http://desicritics.org/ Superior South Asian bloggers on Culture, Media, Politics, Sport, Business, and Technology. en Copyright 2006 by the authors Tue, 21 Apr 2009 12:55:03 EDT http://backend.userland.com/rss BC custom software http://desicritics.org/2007/11/22/134727.php#comment-364486 I first read the poem First they came in Taslima Nasrin's website. It touched my thinking very much. I thought then, I would write something on Taslima Nasrin with this poem. If I would not read this article, where you had already done what I had wanted to do, I would write the same thing written in here. This sub-continent was in British empire once. Now it is going to be a part of the empire of fundamentalists. Pakistan has already collapsed. We are not Pakistani. Soon may be India will collapse, if Indians do not start thinking about themselves. We are not Indian. But when Bangladesh will collapse? No one will left to save us. There will be no Taslima Nasrin, but hundreds of Baytulla Mehsuds. Please read my recent posts on Taslima Nasrin. Here are two links- http://tamosodeep.blogspot.com/2009/04/my-sentiments-have-been-hurt-mordern.html http://tamosodeep.blogspot.com/2009/04/liberation-of-taslima-nasrin-and.html 364486@desicritics.org Tue, 21 Apr 2009 12:55:03 EDT http://desicritics.org/2007/11/22/134727.php#comment-306768 @razorMirage Thanks for letting me know, I was under the impression that it came from Gujarat or maybe the RSS camps in Nagpur and Pune :-P. But glad you cleared things up. 306768@desicritics.org Tue, 27 Nov 2007 17:50:36 EST http://desicritics.org/2007/11/22/134727.php#comment-306758 Abbas, I don't know whether you agree or not..World knew and agrees that all fanatics, jihadis orignate from "Middle East".Whether it is the people or the preachings come out from there. 306758@desicritics.org Tue, 27 Nov 2007 16:37:04 EST http://desicritics.org/2007/11/22/134727.php#comment-306754 Jawahara, you rightly point out that the christian protests across the world were largely peaceful. What was disturbing for me was that most of the cases of violence that was reported were all from India. Which makes one wonder whether south asians are more inclined towards violence when it comes to religion. Maybe it is in our genes :-)! I have seen very sane and seemingly calm people completely loose it when you criticize their favourite swami/mutt or church. India is one of the fastest growing market for evangelical churches. These churches probably appeal to indians more because of their fundamentalistic and completely over the top show of faith. Hindus and Muslims already have tons of such fanatical organizations all across india. 306754@desicritics.org Tue, 27 Nov 2007 15:36:52 EST http://desicritics.org/2007/11/22/134727.php#comment-306742 While we are on a subject of protests, here is my take. In no society, freedom are absolute or can be absolute. For every action, there is equal and opposite reaction. Its a law of nature. That is why freedoms are regulated in every society, even in democracies. In fact democracies make more laws than any other systems. Your right to extend your hand ends where my nose begins. There is no right to hurt or harm others. That harm can be physical, psychological or economic. There is no right to deprive others certain benefits and comforts they may have chosen to derive from any source. It can be any benefit or comfort persons may hope to derive from beliefs, norms, traditions, institutions. Thus one has to enjoy freedoms in a way that does not harm or deprive others. But what if those beliefs, norms and institutions were practiced in way harming or depriving some people - well than, one has to redress the abuses thru laws so exercise of freedoms can remain within civilized parameters. Thus, state has an unenviable job of protecting freedoms and regulating freedoms. Civil unrests occur when state fails in its duties to protect freedoms and regulate freedom. For whatever ideological complusions, when state decides some people have right to offend anybody, some people have more rights than others - than people are left to fend for themselves and find their own way to deal with such situations. If somebody punches me, I am likely to kick him back. That is what protest culture degenerates in to, when state exempt certain people with special rights. If someone offends a group of people, they have to come together to take some collective action against the culprit. Now if the culprit is repentent, the issue would get diffused. But if the culprit seeks immunity for his actions and they are seen as a part of larger agenda of hostility, than those who are offended or harmed may take their anger to political arena and if there is no scope for it to be redressed in political arena, it may turn to direct action at street level where it can not be controlled what shape and form protests will take. In a street level confrontations, eye-for-eye is the norm. You kick me, I slap you. Idea is to extract maximum harm from the culprit and the cause he is trying to benefit. Gandhi tried to revolutionize the street protests and gave it a new language . But that works only when both sides are civil and reasonable, if one side is not, than all bets are off. All it takes is few over-zealots to give a totally different character to protests, just as it takes only few over-zealots to offend and provoke protests. Since most of protests come from religions, it suggests they feel they are target of cultural war, have developed a sense of victimhood, political process is not able to or does not want to handle it or is active participant in dis-empowerment and victimization of religion. Its an explosive situation that needs to be handled with positive secularism and returning to civilized norms for freedom. 306742@desicritics.org Tue, 27 Nov 2007 13:13:45 EST http://desicritics.org/2007/11/22/134727.php#comment-306730 Abbas.. I write in rather plain English and go to length to make my point. If you don't understand something, all you have to do is ask. If you don't want to understand something because it gets in your way and spoils your apples, not much I can do about. 306730@desicritics.org Tue, 27 Nov 2007 11:08:44 EST http://desicritics.org/2007/11/22/134727.php#comment-306729 Btw, this does not mean I am some kind of Christian apologist but I can see the difference between protests in these two scenarios. 306729@desicritics.org Tue, 27 Nov 2007 10:57:08 EST http://desicritics.org/2007/11/22/134727.php#comment-306728 The larger Christian protest worldwide was by and large non-violent. If there were a few instances of violence in India, that is unfortunate. However, even in these cases, the author was not threatened with death. Physical threats and actual violence are a whole other thing. Ransacking a theater, while dangerously stupid and small-minded is not as bad as killing someone (Theo Van Gogh, in Amsterdam, for instance) or threatening others (Rushdie and Nasrin). However, you are right, this thread should not be hijacked by who is more violent or not. The fact remains that freedom of thought and expression are being hounded by those who believe that the laws of religion trump those of the law of the land. And that I find troubling. 306728@desicritics.org Tue, 27 Nov 2007 10:51:35 EST http://desicritics.org/2007/11/22/134727.php#comment-306725 Sorry to go digress from the main topic of discussion here. @Jawahara, http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/India/Violence_halts_Da_Vinci_Code_screening_in_Hbad/articleshow/msid-1674892,curpg-1.cms it is an archival link from TOI of christian 'protests' in Hyderabad. They decided to ransack the theater in protest. Quoting from that article "...Police said the mob shattered the glass panes and damaged furniture and ticket counters..." Reading that line you will not be able to tell if it was a hindu, muslim or christian organisation. http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2006%5C05%5C27%5Cstory_27-5-2006_pg4_17 punjab bans the film 'fearing violence' based on their intelligence reports. I can dig into more of this just to emphasis my point. These are typical acts of violence in india, and has got more to do with the people (call me racist) than their religion. It is hard to draw a line between a vehement protest and a not so vehement one. My point, going by press releases and news reports at that time, is that in India the priests and christians as a community seem to take a stronger umbrage than the priests and community in Europe. 306725@desicritics.org Tue, 27 Nov 2007 09:36:05 EST http://desicritics.org/2007/11/22/134727.php#comment-306724 Abbas, people *do* have a right to protest something they find offensive. It is the other side of the coin, when we talk of the freedom of expression. What they cannot do is to physically hurt someone or threaten them. Those are crimes. Protesting something is not. Some do it publicly, without violence or, in the instance of the DaVinci Code, there were many, many writings worldwide refuting the book. Just what do you consider vehement, Abbas? Is vehemence just shown by being violent? The backlash against the Code and before that The Last Temptation, was vehement. It was just not violent and therein lies the difference. I don't believe in protesting against creative works but if I was to choose a model, I'd rather choose the Christian one than the Muslim one. Others can choose what they want. 306724@desicritics.org Tue, 27 Nov 2007 08:49:34 EST http://desicritics.org/2007/11/22/134727.php#comment-306722 @Deepti, couldn't agree with you more. We have to grow thicker skins. Which is why I was arguing Jawahara's point about christian violence during Da protests. Because nothing was burnt or no price was put on Brown's head does not make that community's protest a model to follow. European priests were not as vehement in their protests as Indian priests were of that book. So it is all in the region you come from not the religion. But I do agree with you that the christian priests tend to be more docile and do not openly advocate violence. That helps in keeping the community in rein. @kerty, I do not think you understand how to use the 'apples and oranges' simile. I also do not understand your point. All I can say is that you keep popping up like a bad apple in these discussions. 306722@desicritics.org Tue, 27 Nov 2007 08:11:20 EST http://desicritics.org/2007/11/22/134727.php#comment-306709 Abbas, there is a difference between protests and violent protests. I was not in India during the Code protests but I did not hear of any violence. There were widespread protests worldwide but no one put a price on Dan Brown's head or burned anything. In a democratic country people have a right to protest but not to become violent and threaten and or physically harm anyone. Personally, I find banning of any of these books extremely idiotic. Don't read the damn book if you don't want. Any country that curtails freedom of thought and expression by continually banning whatever book someone from some religion finds distasteful will have no meaningul discourse left. Sad! 306709@desicritics.org Tue, 27 Nov 2007 04:48:48 EST http://desicritics.org/2007/11/22/134727.php#comment-306690 Abbas #68 Read my comments in the context of issues presented in the thread where BJP was brought into the discussion to create relativism - that all parties do it, all religions do it. If one is going to rely on relativism as an rationale or argument, better line up the facts and they better not be apples and oranges. Although it is important to expose the hypocracy of other parties, it is essential that it be factual and not twisting and stretching of facts to fit the analogy. Communists have ideological and political compulsion to twist the events of past as well as present, even events whose memory is still fresh in public mind. I am all for banning all sorts of things, but we live in a democracy and not Islamic republic. You claim that BJP would have done the same to a writer critical of hindus just like what Bangladesh have done to Taslima. 'would have done it' is not the same as 'have done it' - former is hypothetical and later is a matter of fact. That is apples and oranges. One can only build bogus propaganda on such contrived relativism. Hindus have plenty of literature critical of every aspect of hindu faith and their culture. On the contrary, neither Islam or communism can tolerate any dissent or criticism. If you don't want me to defend BJP, just don't bring it into discussion when it is not relevant, and if you must, be prepared to back it up. 306690@desicritics.org Mon, 26 Nov 2007 23:55:57 EST http://desicritics.org/2007/11/22/134727.php#comment-306687 Abbas, don't you think thats reason enough to demand that our communities grow thicker hides? 306687@desicritics.org Mon, 26 Nov 2007 21:14:03 EST http://desicritics.org/2007/11/22/134727.php#comment-306675 @Jawahara, I am not sure if you meant it were the christians in India who supposedly did not violently protest the DaVinci Code. There were widespread protests in India leading to the film being banned. Religion does not have anything to do with the degree of violent protests. In India, everyone is fanatical of their religion. You should visit a evangelical gathering in small town south india and see the fanaticism on display there. It is the culture of the people in India to be constantly insecure about their religion and hence produce knee jerk reactions to the slightest provocation. 306675@desicritics.org Mon, 26 Nov 2007 16:52:36 EST http://desicritics.org/2007/11/22/134727.php#comment-306668 Jawahara please do not explain the virtues of Christians for not protesting Davinci the way Muslims did for Cartoons. Muslims protest then was mainly political, what can Muslims do? they atleast protest violently not like Born-again Christian army of US or chosen people of GOD (JEws) bombing innocent Muslims. Muslims are far better than them. They did not protest violently because they knew that their armies are bombing innocent Muslims, and Muslims protested because they can do only that much. Right? 306668@desicritics.org Mon, 26 Nov 2007 14:40:16 EST http://desicritics.org/2007/11/22/134727.php#comment-306667 Jawahara please do not explain the virtues of Christians for not protesting Davinci the way Muslims did for Cartoons. Muslims protest then was mainly political, what can Muslims do? they atleast protest violently not like Born-again Christian army of US or chosen people of GOD (JEws) bombing innocent Muslims. Muslims are far better than them. They did not protest violently because they knew that their armies are bombing innocent Muslims, and Muslims protested because they can do only that much. Right? 306667@desicritics.org Mon, 26 Nov 2007 14:38:35 EST http://desicritics.org/2007/11/22/134727.php#comment-306664 Kerty, you sound like BJPs PR man..Wake up and smell the s*!t. Secularism is a lip service that political parties pay to claim higher moral ground. Religion based politics should be banned. That way hollow groups like the BJP will quickly sink into oblivion. Protection to Taslima should not be based on her religion or which religious group she offended. If it was a Hindu writer criticizing Hindus, BJP would have done what Bangladesh has done to Taslima. Its all hypocrisy 306664@desicritics.org Mon, 26 Nov 2007 12:40:12 EST http://desicritics.org/2007/11/22/134727.php#comment-306656 Soham... Society can not remain civil if society can not arrive at an understanding on what should be basic minimum norms of decency and code of conduct or the consensus that exists on such matters is attacked by daredevils in the name of freedom. Respect for beliefs and revered icons held by people is essential to maintain civil society. That does not mean they are beyond critical scrutiny and criticism - but they have to be done in not-so-brazen manner. It is not only true for religious or moral sentiments and cultural mores but secular as well. Try making a similar gross caricature of Gandhi, Nehru or Mother Terressa and you will see what I mean. Your point about common man suffering because of parties using religion and castes does not make sense - Common men are the ones who vote for congress, BJP, Communists who use religion and caste to woo them. Russian people were communists because they chose communism to rule Russia. If people vote for communists for decades and state is ruled by communists for decades, it does make them communists. BJP does not claim to be communal and those who support BJP claim to be Hindus championing positive secularism aka Hindutva. There is only minority communalism and so-called majority communalism is merely a political myth invented to justify minority communalism for sustaining pseudo secularism. Hindus live in all other states too but their widows do not get dumped at religious centers. One wonders why only caricature and mal-practices can survive in communists WB. It has imported communism, Bengladesh and everything else and exiled Hinduism. There is nothing of hinduism, hindu infra-structure left that can enlighten, mobilize, reform, revitalize, support and sustain hindus - the creamy layers are gone, support systems are gone, organizations and leadership are gone - only those who do bidding for communism have survived. The only state that has a dubious distinction of en masse converting into Bangladesh and now communism. BTW, water was a major flop in India notwithstanding all the hype and push received from abroad and in the media. If something is good, people speak with their pocketbook. Not even 1% of Indians bothered to see that boredom-fest. 306656@desicritics.org Mon, 26 Nov 2007 11:28:44 EST http://desicritics.org/2007/11/22/134727.php#comment-306651 It's not even the question of her being allowed to live in Calutta, Shahid. It's the fact that people are so damned thin-skinned that they are so threatened by someone's writing. Whether or not she is officially allowed to return, her life will be in danger, not to mention her freedom to write what she wants. For a truly diverse, secular, and thriving society to flourish artists and writers should have no strictures on what they create. Those who disagree can protest, they can criticize...in a civilized manner. Violence and threats are deplorable. Christians protested The Last Temptation of Christ and the DaVinci Code, but without burning effigies or threatening anyone. Is it too much to ask for Muslims in India (and elsewhere) to display the same level-headedness. The fact is that most of those protestors (for lack of a better word...they are merely goondas) have probably not read the book or any other book for that matter. They have to get used to the fact that the whole friggin' world is not accountable to some uneducated louts. And if your religious sentiments (what the fuck does that mean, anyway) are so fragile as to be offended at the drop of a hat, grow a thicker skin or don't buy and/or read the offending material. These fundamentalist muslims offend me...heck they deeply hurt my secular sentiments (not to mention my intellect)...maybe I need to do the secular equivalent of a fatwa on them. 306651@desicritics.org Mon, 26 Nov 2007 10:31:39 EST http://desicritics.org/2007/11/22/134727.php#comment-306650 Sigh...Jawahara I see what you mean 306650@desicritics.org Mon, 26 Nov 2007 09:54:19 EST http://desicritics.org/2007/11/22/134727.php#comment-306649 I think now Taslima should be allowed back to Calcutta she can live there quietly and peacefully, I understand the difficulty living among people of different language. Also, looks that she will make no more controversies now, she is almost done, she already deserved more than what she had written. She should be allowed to Calcutta on a understanding that she will no more write non-sense, let her write something productive. 306649@desicritics.org Mon, 26 Nov 2007 09:35:02 EST http://desicritics.org/2007/11/22/134727.php#comment-306647 Dee, I must sadly disagree that protests such as ours carry any real weight at all. Only the protests (and hooliganism) of those with religious sentiments really matter. 306647@desicritics.org Mon, 26 Nov 2007 09:11:20 EST http://desicritics.org/2007/11/22/134727.php#comment-306635 Jawahara, we are protesting here as of now. Demonstrations are forgotten with the passage of time but the written word leaves a more lasting impression. Don't let censorship get to you ever;) 306635@desicritics.org Mon, 26 Nov 2007 05:48:58 EST http://desicritics.org/2007/11/22/134727.php#comment-306632 I vote all of us who are sick of these stupid, insane, religious-sentiment-hurt brigade gang up and demonstrate against them. I swear they hurt my sentiments every day by being small-minded, holier-than-thou assholes...why can't I have a morcha? Taslima Nasreen is not a good writer but she has the right to write whatever the heck she wants to. Damn them! 306632@desicritics.org Mon, 26 Nov 2007 05:31:36 EST