One was Tallyrand of Revolutionary France and the other is Nelson Mendala. Status quo resists change, because change is an uncertain element, which denotes instablity in the system. Yes; you`re absolutely right when you suggest that the system frowns down on people who want to change it, because your methods, right or wrong, seek to amend the system and those with a vested interest in the system will resist that change.

As to why it is so hard to be a non-idealist? I guess that would depend on the individual circumtances of the person. In my own case, past experience has taught me that I can not afford idealism and that idealism breeds inflexibility, which in turn fosters a resistence to adaptibility and anything which does not adapt will slowly, but surely wither away and die. To the question of whose interests ``non-idealism`` advances; the answer is mine! In other words, ask your-self the question, whose interests are you advocating by supporting a cause? Is there something, which you will gain personally by fighting for a cause, change or what you will. In the case of ``honor killings``, are your reasons for abolishing this custom really alturustic? Whatever your reasons maybe, you are the beneficary and you will benefit by ending this ritual of ``honor killings`` and that my friend, is in your non-idealistic interest! Every ideal has a selfish motivation behind it and even though we may claim otherwise, non-idealism still forms the core of all our idealistic asumptions.

On the issue of dealing with reality, compromises and ``greasing the wheels``, I will conced the argument to you, but with a caveat. Compromises should be mutally balanced, because otherwise they become ultimatums, but they can not be made on the basis of an emotional state of mind or an emotional reference to events. As to the rational/emotional dichotomy, that depends on which side of the fense you are standing, because one person`s emotion is another person`s rationality! I will come back to this point later and explain what I meant. Vis a vis my ``noble intentions``, they are not a victim of disillusionment based on a perception of the status quo, but of the understanding that I am not the person I used to be and I can never go back to what I once was! :)

Getting back to the emotional content of political arguments, you`re right that a certain level of emotional development is necessary to articulate a position and then use that emotion as a ``second wind`` to keep striving for your goal. There is nothing wrong with this approach to solving problems, but where this becomes a libility is when a solution is derived mainly from an emotional point of departure.

Take the case of the ``Three strikes law`` in California. I will not get into the details of how that proposition become a law, but it was in response to a murder and people reacted to it from an emotional state; punish the offender for killing the little girl. In doing so, they failed to realize that it would increase the prison population in California by casting so huge a legal net that it would trap people with non-felonies and put them in prison. In their emotional revulsion against the crime, on one cared to learn what the long term impact of this law will be and because of that, the Californians are saddled with the largest prison population in the States and with one of the higest taxes in order to keep up with the in-flow of prisoners and to create more prisons to house these criminals, money is being diverted from other sources, such as a health care, education etc., to finance the provisions of this law, which is creating more problems than it has solved.

Yes; emotional reaction to Saima Imran`s death is a foregone conclusion and is justified, but creating a bad law, because of that crime will serve no one in the long run. There is a time and place for emotion and then there time and place where it has to be reined in. Right now, in Pakistan, there is an emotional climate in regards to this crime and before we seek to do anything about it, we have to review the whole situation with a sense of dispassion in case we merely compound the problem with our good intentions. Rationality does not have to be applicable in all circumtances, but it should not subsituted for emotion. Again, you are correct to say that nothing is devoid of emotion, but that still does not imply that we should allow emotion to become the sine qua non of our societal discourse.

I will also readily agree with you that laws in Pakistan have reached a nadir of utility and need to be re-assesed in order to get some justice out of them. Still, that should not be considered as an excuse to deal with problem out of a sense of frustration and dispair. If the laws need to be amended; then that is what should be done, but it should be done realistically, keeping the civil well being of the society in mind, and not with an emotional axe to grind!

Anything, in its extereme form, is a bad policy and like the lines from a supereme racist`s (Kipling) poem: ``if you can keep your head while all others around you are losing theirs..``, we have to be stoic about this whole issue to the point of being cold blooded. Yes, emotion is a doorway into the human mind and is helpful in understanding it, but it still does not justify or condone worsening a sitation, because the intentions were noble! :)

P.S: Sorry for the tedious extent of this post and since I will be out of town till Monday, please do not get mad if you do not see a reply to your reaction to this post! Also AA, after the tete a tete of the last fews day, please do not be so formal; you can call me Feroz! :)

naxal --

``of course it doesn`t but that doesn`t mean that it doesn`t exist--if a crime is committed against a religious minorioty it still remains a crime against minorities--there is no point in denying that--``

I don`t recall denying anything. I just don`t think it`s relevant.

``in fact if you do you are ignoring the fact that a multitude of crimes occur because of gender, racial discrimination and you don`t give

people the voice to speak out against this--``

Discrimination need not lead to violence. That doesn`t make it right, but it makes it a separate issue. In any case, the reaction of the people towards the crime is unnacceptable. I am simply not qualified to tell you or anybody else why these crimes occur in the first place. Nither are you. Easy scape goats don`t make the crime more understandable. In essence your saying that these crimes occur because Pakistani`s are racist and mysogonistic. You blame the society as a whole. However, let there be no mistake, there is no mass mobilization of the Pakistani people against women or minorities. There is no systematic campeign by the people against these groups. It`s all to easy to blame everyone for the actions of a few. I`m not pinning the fault of Saima`s death on Pakistan as a whole. Forget it. I will have no part in such nonsense. I am, however, deeply disturbed at the reaction, or rather the lack of reaction, on the part of the average Pakistani.

``these are not isolated cases. These crimes are not being committed by a few random people who just want to kill- these crimes are a product of a patriarchal culture.``

That`s absolute nonsense. Such crimes proliferate in our modernized, self-declared ``englightened`` cultures aswell. You`re seeking an easy scape goat. In the process you`re guilty of being racist yourself. Cultures don`t kill people. Other people do.

``Yes women`s liberation should be the goal of every human being on this earth--``

I agree, pending on your definition of liberation.

``many pakistanis living in the west would not really call ourselves feminists becuase

it would mean identifying with a white racist upperclass form of feminism--``

Yet you use the very same arguments and the very same rhetoric.

``most people fighting for women`s

liberation though obviously want to change society and society should be changed and if misogyny and

patriarchy fits your broad definition of society then you are part of the problem..``

Misogyny does not equal patriarchy. I`m not neccesarily a big fan of patriarchal societies, but I don`t really see much evil in them. Certainly not as much evil as Feminists will WANT us to think. I`m sorry, but I refuse to be racist.

As for being part of the problem, I have no comment. I make no claims of knowning the Ins and Outs of all that is wrong with Pakistan, and I definitely don`t have nice sound-bite, ill-thought solutions to any of her problems. I see a reaction of a people to a particular crime, and I`m ashamed of this reaction as one of these people. I dare not sit on my high-hoarse and preech to a people who need to help themselves before they try to learn from others.

Re: AA, #39

``this is the world of politics - raw-cold reality -so get real``

I`d like to know, as I`m sure you`d too, AA, from the one who`s quoted above and who apparently `knows` what ``raw-cold reality`` is, to tell and educate us, the ordinary living-in-a-fantasy-world folks, what exactly is ``raw-cold reality`` since he seems to have experienced it!

Re: Ferozk

On reading your last reply, my gut reaction was a profuse heart bleed, and an knee jerk of sh * *, I went too far with the personal insults, and maybe I should be ``more rational, than emotional``. But then my resilience, thank god, and I quickly checked my responses and yours, and guess what, I realize now that I resorted to name calling when my arguments got no response from you and when these were reduced to mere emotional rhetoric.

``Mere emotion`` is problematic concept. Appeals and arguments made with emotion do not lose in their political essence and political arguments can in fact be meaningless, if not fueled and guided by an innate sense of emotional consciousness - call it moral intuition - ``emotional feel`` or whatever… you can not be a good political activist, leader, or scientist, if you haven`t reached within in some sense, or at level. The dichotomy you draw between rationality/emotion is largely false; as an argument posed on chowk, in calm tones, yeah reasonable minds can easily be swayed that rationality is our solution and emotion/idealism and all that doesn`t work - it is simply a leverage. But this distinction, I repeat is fallacious. Because everything we say and do - political theory and all is not devoid of emotion - emotion gets a bad name, because yes, it can be exploited. Hate can be exploited to produce racial and racist agendas - extreme religious fervor can be leveraged to further talibanism - yet true insight to the human condition is not ever without emotion. As an example, talking about Samia Sarwar`s death, in particular, can never be without emotion; emotion that won`t retard the conception of solutions, but emotion that will like a lantern , ight up the issue in all its, socio-political-legal dimensions.

Calling you names won`t stop honor killing; I am in full agreement with that. But at least, as an argumentative exercise, one can stock up activist energy by reverting to occasional comic relief through relentless chowkies like you.

As to your argument: that the biggest obstacle in Pakistan is not the laws, but a lack of their enforcement and this problem can not be solved by passing more laws.`` I don`t really agree with that. I reiterate my earlier point. Currently in Pakistan, yes, there is a schizophrenic presence of Islamic/Anglo laws. Regardless, both need massive change. Anglo law hasn`t changed with time; Islamic laws have become more repressive with time. The judiciary has lost its independence. The entire legal system is corrupt, including police, and judges, who will pass on your motion if you bribe. So yes, the problem is systemic and laws alone won`t change anything just yet. But my point is that the laws are SO BAD, SO REPRESSIVE, so blatantly discriminatory, that getting them changed on the books is as important a political step, and as hard to do, as the next step of enforcement would be. Law shapes social consciousness and vice versa. In dog eat dog America, employees had no social protection until in the 1930s a sytem of social security and the National Labor Relations Act shaped a consciousness and carved space for a dialogue for employee securities. Nothing much has still changed in America, but still…

My rational point ferozk- law shapes consciousness - change the BAD laws and perhaps you have taken a baby step towards enforcement, `cause enforcement too comes with social consciousness. Our shaheed
Dictator, along with other tactics, in passing hudood, did exactly that, and altered our genetic makeup, and our ability to let religion infiltrate our blood streams..

When you say, ferozk that you deal with reality and politics all day - and no space for idealism - understand your compromise. I think in trying to make anything work you need to compromise and ``grease the wheels``, but my emotional/rational false distinction argument applies here you. Compromises in any situation should not be so extreme that instead of greasing the wheels, the wheels are leaving their skid marks on you. If not, then maybe your once `noble intentions` are falling prey to a system that breeds disillusion and systematically destroys people`s good intentions and idealism to maintain status quo.
We all work within limitations, but the compromises we make should allow us to sleep at night. If in fact we are well rested, sometimes, survival, making 60K with benefits are part of this system that makes people feel insecure in a highly materialistic world - that shedding idealism is but, inevitable. Whenever you brand something as ``idealistic`` ask what is non-idealistic and why is it that only ``non-idealistic`` is possible and whose interests does the non idealistic ensure? And please keep talking, but don`t reply by, ``this is the world of politics - raw-cold reality -so get real``. I could easily and fairly classify that as the much despised ``emotional rhetoric`` or rhetoric nevertheless.

The same system perhaps, looks down upon people like me, and thinks that we novices haven`t quite figured the rules of the game - we are bad administrators - perhaps look inward to question this regime that mocks and derides ``revolutionaries`` because they are so threatening to the status-quo. While emotion and moral intuition guides, pragmatism is always essential - strategy and all - and believe me no one is starving at this end, except one doesn`t have to be SLAVE to hard cold reality - question why it is so hard to be non-idealistic, then be non-idealistic if you have to - but at least with some analysis.

Digit--

``If a woman is shot by her family while trying to obtain a divorce from her husband it is a crime against a woman...``

``Technically, but that doesn`t qualify the crime is better or worse....``

of course it doesn`t but that doesn`t mean that it doesn`t exist--if a crime is committed against a religious minorioty it still remains a crime against minorities--there is no point in denying that--in fact if you do you are ignoring the fact that a multitude of crimes occur because of gender, racial discrimination and you don`t give people the voice to speak out against this--these are not isolated cases. These crimes are not being committed by a few random people who just want to kill- these crimes are a product of a patriarchal culture.

Yes women`s liberation should be the goal of every human being on this earth--so should liberation against poverty, racism , etc. Feminism is about changing society to liberate women--and much like Islam it can be defined in many diff ways..many pakistanis living in the west would not really call ourselves feminists becuase it would mean identifying with a white racist upperclass form of feminism--most people fighting for women`s liberation though obviously want to change society and society should be changed and if misogyny and patriarchy fits your broad definition of society then you are part of the problem..

Re: AA

You need to click your heels three times and find yourself in Oz!

AA, it seems that you do not have the capacity to engage in a ``meaningful discussion``, on topics, because you have a tendency to shift towards emotional arguments. In my last post, I asked some questions, about the nature of Pakistani legal system, which you chose not to answer and instead you compared me to an overbearing idiot and a showoff. Fine. I have never denied that I am not a showoff and as to being an idiot, I can live with that label if you will add ``dork`` to it too. :)

If you want to call me names, please be my guest and go ahead. I do not mind being called names, but I have to wonder just how does your argument will get any stronger and just how does this cause can be resolved by questioning my intelligence. If calling me an idiot and a buffoon helps to end ``honor killings``, please feel free insult me from the roof tops and be as creative as you can in finding names to call me. AA, if you feel that calling me witty names proves a point, what ever that point should be, I do not mind being abused for a worth while cause.

After re-reading AA-Ferozk posts, I can understand your position and why you feel so strongly about this issue. I would still encourage you to revert to my earlier post and see if you can answer the questions I had asked.
I am still of the opinion that, in a legal sense, the biggest obstacle in Pakistan is not the laws, but a lack of their enforcement and this problem can not be solved by passing more laws.

So far in this dicussion-posts, you have refused to engage in a debate on the issues, but have instead chosen to call me names. Fine, I have nothing against that, but please do not tell me to shut up, because it is you who is refusing to deal with the real issues and instead seems content to emotionalize this issue.

AA, I have to deal with reality all day and I have to compromise daily in order to get things done. Whatever idealism I might have had and whatever noble intentions I once had, have long since faded away. Being in politics, I have to deal in raw-cold reality and do thing with which I do not agree with, because I have to seek a compromise between my intentions and my limitations daily in order to ``grease the wheels``.

My comments were based on the reality of the situation and on the premise of what is possible and what is not possible in Pakistan. Please allow me to say one more thing. In politics, emotion is a lever, which can be leveraged for political gains, against your interests, and idealism and emotional devotion to a cause can often be exploited, because there is nothing altrustic in politics and there is no cause, which is the sine qua non of politics. This topic is nothing more than a sub-game within a larger game, which is known as politcs and win or lose, the game goes on forever.

AA, you do not have to like any of this, but if you are going to play the game, you have to learn and understand the rules by which this game is played. The trick to winning this game, of life and politics, is learning how to play with a deck of cards stacked against you, because no one said that world was a beneign place with,`` charity towards all and malice towards none``. Now, you are more than welcome to ignore this post and call me some more names, but it will not help you and your cause in the long run. Emotions will carry to a certain extent, but then reality will filter in and you will to compromise, against your wishes, in order to consolidate what you have gained.

Why do you think that revolutionaries make such bad administrators, because they all think that revolutionary zeal, emotional faith and fervor will carry day and solve all their problems.

Sincerly,
FRK

``...One couple, `friends` of Saima, both doctors, who married of their own choice, believe that the parents did the right thing in view of the Pathan code of ethics!...``

I thought I might suggest this as a possible tangent: doesn`t this smack somewhat of the ``rough justice`` in Northern Ireland, that is meted out by the ``hard men`` to *suspected * informers (i.e. not proved guilty, and sometimes actually proved innocent)?

The horror lies not in the fact that a suspected informer can get his kneecaps shot off as ``punishment``, crippling him for life, but that the whole community believes it to be only the right punishment for him. The Saima murder exhibits the same horror. Far too many societies all over the world have brutal aspects in their code of ethics: it`s not just restricted to certain communities. If even the educated members of the community believe that the brutality is the ``correct`` attitude, then it`s not very surprising that these things happen.

Let us celebrate the fact that there are people like Asma Jehangir in Pakistan who have the sense to know what is right and wrong AND the moral courage to do something about it. There is no doubt that there are forces of darkness that envelope our country - greed, irrationality, shortsightedness, ignorance, superstition, hypocrisy, violence, intolerance. The shining example of the brave souls like Asma Jehangir who represent the true spirit of Islam gives us hope that one day Pakistan too shall progress to become at least the land of the humans.

Re: Ferozk in general

Ferozk, read the following lines penned by you:

``Couple of things about me, which my help to explain my irreverence to you et al; one; never take anything I say personally, because if you do, I will find ways to offend you and will know how to emotionally upset you.``
``I have a real, real twisted sense of humor coupled with a morbid cynicism, which just irks people to no end.``
``If the world wants to safe itself, I will give it a helping hand, but it has to ask for my help. As to lost causes and false hopes, I have no time to invest in such ventures.``


Please stop this embarrassing promotion of your attributes and qualities; are you feeling tremendously attacked that you feel the need to descend to a defense of self-propaganda? If not, your abilities to play with people, irk them, understand them, should speak for themselves not shamelessly written about whenever chance allows - all too often. There is a phrase in urdu kay- ``apne moon mian mittoo mat bano..`` In other words, do not blow your own horn! It is nice of you to join our weak causes, our false hopes, and hopeless ventures, and lend us a helping hand..but on one condition…will you please stay QUIET during the struggle…

Also, before I was visualizing animals, machines, humans on a lower wrung of the evolutionary ladder, now my view is getting clouded by a balloon, a big big balloon, ever expanding, and as its skin gets tauter and thinner, and hot air bloats it with fragility, a little pin prick is all it takes - so all chowk walas feel empowered that a little pin prick, or perhaps a sharp nail, a twist of the fingers, and BLAST!
boom boom..

But all is not hopeless, sometimes little kids will use the broken skin of a balloon to make a chota sa, nana sa ghubaara..

Re: AA, #22

``evolutionarily challenged``?

Hey, AA, couldn`t control my laughter!

You know, I`ve observed among some of the Chowk inter-actors that the harder they try to display their knowledge, the more it becomes apparent how little they `know`! ``Infinitely wise`` knows no bounds!