The Interview

I thought this article was funny. But the close resemblance of the fictionalized character to a gentleman who is very well versed in english and does not hold any views like the ones expressed by the author made me vmoit in disgust.

Freedom of expression is one thing but slandering someone without a good reason is something else. Chowk editors should think again if they are doing justice to their responsible positions.

Sandhana,

Just an acknowledgment that I`ve read your last post addressed to me... will respond later..

hmmm... I see you seem to be having it out with Solitude. Take his effervescent ramblings with pinch of salt.. he`s given to skipping his medications every now and then :)

PM

Solitude

If there is a point in your tasteless posts, I cannot see how dragging in mothers and sisters in makes it any clearer. In any case, search as I may I cannot find ``convincing Solitude`` anywhere on my priority list.

And for your information, I will not have to go to Vermont, if ever the need arises. Now figure that out :-).

Sadhana

Solitude,

``But this forced copulation is the norm in my religion and community.``

This statement of yours disturbs me. Forced copulation is not something ``unique`` to Muslims or Pakistanis (I`m assuming that is the religion and community you are referring to). This type of ``male dominating`` behavior has been occuring in every culture, religion, and community in this world. Our dear mother of all mothers, Eve, was also deemed a temptress by all three major religions for straying poor, innocent, doe-eyed Adam into hellish sins. Women have been subjugated by men everywhere. Even the Kama Sutra, an old historic text, teaches women to be temptresses in the most carnal sense of the word. IT IS THE COMMUNITY OF MAN, NOT RELIGION OR CULTURE OR COUNTRY, THAT SUBJUGATES WOMEN.

yours truly,

equalist (note: not feminist) schizo ;)

Sadhana, It is not that I quickly read what you have to say. It is that I do not understand what you are writing. It is very hard to comprehend your sentences- in other words I am too stupid to understand your oracle-ifications.

``My point was that there are situations in which men/women wilfully do put themselves where it maynot be not clear to even to the principals forget about a disinterested party(such as a judge or jury), where and which point consent began or ended. ``

And that point of yours was exactly what I was clarifying. The point is where the woman says ``no``. I gave examples (but you did not read them) do I care? probably not. Since guy or gal desi or non desi you - your ideas are conservative. (not that I am liberal, goodness knows I would not want to give them a bad name).

BTW I did not call you a desi - if I did I am not only bad at comprehending your fallutions but I am bad at writing precisely - now how about that? what a discovery ...

When I extract pieces of your comprehensible wisdom and then write about it. I am not NECESSERILY (sp?) writing to you at all. It is for all to read. I address every one (e.g. ``Dear fellow man``) and when I use words like ``desi community`` I am talking about the conservative un enlightened kind.

There is no question of ``aql`` a woman may be NAKED with a naked man but if she has second thoughts and she says ``no I am not ready``. Then the guy stops. That is what making love means to most people who do not know what ``aql`` means.

Ofcourse people who know what ``aql`` means (like you esteemed self) think : ``why did she have to get naked if she did not want to have sex with him?`` or ``why is she being such a tease? the man is ENTITLED to f_ck her now - this is a POINT of no return, no? does the woman have no aql``.

In Islam a woman cannot say NO to a husband if he demands her in the Islamic way (what is that? well it has a lot to do with camels) On the contrary there are laws that give the wife the right to say no to her husband in ``evil decadent`` and ``bay aql`` countries like this one.

- Hoping to see you finally marrying the love of your life (was his name Tyson?) in the state of vermont. Do send a postcard from Kabul (or whatever ``aqalmand`` country you are going to) when you go there for your honeymoon.

Dear Mr Solitude,

You are in too much of a hurry to read with full comprehension. I am not making a case for desi guys, why would I, I am not a desi guy. What did desi guys have to do with what I was saying anyway? How did they manage to creep in?

In addition, I seek neither to excuse nor promote the cause of `human imperfections` in man or woman or their situations. My point was that there are situations in which men/women wilfully do put themselves where it maynot be not clear to even to the principals forget about a disinterested party(such as a judge or jury), where and which point consent began or ended.

In my opinion, its futile and meaningless to the cause of `freedom and happiness` to keep finetuning laws for these essentially interpersonal matters and cheese-paring these situations down in court, down to what `is` is and all the rest. Its common sense for thinking sensible men/women to prevent themselves from getting into such situations and not go running to all the kings men of glorious Western jurisprudence expecting restitution for their own errors of judgement.

Now nowhere do I imply that adequate laws protecting men and women ought not exist. I`m only speaking of society sending its `aql` on holiday and leaving it all up to blind principle.

I get a feeling you may not read this post through carefully. Thats totally OK with me, I didnot bother to read yours fully either.

Sadhana

``It is assumed that every behaviour that exercises that freedom can only be to the good (like being alone in a closed room with the opposite sex in the dead of night)``

I was often asked by my Muslim brothers ``What is freedom ? Do you want to be free to rob a bank or kill a person? Is that what freedom is for you?``

The problem is most of us desis (the conservative kind atleast) do not know what freedom means. You talk of human ``imperfections`` as though those imperfections are OK justification for rape! ``I am sorry I am imperfect so it is OK for me to rape a woman who comes to my room in the _dead of the night_``

Have you ever been in a closed room in the dead of the night with your mother ? or your sister ? Why did you not rape them ? You could say ``Please dont give me five years for raping them because I am only a man and I cannot control myself when my mother and sister are in the same room in the dead of the night``. How about if your mother or sister came out naked ? How about if your mother or sister wanted you to have them ? Would you do it? Would you do it and then go ``I am sorry I am imperfect man - oh pity me - I had to f_ck my mother and sister because I am just a man and swayed easily by tamptation of women``.

I am sorry for the men of my country and origin. I am sorry that they have not been with strangers (women) in the dead of the night in a closed room. I lived for over 2 months with a model in NYC. Her beauty made my heart ache with longing but I never assaulted or raped her or dis respected her. Even when she walked around the house in her under wear. Why ? because I said ``this beautiful woman has trusted me! she has trusted me when women of my own community were too afraid to talk to me - when my own women were too afraid to touch me- I cannot break that trust- I have to be a gentle man - I have to be strong.``

I often see men and women cuddle and roll around all over each other - they are so comfortable with each other and despite that they make love to who ever they want WITH CONSENT - without raping each other! UNLIKE the desi community where even looking at each other is uncomfortable.

I want to play around carelessly with the hair of these women and let them fondle and touch me without being afraid that I will go out of control and rape them. There was once a Japanese girl who was sitting on my bed and I started kissing her and she said NO once - I had not had a woman for months (I start feeling guilty when I do) That one ``no`` was so torturous for me that I gripped the side of my bed and I turned my face away out of fear that I might look weak.

She sat there for a little while and then she herself said ``wow, you are so nice, most guys don`t stop when I say no`` and then she herself kissed me and it was cool there after.

Dear fellow man, tell me! would you rather make love to a girl who is saying no? or would you rather have a girl who is saying yes ? would it not be better if the girl was happily consenting and enjoying your company , your touch, your love?

Would it not be better if a girl was ACTUALLY loving you rather than being forced to love you? Would you rather she squirm and make faces and say no or would you rather that she smile and beg you for your body? Would you rather she relish and crush and churn your flesh or would you rather she avoid touching it ?

There is nothing inhuman about respecting the other person`s consent EVEN when she is naked and you are on top of her and ABOUT to enter her and she says no. Making love is mutual not a one sided affair. It is not making love if the other side is saying no - it is rape. No matter if you are husband or wife or lovers.

But this forced copulation is the norm in my religion and community.

Mike Tyson accepted Islam for the reason : the religion pandered to his sick, twisted and violent side - it consoled and justified the rapist in him. This religion that views all women as ``temptresses``[1] and ``loose`` and morally corrupt (enough to cause the ``majority of women to end up in hell``) was ideal for Mike Tyson and his conscience.

[1](Prophets words - references will be provided)

Sorry if this is a repeat post.

PM #24 from the other board:

Thanks for your response. I actually meant discussion by everyone else :-) and I guess thats already happening.

Anyway, I feel there are exact parallels between the M Tyson issue and the Hudood ordinance issue. In both cases, `blind principle` is allowed to rule to the exclusion of common sense and conventional wisdom.

In the M. Tyson case, due to the acceptance in principle that unfettered personal freedoms are `good` for men and women, it is assumed that every behaviour that exercises that freedom can only be to the good (like being alone in a closed room with the opposite sex in the dead of night). So any ill effects due to imperfections in humans and their situations need only be legislated by the state and hair-splitting of every detail into the finest meaningless micron is required in the cause of freedom and justice.

Similarly going on the general principle is that since Islam is generally pronounced to be protective wrt women, and Islamic law meant to foster `godly` and orderly society, ultimately conducive to women`s well-being, a woman is assumed to automatically `protected` under every law with an Islamic bent, and you get the Hudood ordinances and the Taliban`s peculiarly vicious laws.

I believe there is a point beyond which exercising jurisprudence over personal behaviour is futile(law of diminishing or even negative returns). I think the West and some Islamic countries have both reached that point of futility in their different ways.

In fact there is even negation of the original principle. The woman in Tyson`s room or Tyson himself were victims of their own stupid choices and could not be safeguarded by either the laws or the previous punitive actions of the state or all the social freedoms granted to both.

The Taliban and Afghan society are no closer to God(in my opinion) for dealing out harsh punishment to women for showing an extra inch of ankle(and incidentally sustaining themselves on the backs of miserable drug-addicts the world over) nor any Pakistani woman safer or society more moral because on blind principle there was a law handy under which to charge that 15-year-old who died in fetters.

Sadhana

No not even a chamaataa ... though I know children here in the US ... italians, spanish, irish you name it get smacked by the their parents too ...

I am from Lahore... and please dont bother writing again because your writings are always in bad taste ...

-Yasser

Solitude:

In response to my remark, ``Tyson got five years because, presumably, the lady didn`t exactly say ``okay, you can now touch me`` ``

You said: ``No it was because he did not take NO for answer.``

Point taken. It was not my intention to completely condone Tyson`s action, but rather to show how men can end up getting unduly victimized in a system based on blind, bland, equality rather than one that recognizes (natural) gender-based differences in sexuailty (libido, instinctive reaction, signal interpretation etc.). It may sound very fair and just to have similar rules applied to the realm of sexuality as elsewhere, but this levelling of the playing field may have little to do with the reality of our respective (gender) natures and more to do with abstract political theory. We end up with situations in which a man (or woman) is expected to act with perfect rationality under any amount of seduction. And then there are no grey areas between love-making and rape. None of Dante`s `divine madness` either.

(We could argue over whether going topless in a given society constitutes seduction, but I think there are only so many was in which the acceptance of an invitation to a stranger`s room after midnight could realistically be interpreted. Did Tyson deserve to be punished? Yes, I think so. Did `rape` and five years fit the crime? I don`t!)

If rules of engagement for a sixth-century people err on the side of chauvisnitc male domination, the ones governing present-day America are flawed, IMO, the opposite way: in seeking to trans-genderize (couldn`t come up with a better term!) sexual roles and rules, and in seeking to bring sexual conduct neatly under the ambit of the Law, it has, perhaps unwittingly, made men unsure and afraid of how to interpret signals, doubtful about their exact role unless spelt out.

Needless to say though, some rules of sexual conduct handed down to a sixth-century nomadic people are by far the more unjust in an enlightened society than the `liberal` ones I also frown at. Lest I be accused of engaging in academic ambiguity, I am referring, in particular, to the requirement of four (male, Muslim) witnesses (`of reputable standing`, and having witnessed the act with anatomical unambiguity) for a rape conviction!

Now that this discussion has been pushed to the innards of the chowk, we will not likely witness the spectacle of a defence of that obnoxious bit of jurisprudence. ... maybe just as well...

regards,

PM

``Of course, th US where the male eroticism is essentially demonized``

Things are changing - we get to see more and more naked men in undies every day. Still not enough by my standards however. Don`t get me wrong I prefer naked chicas to naked senors but I do feel that us men are not lusted after for our bodies as often as we should be. I mean an occasional grope and grab in buses and nightclubs just barely keeps me alive (the most recent one was by an 80 year old woman- which is OK too since older women need a little lovin now and then so I don`t mind).

What I do mind is the sad fact that I am yet to to be RAVAGED (or was it ravished?) I want to be RAVISHED! (or was it ravaged?)

``Tyson got five years because, presumably, the lady didn`t exactly say ``okay, you can now touch me`` ``

No it was because he did not take NO for answer.

http://www.deccanchronicleonline.com/cover12.htm

Christians raped in Pak dare not complain

Islamabad, May 23: Members of the small Christian community of Kala Shah Kaku in Lahore province have refused to allow the police to record statements of seven unmarried girls, who were gangraped by some unidentified persons some two weeks ago, as they fear revenge by the culprits.

The girls were gangraped outside their village in Chak 44 while returning home after working at a factory, reports daily Dawn. The incident forced the community to stop sending women to work.

Earlier women had been working in the factory for the past 15 years. While the police claimed few days back that it had identified all the five offenders involved in the gangrape, the families of the victims are reluctant to present the victims before the police for fear of retribution, the papers further said.

``We have been ruined,`` says Barkat, father of two of the rape victims. ``I do not know what will be the future of my children.`` Barkat family depended heavily on the income of two girls.

An orphan girl who was among the victims has already left the village to stay with her relatives. Police sources revealed that the incident was planned by a young man from the village who was angry with the girls over a petty issue.

The gang consisted of his friends from the village, it said. The gang consisted of his friends from the village, the paper said. Atrocities against the Christians are on the rise, particularly after demonstrations by the community against the blasphemy law.

May-23-00 16:31:32 EST Reply #: 38

urstruly``

What you posted are the SUGGESTIONS (unlike Islamic LAW enforced at gun point) for women who are walking around on campus LATE at night. Such drastic measures did not have to be taken a few decades ago but since they started importing a lot of sexually frustrated International students - people have started to take precautions.

Take the example of the Iranian student in Sweden who acquired AIDS from a prostitute (since his parents could not buy him a bride) who purposefully went around infecting, raping around 39 women. In EVERY University there is atleast ONE American woman who was impregnated by a ``Brother`` - the brother then fled the country to his homeland to enjoy the enlightenment offered by the madrassah system of education. Sounds familiar ?

All sorts of people come to Universities (even people like yourself) and some of them actually think that raping a woman is ok if she is wearing a bikini or if she comes to your room she is ``asking to be raped``. [If I raped every woman who came to my room I would have been a very very very very sexually satisfied man but alas in this Un Islamic Country we don`t have our parents to do the begging for us and we dont have our elders to do the courting for us and we dont have our Sharii Police or Judicial System or pure Society to blames the woman for ``asking to be raped``]

The suggestions you mentioned are for a SITUATION: ``Defuse a Bad Situation`` - when things are that BAD you can even use your pepper spray. It does not mean you ask every woman to go around using pepper spray on men all the time they are in public. Women here smile and laugh and touch you flirtatiously also (and the men are kind enough to NOT rape them for it - unlike the ``men`` from Pakistan) Women here are gentle and generous enough to tango with us - they are giving enough to peck us on the cheek and even give us a hug. And what do the men do ? they dont rape them for hugging them or pecking them on the cheek - they thank them and act like gentlemen, they act chivalrous and act quite unlike a Muslim.

A Muslim on the other hand needs an entire judicial system, society and APPARTUS and threats to PREVENT him from committing rape : he needs veil, draconian deterrants like stoning to death and ``char dewari`` and all sorts of ``no perfume, no white socks, no hair showing, no smiling, no running around in public``, serious and stern expressions.

Its like saying ``you better not go to school or wear what you want or smile or laugh or show your face in public otherwise I will rape you or someone else will rape you and it will all be YOUR fault``. WOW! Muslim women have it really good don`t they ?

That is one of the reasons why I left the Muslim community : the women have no love to give because they canNOT. Thanks to ``brothers`` like you and their ``abbas`` and their ``cha chas`` (who wear burqas on their assassination attempts with TT guns to ``win honor and paradise``)

The words ``talibanise this`` rang as peculiar. It confirms what I have felt all along : MOST of you secretly have wet dreams about the Taliban but are afraid to admit it. You ADMIRE Bin Ladin, and possibly even the Taliban and their like.

More than 90% of the Military of Pakistan is composed of Pan Arab / Taliban sympathizers. The religion is very close to a militant man`s thinking : it is TOTALitarian, its cruel and violent and controls its members quite like a machinery or a cult.

``By coming to his room (on invitation) after midnight, what was the woman saying to Mike if not ``Yes, I`ll go to bed with you (or at least make you think so till I can sue your rich ass for a couple o` million) ... ``

Oh my goodness! hahaha :) wow I seem to be forgetting the audience I am writing for! NO WONDER all the anger and hatefilled responses. What amazes me is the above. How far have I come - how differently do I think today than the way I used to be - I amaze myself :)

Its a temptation - do I change, drink from the water of life, strengthen myself, re arm and charge back into the heart of darkness ?

or do I forget it all and travel further away ? The responses (I could do without the negativity) make me want to paint myself for war, but when I look away at all this beautiful country (beautiful in comparison to where I was) has given me : the ideas, love, flesh, freedom and affection.

I would like to thank all the bosoms who were my pillows. Sorry for being a typical Pakistani ``brat``.

``My parents NEVER HIT ME!!``

Not even a Chamatta or a slap? not even a the traditional ``thappar`` ? that national medium of expression ? You have the liberty to say ``but it was a friendly slap`` - you have the liberty to say ``but it did not break my bones``.

If that is true then you are an anomaly - an exception not the norm. I don`t know what part of Pakistan you hail from but the best families in Karachi (and I can confess to using the bathrooms of quite a few of them) had a long and time honored tradition of setting their children straight with a ``combs and hangars, and belts or just the back of the hand``. The only other city that can lay claim to ``civility`` (by Pakistan standards) is right in the middle of paindu-stan : La hore. But the people of Lahore are too sincere, too ``crude`` and too high on ``ghee and makhan`` (lard and butter) and I hear they use ``dandas``(fat stick) and ``charrees`` (stick) and ``rulers`` there also (I guess its cuz its surrounded by sugar cane plantations)

``Ultay hath ka tamacha maroon ga- kay jabra idhar say udhar ho jaye ga`` (I will slap you with the back of my hand such that your jaw swivels to the other side) now that should be the national anthem of Pakistan. Such poetry, such poignance , such tenderness, such affection in that oft repeated cliche. Don`t tell me you have never heard of this wonderful line either ?

That is our national ``greeting`` amongst friends and family. Abuse is in our holy books, in our daily lessons and a part of the national psyche. But then so is denial ...

``you won`t see any girls taking off their tops. Pearl Jam fans are smarter than your average rock-heads ... ``

Now everyone is calling me smart - have I not taken enough of your ire ? in one day? Where were you during the concerts ? but its possible - a lot of really uptight people go to concerts too. I personally refuse to be around such terribly puritanical prudes.

RE: Sameer JB Reply# 32

Following is an excerpt from a brochure that is distributed to all female students of this university in USA, where I used to go. The similar brochures are distributed at all universities in United States. I hope you will understand my point.

WHAT YOU CAN DO TO PREVENT SEX CRIMES

Defuse a Bad Situation by:

``Telling your attacker he is committing sexual assault``

``Scream and draw attention to yourself``

``Yell ``No!`` or ``Stop!`` or even ``Fire!``

``Run away if possible``

``Fight back using any means at your disposal``

``Don’t walk alone at night and stick to well-lighted streets``

``If you are being followed, walk fast to a populated area``

``Do not make an eye contact with a stranger when you are alone``

``Adopt the buddy-system when moving between classes after dark``

Sameer! Talibanise this.