Religious zest and the plight of women

Today as we stand looking at significant scientific, economic and technological advances that had been made in the last fifty years, you can’t help wondering how come the situation of women has improved so little or in parts of the world got worst. The reality is that millions of women are suffering and being oppressed under religious laws and Islamic cultures in many different parts of the world. The past fifty years have been some of the darkest in women’s lives. With the anti-secularist backlash, the rise of political Islam, and efforts over the past two decades to impose religion on the people, thousands have been executed - decapitated or stoned to death - and medieval laws to suppress women have been revived.

Islam is the ideology in power in most Muslim countries. In all of these, society has suffered serious setbacks in civil rights in general, and women’s rights in particular. Yet many voices seek to justify Islam: western academics, the mainstream western media, so-called moderate Muslims and some Eastern intellectuals all try to justify the operation and rationalize brutality. They tell us that what we are seeing is not the real Islam; they divide Islam into good and bad, moderate and fundamentalist. They tell us it’s their culture and that’s how they live. The British imams going on media to keep reminding us that all Muslims are not terrorists.  Outrageous and racist but because they are Imams or religious leaders their remarks are tolerable. They fail to address in any constructive way cultural, social, political and economic factors that has bedeviled Muslims across the world. Here are a few cultural issues that the Muslim leaders need to address.

1.     Equality of rights for women

Women are deemed to be inferior to men. Women are men’s belongings and women can have no authority over men. That a woman counts as only half a man in legal and financial matters; this is enforced widely and those Muslims who justify this rely on Islamic script. “And call into witness two men; or if two be not men, then one man and two women” (Koran, The Cow. Verse 282) and “ God charges you concerning your children: to the male the like of the portion of two female” (Koran, Women, verse 11)

2.     Sexual oppression of Women

Women earn God’s grace by obeying their husbands. The message is clear: men dominate, women obey. From a religious perspective, women are there merely for the sexual enjoyment of men and for purposes of reproduction. In Islam female sexuality is acknowledged, but limits and confines women to their sexual and reproductive roles. Most muslim has taken this too far by considering women as a potential danger by distracting men from their duties and corrupting the community. Orthodox interpretation place restriction on women’s sexuality, whilst men are given the right to marry up to four wives and the right to temporary marriage as many times as they wish. Free male–female sexual relations are considered a sin in Islam. This is justified by literal interpretation of Koranic verses that define which sexual relations are permitted under Islam, and the punishment for any transgression (called zena) outside these limits. Zena is punishable by flogging, imprisonment and stoning to death.

3.     Legal practice and women

Despite modernisation and reform, family law and the penal code have remained largely untouched, on the contrary in the last three decades fundamentalists have inserted their interpretation. Polygamy, men’s unconditional right to divorce their wives, the law regarding sex outside of marriage, men’s decision making over their wives’ employment and travel, and a woman’s lack of right to custody of her children are among them. Hijab is the definitive form of clothing for women. According to widely practice Islamic law, the legal age for a girl to wed is nine – an obvious case of sexual abuse and rape.

Conclusion

The state is a prerequisite for women’s liberation from religious oppression. A strong social movement and international support is needed with long-term commitment to build modern and stable states across the Muslim world.

The Reason a woman is brutally murdered by a mob in Kabul

An angry mob lynched a woman in Kabul on Thursday, beating her to death and then setting her body on fire.  The incident happened in the centre of Kabul and under the watch of Afghan police. At the time she was accused of burning the Quran but it is unclear whether she had actually burned it or not. A government statement from ministry of Haj and religious affairs dismissed the account and added she was an attendant at the shrine, according to Tolo News. It has also become apparent that the victim later identified as Farkhunda suffered mental illness, “Farkhunda had a mental malady, and we have been seeing many mullahs and doctors to seek a cure for her mental illness,” her mother told reporters.The last couple of days I have been thinking why such a barbaric and anti-Islamic travesty happens yet a large number, but not all, Afghans support it. The New york times in a story reflects on Afghans Reaction reporting approval. Reuters Report of support from cleric who in a sermon broadcast by loudspeaker told devotees that the crowd had a right to defend their Muslim beliefs at all costs.

Before we lose perspective and infer bile stereotypes of Afghans and slash any hope for this nation where a mob of angry men bludgeon to death an innocent woman, lets remind ourselves of murder and death in the state of nature. No other word depicts the human condition than the visionary masterwork of Flemish artist Pieter Bruegel, The Triumph of Death, it is not of course a work of realism, but Breugel certainly did not have to rely entirely on his imagination to depict a scene of stomach wrenching death and destruction. In a land ruled by an army of skeletons, a king lies dying, his treasure of no avail, while a dog gnaws on a nearby corpse. In the background two hanged men on gibbets, four men broken on wheels, a man about to be beheaded. Armies clash, houses burn, men and women young and old soldier and civilians are all driven pell-mell into a narrow tunnel. No one is spared. The artist himself died in his early forties. The portray.

Much of human history is some version of agony depicted by Bruegel in the state of nature. Islam as cultural framework lifts the state of nature by creating an individual value system conducive to peaceful coexistence and as subjects of a legitimate Islamic state that is tasked to be a vessel of collective decision-making and enforcement. The laws of Islamic State of Afghanistan is based on Islamic values and principles. The basis for a judgment in Islamic law is the jurist’s ability to carefully apply knowledge to theory and practice. In order to be qualified to interpret the sources of law, a jurist should master many branches of knowledge such as logic, Quran, Hadith, history and general knowledge as well as specialised areas like commerce or international relations. This approach adopted by Islamic law to reach judgement through Fiqh, Ijma, Qiyas, Urf and Istisahan is to ensure due processes and streamline justice. Mob justice undermines due process of Islamic justice and is a manifestation of Jaliyat, it undermines Islamic foundations of Afghan society. It also shows obsession and compulsion with icons and symbols of religion that is only valued for its physical material. From the onset Islam opposed Icons and Statues in Kaba that were worshiped by the pagans. Islam is world-affirming by construing the created world as fundamentally a good place and placing responsibility on individual action. For such a system of belief conduct and laws are fundamental than icons and symbols.

I believe for such barbarism is a failure of state policy and structures. The state should create a monopoly on the means of violence. In practice, this criterion has often been reduced; first to a simple monopoly on violence and then to little more than control of capital city. However, it is the legitimacy of the state’s monopoly on violence as perceived by the citizens of the state that is the key to using this monopoly as a criterion of statehood. If the polity rejects the legitimacy of the state’s monopoly on violence, then that monopoly is inherently unstable. Hence the state’s monopoly on the means of violence must be balanced by the presence or creation of credible institutions that provide checks and balances on the use of force; that the state itself must be constituted through, and accountable under, the rule of law. The rule of law is undermined by the very same leaders and clerics who are high-level functionaries of the state. The powerful men and the current patronage system of state power distribution are impediments to rule of law and the real reason for the troubles that ravage Afghanistan. The violence of gangs and mobs are unnerving but they are nothing more than symptoms of an ailing system.

There is no limit, it is coming for us!

The Afghan parliament has passed a bill making it a criminal offence to play music in parties and wedding ceremonies. For awhile a couple of years ago I believed that the battle for music was won by emergence of up to a hundred radio station across Afghanistan playing regional and Afghan music, but after the legislation I was disappointed. A latest article in Kabul weekly tackles the voyage of TV programs into entertainment domain. Barely 10-15 per cent of shows aired on the country's stations are about the major problems facing Afghanistan today. The airing of a single "Round Table" and one serious report per week on any popular Television station proves that television stations in this country are becoming ineffective. This change is materialising under the pressure from authorities and religious figures. There is no limit for the sphere of life where Islamists will adamantly venture. Something experienced under Taliban. Once disguised Islamists in Karzai administration brought women and media under control then they will address how to build our houses and how to walk in public.

For those of us who grew up in Afghanistan or for this mater any other conflict zone, during the years of wars; the shadow of that slaughter has remained as a dreadful warning of what men will do in the name of God. Communalist politics have become a powerful force, in the form of the extremist Islamic ‘Trivialism’ which is wrongly nicknamed ‘Fundamentalism’, there is nothing fundamental about the Islam practiced in Afghanistan, it is primary concern is with footwear, beard and things of such calibre and they don’t have any fundamental value; things like love, respect, happiness and freedom are fundamental to me. The ignorant youth recruited by Sayyaf, Mazari, Massood and Gulbodin killed, destroyed and tortured the public indiscriminately. For several years the capital was deprived from reaching any residents’ basic needs from food and water to electricity. Residents had to travel on bicycles or on foot to the outskirts of the city where the warlords had established their bazaars. On the way back anything could happen from getting captured by another ethnic group and being used as PoW to do hard labour; but that was if the commander of the checkpoint is a nice person which was rare, warlords in an attempt to intimidate their rivals were recruiting the most brutal commanders who would use methods such as dead dancing which is cutting of the victim head and then pouring hot oil on sever neck. Travellers often were caught in fires from two belligerents aimed at them. One wonders whether any lessons have been learned.

No, in the depressing condition of Afghanistan people turn to religion for the answers to the two great questions of life: where did we come from? And how shall we live? But on the question of origins, Islam and all other religions are simply wrong. No, the universe was not created in six days by a superforce that rested on the seventh. Nor was it churned into being by a sky-god with a giant churn. If you look around everything is a creation of science today and science clearly disproves God and religion and Islamist make equal use of science as those who believe in science. And on the social question, the simple truth is that wherever religion, with their narrow moralities gets into society’s driving seat, tyranny results. The Inquisition result. Or the warlord of the early 90s or their slightly better version the Taliban.

And yet Islam continues to insist that they provide special access to ethical truths, and consequently deserve special treatment and protection. And they continue to emerge from the world of private life, where they belong, like so many other things that are acceptable when done in private between consenting adults but unacceptable in the town square, and to bid for power. I sometimes wonder if the idea of private does not exist in Islam, there are things which exist and things which don’t exist. Ideas and beliefs do exist and Muslims will not hesitate to display their belief in the form of banner or poster on their car. Things which don’t exist, such as sex. it is never talked about and never referred to, as though it doesn’t exist.

I know plenty Afghans who are champions of freedom and have dedicated a lot to the cause but they can’t come out with a criticism of the root problem so is the problem with the western support. The west supports democratic values but not dares to scrutinise what Islamic politics mean. The government and their fanatic authorities’ paint up a democratic face to the west but explain their tyrannies by Islamic justification. At the end we are all playing with the politics of communalism and by it is nature it is doomed to failure. Whether you want to confront religion or not, it is coming for you and it is good to be prepared and start thinking about our response.

Hypocrisy: The cover for the failures of Islamic Politics

I was talking with a friend in Kabul over the phone earlier today as he was walking out of Indra Gandhi Paediatric Hospital in Kabul. My friend signed in her daughter who is seriously ill into Indra Gandhi hospital a few days ago but she has not received the appropriate treatment and the hospital condition is dire. He could not get his daughter to Charsad Bistar hospital which is slightly better condition because it does not admit children. He was on his way to ISAF hospital where a foreign friend offered to help him get his daughter signed into the hospital. ISAF hospital is not open to general public and the condition is very good as it is for treating foreigners. After I got off the phone I was thinking about the hospitals in Kabul and there is one thing strikingly similar about all Kabul hospitals: they are founded and funded by foreign countries. Indra Gandhi Hospital, obvious enough from the name, was established and mentored by Indians. Charsad Bistar was founded by Russians. It is modern and big and rival any US funded public building. ISAF hospital is run by NATO and the administration rotates between European nations. All these hospitals were built at the time when the Afghan government developed close ties with the country of sponsors. Kabul hospitals date back to fifty years and it shows how the country always relied on foreign support. Afghanistan has always relied on foreigners to sustain some sort of government. It was true fifty years ago and it is true today. Doud Khan leaned toward USSR in the 70s because he needed money to bridge 70% deficit in his government budget; huge chunk of Afghan governments came from abroad and the reliance has been increasing ever since while the politics of Afghanistan is pervasively becoming ‘Islamic’ which means militancy and violence has been encouraged though Jihadi ideology. Jihad in its essence is xenophobia, Jihad is nurturing an attitude of hatred toward foreigners and they do not have to be non believers. Jihad in Afghanistan has been mostly concerned with massacring the next village or the other tribe. Below I will try to analyse how Jihadi groups, which are strongest ever in Afghanistan today, are subdued to Americans and international community.

I argue that Jihadis and Islamic politics which means no state affair could be contrary to the principles of Islam, as stated in the Afghan constitution, is based on hypocrisy. Islamic politics are so vulnerable to interpretation that it lacks any principle. Afghan politicians interpret Islam in the way to suite their purpose; it could be argued that Islam as a state mechanism provides a cover for tyranny. Afghan Jihadi leaders have killed thousands fighting an opponent because they believe the opponent has links with a foreign state while they are also supported by a similar foreign government. Islamic politics is not the only source of evil in Afghan society; the society inherently is closed and rejects any change except when it is forced up on it.

Change is an important concept of any society. Change means to exclude everything that is predictable. This means that only events that could not be expected in accordance with the prevailing state of knowledge qualify as change.

Afghanistan is a tribal society and tribal morality gave rise to a closed society, which confers rights and obligations on members of the tribe and discriminates against outsiders. Tribal morality doesn’t recognise certain fundamental human rights. Rights differ based on tribal, ethnic or religious affiliations. Afghan society, being a tribal society, is built on the absence of change. In such a society, the mind has to deal with one set of conditions only: that which exists at the present time. What has gone before and what will come in the future are perceived as if they were identical to what exists now. There is no need to distinguish between thinking and reality. This traditional mode of thinking has only one task: to accept things as they are. Islamist can get away with their actions until they admit they are devoted muslims which appeals to the status quo. The public would not challenge them because that is a change. This supreme simplicity extracts a heavy price: it generates beliefs that may be completely divorced from reality. Abdul Rassool Sayyaf commander who is famous for beheading ethnic Hazaras and then pouring boiled oil on their scored necks to watch what he called ‘dead dance’ is driving in a smart car in Kabul today. Perhaps the reason Afghan society does not protest actively against such gruesome action is they are detached from reality. The traditional mode of thinking can prevail only if members of a society identify themselves as part of the society to which they belong and unquestioningly accept their place in it. a better term than traditional or tribal to explain Afghan society is to call it ‘organic society’, a society in which individuals are organs of a social body. This explains why a women is killed if the husband is taunted about her. Paighure is tribal code and it is to punish a woman if she is misperceived by some other person in the society. She is not an individual but rather an agent of the society/tribe. Afghan society being an organic society does not function along side a working government. Afghan society is vulnerable to forms of social organisation that had a better grasp of reality.

Change as it occurs in Afghan society causes uncertainty. There are two ways to deal with uncertainty: we can accept it or deny it. the former leads to a critical mode of thinking; the later to a dogmatic mode. Each approach has its merits and drawbacks. The state of affairs in Afghanistan constantly changes, people are confronted by an infinite range of possibilities. Understanding what is going on from the haze of possibilities requires critical thinking. Critical thinking has a major drawback that it does not satisfy the quest for certainty. In a rapid changing place like Afghanistan critical thinkers can rarely provide answers because of the amount of uncertainty. On the other hand Islam and Islamic politics offers certainty through dogmatic thinking. The dogmatic thinking gives people the illusion of certainty but it distorts reality. Islamic leader despite their atrocities continue to appeal to society as oppose to any other form of politics because they are dogmatic in their action and Islamic in their ideology.

Hypocrisy: The cover for the failures of Islamic Politics

I was talking with a friend in Kabul over the phone earlier today as he was walking out of Indra Gandhi Paediatric Hospital in Kabul. My friend signed in her daughter who is seriously ill into Indra Gandhi hospital a few days ago but she has not received the appropriate treatment and the hospital condition is dire. He could not get his daughter to Charsad Bistar hospital which is slightly better condition because it does not admit children. He was on his way to ISAF hospital where a foreign friend offered to help him get his daughter signed into the hospital. ISAF hospital is not open to general public and the condition is very good as it is for treating foreigners. After I got off the phone I was thinking about the hospitals in Kabul and there is one thing strikingly similar about all Kabul hospitals: they are founded and funded by foreign countries. Indra Gandhi Hospital, obvious enough from the name, was established and mentored by Indians. Charsad Bistar was founded by Russians. It is modern and big and rival any US funded public building. ISAF hospital is run by NATO and the administration rotates between European nations. All these hospitals were built at the time when the Afghan government developed close ties with the country of sponsors. Kabul hospitals date back to fifty years and it shows how the country always relied on foreign support. Afghanistan has always relied on foreigners to sustain some sort of government. It was true fifty years ago and it is true today. Doud Khan leaned toward USSR in the 70s because he needed money to bridge 70% deficit in his government budget; huge chunk of Afghan governments came from abroad and the reliance has been increasing ever since while the politics of Afghanistan is pervasively becoming ‘Islamic’ which means militancy and violence has been encouraged though Jihadi ideology. Jihad in its essence is xenophobia, Jihad is nurturing an attitude of hatred toward foreigners and they do not have to be non believers. Jihad in Afghanistan has been mostly concerned with massacring the next village or the other tribe. Below I will try to analyse how Jihadi groups, which are strongest ever in Afghanistan today, are subdued to Americans and international community.

I argue that Jihadis and Islamic politics which means no state affair could be contrary to the principles of Islam, as stated in the Afghan constitution, is based on hypocrisy. Islamic politics are so vulnerable to interpretation that it lacks any principle. Afghan politicians interpret Islam in the way to suite their purpose; it could be argued that Islam as a state mechanism provides a cover for tyranny. Afghan Jihadi leaders have killed thousands fighting an opponent because they believe the opponent has links with a foreign state while they are also supported by a similar foreign government. Islamic politics is not the only source of evil in Afghan society; the society inherently is closed and rejects any change except when it is forced up on it.

Change is an important concept of any society. Change means to exclude everything that is predictable. This means that only events that could not be expected in accordance with the prevailing state of knowledge qualify as change.

Afghanistan is a tribal society and tribal morality gave rise to a closed society, which confers rights and obligations on members of the tribe and discriminates against outsiders. Tribal morality doesn’t recognise certain fundamental human rights. Rights differ based on tribal, ethnic or religious affiliations. Afghan society, being a tribal society, is built on the absence of change. In such a society, the mind has to deal with one set of conditions only: that which exists at the present time. What has gone before and what will come in the future are perceived as if they were identical to what exists now. There is no need to distinguish between thinking and reality. This traditional mode of thinking has only one task: to accept things as they are. Islamist can get away with their actions until they admit they are devoted muslims which appeals to the status quo. The public would not challenge them because that is a change. This supreme simplicity extracts a heavy price: it generates beliefs that may be completely divorced from reality. Abdul Rassool Sayyaf commander who is famous for beheading ethnic Hazaras and then pouring boiled oil on their scored necks to watch what he called ‘dead dance’ is driving in a smart car in Kabul today. Perhaps the reason Afghan society does not protest actively against such gruesome action is they are detached from reality. The traditional mode of thinking can prevail only if members of a society identify themselves as part of the society to which they belong and unquestioningly accept their place in it. a better term than traditional or tribal to explain Afghan society is to call it ‘organic society’, a society in which individuals are organs of a social body. This explains why a women is killed if the husband is taunted about her. Paighure is tribal code and it is to punish a woman if she is misperceived by some other person in the society. She is not an individual but rather an agent of the society/tribe. Afghan society being an organic society does not function along side a working government. Afghan society is vulnerable to forms of social organisation that had a better grasp of reality.

Change as it occurs in Afghan society causes uncertainty. There are two ways to deal with uncertainty: we can accept it or deny it. the former leads to a critical mode of thinking; the later to a dogmatic mode. Each approach has its merits and drawbacks. The state of affairs in Afghanistan constantly changes, people are confronted by an infinite range of possibilities. Understanding what is going on from the haze of possibilities requires critical thinking. Critical thinking has a major drawback that it does not satisfy the quest for certainty. In a rapid changing place like Afghanistan critical thinkers can rarely provide answers because of the amount of uncertainty. On the other hand Islam and Islamic politics offers certainty through dogmatic thinking. The dogmatic thinking gives people the illusion of certainty but it distorts reality. Islamic leader despite their atrocities continue to appeal to society as oppose to any other form of politics because they are dogmatic in their action and Islamic in their ideology.