tarek

Yes we can understand that it is easier to deal with those who control vote banks - but I think, from my interaction with Indian Muslims, that they would like to respond courageous "attitudes" and ideas that involve them as full citizens.

It is a basic foundation of method, that we all bring "presuppositions" to all that we observe -- If Islam is obscuitanists, can we escape the idea that if looked thru different lens it may not be obscuritanist??? Ideas are like lens, when one look thru inappropriate lens, one can get a distorted image.

mostlymad

The Muslim personal law allows the husband to do this without his wife’s consent: the husband just needs to utter the word Talaaq (pronounced as "talaakh") thrice before witnesses, and the divorce is done. (posted by Ray)

Is this only in India, or does it apply to Muslims everywhere? According to this law, can a woman divorce a man? If so, is it done the same way?

tarek

I know that during the time of Zia in Pakistan, It most certainly did apply - there was a comic tragedy in which a couple enacted a divorce scene in tha play and some "clerics" insisted that because the words were used, that the couple now stood divorced.

I think that in Pakistan, this may still be the case, we will have to see whether the Majlis has the courage to undo the Huddood and blasphemy laws.

This whole exercise of so called "Muslim" law, is an exercise to undo the nation state, to undo it's institutions and to create tribes with which to exercise control, ever smaller groups, smaller morsels for the radicals to divide and consume society.

mostlymad

that's insane.


tarek, when you say it did apply, does that include my question about women seeking a divorce? Can they do the same ridiculous thing?

tarek

Mostly

Get real - Muslims can go thru the usual stuff about women x y and z rights and Islam was the first to give rights and etc., - Reality is (and I am a Muslim, though to many a "kafir") that Muslim society and in particular Pakistani society, is MISOGYNISTIC.

I know not a single case where a woman repeated "talaak" three times and had divorced her husband - and did not get thrashed for her exertions.

mostlymad

that's what I thought. It always bothers me when people say, "well, Muslim women like to be sub-servient. Muslim women like the way things are. They like having the man do al the talking...."

It sounds far to much like what some Westerners say about abused women in Western society - "well, she must have liked the abuse; after all why else would she have stayed so long?"

Ummm....low self-esteem? fear? Years and years of being told she can't manage on her own until she believes it?

tarek

Mostly

Actually it's worse - because society is reenforcing the message of the cleric, that God wants this for you, that this is your role in life, in society.

In Pakistan there is a book that is compulsory for girls "Beheshti Zevar" -- Zevar is jewelry, usually associated with marriage - "Behesht" is another word for "Paradise" -- It is a code of conduct, recommended.

But to give a more wide view, lets be conscious that we can effect the freedom of no one who does not want it -- there are many persons who are outraged by the lack ofmorality and ethics in our (Muslim) societies, especially as it relates to women, but most women are not "conscious" in any organized way -- and if they were wouldn't I be suggesting the role of marxist organizers? Sure I would.

mostlymad

and that's a big problem, for any group kept ignorant of the fact that we are all equal.

Ray

It wrecks up India. What is your suggestions?

It is so painful.

yes, divide and rule. Bloody idiotic. And sadly, nothing can be done.

Emancipated Moslems like you Tarek would have no place here. The silly Mullahs rule, lest their powers fade because of follks like you.

Pwer corrupts.

It only adds to radicalism on all sides.

__________________


"Some have learnt many Tricks of sly Evasion, Instead of Truth they use Equivocation, And eke it out with mental Reservation, Which is to good Men an Abomination."

I don't have to attend every argument I'm invited to.

HAKUNA MATATA

Ray

Tarek,

You statement about looking through prism is making sense.

I am looking at Islam through the shenangians of the Indian Moslems (the illiterate ones only, who unfortuately are the majority).

Obviousloy, Paksitan's Islam is more emnacipated (including the illiterate ones there)

That is why Asim, Aryan, Vision and to some extent you, adn I have totally doiffernet perspective of Islam.

I remain ever grateful to the medium provided by WAB for my education in many fields. I have no hesitation in saying so.

tarek

attitudes are founded on pre-suppositions

What are my suggestions?:

...the critical role of mental attitudes in the dynamics of....

It's time for a moral and ethical society, a society in which the casting of a vote is a act of INDIVIDUAL conscience, not a "saauda" - honestly, it's time to question some presuppositions - what have we got to lose, what we not already lost??

mostlymad

Oh yeah! I've only been here a short while, and what an education. Often sad, painful, but necessary. There is a certain freedom that comes from being able to admit we don't know everything.

Aryan

So much for Indias "secularism" I guess.

The reason islamism and Islamic sharia is so popular in India is because it's encouraged and supported by the Indian government. When after the Muslim vote, they find it easier to appease Islamic clerics than address actual concerns muslim communities may have, such as water and food shortages and other amenities. The Shah Bano case is a perfect example of this.

Indians might see appeasing islamism and sharia as great example of India's secularism (forgive me for thinking secularism was the separation of church and state), but this appeasement is a slippery road to full fledged Islamic sharia.

Jay

Thats becoz of the bigoted nature of Islamic clerics around the world.
No one is stopping a muslim from voting. Muslims are the swing powers in a lot of powerful states like for instance UP. But they chose to remain the hell hole.

Muslims can use he same educational medium that the Christians and Hindus use. But they havent, they send heir kids to madrassas. So unless there is a progressive leader for muslims, none of these things would change. There is no point in blaming the govt, coz what ever we do/did, if it threatens the bigoted clerics, was termed as supression of religious rights.

This is how Indian secularism works, you can be of what ever religion, you can practice what ever religion, but the state does not have a religion.

We dont bar muslims or christians bcoz they are minorities like they do to hindus and others in Pakistan. We give equal constitutional rights to everyone unlike Islamic republic of Pakistan. See the difference?? so much for Jinnah's vision of secular Pakistan and 2 nation theory.

__________________
A grain of wheat eclipsed the sun of Adam !!

Ray

1. Don't appease the Moslems and then there is a riot. Not a great way to ensure secularism.

1. Common to all Indians. No discrimination in that!

1. Sadly, most Moslems don't want to rise above their lot. Now if using Condoms is against the Sharia, then families will be a football teams. How can they give them education? Except the free madrassas education filling innocent minds with religious claptrap including dying for Islam to get Paradise with a surfeit of women to meet all biological ecstasies! In this world you are to be in a 'stand alone' mode and in the next world you are invaded with 'virus'!

Sadly, the Italians are right - Domani never comes.

Are you suggesting that iswaht hapens in Pakistan? I don;t think so. The Pakistan Moslems are far more emancipated. Here they wear their Religion as a defiant aggressive begging bowl for privileges or else.............!

When I see the vast difference in the interpretation of Islam of others vs the India Moslems, I think the Indian Moslems (the illiterate one who are the majority and their Mullahmen bosses are straight out of the Cartoon Network).

Imagine, Islamic countries are going in for Family Planning including Bangladesh, and our Moslems are the last bastion of PURE Islam by stating that it is against the Sharia! Wonders never cease.

You maybe right. What is the option? Try to convince some bearded goats or have a riot at hand?