7.3.12

Of shooting orders, noses, and pictures that brutalise


President Barack Obama can kill anyone. Or, his administration can. Needless to say ‘anyone’ here means persons who pose a “threat”, and for the United States of America it is the al-Qaida. Now that it has done away with Osama, is moving out of Afghanistan, and is a bit strapped for taking any overt action against Iran, the target practice begins at home.

If the threats come from US recruits of the organisation, the President’s office can get rid of its own citizens abroad without consulting a federal court.

US Attorney General Eric Holder said:

“Given the nature of how terrorists act and where they tend to hide, it may not always be feasible to capture a US citizen terrorist who presents an imminent threat of violent attack. In that case, our government has the clear authority to defend the US with lethal force.”


This is dangerous for a few reasons:

  • If the US government does not know where the terrorists hide or how they operate, and we have evidence of it by the long-drawn out wars, then how would it assume there are threats?
  • If you do not know where they hide and therefore it is not feasible to capture them, then how will it be easy to spot them to kill? 
  • If the US knows that there is a possibility of violent attack, its intelligence agencies would know where it comes from. Isn’t it amazing that these agencies can recognise an American citizen as an al Qaida recruit who is a threat, but cannot figure out what to do with him? Has he put up the Stars and Stripes in some hidden location so that people can recognise his nationality?
  • How would the American government be so sure that the lethal threat is planned against the US? How many times in the past decade has the country been attacked?

This move is just a carte blanche to do as it pleases, round up the usual suspects and make it difficult for ordinary American citizens whose origins are elsewhere. They may be second generation immigrants who have no links with the country of their parents’ birth.

This is not to deny that young people have become acutely aware of their identity. Part of it is brainwashing, and part of it is most certainly the result of being socially targeted without any cause. These are a few. The US is supposed to know a lot about everything that happens in the world, so why can it not keep a track of its own citizens?

Why did it insist on getting David Headley back for trial? How did this US citizen manage to visit India and Pakistan? The US did not capture him. He was handed over. And the story of what he did and why will continue because the United States of America does not want anyone captured. It wants to kill, and not have to answer inconvenient questions.

- - -



Cosmetic surgery is not halal. An Egyptian member of the Islamic Al-Nour party has discovered. Or, rather, he knew already, that is the reason Anwar al-Balkimy explained away his bandaged nose as the result of being beaten up by gangsters in a robbery attempt.

His fib was exposed and he was expelled from the party and had to issue an apology. However, there will be an official inquiry and if found guilty he might be imprisoned for “creating anxiety among the public” and “worrying public officials”!

Does the public care? If only some of these purist groups took a look behind the hijaabs, they’d find blonde streaks and heavy make-up. Men probably use quite a few things that make them look and feel good.

It is indeed possible that somewhere in the religious texts there is a provision for not tampering with the body. There was no concept of cosmetic surgery until a few decades ago. If a person suffers from severe burns, will there be no skin grafting? This is reconstructive surgery and is meant to repair the appearance, for it does not necessarily hamper the functioning of other organs. So, what is the fuss about? Perhaps, the MP had problems with breathing because of his nose structure. Or, it may as well be that he wanted to alter the shape because he felt like it.

He has not changed as a person, so his nose should concern no one but him and his god, if they insist.

- - -


You are seeing this photograph and are revolted. Everyone is. However, what does come out of this? Today’s Mumbai Mirror had a front page story on this one picture – of a man who survives by begging, has no one and lives on the streets. He was beaten up, and it transpires it was by the cops. The important thing to note is that this photograph first appeared in yesterday’s issue. The writeup expressed remorse and anger, but no one knew who the people beating him up were. In today’s edition, Pritish Nandy says "These brutes must be punished". But, when he states that people just stood there and did nothing, he forgets to ask: did the newspaper’s photographer do anything?

And this is the long caption that went with it:

On a pavement opposite CST, scores of people were momentarily distracted from their vada pavs and chai by the screams of this dishevelled man in the picture. The drama started around 2 pm when a group of six, carrying canes, ordered the man to get into a police vehicle, which already had around 20 others. When he refused, he was thrashed mercilessly; the lashings didn’t stop even when blood started gushing out of his forehead. Shopkeepers by the pavement said the man was homeless, and would often be found looking for food in the garbage bins. There was no confirmation whether the assaulters were policemen; the man was finally bundled into a vehicle, driven away to an unknown destination.

Apparently, somebody wrote this seeing the picture and talking to the photographer. It was a “drama”, and now we have a story.

Is it always about a story, and then the claim of being the first to ‘expose’ how callous we are? Are they not ‘we’? Brutality, anyone?

- - -


Images: Telegraph, The Guardian, Mumbai Mirror

9 comments:

  1. FV,
    Good read – the aggressor, the zealot and the oppressed – microcosm of the world we live in.

    Some questions as always.

    “How would the American government be so sure that the lethal threat is planned against the US? How many times in the past decade has the country been attacked?”

    IMO this is circular reasoning – can it not be that the US’s ‘war on terror’ (let’s call it that for want of a better word in my right-wing dictionary) served as a deterrent, which ensured the safety of its citizens (read White Anglo Saxon Protestant, to ruffle the left-lib feathers).

    Are we to entirely rule that aspect out?

    “If the US knows that there is a possibility of violent attack, its intelligence agencies would know where it comes from. “

    Are we not getting ahead of ourselves with this kind of speculation? How does one by design mean the other?

    “They may be second generation immigrants who have no links with the country of their parents’ birth. “

    Isn’t country of their parents’ birth irrelevant at least in the case of “War on terror”?

    Uzbeks,Afghans,Pakistanis,Bangladeshis – it’s a mad hatters tea party with one evident common thread that binds them .

    “Part of it is brainwashing, and part of it is most certainly the result of being socially targeted without any cause”

    Are we rationalising here? or is it box-standard-apologists-diatribe ?


    My apologies , but you sound more like Difa-e-Pak albeit in sober tones - it's a bit disconcerting because you also have the luxury of intellectual dishonesty.

    Either that or my personal biases are so overwhelmingly strong and my cognition so messed up that I am the one mixing up my who's-who of victim aggressor

    ReplyDelete
  2. CandidSpace,

    QUOTE: "you sound more like Difa-e-Pak... you also have the luxury of intellectual dishonesty."

    That amounts to personal attack! Please refrain, lest you want to be called a mass murderer on a public forum!

    For more, refer to the terms and conditions of the Left-Lib-Jehadi-Sekulaar rulebook.

    ----

    FV,

    Have I redeemed myself? Am I a human being now?

    ReplyDelete
  3. >>Uzbeks,Afghans,Pakistanis,Bangladeshis – it’s a mad hatters tea party with one evident common thread that binds them.

    I guess Indian Muslims are ruled out then or to acknowledge their existence is a sin for the right-wing now?

    My apologies but you sound just like Boy George who cried "why do they hate freedom?"

    ReplyDelete
  4. Hitesh,

    a glaring omission not at all deliberate - thanks for pointing it out.

    I was not trying to make a exhaustive list of the all nationality - funny you had to nit-pick on that - I omitted half-blooded Jamaicans as well , does that translate into some deep rooted resentment against them ? or Somalians or Syrians ?

    ReplyDelete
  5. >>Uzbeks,Afghans,Pakistanis,Bangladeshis ..

    If you start from either end, you do have to make a deliberate and large jump to skip over the missing nationality ...

    Jamaica on the other hand ... oh well..

    I did in fact think that it could have been an omission,

    but neither I or you have much idea about the actual living conditions of those we are talking about here anyways.

    So, if we are still going to pass judgments and form prejudices on our iPads, we might as well be as thorough and
    accurate as Google Earth allows us to be :)

    ReplyDelete
  6. CandidSpade:

    If the 'war on terror' was such a success, then why did the US kill so many outside its shores? Was this the deterrent? Drone civilians and they just might be the ones who would sneak in?

    Intel agencies seem to know about everything except what could happen in their own backyard.

    Isn’t country of their parents’ birth irrelevant at least in the case of “War on terror”?

    Wonderful. It becomes irrelevant for the flip argument, not when one says it ought not to matter where immigrants come from and not to target them.

    You decide who you are and what you are mixing up, because I think I raised pertinent points, perhaps not the ones that everyone likes, but that's never a goal. "Intellectual dishonesty" is if you pretend to be/say what you are not/mean not.

    Yet, you have the luxury of name-calling and branding.

    F&F:

    When have I called you or anyone a "mass murderer" for comments made here? Yes, there is a note which states what will not be published, and yet a lot is.

    I came out and declared that I was not posting any comment on that one piece (http://farzana-versey.blogspot.in/2012/02/marred-snapshots-of-post-godhra.html). I updated it with my comment and stopped the comments there. Ask yourself why I had to do it, instead of playing the victim here.

    Have I redeemed myself? Am I a human being now?

    Why are you asking one who is "Left-Lib-Jehadi-Sekulaar"?

    PS: I did remove the word verification, but was flooded with spam. Yeah, I know, that will help when "comments dry up"...

    ReplyDelete
  7. Hitesh:

    To CS:

    So, if we are still going to pass judgments and form prejudices on our iPads, we might as well be as thorough and accurate as Google Earth allows us to be:)

    Don't rub it in. You know what all those with a "common thread that binds them" use iPads for, don't you? The omission of Indian Muslims, I thought, was an after-thought appeasement. No such luck. The "half-blood Jamaican" in me is crying to come out!

    ReplyDelete
  8. FV,

    I did ask myself whether the ban on comments imposed by you was justified. The answer was a clear NO.

    I had posted, I think, three comments on this particular article. None of them contained anything that amounted to a personal attack on you. Some frank views perhaps, but nothing personal. I have never mixed the personal and the public in my comments. I think some of your readers can give me as well a character certificate to that effect.
    ---

    Was that article writen in grief? We only have your word for it, FV. It sure didnt sound like it was. Read this stuff below and tell me if it is grief or blind, rigid, blinkered, prejudiced, froth-at-the-mouth fury.

    QUOTE: "... Why does he (Modi) not apply the same standards to his party’s behaviour? Why were Muslims wearing black bands as a sign of protest wrong and the RJN celebrating the conquest of Ayodhya as ‘swabhimaan divas’... acceptable? If the attack on the train was pre-planned, then were the subsequent riots completely an emotional outburst? Why was there no rioting on the same day? Why did they wait for the VHP call for a bandh and then go around torching houses and people?"

    ----

    I however appreciate it that you closed the comments by declaring it and not surreptiously like some wetpants sekulaar bloggers and tweeters do.

    Getting on with the word verification now....!

    ReplyDelete
  9. .............................................................................................................................................

    ReplyDelete

Note: only a member of this blog may post a comment.