The Ever Changing MQM #10,

AKC, firstly I do not belong to Tehrik-e-Insaf, nor do I belong to the Taliban. Actually, I am a "Muhajir", i.e. descendant of migrants to Pakistan from India. Your automatically labeling those who have a problem with the MQM as being Taliban sympathizers is the same kind of blind political jingoism that your kind are accustomed to. Maybe you should stop to consider that there is a whole city, or rather, a whole country, full of Pakistanis who are neither Taliban, nor do they have any love for the MQM. Immediately branding those who disagree with the MQM as being Taliban, your euphemism for terrorists worthy of extra-judicial actions I assume, is a symptom of the kind of fanaticism which you got chastised for by Faisal Sabwari and others at the MQM. If you think that being such a loud mouth is going to impress Big Al and its going to move you up in the ranks, think again....you're making enemies faster than you're making friends. And the kind of bayghayrat friends you're making are the liberals who jump into bed with anyone who has power that day. The others you see jumping to your support are the Hindus from India who rejoice at every pain that Pakistanis feel. Good company you keep.

The Ever Changing MQM Hey thanks Vanguard, This Ali Chishti guy is an MQM fanatic whom even Faisal Sabwari recently chastised for his fanaticism. Not only does this joker claim to be the Vice Chairman of some MQM professionals forum, but the MQM itself disowned him according to the same link you sent. Strange that Chowk allows such confirmed propagandists and liars to publish on the front page like this. I think Mr Ali K Chishti deserves more coverage and should be fully exposed for the buffoon he is.

The Ever Changing MQM "Anti-MQM forces"? You mean helpless Karachiites who have been subjected to extortion, coercion, kidnapping and bhatta by MQM? You make it sound as if the "Anti-MQM forces" are an armed group with strength whereas the truth is that the MQM is the armed militant organization and those who oppose it in Karachi are typically educated people who are disgusted with its methods.

Regardless of features of one of the faces of MQM you are talking about, the many other faces cannot be ignored. This party, like most others, cannot fund itself without its "earners" who do the type of things that MQM is famous for in order to pay the big man in London. Babar Ghauri, Ishrat-ul-Ibad, Waseem Akhtar, Mustafa Kamal....how many FIRs do you think are registered against each of these people for murder? DId you know that Altaf had 240 cases of murder against him dismissed during Musharraf's era?

Ali Chishti, the fact of the matter is that the liberals such as yourself are willing to entertain murder, fascism, dictatorship, foreign invasion, bombing civilians and every other unimaginable treason against the people of your own country just because you feel a moral and intellectual self-righteousness in your beliefs over those of all others. For you people, secularism is the end that justifies any means. In the end, secularism as you want it is nothing less than tyranny.

Chaos – Thy Name is Pakistan Why bother with facts and information when its so popular these days to blame Islam and "mullahs". I personally think that divide and rule is continuing to work because of articles like this that continue to divide our ranks into smaller and smaller groups that each refuse to work with one another. What needs to be done is to curtail not only the Taliban and religious extremists, but also these liberal extremists since they both over-react to one another and cause problems for the remainder of mainstream Pakistan. Mohammad Gill.....try a little more education before saying that Shia Islam is different from Sunni Islam which is different from Wahabi Islam. You really need an education on this subject cause you don't know what you're talking about. Ask the followers of Imam Jafar and the followers of the main schools of thought in Sunni Islam whether or not there are fundamental differences in our sharia.

Besides....aside from complaining about what you perceive to be wrong.....do you have any solutions? If not....I propose you stop whining and get an education first.

Sharp-Eyed View of a Mohajir Honestly this guy is such a sell out that I wonder what on earth he is so proud about. I agree with #60...good riddance to people like this. I am a Muhajir and a Pakistani-Canadian so I suppose Sayeed Hassan Khan would be disappointed that this experience doesn't have the same affect on everyone....there is something about him as a person that makes him this way. I guess this guy is an example of the type of closet-Indians we have among the liberals of Pakistan. Way to go dude....please keep representing your bayghayrat class so everyone can begin recognize you from a distance.

British Wheel of Anglo-American Axis Coming Off Don't under-estimate these Brits. They have a lot of experience doing things in the covert manner. Do people realize that most off-shore tax havens in the world come under the British queen. Just the Virgin islands with a population of over 50,000 has over US$ 2 trillion in banking assets. Additionally, the Brits also famously used the Al Yamama arms purchase program with Saudi Arabia to pull off all kids of covert activities and bribe all kinds of officials. They have countless institutions that are so discrete that you'd never know they exist, or if you do, you would hardly be able to recognize the implications and magnitude of what you were witnessing. If you believe the global banking capital is NY, think again...it has been London for over 100 years and still continues to be for the foreseeable future. Many in the American establishment elite, i.e. Dick Cheney, are closet anglophiles and have more respect for the British class based system than they do for the American system of equality and opportunity for all.

He who controls money controls it all. There is much of the picture you're missing...follow the money and you'll see for yourself that the British people may be screwed, but their establishment is thriving and growing.

Land Mafia Havens in Karachi Glad to see that Chowk is not infested with jiyalas of the MQM. Intellectual honesty demands that we call them what they are. But the disappointment lies in Chowk itself allowing this drivel to be published....not because it represents a different point of view...but because it lacks any facts and suggests division and hatred for Pashtuns using euphemisms such as Taliban, Afghani, Bearded Mullah, etc.. Shame on Chowk for this crap!

Land Mafia Havens in Karachi MatloobZ,

When you start believing the sponsors of Baitullah Mehsud (Americans) who clearly have another agenda for Pakistan, you delude yourself and bring potentially catastrophic misunderstandings into the mix. Please lets rely on our Pakistanis to tell us whats happening in our country rather than foreigners who have other interests.

Land Mafia Havens in Karachi What kind of BS is this? You saw some Afghani looking people? How did you know they were Afghani? Did they have long hair, black turbans and were carrying Taliban flags? You MQM instigator! There are no such people in Karachi and it is MQM that is instigating such ethnic hatred just so it can maintain its iron grip on the city. Chowk should be more responsible than to public divisive nonsense like this that sounds like it comes straight from the simple mind of an MQM karkon. If they want to be mature about politics, they cannot be using these kinds of methods. One of my friends who is a reporter for Aaj TV informed me that they investigated the incident in Surjani Town and found that MQM and PPP are scapegoating ANP because ANP has risen to power very fast and they make convenient scapegoats during this Taliban panic. You not only play into the hands of India, the US and our enemies by using such stunts to promote the insane agenda of MQM...but you destroy the city you live in.

Hangman and the Priest Always blame the mullah and Islamism. Knee-jerk statements made by almost every member of this pseudo-intellectual crowd tat calls itself civil society and demands to be given priority over the masses. Ibrahim, I think some of my iLogs should directly to you, i.e. Fake Blonde Aunties..." and others on liberal fanaticism in Pakistan. The whole thing about 1400 years is also ridiculous....I'll bet you worship the Magna Carta which incidentally is almost as old. You don't cure extremism with a dose of ignorance and extremism from the opposite side...thats not balance. Try having a little more understanding of the conservative nature of Pakistan and try to understand that there is a big difference between JI and the other orgs and the Islamic ideology itself.

Take your inner-most agenda to its logical conclusion and see what you come out with. A secularist should ask himself whether or not it is ridiculous for him to think that he'll be able to remove the word "Islamic" from the "Islamic Republic of Pakistan" on my passport....if he thinks there is any possibility of this, let him go and say this in any public forum and check the public sentiment. Let me know and I'll show up to tape the funeral and we can upload it to Chowk so we can conclusively prove once and for all that there is no public appetite for this kind of nonsense.

Urban Middle Class’s Steady Descent Into Conservatism and Religious Right "Ironically this class has always been in power and has grown substantially richer since the late 1990s. If there are “gaps’ in the society, at least urban middle class does not face them the way impoverished masses are facing them."

The quote above from your article pretty much summarizes what you think of this class. That they've had too much influence, they have it too good, and they're over-represented. Ask any economist if the Pakistani middle class has it good. And ask any politician how much influence the middle class has on the national stage. I think you'd find yourself to be wrong on every level.

Urban Middle Class’s Steady Descent Into Conservatism and Religious Right Ilogs are not articles that are being posted on the main page...they are meant to be comments and rough ideas. I am not pretending to try to educate an entire class of people...I am pretty straight-forward about my disdain and dislike for the Kemalists of Pakistan.....frankly I have no hesitation in openly abusing them either on the net or in person...something I thoroughly enjoy doing. You on the other hand are trying to come across as a scholar who is analyzing and trying to persuade people. However, your article clearly won't win any friends in the middle and lower classes because of the way you have painted them. You obviously won't convince any upper class conservative. The only people you will be speaking to are liberal upper class and foreigners....it doesn't really serve your purpose to preach to the choir does it?

"Majority of people belonging to urban middle class, I have talked to, have been in this strange state of denial where there have until very recent past refused to admit that Islamic militants were behind anything."

According to you, you've taken a statistical sample that reveals "...this strange state of denial where there have until very recent past refused to admit..."

Please explain how you can say this about the entire middle class.

"Pakistan army which draws its rank officers from the middle class was also agitated and finally intervened."

Please explain the purpose of throwing the middle class into this argument here. Since you've mentioned the middle class and "this lot" so many times....one has to conclude that your point revolved around the fact that it is the middle class that forms the army.

Also....both of these above quotes simply demonstrate that you have a beef with the entire middle class. I assume you don't mention the lower class since they're not even worthy that much.

Urban Middle Class’s Steady Descent Into Conservatism and Religious Right I've read your article Reza and you should take a step back and read it again yourself. Other than the obvious poor choice of words which I have already pointed out, your underlying thought process is also flawed. You are talking about a middle class that likely constitutes over 40 million people....yet you are talking about them as if they are one monolithic brainless group which the liberal class didn't handle well enough. When you're talking about that many people....its ridiculous to suggest that MOST of them feel the way they do as a reaction to something or another rather than due to an actual belief that they hold to be true. You stretch their position by saying that they are apologizing for the Taliban, in a state of denial, and so on as if they're following something on a reactionary basis that lacks logic and now they're cornered and need education to get them out. According to you....all it takes is for the "educated" liberals such as yourself to correct them from their downwards descent. This article ain't right on any level man....try again and try not to be so arrogant next time.

Urban Middle Class’s Steady Descent Into Conservatism and Religious Right The tone?! The tone of my iLog? LOL You're not saying anything...that iLog is intended to be sarcastic and abusive towards a pretentious and fringe group of Kemalists in Pakistan. Was your article intended to be arrogant and disdainful of the middle class?

You wanna go and make a comment there? Cause I'm more than willing to hash it out with you

Urban Middle Class’s Steady Descent Into Conservatism and Religious Right I neither said that I hate you, nor did I say anything about conspiracy theories, nor did I call you a sell out, nor did I even mention the word "West". Sounds like you have a stereotype in mind for people who disagree with you....and you've painted that stereotype both in your words here and in your article. Regarding respecting a difference of opinions...I think your article speaks plenty about the respect you hold for such differences.

Urban Middle Class’s Steady Descent Into Conservatism and Religious Right

But anyway...at least you yourself suggest clearly in your article that you realize that yours is a fringe ideology in Pakistan.