this world has gone MAD

This is sad stuff. Goes back to what Abhi was talking about yesterday - all the copycat multi-explosions, suicide bombings , brainwashed speech about iraq, ummah etc.

It is just a matter of time for attacks like these to happen in Indian cities. The underworld network/Islamic fundamentalism (violent one) runs rampant in Indian cities too - not just Bangladesh and Pakistan. Moreover, they have assistance from some Bangladeshi fundamentalists who crossover to India for daytime jobs and "other stuff".

WHERE is the news coverage on this?? I was just on the WashPost site....nothing. 'Car bombs rock Baghdad' - and what else is new?

After a quick flip through my news sites, I can't believe this isn't "bigger" news.

maisnon,
NY TIMES HAS IT

this world has gone MAD

Silly :) they world has always been MAD

After a quick flip through my news sites, I can't believe this isn't "bigger" news.

Yes, you would think since it's brown+muslim that it would get the attention of everyone, and used for political purposes. But don't forget no one white was killed, so it doesn't really matter all that much...

My mom heard about it online this AM, but she didn't have much details on it. We have a few relatives who work for the govt over there...

It is just a matter of time for attacks like these to happen in Indian cities.

Worse attacks (Bombay Stock Exchange Bombings) have taken place in Indian cities before. Something like this with very few casualties wouldn't be too bad.

Yep, it is a tragedy only if there are white lives at stake.

Yep, it is a tragedy only if there are white lives at stake.

there is some truth to this, though i think the racial angle has to be supplemented by the first world/nationality angle (and i think the racial angle is less important than in the past). but why is that a big deal? here at SM brown lives get a big deal of play. the casualty count was low. more people probably die in niger in 10 minutes than will die of this bombing.

more people probably die in Niger in 10 minutes than will die of this bombing

Excellent point Razib. I'd even take it further. Perhaps more people will die in places like Niger just this week of non-terrorism related causes, than will die in all the terrorist attacks we at SM will write about in the whole next year. It is fascinating to me how television and media can alter the perceptions of people, myself included, to not always see this fact.

More than the number of lives that were taken, I find the number of bombs, that were timed close to each other, to be chilling.

Can you imagine what 350 bombs could mean if those weren't amateur bombs?

abhi writes:Perhaps more people will die in places like Niger just this week of non-terrorism related causes, than will die in all the terrorist attacks we at SM will write about in the whole next year.

And more people will die of Cancer than in places like Niger. And more people will die of AIDS than due to Cancer. And more people will die of traffic accidents than due to Caner. And more people will die of boredom listening to Michael Moore's raves and rants.

So, let's tackle MM first.
//sarcasm off

AIDS, Cancer, Niger, Poverty, traffic accidents etc are not caused intentionally by a set of people to kill another set of people.

Terrorism, on the other hand, is willfully caused by a set of people with an intention to kill. Hence, that's more dangerous and needs to be tackled first, even though the number of people killed is smaller.

M. Nam

Excellent rebuttal, Moornam. If we are going to play the comparison game, we might as well give up. Why do we have to compare them? What does that rhetorical flourish accomplish? Cynically saying, "X people have it worse..." may be true but it's irrelevant.

Stop and think about it. Can you even imagine several hundred bombs going off around you? If that had happened in London, we wouldn't hear the end of it. I'm very disturbed by some of the comments like

Something like this with very few casualties wouldn't be too bad.

Hence, that's more dangerous and needs to be tackled first, even though the number of people killed is smaller.

Explain to me why that isn't a subjective statement? I don't see it. I think number of people killed is as good a metric as any, no?

I'm not saying terrorism isn't an important issue. All I was saying is that Razib made a good point about how perception=importance.

If we are going to play the comparison game, we might as well give up.

Give what up?

If that had happened in London, we wouldn't hear the end of it. I'm very disturbed by some of the comments like

let's hope we wouldn't hear the end of it. look, i was visiting family in bangladesh in june of 2004. it's a messed up country. there was a general strike by one of the major political parties, and when some people went to work, the political goons decided to burn a bus filled with people (my uncle is a gov. functionary and in a supervisory position, so he had to go to work, so we were concerned about this issue). you didn't see that in the news. now, if bangladeshi islamists were going to build 350 shitty bombs in london, or new york, or fill in the blank, i'd be pretty fucking concerned. as it is, it's bangladesh, who cares? bangladeshis do, and it is certainly in their media, but in the grand scheme of things, it's not an important country. the GIA has been slaughtering people (now less) for 15 years now in algeria. wackjobs wander egypt killing people. in thailand malay separatists are beheading buddhist kufirs. happens everyday everyway.

my response was motivated by the calls of "hey, whitey isn't paying attention because whitey isn't being killed." of course not, why should westerners weight terrorism in the third world when it is half way toward banality there? the only relevance is a connection to terrorism in the west, and as it is, bangladeshi terrorists are, i suspect, a minimal threat right now to the west (the bangladeshis in britain aren't as assimilated so they haven't become as alienated, if you get what i mean-i suspect some of do know what i mean, and on a personal level from what i can gather).

so cut the knee jerk cries of racism out i say, it's hypocritical, especially on a blog devoted to south asiancentric concerns. if you want 'white people' to pay attention to brown people, well, go comment on 'white weblogs' about this topic and stop bitching a weblog self consciously focused on browns about how white people consciously focus on their own concerns.

AIDS, Cancer, Niger, Poverty, traffic accidents etc are not caused intentionally by a set of people to kill another set of people.

Terrorism, on the other hand, is willfully caused by a set of people with an intention to kill. Hence, that's more dangerous and needs to be tackled first, even though the number of people killed is smaller.

Setting aside for a moment that this is an "I'm right because I'm right" argument, even the premises don't stand up. A lot of these so-called "natural" disasters have a human element to them too. There's an international system that has some countries that are extremely wealthy and powerful and others that aren't and this is built on many things, including racism, colonialism, meddling, military intervention, and other things that impeded societies from really being free. Wealthy and powerful countries tend to act in their own interests and do things like installing shahs, killing Allendes, maintaining Eastern European satellite states, having proxy wars, selling arms, imposing economic ideologies on them, and otherwise creating circumstances that make it harder for society to deal with eventual "natural disasters". Where the money goes always tells the real story.

so cut the knee jerk cries of racism out i say, it's hypocritical, especially on a blog devoted to south asiancentric concerns. if you want 'white people' to pay attention to brown people, well, go comment on 'white weblogs' about this topic and stop bitching a weblog self consciously focused on browns about how white people consciously focus on their own concerns.

So we're not allowed to talk about possible racism/nationality/"importance" bias in the media? We're not allowed to question why a missing teenager in Aruba got a million times more coverage than the famine in Niger, why coverage on the tsunami was slow to pick up, simply because we're on a space that caters to brown people?

Maybe racism isn't the right lens to look at this through (although it is a component, I think), but there's a situation with the media in the US and it's 1) a problem in and of itself and 2) has damaging effects on American society by encouraging parochialism--which we can see reflected anytime foreign issues have an effect here.

btw, i think it's fair game to direct the same criticism at identity spaces like SM.

why should westerners weight terrorism in the third world when it is half way toward banality there?

Exactly. Brutality, starvation, murder, famine, and disease in the undeveloped world is just a lot less unusual than in the first world. And the news is about what's unusual and newsworthy, not what's unsurprising.

In a very real sense, Muslims blowing stuff up in South Asian is less surprising than them blowing stuff up in North American or Europe. They've been doing it in the former place for longer, so only real "spectaculars" -- like 350 simultaneous bombings -- make the Western media.

The penny ante wages of Islam in Islamic countries -- a beheading here, an honor killing there -- don't make the news because they *aren't news*.

And as for Africa -- well, jeez, the number of countries on that continent that *aren't* failed states is less than those that are. Again, not newsworthy. A country in sub-Saharan Africa that *wasn't* a disaster area would be newsworthy, but odds are we'll be waiting a long time for that headline...

in South Asian...North American

aagh, should be "South Asia" and "North America" above.

btw, i think it's fair game to direct the same criticism at identity spaces like SM.

you aren't the object of my criticism because you moot this last issue all the time. there are people on these boards who have a sharp focus on brown issues, and verge on brown (often hindu) chauvinism. i don't particularly mind their brownocentric attitude, some of them are FOBs so they have a bigger stake that normal (though i feel entitled to point out that many american browns don't subscribe to this viewpoint and those who do shouldn't be surprised that there are people out there like us). but, i get really tired of them acting all shocked that westerners, and whites, might be guilty of the same chauvinism. i'm a american chauvinist to some extent, i admit it. i'm not going to bitch and cry that indians, or nigerians, or etc. etc. have a concern about their own people.

there is a certain type who apologizes for shariah (and dhimmititude) in the muslim world while arguing strenuously for civil liberties in the west. there is a type that pushes foward apologia for the RSS and hindu nationalism in brownland but bitches and moans about how racist and stereotyping americans are. i can't brook that crap.

because we're on a space that caters to brown people?

It's not just a space that caters to brown people, it's a place that believes the lives and deaths of browns are more notable -- and tacitly more important -- than those of whites, blacks, or other groups. That's reflected in the coverage, which doesn't cover Columbian narco-terrorism or the latest Liberian massacre, but *does* cover Islamic terrorism, outsourcing, and the terrible indignities suffered by "Turbanhead" :)

The focus is "South Asian" -- not Indian/American/Pakistani, not Hindu/Muslim, and not English/Hindi/Punjabi. That is, the focus here is race, not nationality, religion, culture, or language...except insofar as they intersect with race.

Given this avowedly racialist focus, it's unseemly to complain about the *nationalistic* biases of the mainstream media and conflate them with the racialistic biases in coverage that are overtly on display here. You know, mote in thine eye and all that jazz.

p.s. of course, that does not imply that civil liberties are bad or that stereotyping and racism is good. i am less concerned about the issues that some types concern themselves with (ie; in the case of some muslim radicals, campaigning for the freedom to destroy freedom to all intents) as i am with the hypocrisy. hypocrisy is human, but so is pointing out its odiousness.

That is, the focus here is race, not nationality, religion, culture, or language...

It's actually shared culture.

Given this avowedly racialist focus, it's unseemly to complain about the *nationalistic* biases of the mainstream media and conflate them with the racialistic biases in coverage that are overtly on display here.

Your argument is inside-out. The raison d'etre of a desi site is that the mainstream media doesn't cover these things. It's almost tautological-- complaining about media bias flows naturally into providing a different view.

It's actually shared culture.

What culture do Raj Bhakta and the Bangladeshi bombers share?

Culture defined so broadly is operationally equivalent to race. I mean, don't get me wrong...given GNXP I'm hardly one to say that race isn't worthy of attention. I'm just saying that chastising the newsmedia's ostensible parochialism from the confines of a brown-centered blog is much like La Raza criticizing *others* for racism.

and for the record, i'm not pointing fingers at everyone here, otherwise i'd point fingers at myself. i appreciate SM for the window it gives me on what some brown people, who tend to live not in brownload, are computer literate, literate, etc. etc. think.

but, that being said

1) i don't think this event, ipso facto, is necessarily newsworthy. the 350 bombs is noteworthy, but, they seem to have been rather shitty. the death count seems pretty low (this in a country where 120,000 have died in natural disasters in the past generation). the coordination was impressive, but i think that is relevant only in the case of bangladesh since i don't think a cognate network of islamists exists in the west.

2) so, i think that the charge that 'whites weren't killed so no one cares' is knee jerk. obviously white bodies do count more, as do rich bodies, western bodies, american bodies, etc. in the western media. but i've seen intense narrow-focus arguments blow-up on these message boards which indicate no one here is (aside from perhaps saurav) is really committed to the mohist project of universal love and concern.

let me end with a 'big picture' concern that i always have. i have heard the argument from many non-whites, black, brown yellow, etc. that they feel excluded and alienated from the majority white culture. they share cultural similarities and affinities with people 'like them' (there isn't a check list definition of 'like us' as the disputes about south asian vs. non-south asian, etc. etc. indicate). but the flip side of this is that withdrawl because of perceptions and experiences of exclusion will result in a homogenization of social circles, white and non-white, which will perpetuation alienation and stereotypes (in my opinion). there isn't an easy answer to this. but i think it's out there, i am willing to give whites more slack about being whitocentric because is see how many non-whites (not me, but i live in a world where my own concerns, and secondarily my girlfriends, are basically all that exists) get comfort from being 'around their own kind' (and no, i don't think it is solely a function of 'push' factors, there is a lot of 'pull' too).

Culture defined so broadly is operationally equivalent to race.

gc, I think you're being unfair here. I agree that there's a conflation often made between sharing a cultural and racial identity by some here, but there's clearly an educated, American desi, middle class or uppwardly mobile, professional, identity-focused vibe to the blogging that happens here--at least in the posts (and I argue that the posts frame the space although they're not hte only thing). Part of this perspective, in my opinion, is omission of exactly how narrow the identity I described above is and that leads to a kind of hegemonization--in which that identity is never articulated and "brown" or "desi" or "South Asian" is substituted instead. What Raj Bhakta and Bangladeshi bombings have in common is that they may be thought to be of interest to people who fit the description I described.

American desi, middle class or uppwardly mobile, professional, identity

well, without a poll or anything to back it up all you have are your impressions. right? :)

i think a better analogy than white nationalism for what goes on here is probably being italian american. by definition (usually) being italian means being white (and of italian descent), but it is fundamentally defined by cultural and historical parameters, race is just a prior conditional.

i also think the italian american identity is apropos because most italian americans have origins in the southern part of the peninsula, and a large number are sicilian, and they are likely not aware of the importance of regionalism in their ancestral "homeland" (past the 2nd generation). the hostility of northern italians (which, by some measures, is the wealthiest part of europe) to those from the south, and especially sicily, is in my experience far greater than that between southerners and yankees. a close friend who lives in the milan area has a father who was born in sicily, but she's never been to sicily and has never visited her relatives there (she's 40). my girlfriend told me not to mention that i know about her sicilian heritage to her since i was almost about to ask about the pesto vs. tomato sauce issue relating to north-south and where she stood.

anyway, that was a long-winded way to say that italian american identity is something new worldish, without old world cognates, though it derives from old world antecedants. the people here remind me of the same sort of thing, though i also do sense the 'hegemonization' that saurav is talking about. the occasional tifs between FOBs (and FOB-lites who seem to identify more with brownland than amerika) and the more manishesh (for lack of a better word) types over 'south asian' is i think simply evidence of the distance developing between the new world south asian identity and the old world regional-religious sensibilities. the assimilation of muslim browns into a muslim, as opposed to south asian, identity is i think another part of the puzzle.

This is off track but I remembered talk over lack of UCC in India sometime back when I read about this ban

American desi, middle class or uppwardly mobile, professional, identity

well, without a poll or anything to back it up all you have are your impressions. right? :)

Sorry...I should have been more precise--I was referring to the perspectives I feel are coming from the bloggers themselves, not the overall space. But yes, I haven't conducted a poll on the demographics of Manish, Abhi, Ennis, Anna, Amardeep, et. al.--just impressions, conversations, (and some deductions based on who generally has time to blog :)

What culture do Raj Bhakta and the Bangladeshi bombers share?

If you have to ask, what was the point of reading SM for the last year?

... chastising the newsmedia's ostensible parochialism from the confines of a brown-centered blog is much like La Raza criticizing *others* for racism.

You might as well diss Consumer Reports for critiquing bad automakers. SM exists because the MSM does a shitty job covering the things that interest us. It's SM's reason for being, its differentiator, its inspiration. In a land of Andrew Sullivan and DailyKos, there's no need for yet another mainstream political blog-- and in contrast, some of the things we write about are burning to be written.

there's clearly an educated, American desi, middle class or uppwardly mobile, professional, identity-focused vibe to the blogging that happens here

Saurav, you're under some illusion that this blog is a monopoly and/or has the duty to be representative. We're not the government. Nobody wants to read corporatespeak riddled with a thousand disclaimers. We have distinct points of view. Part of that tone (literate, American) is by design, part of it is intrinsic to who we are. Nobody on this blog is trying to appropriate the authenticity that you don't have.

Nobody on this blog is trying to appropriate the authenticity that you don't have.

*cringe* man, that was a real good one liner. props.

i don't think this event, ipso facto, is necessarily newsworthy.

400 bombs, on one day, in one country, by Muslim extremists preaching neo-Talibanism is newsworthy no matter where you are . Even in terms of strict self-interest, it behooves counterterrorism people to investigate the new tactics. That this barely made a ripple on U.S. news sites is ridiculously bad judgment.

400 bombs, on one day, in one country, by Muslim extremists preaching neo-Talibanism is newsworthy no matter where you are . Even in terms of strict self-interest, it behooves counterterrorism people to investigate the new tactics. That this barely made a ripple on U.S. news sites is ridiculously bad judgment.

funny, just talked to my mom. she had no idea what i was talking about when i mentioned it :) anyway, the deaths are 10 last i checked. i think you need to break into triple digits in a non-iraq third world story to get play.

what was the point of reading SM for the last year?

the point of reading sm? simply that there are plenty of left wing south asians in the US who would purport to speak for me. I want to keep tabs on what they're saying in my name, and from time to time register my dissent.

If you have to ask,

Humor me. I do have to ask. What culture do Bhakta and the bombers share?

Covering the people with genetic ancestry from the Subcontinent all over the world is a worthy task for a blog. But let's not pretend that Bobby Jindal, Raj Bhakta, MIA, Shezad Tanweer, Daler Mehndi, and a pack of Bangladeshi Islamic fundamentalists have anything in common besides their continental-scale race. They certainly don't share the same language, nationality, ethnicity, political leanings, religious beliefs... or culture.

400 bombs, on one day, in one country, by Muslim extremists preaching neo-Talibanism is newsworthy no matter where you are . Even in terms of strict self-interest, it behooves counterterrorism people to investigate the new tactics. That this barely made a ripple on U.S. news sites is ridiculously bad judgment.

I actually concur 100% with this assessment, but I think the lack of a ripple is for a different reason -- in addition to the newsworthiness filters mentioned above, the newsmedia tends to suppress stories of Islam-behaving-badly unless it *really can't avoid it*.

That is, I don't think the relative lack of coverage in Western media (though the NYT did cover it) is due to a lack of sympathy for brown lives, but rather due to a misguided equivalence between "fundamentalist Muslim" and "brown"...an equivalence that the "South Asian" label, AALDEF, and plenty of left of center Indian Americans all (unfortunately) tend to propagate.

What Raj Bhakta and Bangladeshi bombings have in common is that they may be thought to be of interest to people who fit the description I described.

Granted, but why? I submit it is because these are the deeds of people who look like us, and society's perception of us is partially predicated on their actions...and our response to their actions.

you're under some illusion that this blog...has the duty to be representative

"South Asian" "mutiny" "desi" "brown" "punk." If you don't want to live up to your own self-definition, pick better words or stop replicating all the power dynamics already plaguing desi communities.

You could stay by adding an entertaining disclaimer to your FAQ!

"We are a desi blog; however, we feel no obligation to even attempt to represent the following perspectives:

working class people;
LGBT people;
people in South Asia;
Indo-Caribbeans;
British Asians or members of other diasporas;
1st generation South Asian immigrants; noncitizens;
people who believe in mutinies;
people who are actually punk;
people who we decided are South Asian but don't identify as such;
people who are mixed race; and non-Indian-Americans.

But really, we swear, we are a desi blog."

Looking forward to your next witty potshot.

stop replicating all the power dynamics already plaguing desi communities.

Saurav, please see the promo poster for this new movie. I think it hits every one of the quotas targets on your list...

stop replicating all the power dynamics already plaguing desi communities.

Those pesky little power dynamics! What with their ridiculous resilience, one would think they were an ineradicable part of human nature or something...

Those pesky little power dynamics!...one would think they were an ineradicable part of human nature or something

hence the need to try to actively mitigate their effects...

More seriously...

Saurav, Manish and I have our differences. Boy, do we have our differences.

But one thing I'd like to think we have in common is that we don't front. We're not concerned about how "authentic" our various overlapping identities are. I'm not ashamed to be an upper middle class college educated Indian American, and I doubt Manish is either. We earned this shit.

What's more, we're the mainstream. The marginal subgroups you had to hunt and peck to assemble are clearly just totems to you. You don't actually care about them; you don't actually *know* anything about them. You're just using them as hastily gathered objects of conspicuous compassion, ways to push off on the rest of us to show how decent and moral you are relative to us unfeeling brutes.

But the jig's up. Fact is -- contra what your sociology teacher told you -- moral status is not a function of identity. The fact that a working class household has one less TV on average than a middle class household does not make them worse people...but it certainly doesn't make them better people either! There is absolutely no moral compunction -- *none* -- to devote coverage to people just because they're "marginal" by some tendentious definition.

PS: an offhand reference to "punk" in the faq does not represent a committment to cover the miniscule SA punk culture...next we'll hear about how Abhi's reneging on his promise to cover the bumping bhangra scene of North Dakota...

Saurav's last amusing comment aside -- taking this back to the main topic here -- there hasn't been very much media coverage of the bombs in Bangladesh here in the UK either. I expected to see "Breaking News" on the Sky News channel, along with BBC News, and of course CNN etc, but there was nothing at all (apart from teletext news on CNN).

Various arguments have already been bounced back and forth here on SM, but I wonder if one of the main reasons is actually the relatively small number of fatalities. Either way, the lack of coverage is still surprising, considering the huge number of bombs that were detonated.

Kind regards,
Jai,
London

well, rezwanul in dhaka is trying to talk about it. he says that bombs exploded in 63 out of 64 sites. the death toll is not bad, 10ish from what i've read. not to trivialize it, but this kind of seems like a publicity stunt on the part of islamists. i mean, their bombs were shit, but they showed the world their organizational capabilities, if not their technical chops.

Ok now lets get back to the Natalie Hollaway story. Any new leads ?
(Sarcasm overload)

Speaking of Natalie did anybody else notice those two dudes with Indian names ? Are they Arubans of Indian origin or actually Indians in Aruba ?

The only way the mainstream media will cover the BDesh story is if some european looking super model twisted her ankle because of the bomb blasts in BDesh.

All speculations true - Islamic fundamentalism finally arrives in Kolkata.

Speaking of Natalie did anybody else notice those two dudes with Indian names ? Are they Arubans of Indian origin or actually Indians in Aruba ?

The dudes are from Suriname . 37% of the population has Indian origins. It is interesting to hear their mother back them up with "They are good Indian (hindu?) boys they would never do such a thing"

anyway, that was a long-winded way to say that italian american identity is something new worldish, without old world cognates, though it derives from old world antecedants. the people here remind me of the same sort of thing, though i also do sense the 'hegemonization' that saurav is talking about. the occasional tifs between FOBs (and FOB-lites who seem to identify more with brownland than amerika) and the more manishesh (for lack of a better word) types over 'south asian' is i think simply evidence of the distance developing between the new world south asian identity and the old world regional-religious sensibilities. the assimilation of muslim browns into a muslim, as opposed to south asian, identity is i think another part of the puzzle.

OK fair enough, but how do you think the dynamics (ossification of a new world identity) change when there is near frictionless flow of information, people, money, relationships across the 'old' world and the 'new world'. Esp for a lot of people on this blog who tend to be mobile (in a real or virtual sense). The sicilian example you have given is pretty much one way, people cross the ocean and are done. Nobody wants to go back. Time passes distance develops, italian american vs sicilians etc. But now, you see korean second gen kids go over to Seoul to create the 'new' old world. Mumbai kids who are soaked deeply in the US culture represent the 'old' new world. Second gen indians who relocate and work in Bangalore for a few years. Indians who work in the US for ten years and go back etc. etc. People soak up information on the "contra" identity all the time.

I don't see the fuss in ther NYTimes not covering BDesh. SepiaMutiny isn't writing about the popular revolt in the Maldives (despite its 'south asian' status.) People write about what interests them and newspaper publish things that interest their readers.

Look at the Gaza withdrawal. 8,500 people forced to move -- more people live on a single Manhattan block. It's a pittance. But the NYT covers it like D-Day, and has a feature where you can look at individual houses in Gaza (Real estate, Cheap!).

Abhi,

>> I think number of people killed is as good a metric as any, no?

No. The number of people that could be killed is the best metric.

If one of these days these terrorists get hold of nuclear/biological weapons, it's all over for the world as we know it. They will use it with devastating consequences, killing probably tens of millions. Economies will go bust. Hunger, starvation, disease will be rampant. Hundreds of millions, if not more, will be affected. Far more than AIDS, Cancer, traffic accidents etc put together.

Hence, pay more importance to curb terrorism, even if means taking away funds from Niger, AIDS etc.

Now, if there emerges a bigger threat than islamic terrorism, I would tackle that first. If say, astronomers detect an asteroid that would hit earth in a few years, killing off all life, then I would say, forget islamic terrorism, let's tackle the asteroid first.

Saurav,

>>Setting aside for a moment that this is an "I'm right because I'm right" argument

Saurav, Saurav, Saurav... was that really necessary?

>>A lot of these so-called "natural" disasters have a human element to them too. There's an international system ...including racism, colonialism, meddling, military intervention, ...that impeded societies from really being free.

I certainly agree. Niger is that way not only because of decades of colonial looting, but also because their tribal belief systems from forcibly supplanted with alien faiths like Islam and Christianity. Their tribal beliefs had helped them live of the land without affecting their environment since the begining of time. When that was obliterated, the knowledge of how to live in harmony with nature was also obliterated. Hence the present predicament...

>>Wealthy and powerful countries tend to act in their own interests

You have the cause and effect backwards. Countries that act in their own interests become wealthy and powerful. So do individuals.

>>search of Halloway in Aruba....

I was really pissed about this. There were 20+ searchers for more than two weeks, in a foreign country, looking for a lost girl. Me thinks it was only because she was white and middle-class. If she were a non-white, it would not have been on the CNN front page for a week. Come to think of it, it would not have been on CNN at all.

M. Nam

(cont from above)

You can't blame the Times -- New Yorkers are interested in Gaza. They don't care about skinny-assed Bangladeshis.

SepiaMutiny is actually slightly more misrepresentative -- it gives the impression of being a South Asian diaspora blog (according to the FAQ). But there's not much on Vancouver, Toronto, Guyana, Trinidad, Fiji. PK, BDesh, etc are discussed from an Indian perspective. (It isn't terribly punk either, despite the photo in the FAQ). As Manish says,

SM exists because the MSM does a shitty job covering the things that interest us.

The tag-line should, more honestly be 'The world, mostly from an Indian-American perspective'. Absolutely nothing wrong with that. A few fix-ups to the FAQ, and you'll have truth in advertising. And a lot fewer whinging commentors.

Dude, why all these heated arguments about what individuals SHOULD blog about? Why all the identity politics? For heaven's sake, if you're not interested in a particular story, DON'T FREAKING CLICK ON IT! Why spend your energy whining about how you don't think Indian Hindus are like Bangladeshi extremists or like left-wing American desis?

What do a British Sri Lankan raised in a white neighborhood and a British Punjabi raised in brown Hounslow have in common? I dunno, but Bobby and Nihal have a popular radio show, and make jokes about ALL South Asian cultures while promoting Asian music no matter where it's from. The Asian Underground music scene in the 90s was populated by British representatives of ALL of the subcontinent and diaspora (State of Bengal=Bangladeshi, Equal-i=Indo-Caribbean, Talvin=Sikh Indian, Fun-Da-Mental=Pakistani, etc etc), and I guess they were too busy making music and art to be as focused on identity politics as today's blogerati. For some people, perhaps being brown in a white-majority country is enough to find common ground to build on. Maybe for some of you guys it's not.

I read this blog because my partner is brown, my boss is brown, my friends are brown, and I couldn't avoid brown people in London even if I tried, so I've developed an interest in brown issues. What country their parents were from doesn't seem to be so much of an issue between them.

There's LOADS of stuff to read on the web. You have the freedom to click on only the things you want to know more about, you know. ;)

SepiaMutiny is actually slightly more misrepresentative -- it gives the impression of being a South Asian diaspora blog (according to the FAQ). But there's not much on Vancouver, Toronto, Guyana, Trinidad, Fiji. PK, BDesh, etc are discussed from an Indian perspective. (It isn't terribly punk either, despite the photo in the FAQ). As Manish says,

SM exists because the MSM does a shitty job covering the things that interest us.

The tag-line should, more honestly be 'The world, mostly from an Indian-American perspective'. Absolutely nothing wrong with that. A few fix-ups to the FAQ, and you'll have truth in advertising. And a lot fewer whinging commentors.

Ask the Mutinous hosts if you can guestblog. If you're feeling underrepresented in another locale, speak up... It's a blog, not a network-- there is no obligation on SM's part to be 'fair and balanced'... blogs are opinions and brain spew.

(not directed at you, personally, Ikram. Directed at the collective You)

No. The number of people that could be killed is the best metric.

Moornam, if by your own words this is the best metric than I could care less about terrorism. I would be much more worried about global warming and a host of other problems. How do you figure "tens of millions" killed in a nuclear attack?

Hence, pay more importance to curb terrorism, even if means taking away funds from Niger, AIDS etc.

I just read your whole comment again. No offense but I hope you never become a policy maker.

there is no obligation on SM's part to be 'fair and balanced'...

Yeah, but if that's the case, don't you think we all have an obligation to stop fronting as much? I think the alternative is what Ikram posed: "The tag-line should, more honestly be 'The world, mostly from an Indian-American perspective'...A few fix-ups to the FAQ, and you'll have truth in advertising. And a lot fewer whinging commentors."

I'd know I'd stop whining as much, although I'd be disappointed in the decision to choose to have a narrow vision and articulate it honestly rather than to take a more encompassing articulation of what it means to be South Asian and work towards making it a reality.

I do think, as the only and largest desi american group blog out there that I know of, SM would benefit from more holistically represnting the various perspectives of its community).

fair enough, Saurav.

I'm just here for the chai and samose. ;)

What's more, we're the mainstream. The marginal subgroups you had to hunt and peck to assemble are clearly just totems to you. You don't actually care about them; you don't actually *know* anything about them. You're just using them as hastily gathered objects of conspicuous compassion, ways to push off on the rest of us to show how decent and moral you are relative to us unfeeling brutes.

gc, you're not the mainstream; you represent the mainstream perspective that comes from the perspective of a small group of people that have dominance among South Asians. With the exception of my sexuality and perhaps my politics (although I doubt it), I'm part of the same group. I just think it's wrong to try to universalize it as you're doing because you obliterate other people's voices.

Your point about what we know and don't know is the relevant one; if those perspectives were included more here, perhaps you would know more about what they care about. I agree with Manish that it doesn't have to be here and am trying to figure out how I think this can be accomplished in the desi blogosphere, but given that SM is out there and heavily visited, I'm going to contest the space.

The various subsets I picked were the ones that I came up with in a list at 5 in the morning -- I didn't include women but I respect SM for at least taking minimal strides in that direction; I didn't include South Indians because there is (or was, at least), a lot of mallu pride; I didn't even include religion (although you could make the argument that it wouldn't kill us to have someone coming from a Muslim background). But I'm open to being critiqued for not being inclusive enough.

And as for what I know--well there's some truth to your argument about self-righteousness on my part and I apologize for that; but please don't ever f#Wking assume again about what my life experience is without asking first. I've had developed relationships with people who are and were being deported; I've talked to countless working class desis on the street, at work, in their homes; I'm queer myself and have organized with other queer people--coordinating discussions about whether it makes sense to march in the India Day parade and blah blah blah; I have mixed race friends who have confessed to me their issues with authenticity and the fact that I was their only desi friend; etc. When you grow up queer in a homophobic desi home, when you think you're an atheist at age 7, when you try to get your mother to buy you puja clothes in the women's section on gender identity grounds, when you make choices to get outside your so-called "mainstream"--well then you can come back to me and talk to me about what I know and don't know.

I'm not perfect, but when I say that there are people whose voices are marginalized in desi spaces, I know what the f@#k I'm talking about. And my suspicion here is that most everyone else here does too, even if they don't care to admit it or deal with it.

fair enough, Saurav.

I'm just here for the chai and samose. ;)

Well this is ironic; I've managed to stifle your voice. I guess it's time for me to shut up now.

oh no, not at all! You know it's not that easy to shut me up :) I'm just taking the quiet observer role today. (ok, for once... I'm trying it out!)Lots of interesting comments to think about, and I am preoccupied entirely with something IRL

as for the chai and samose, I was carrying out your directive not to front-- I'm just all about the food.

I've come a little late to this party.

First off - about how many people die from AIDS vs bombs, I think you're wearing blinkers if you think there are no manmade elements to things like AIDS pandemics. You've heard of the 90:10 split?

Terrorism, on the other hand, is willfully caused by a set of people with an intention to kill. Hence, that's more dangerous and needs to be tackled first, even though the number of people killed is smaller.

People in the developing world die of disease every day due to the rest of the world's intention to not do anything about it. I'm not talking about millions of dollars in aid, I'm talking about reducing drug profits nominally.

About South Asian/Desi/Indian etc debate. I kind of echo DesiDancer's sentiments, I'm at least 4 of the things in your list Saurav, but I still enjoy reading bits and bobs on here - as well getting bored by other bits. I'm not overly fussed by the similarity of the SM staff, or how they define this blog. Sure I see your point and I agree that the scope of posts could be wider, but the comments facility exists so anyone can write up their views.

Oh Gori Observer - I don't buy your argument about B&N though. But I'll explain that to you in person or via email, long story. However I agree with you that there's plenty out there on the web, it doesn't all have to come from one site.

there's just no pleasing some of you, is there?

saurav, if they do what ikram suggested, you're disappointed. if they do what they are trying to already do and move beyond "indian-american" etc, you slam them for not hitting every item on your checklist.

what about this specific post was from an indian-american perspective, aside from the fact that it was written by one? i'm curious, in your opinion, can any of these SM bloggers write from anything BUT an "indian-american" perspective?

if they added a queer pakistani or a working-class illegal (assuming that this person even has the time and resources to blog. but who gets to blog/read blogs is a different issue), do you really think that the blog would read THAT much differently? i think desidancer is right-- YOU want to blog here and until you do, SM isn't going to be representative enough.

as for the chai and samose, I was carrying out your directive not to front-- I'm just all about the food.

Here here. I left out "gourmand" from the list :)

I kind of echo DesiDancer's sentiments, I'm at least 4 of the things in your list Saurav, but I still enjoy reading bits and bobs on here - as well getting bored by other bits. I'm not overly fussed by the similarity of the SM staff, or how they define this blog. Sure I see your point and I agree that the scope of posts could be wider, but the comments facility exists so anyone can write up their views.

Fair enough. Lack of honesty about identity descriptions in a political context are a pet peeve of mine (obviously) and in some sense my line of work, but it's more than fair for other people who are potentially affected by the same things not to feel the same way as me or to not view this space through a political lens.

(1) As I understand it, SM works largely off of tips and what the mutineers see in the media, etc. SO - if you're feeding them 10 tips a day on Fiji, or topics featuring Indo-Caribbeans, and not seeing it on SM - ya got beef. (No pun intended.)

If you're not feeding the tips on the topics you want to see covered, well - get to it.

(2) The reason I was so shocked the bombings in Bangladesh didn't get more coverage is not "because The Man doesn't care" blah blah blah - as someone else commented, I'd expect that 350 bombs detonated in a country containing "Taliban-tendency terrorists" would mark more press.

Now to be fair to Saurav, I think all he's objecting to is how they define SM in their description, he's not claiming every post is from an Indian American perspective.

How about this:

SAVEMA (SM's staff) are all brown.
They are all of South Asian origin.
They are all members of the South Asian diapora.

Hence they have every right to call this a brown, South Asian diaspora blog, right? Just like I could make a blog described as a British blog - I certainly wouldn't be representing all Brits would I?

It does say 'Come one, come all' in the FAQ too, so I guess you could say they're encouraging anyone to comment.

Clearly we all find something interesting about SM, which is why we're here. The only criticism I'll wholeheartedly agree with is that there's nothing PUNK about SM! ;)

Otherwise, it's all cool wit me yo.

saurav, if they do what ikram suggested, you're disappointed. if they do what they are trying to already do and move beyond "indian-american" etc, you slam them for not hitting every item on your checklist.

No, I critique them for not trying.

And oh:

YOU want to blog here and until you do, SM isn't going to be representative enough.

I think I want a platform like this but not quite this one--but, more to the point, yes, there's truth to your accusation of ego.

The underlying issues I'm bringing up, though, would largely still be relevant, even if I chose to be coopted :) Aside from being queer and some life choices I've made, a lot of my worldview is informed by the same background as the folks who blog here and hence I wouldn't really expand the range of perspectives all that much.

Anyway, it seems like a lot of people are getting annoyed with this discussion, so I'll just stop here--barring the unforeseen.

Saurav,

I shouldn't even respond to your self-contradictory complaints. But at least I can take care of that annoying and inaccurate list:

working class people; Biju Mathew, taxi workers alliance

LGBT people; Queer India

people in South Asia; About 1/3 of all recent posts at Sepia Mutiny, including 17 on the front page (current posts) alone

Indo-Caribbeans; Guyanese Independence day

British Asians or members of other diasporas; You're kidding, right? Did you miss the 300 posts on MIA, Jay Sean, Raghav, Bobby & Nihal, etc etc.? Hanif Kureishi and British Multiculturalism?

1st generation South Asian immigrants; 149 posts have had the word 'immigrant' mentioned

noncitizens; All of the recent posts dealing with profiling, unfair detentions and deportations have addressed the noncitizen issue. The posts on the disappeared Bangladeshi girls dealt with this in depth.

people who believe in mutinies; ???

people who are actually punk; I am way more punk than you, mofo

people who we decided are South Asian but don't identify as such; ????

people who are mixed race; Katrina Kaif

non-Indian-Americans. this last is redundant with several of the previous

saurav,

thank you for responding. i went to your link and what i was struck by is how your "alternadesi" would essentially be as much of a "thought ghetto" as you accuse SM of being. i didn't see any mention of including some of the viewpoints that are represented here, so how would that alternate space be anymore of a solution than this?

bongbreaker,

what, if any "punk" coverage would you like to see? :)

Abhi writes:I hope you never become a policy maker

For now, I'm content with electing policy makers of my persuasion. My man's in the White House. The birds are a-chirping. The sky's blue. The civilisational war is progressing exactly as it should. What more could I ask for?

BongBreaker:

>>I've come a little late to this party.

We're out of Kingfisher, but there's plenty of Hieneken left!

>> I think you're wearing blinkers if you think there are no manmade elements to things like AIDS pandemics. You've heard of the 90:10 split?

Yes and No.

Yes, I know that AIDS is a manmade pandemic. Made and spread by men and women who share way too many needles and partners. Unfortunately, their children contract it by virtue of being born to morally loose parents. And some innocent people also contract it due to contaminated blood, unfaithful partners etc. It's man-made allright.

No - I don't know the 90:10 ratio. Something tells me you're not talking about the ratio of liberals to non-liberals on this forum!

>>I'm not talking about millions of dollars in aid, I'm talking about reducing drug profits nominally.

My humble request to you to let us know when you take up the job of a policy maker - I'll have to sell all my drug stocks right away. A pity - they've given me consistent 20%+ returns.

What's a "nominal" amount by which you will reduce drug profits to fit your agenda on how the world should work and how wealth should be distributed?

M. Nam

For now, I'm content with electing policy makers of my persuasion. My man's in the White House. The birds are a-chirping.

Now see. If you had simply stated that at the begining this discussion would have been more productive as we would have understood each other better. I am working on a system by which comment leavers such as yourself would get a red font, and comment leavers like me would get assigned a blue font. :)

people who are actually punk; I am way more punk than you, mofo

Haha! That cracked me right up.

Galatea, I shouldn't have said not being punk is a criticism, it's not at all. To me SM is like a broadsheet. Let me explain. I have a fantastically over-inflated ego. I generally think I'm the world's smartest man, with the exception of the chap who invented bubble wrap, but then I happened upon this wee blog and realised there are people out there who are smarter than me. I have got lots of gems from here which I later recount to my girlfriend or friends, it's erudite, it's thought-provoking and it's a chance for me to hear views of people I generally don't know much about - by that I mean South Asians in America.

However punk it ain't. I take punk to mean young and rebellious, and having just checked, so does answers.com. Young - yep most people here are(ish!). Rebellious - nah. Sure that's a massive generalisation and I don't know the first thing about most of the SM chaps and chapesses, but from the posts the general topics are not tremendously out of the ordinary. This is NOT a criticism at all, please don't take it that way. The vast majority of readers are regular folk too - in normal jobs doing normal things - and it would be silly to start pursuing off-beat topics or causes.

When I finally do get round to putting something up on the Internet, it will most likely be nowhere near as intelligent as the posts on here (especially Amardeep, way over my head!) but it may be a little bit more alternative; less mainstream. You'll see!

Abhi writes:

>>comment leavers such as yourself would get a red font

I prefer saffron!!

Republicans would get a red font. Envornmentalists/PETA activists/Muslims - green. Feminists - pink. Democrats - blue. Gays - purple. SouthAsians - brown. Liberteranians, Hindutvadis - saffron. Blacks - black.

M. Nam

Now see. If you had simply stated that at the begining this discussion would have been more productive as we would have understood each other better.

Agreed Abhi, when I read that it all fell into place!

MoorNam, the split refers to the fact that 10% of the world's medical research money is allocated for 90% of the world's population. Malaria is in fact the biggest killer in the world (some say HIV/AIDS - both are around 3-5 million/yr, estimated) and again this is massively underfunded. Now you're argument is that we should spend more effort on countering terrorism than disease. Well OK, but then out of the money that is allocated to fighting disease, should we not prioratise spending on diseases that account for the most lives, or are lives in Africa worth less than Americans'?

This is an article from a magazine I occasionally write for, the student version of the British Medical Journal, which explains a bit more. An article from my newspaper details more about Big Pharma (page 9). Check out point number 9 - if profits fall, research won't suffer.

I'm genuinely happy you've done well with you stocks, I'm not one of these people who begrudges someone for making money instead of giving it all away. But perhaps you should consider the ethics involved in just about every American pharmaceutical company's progress and success. Like worldwide patents preventing India's huge generic pharmaceutical market from manufacturing life-saving drugs for the needy in Asia, Africa and South America, for a fraction of the price.

Sorry, forgot the link. Page 9.

And Heineken sucks!

Not sure I agree with your colour-coding, don't think we need to know everyone's race or sexuality. Just the important thing - political allegiance!

Saurav, I shouldn't even respond to your self-contradictory complaints.

Amardeep, let me try to be clearer and maybe this will resolve some of what i said which either was or appeared self-contradictory. SM can argue it's a pan-South Asian space and make stronger efforts to move towards that, or it can do what Ikram suggested and label itself more honestly. I also think it's dishonest to say "it's just a blog" when this is a form of social capital and its bloggers have already been approached to speak on behalf of South Asians.

I'm muddled, not oblivious; when I talk about "voicese", and "perspectives", I'm referring to the structure of the blog and how that informs the language it brings forth in the writing as well as, but not exclusively, the selection of the posts. For example, to take this into somewhat less contentious territory: before you started guestblogging, there were not as many posts on literary topics from an academic perspective; before Turbanhead started guestblogging, that were imbued with references to married life). Similarly, when SM posts about London bombings and backlash, it might help to have someone from London present the perspective that comes there. Or if it posts on queer issues, it might help to have someone whose writing is imbued with a queer perspective--like Venial Sin.

Obviously, no space can encompass all of that, but I think that SM could do a little more than it does and have more of a commitment to the idea of being as inclusive as possible not just in obvious ways, but in a way that integrates the idea of inclusiveness into the values of the blog. If I had been more constructive and wiser, I would have stated up front that I think this is part of a broader conversation about the American desi subset of the blogosphere and how we can all work together to make sure that as comprehensive a vision of real-world desis as possible gets brought into what we do collectively while individually still being honest about who we are and being able to say what we want. And further that this is part of a larger project that 1.5/2nd gen americans who understand themselves as South Asian need to work towards. The same dynamics that I think play out in SM are dynamics that I see in other places--like the non-profit world.

... it gives the impression of being a South Asian diaspora blog (according to the FAQ). But there's not much on Vancouver, Toronto, Guyana, Trinidad, Fiji. PK, BDesh, etc are discussed from an Indian perspective... The tag-line should, more honestly be 'The world, mostly from an Indian-American perspective'...

~and~

We are a desi blog; however, we feel no obligation to even attempt to represent the following perspectives...

1. There is no tagline: The FAQ is a glossary of terms. There is no tagline, there are no claims about what the blog is about or by whom it's written. The closest thing to a tagline we've got is the blog description in the RSS feed, 'All that savory brownness in one flavorful packet.'

2. Exclusivity bad: The tagline you suggest is pointlessly exclusive. The minute you put 'Indian-American' in the FAQ description, you turn off Pakistanis, Sri Lankans, Brit Asians and so on.

3. about vs. by confusion: It's not by a demographically representative sample of the diaspora (and what boring reading that would be), it's about the diaspora.

4. about vs. for confusion: It's not for 'middle-class Indian-Americans,' it's about the diaspora. At a minimum, every non-desi reader understands that implicitly.

5. Describing vs. representing: Every blogger here is accurately described as a member of the South Asian diaspora. That doesn't mean the blog's mission is to fully represent.

6. No duty to represent: With a government or an ISA, there's a situation of scarcity, exclusivity or monopoly. There's no such situation here, and there's no duty to be representative. There's only the basic human courtesy of being interesting. And the best writing is by those who write what interests them. That's that we do.

Saurav's rant about including the Pakistani flag is perfectly legit as a personal sentiment. But it's a steaming pile of horseshit as an attempt to force the bloggers to write about something and in a certain style.

In fact, his demands are contradictory: both to represent others, and to not claim to represent others.

7. Detailed profiles bad: You want A/S/L-type info about the bloggers (ethnicity/class), but there are many good reasons not to do so (privacy, labeling), which is why even Saurav doesn't post a profile page in the sidebar of his own blog.

if there's one thing that really peeves bloggers, i think it's telling them what they should write about, or should be about. 99% give their time and money gratis. i understand some of saurav's complaint, and one reason i was interested in a poll is that i was curious as to the exact (or at least exacter) unrepresentativeness of SM. but that being said, sometimes you have to tack rather than head straight into the wind....

as for representing themselves as 'south asian' or 'desi,' even if the terms have a broad original connotation i think it is likely plausible that in the USA (for example) they will empirically tend to be characterize a narrowerer set. like i said, a far smaller number of 'south asians' are likely to be muslim than in south asia. if this blog is an example, punjabis, malayalees and bengalis are also way more overrepresented than their numbers in brownland. etc. etc. i've had my disputes with manish over being brown, and what that means, but ultimately, all this shitting about and commenting on the message boards is part of the process of brown (or south asian, or whatever).

isn't a blog somewhat like an open diary? If a few people choose to get together and write in the same one, then all the more juicy for the voyeurs oh, I mean commenters... It's not a real mutiny, there's no need for hand-to-hand combat. It's a party, Linda Richmond style. Talk amongst yourselves...

In fact, his demands are contradictory: both to represent others, and to not claim to represent others.

It's not and--it's or--in my mind I'm trying to be undersatnding that it's possible that you collectively simply don't want to make this a more interesting, more full, more comprehensive South Asian diaspora blog that's part of a South Asian diaspora community. That doesn't mean Abhi or Manish or anyone else martyrs themselves to their readership by constantly and out of obligation writing things that they don't want to; it means that you go out and find other people who will write about things because you think that they're important to present from a particular standpoint but you know that you can't or don't want to do it yourself. But perhaps you're not interested in that at all, so I give you an out and ask you just to be honest about who you are like Ikram did so you're not pretending that you actually substantially give a $hit whether Pakistanis, Bangladeshis, queers, women, and others continue to visit.

What i think I'm more guilty of than self-contradiction is dichotomizing a spectrum of different standpoints ranging from "Indian-American blog" to "South Asian diaspora blog encompassing many different types of South Asian diaspora voices and accountable to the South Asian communities of the world" impatience with a process of identity formation, and more than my share of rudeness (and I apologize for that last one). And of course my own personal agenda.

As for "what this blog is" "taglines" and whatever else--if you think that social spaces are what the people in control of them say they are regardless of empirical realities--well, that's your prerogative, but I think that's a steaming pile of horseshit. The crux of the matter is: why are you willing to change your language to meet the perceived needs of Pakistanis, Sri Lankans, Brit Asians, etc. but not change your blog lineup to draw them in? Why are you willing to present yourselves as South Asian but when you write a post about Indian independence, you're not concerned with what Pakistanis will think then? Why are you willing to use the device of rebellion but not be truly rebellious? Why do some people feel comfortable commenting on particular topics but not others? Who lurks and why?

If this is just a blog, then let it be just a blog; and I will respond nicely like an obedient, complacent, reader. If this is a collective space, then let it be a space, and we'll express our disagreements and have give and take, and you'll cede some power to your readership and potential readership (the Times has a public editor). If this is a mutiny on the other hand (or rather, part of a mutiny), then let's have a mutiny.

Manish wrote

2. Exclusivity bad: The tagline you suggest is pointlessly exclusive

No. The tag-line I wrote is accurate. The blog, like all blogs, is exclusive. It's pointless to be inclusive of all the south asian diaspora -- you'll never succeed.

Better to be clear about what perspective you write from. The blog is well-written and interesting on it's own. It's doesn't need pretentions of universality to succeed.

(And, as an aside, didn't Saurav's rant about the PK flag work?)

razib wrote:

all this shitting about and commenting on the message boards is part of the process of brown

Can I hear an Amen, my East-Pakistani friend.

Saurav writes:>>That doesn't mean Abhi or Manish or anyone else martyrs themselves to their readership by constantly and out of obligation writing things that they don't want to; it means that you go out and find other people who will write about things because you think that they're important to present from a particular standpoint but you know that you can't or don't want to do it yourself.

Very well put.

Now let me rephrase this to Abhi and BongBreaker for our earlier discussion...

That doesn't mean Pfizer or Merck or anyone else martyrs themselves to bleeding hearts by constantly and out of obligation producing drugs that they don't want to; it means that bleeding hearts go out and find other drugmakers who will make drugs for Malaria etc because they think that they're important to present from a particular standpoint but they know that they can't or don't want to do it themselves.

Standard scene I'm seeing in America since I set foot here: Conservatives demand control on speech/art. Liberal demand control on production and economy.

While your resident Liberteranian-Hindutvadi watches along amused...

M. Nam

I'm a lurker here and have been reading comments related to identity, and to SM's role in the South Asian American space for awhile now.

I [maybe like saurav and desi dancer?] understood SM to be a collective space which is inclusive and open - and which could even be part of a larger "movement" that is identity-based and also values-based. But it kinda seems like, as Manish said, it's a place where people post what is "interesting" to them. If that's the case, then yeah - there's no real need to be representative or comprehensive.

But what I've also seen is SM speaking on the community's behalf and positioning itself as a space for all South Asians - and that justifies the questioning of whether it is truly open, and representative.

you see what you see lurker. i don't see that at all. i mean, if this place was as serious as you depict, what do you say to the ubiquity of photos like this???

i think saurav has a point, but that's why there are comment boards. i consider myself a dissenter from SM's dominant zeitgeist, with the punjabi-mallu kuffur mafia ascendent.

in other words, only you can silence your own voice, we all have liberty to be arrogant assholes. this is amerika after all :)

All,

We should all have understood Saurav's grudges about SM by now... He (assumption by name) wants to guest blog on SM like Amardeep and invade it with his extreme political eulogies.

Saurav,

The crux of the matter is: why are you willing to change your language to meet the perceived needs of Pakistanis, Sri Lankans, Brit Asians, etc. but not change your blog lineup to draw them in?

You're still arguing as if SM were some kind of international agency. It's not.

Identitarian thinking is bad thinking for at least two reasons: 1) It's never enough. If they invite a Sri Lankan to join them, the next question is of course -- Tamil or Sinhala or Muslim or Burgher? Male or female? etc

And 2) Good blogging, like good journalism or good teaching, is more about what you know and how you think than about your background per se. Your background helps a little, but the actual line between a Punjabi Pakistani and a Punjabi Indian isn't that great (that's the whole idea of 'desi' to begin with).

I'm sure SM would value the voices & perspectives of bloggers from different backgrounds from themselves, but it's their prerogative to decide whether the chemistry is right. It's a surprisingly difficult balance to get right...

I would actually advocate going in the opposite direction from the one you propose -- less 'identity' rather than more. For instance, I personally think it might be interesting to have non-desi bloggers at SM occasionally, blogging, as Manish puts it about desi issues -- people like Andrea/Trilia or Ms. World. They are really good bloggers and they have strong interest in South Asian stuff. Those are the two most important criteria, IMO.

hammer_sickel, you are my favorite crazy ever for linking to the telemarketer calls from India to London on the day of the bombing. They were compelling (and funny) enough to begin with, but the fact that you feel that they're an example of an "extreme political eulogies" on my part removes it to the realm of the lovably absurd. In all sincerity, thank you for unintentionally highlighting humanity in what has been an ugly, ugly conversation :)

Here's the original post on CSF with links to the three audio calls.

Frankly, I didnt even read your post on CSF or whatever... was browsing over the titles to find an absurd one.."Capitalism Vs Jesus Vs Terrorism" - talk about linking!!

Anyway either you want to guest blog here on SM or want to shut this one down so others can only read your blog/clog.. hah.. Red tradition isnt it?

is more about what you know and how you think than about your background per se

Well said Amardeep. Part of the reason this blog is attractive to me is the effort the mods put in commeting and moderating the topics. One thing SM should absolutely not deteriorate into is a survey site in the name of 'diversity' much like instapundit or desipundit. I usually don't spend much time on such survey sites, instead I have my RSS reader pick up the 'original/source' blogs of interest. The guest bloggers idea is good if they are of the same quality as the current mods.

And 2) Good blogging, like good journalism or good teaching, is more about what you know and how you think than about your background per se.

I agree completely.

Identitarian thinking is bad thinking

I wholeheartedly agree that an exclusive or fairly exclusive reliance on identitarian thinking is counterproductive. The reason I spoke in an identity framework above was because this conversation came out this statement by me: "there's clearly an educated, American desi, middle class or uppwardly mobile, professional, identity-focused vibe to the blogging that happens here--at least in the posts" and what followed and probably some sloppiness on my part as I try to get over my own identity politics issues.

The proposal that you have is important and complementary to what I was suggesting--both are fundamentally coming from a place of wanting to expand viewpoints and move away from a rigid identity politics.

While it is hard to find voices that are both interesting and also break out of the mold, the response to my and other people's requests to do so is usually not "we're trying" although sometimes it admirably is. There are things like Abhi's post on Niger and SM's effort to try to recruit another female blogger (I think?) that are really, really good--even if they "only" turn out to be failed experiments. Beyond that, what about other ways to go about it? How about finding people who are not bloggers but can write to bring forward a perspective. We all know brilliant people who are doing immigrant rights work, lgbt work, and other things that SM could approach to write 1 post. If folks are willing to accept the underlying premise that it would be nice if there were a more diverse set of perspectives represented, at that point it would become a question of how and to what extent rather than why.

You're still arguing as if SM were some kind of international agency. It's not.

This blog is going to receive around 175,000 hits this month and its hits are increasing every month. That's a lot of social capital given the ample present and future resources of the community that reads it. It presents political perspectives through commission or ommission often. Regardless of whether or not SM set out to acquire that capital, I think it's fair to argue that posessing it makes it an object for consideration which falls somewhere between the public and private spheres more than "just a blog." It's a tool that a lot of 1.5/2nd gen desis read for information, it's a space that people have used to build activism out of (like the Modi stuff and, ironically, media criticism), to form networks to find jobs and otherwise build connections among desis (which in turn are used to find jobs, etc.), and I'm sure is put to other uses by other people. It also relies heavily on contributions by commenters for its appeal. It's a community space as well as being a blog.

Also, as I mentioned above, I think these issues are also relevant outside the context of this blog.

I think it's fair to argue that posessing it makes it an object for consideration which falls somewhere between the public and private spheres more than "just a blog."

Let me break this down Saurav although I have tried to stay out of this debate. I have spoken to you offline so I know that your heart may be in the right place but I should be clear. This is about vision. Your vision for what Sepia Mutiny should be (and anybody else's vision) doesn't matter to me AT ALL. The only vision I care about is my own (and I have had a vision from day one), and that of my co-bloggers. Nobody will guilt us or force us into changing our tone, content, or anything else. We are also under no obligation to reveal how and for what reason we invite certain guest bloggers or how and why we pick our stories. People can speculate all they want but we still won't give it up. Some comments above reveal that people actually think we just blog all day. We all have full-time jobs. THAT is often times the main discriminator of which stories get blogged and which don't.

There is already a guest blogger who was invited a while ago that will probably be starting next week. I don't want a discussion next week as to why we picked this person (although you can bet it's because we liked their writing). It's nobody's business but our own. If someone thinks our blog sucks or doesn't cater to them than they can move on. We aren't an Empire. We are not going to recruit/conquer bloggers to dedicate most of their time writing for us at the expense of their own unique and interesting blogs. Also do you think a group blog is easy to run? If we just added "voices" willy-nilly SM would implode within weeks.

My point is you can all debate all you want but in the end what Razib said is true:

if there's one thing that really peeves bloggers, i think it's telling them what they should write about, or should be about. 99% give their time and money gratis.

MoorNam, I'm not sure I've followed what you meant by:

That doesn't mean Pfizer or Merck or anyone else martyrs themselves to bleeding hearts by constantly and out of obligation producing drugs that they don't want to; it means that bleeding hearts go out and find other drugmakers who will make drugs for Malaria etc because they think that they're important to present from a particular standpoint but they know that they can't or don't want to do it themselves.

Funny how a 'libertarian' labels someone suggesting the developing world gets a bum deal as a 'bleeding heart'. Pfizer, Merck, GSK etc - DON'T ALLOW other drug companies to make drugs, so no matter what good intentions other 'bleeding hearts' have, it's in vain. The patents are more damaging than anything. Sure, Pfizer don't want to waste their time on some poor Africans, but other companies do. But they aren't allowed.

self-criticism is good as a means to an ends. but sometimes it can become the ends. anyway, i've commented on plenty of weblogs where the bloggers are uninformed dumbasses who don't know shit what they're talking about. but, i do always come down on their side when someone doesn't just criticize them, but tries to tell them that what they should be saying and doing. it's like if people like to have fattie orgies in their house. if you like visiting their house for the pre-orgie snacks, and sometimes you have to see some fatties fucking, well, it's their house, and you came in, no one forced you. as much as i detest the image of fattie orgies, i defend the right to engage in them within the bounds of one's home.

mebee it be the libertarian piping up in me. i guess saurav sees this as if fatties are doing it in a public park to something in plain view, so people have a right to ask them to be a little more discreet or use positions that are less revealing of their privates, but i don't view weblog communities that way at all. they're like old style discussion salons, and in salons there was always someone hosting, directing and setting the terms of the social organism.

google "rahel levin germany salo.n" that's manish (though he is better looking than her).

anyway, that's enough of me taking up some of the bandwidth you paid for manish :)

That's some analogy razib, some analogy.

a friend of mine had "observer" status at an orgie a few years back. said he saw a lot of fatties.

Fattie orgies. Haha, too funny.

google "rahel levin germany salo.n" that's manish (though he is better looking than her).

Ergo, Saurav is Frank Costanza then. Costanza, he of the epic "A Festivus for the rest of us" crusade fame.

well, saurav likes short jewish dudes, so that's apropos, isn't it?

Your vision for what Sepia Mutiny should be (and anybody else's vision) doesn't matter to me AT ALL.

Yes, sahib. No problem, sahib. Anything else I can do for you, sahib?

I've done my share criticizing the middle class/upwardly mobile/professional hetero male Indian American values that imbue this blog and you've done your share in showing exactly how much this institution is willing to move even slightly towards other people's suggestions for a broader vision. I guess we all have some sense of SM, its bloggers, their politics and values, the demographics of the desi community, and everything else that went into this conversation now--and I hope folks keep it in mind the next time SM touches on "injustices", what it means to be desi, community, or media accountability and criticism.

All in all, it's a shame, I guess, but it's not the end of the world; those of us who want to will find other ways to develop community or will just stop aligning ourselves with desi identities like this one.

Good luck not becoming an echo chamber; I think you're going to need it.

Fuck all yall, Saurav is the man. I've disagreed with him many times but he always comes up with well thought-out and articulate responses that make one think. If you are truly in search of knowledge and understanding, you have to understand your views and constantly exercise them. When I say exercise, I mean pull them and stretch them to test their vitality and validity. If you're content with a masturbatory and self-laudatory perspective to life, (beautifully exemplified by the following quote), then stay content...but know you aren't engaging in dialogue or even thinking that much.

But one thing I'd like to think we have in common is that we don't front. We're not concerned about how "authentic" our various overlapping identities are. I'm not ashamed to be an upper middle class college educated Indian American, and I doubt Manish is either. We earned this shit.

Ohhh yeah, "you're the man now dogg"

Saurav has always injected an interesting class based perspective to SM that is essential to many of the deep conversations that go on here. SO WHAT if he would like more coverage of this and that? SO WHAT if he thinks SM is horribly skewed in perspective? OK so you are the Sepia Mutiny god/sysop/whatever and you wont listen, thats cool. But don't be hating on the man just because he expresses a view that offends your pride

it's like if people like to have fattie orgies in their house. if you like visiting their house for the pre-orgie snacks, and sometimes you have to see some fatties fucking, well, it's their house, and you came in, no one forced you. as much as i detest the image of fattie orgies,

Worst...analogy....ever.

Now everyone in SM sing in unison, "Saurav give me one more chance...."

That is, I don't think the relative lack of coverage in Western media (though the NYT did cover it) is due to a lack of sympathy for brown lives, but rather due to a misguided equivalence between "fundamentalist Muslim" and "brown"...an equivalence that the "South Asian" label, AALDEF, and plenty of left of center Indian Americans all (unfortunately) tend to propagate.

Since we are speaking in Bill Walton-esque absolutes, you're absolutely a goddamned idiot. Hows that? Now explain to me how AALDEF propogates the equivalence between fundamentalist Muslim and brown. Very curious to know...Thats like saying Donald Rumsfeld supports Saddam Hussein....hmm bad example...like saying the CIA supports Afghan mujahadeen....hmm another bad example. Anyway, please explain this ostensible equivalence.

... you've done your share in showing exactly how much this institution is willing to move even slightly towards other people's suggestions for a broader vision.

What Abhi's saying, perhaps more bluntly than I have, is this: this is not just a community space, it's also about the artistic rights of the writers.

Good: 'Check this out' is great, we use tips all the time.

Bad: 'If you don't write what I tell you, you are morally bankrupt' is totally lame. Start your own blog. That's why we did.

I've done my share criticizing the middle class/upwardly mobile/professional hetero male Indian American values that imbue this blog and you've done your share in showing exactly how much this institution is willing to move even slightly towards other people's suggestions for a broader vision.

this sentence has bothered me all day; unfortunately, (or perhaps fortunately) i couldn't comment from work. how ironic-- the pious, conscious, noble Saurav who wants to make sure no one is left out is the one who makes me a token.

i'm an equal partner in this project.

i wasn't chosen b/c i have a vagina.

i am not here for decorative purposes.

if anything my voice is probably "more heard" than several of my co-bloggers.

i don't have "male" values and i am incensed that i might be characterized as such just b/c i'm not the sort of feminist that you approve of. your rant was unfair and petty (good luck? echo chamber? c'mon.) you are not privy to what goes on behind the scenes of this blog, and it's easy to complain when that's the case, isn't it?

if you knew how much time and effort we invest in this blog, as we painstakingly try to maintain/improve the very qualities that keep you coming back, you'd feel shitty for assuming the worst about people who give up sleep, meals, even--oh--what's this? FRIDAY NIGHTS just so we can blog around our full-time jobs and other obligations.

each of us has a personal blog (in my case blogS).

each of us has friends.

each of us has a family.

each of us should probably go to the gym.

sometimes some, if not all of those priorities get less than they deserve b/c we are so grateful for your loyalty and attention, we want to give you the blog that you deserve.

we never said we were perfect and you're absolutely right, with our success comes serious responsibility...but we didn't get to this amazing place by being idiots who stumbled ass-backwards into it a la Kramer.

how 'bout a little faith in us for once?

Fuck all yall, Saurav is the man. I've disagreed with him many times but he always comes up with well thought-out and articulate responses

Well, sure, I guess -- if "Fuck all yall" is the standard. :)

Saurav has always injected an interesting class based perspective to SM

Meaning what...his laundry lists of ostensibly oppressed groups? Beyond denigrating SM for its shocking lack of desi dropouts and Pakistani proletarians, what "class based" perspective does he contribute?

And why would class warfare be worth injecting into the debate anyway? Newsflash: Marxism died with the end of the Soviet Union. Deng Xiaoping and Manmohan Singh got the message...why haven't you?

If you are truly in search of knowledge and understanding, you have to understand your views and constantly exercise them. When I say exercise, I mean pull them and stretch them to test their vitality and validity.

It seems like you're trying to set the record for the most useless fluff stuffed into a single paragraph. The above reminds me of nothing so much as the contentless page fillers I used to see back when I graded freshman essays.

...in any case, insofar as Saurav's rather incoherent beef can be summed up, his main objection to this place is that he isn't posting here:

Yes, I have an ego. Yes, I replicate things my uncles do. Yes, I want to feel included and am a control freak....

That Anna and other people are open about queerness, women, and other issues, to at least a limited extent is good and important. That doesn't change the structural bias of SM--which is that there are mostly desi, straight, male, American, nationalist bloggers and the perspectives being represented there echo that. The topics chosen echo that...

You have no idea how many tips I have sent them which I would have liked to have seen them cover on topics that I thought were legitimately important and fell within their purview (And I continue to send them tips even now, although I've resigned myself to the fact that there's a selection process (intentional or arbitrary) that goes on even with things that meet their criteria).

So yes, I am insecure, and petty, and ego-driven, and oversensitive. All of which is exacerbated by participating in a space in which you get ZERO support...

It's about ego, not about "vitality and validity". There are plenty of opposing opinions here, but because sheer bloody-minded tokenism isn't the obsession of the writing staff, he feels like his viewpoint is excluded.

The solution to this is simple. There might be a market for a "South Asian" blog which was nothing more than a front for leftist agitation, and which featured regular harangues of the readership from a "class based perspective". Vurdlife, maybe you could ask to contribute an expletive ridden manifesto or two. I'm sure their standards would be low enough...

Now explain to me how AALDEF propogates the equivalence between fundamentalist Muslim and brown. Very curious to know

I'm talking about the left-wing useful idiots of Hindu descent who stop the deportation of Muslim fundies...fundies who'd slit their throat if given the chance. I'm talking about Indians who blur the difference between "Indian" on the one hand and "Pakistani/Bangladeshi" on the other hand...a cultural difference of utmost importance when it comes to the propensity for terrorism.

And spare me the tropes about how whites can't distinguish the two. Clearly white society is capable of making the distinction. Ask your average white Brit or American whether they'd prefer to live next door to some Hindus or Sikhs. Then ask them whether they'd prefer to live next door to some Muslims. Dollars to doughnuts you'll see a difference...a difference that is a function of *rational decision making*, including the knowledge that Muslims in the UK commit crimes at a much higher rate than Hindus:

The fact that the Muslim population has a crime rate six times that of the Hindu and three times that of the Sikh suggests that it could, for the Muslim culture of the subcontinent has in general much greater difficulty compromising creatively with Western culture than the other two religions have. This startling difference is a further argument against those who would see in the development of an Indian underclass an inevitable response to racial prejudice: for it is surely unlikely that the racially prejudiced would trouble themselves to distinguish between Muslims, Sikhs, and Hindus.

Unfortunately -- unlike the population at large -- leftists of brown skin who'd pursue a "popular front" are incapable of making these trivial distinctions. The fact is that Indians are *not* Pakistanis, and Hindus and Sikhs are *not* Muslims. Non-Muslim browns have *no interest whatsoever* in wearing the sackcloth and ashes for a community that not only defends terrorism -- or looks the other way -- but that would treat us just as poorly as other "infidels" if given the chance.

And lest you think this is hyperbole, check out the mainstream UK Muslims on sharia:

Full text: joint statement from Muslim groups

1. The term "extremism", frequently used in the public discourse about religion and terrorism, has no tangible legal meaning or definition and is thus unhelpful and emotive. To equate "extremism" with the aspirations of Muslims for Sharia laws in the Muslim world or the desire to see unification towards a Caliphate in the Muslim lands, as seemed to be misrepresented by the prime minister, is inaccurate and disingenuous. It indicates ignorance of what the Sharia is and what a Caliphate is and will alienate and victimise the Muslim community unnecessarily.

39 Muslim groups signed this. This is not a minority opinion. These people defend sharia, for crying out loud. And in the states, these "Muslim charities" and legal orgs are cut from exactly the same cloth as the lefties over here who defended Sami Al-Arian, the Buffalo Five, and virtually every other accused terrorist...a group which includes AALDEF:

New York, New York – On September 17, 2004, CBS News reported that the FBI was planning to conduct rounds of interrogations, surveillance and possible detentions to deter possible disruptions around the Presidential elections. The FBI agents will be aggressively conducting surveillance of persons identified as terrorist sympathizers, but who have not committed any crime. Individuals and their family members may be called in for questioning. Mosques will be visited and members will be asked whether they have observed suspicious behavior. The so-called "October Plan" is scheduled to go into effect the first week of October and continue through the elections, according to CBS News.

The Asian American Legal Defense and Education Fund ("AALDEF") is offering free legal advice and representation to concerned individuals approached by the FBI.AALDEF attorneys have represented persons caught up in previous rounds of the government's surveillance and questioning initiated by the FBI and NYPD Terrorism Task Force.

I didn't see AALDEF champing at the bit to defend Eric Rudolph or Myron Tereschuk. So this is not about "principle", but about *racism*. The non-Muslim browns at AALDEF disgust me...it is they who are the real racists, as they impede FBI investigations and defend Muslim terrorists just because they share the same skin color. Their loyalty is to a brown racialist fiction rather than the United States of America.

Sigh. I just got here. I was on vacation, I'm working my way semi-backwards through posts.

Chill out people, please. We need some love.

I am working on a system by which comment leavers such as yourself would get a red font, and comment leavers like me would get assigned a blue font. :)

I want blue with gold underlining please.

Um, to, ahem, cough cough, get back to the subject at hand:

1) Terrorism is of concern b/c it's terrorizing, not because of the number of people it kills. It's not the number one concern. But if you enjoy living and working and doing research and travelling with the relative ease of movement and predictability and fearless order most of us enjoy (and I mean relative, so nobody jump down my throat about the myriad ways those pleasures are not quite perfect in our various societies), then terrorism is of disproportionate concern. Routine, schedule, predictability--these are the building blocks of sustained creative work and innovation. Terrorism threatens that. More importantly it threatens that in a way that is easy to manipulate. I mean, hurricanes also threaten routine, predictability, schedule. But nobody realy has a way of causing them, so noone who profits from that disorder can increase them. People can cause sudden, surprising, disorienting violence however, and if they can link the results to a desire objective---even if that link only exists in their head, and never materializes--they will have an incentive to cause more. And if other other people see that the system doesn't respond, other people may also cause more. (Classic broken windows theory.)

Now I agree that it's not our most pressing problem. Personally I think energy/global warming is our most pressing problem. The fact is different people are suited to thinking about different problems, and they're going to emphasize whatever problem catches their problem-solving fancy more. For all its intractability, terrorism might very well be a more attractive problem to government/journalistic types than energy crises and global warming. I mean, I certainly find myself more willing to read up on Al Qaeda than on coal-treatment and nuclear energy, and I've got energy issues in my blood.

2)Manish is spot on. The issue here is precisely that nobody was killed and yet 400 bombs went off simultaneously. It speakse of immense precision, organization, coordination, and control. It's meant to terrorize a particular subset of people: a) people who care about Bangladesh for whatever reason and b) people who think a lot about logistics. That's an important set of people--it includes the Bangladeshi government, several other governments, business types, investors, etc. It was mean to make them feel at risk. People behave differently when they are feeling risk. But as Razib pointed out, for most Bangladeshis--who've already got incredibly tough lives and plenty of problems to deal with--this may very well seem banal in a few days.

As an aside, I want to say, I like Sepia Mutiny b/c it's very well done, not b/c of the specific content. I'd be happy to lap up other content that's as well done somewhere else--the more the merrier.

this sentence has bothered me all day; unfortunately, (or perhaps fortunately) i couldn't comment from work. how ironic-- the pious, conscious, noble Saurav who wants to make sure no one is left out is the one who makes me a token.

Anna, I don't really want to continue this "dialogue," but I do want to address your point because it's important and I want to clarify what I was saying--which I think you misread. No one said that because you're a woman, you're here because of that (I have no idea what the process was that went into any of you being chosen). What I said was that the overall tone of the blog is "middle class/upwardly mobile/professional hetero male Indian American" and that has to do with a number of structural elements to the blog (in addition to other things). You yourself have pointed out how often your looks get commented on; are you seriously arguing that the atmosphere created by the blog has nothing to do with that? Do you really like listening to men talking about women the way they do here on occasion?

And as for all the other adjectives I listed as part of the tone--I think they fit your voices, choices, politics, etc. fairly well. The point is that if you bring other types of perspectives in (over time, or perhaps in other ways that are not within SM but making a conscious effort to post things), perhaps there would be less grounds for complaint. The point isn't to abandon all the values of SM as it exists right now--just that it move towards a direction that's more genuinely reflective of different kinds of perspectives (both on and offline).

And stating that we readers don't know waht's going on behind the scenes because you choose not to tell us and therefore we need to just be quiet and have faith is a really poor argument given that Abhi has already laid out an argument for why I shouldn't have any faith at all in that, and Manish has echoed that idea.

The only sm blogger who has remotely engaged my criticism in an open way is Amardeep because (I think) he also understands that a "South Asian" voice that goes no further and doesn't look at any of hte dynamics within what "South Asian" means is a poor way to go about things. I think this is especially so with the amount of social capital you're all accumulating.

You guys get mad props from all the other folks here most of the time (on anniversaries, blah blah blah), so I hope that one thread with intense critique from me (even if i was nasty about it--which, again, i apologize for) hopefully won't kill you.

vurdlife, thanks for the support. biharis continue to be the best people in the world :)

The only sm blogger who has remotely engaged my criticism in an open way...

Courtesy goes a long way.

I think this is especially so with the amount of social capital you're all accumulating.

The accumulation of capital doesn't automatically demand expropriation ;)

Beyond denigrating SM for its shocking lack of desi dropouts and Pakistani proletarians, what "class based" perspective does he contribute?

I think it is fairly obvious from reading the comments on this blog that he contributes plenty of class-based arguments that have nothing to do with SM or its denigration.

And why would class warfare be worth injecting into the debate anyway? Newsflash: Marxism died with the end of the Soviet Union. Deng Xiaoping and Manmohan Singh got the message...why haven't you?

There is a distinction between classism and "class warfare". I suppose its all a commie-pinko haze to your discerning mind.

It's about ego, not about "vitality and validity".

Your posts clearly establish that, unfortunately.

The above reminds me of nothing so much as the contentless page fillers I used to see back when I graded freshman essays.

You don't want to play the "I'm smarter than you" game with me, bucko. It is a game you have repeatedly lost in the past and will continue to do so.

Now explain to me how AALDEF propogates the equivalence between fundamentalist Muslim and brown. Very curious to know

I'm talking about the left-wing useful idiots of Hindu descent who stop the deportation of Muslim fundies...

AALDEF is not a Hindu organization, and a very small part of their makeup is Hindu for that matter. So even if your points are valid (they're not, they are drivel), you're still over-generalizing and misinformed.

I didn't see AALDEF champing at the bit to defend Eric Rudolph or Myron Tereschuk.

They have not been surveilled or prosecuted solely on the basis of their race or ethnicity. Its the Asian American Legal Defense Fund (AALDEF), not the Randon White Guy Legal Defense Fund (RWGLDF).

The non-Muslim browns at AALDEF disgust me...it is they who are the real racists, as they impede FBI investigations and defend Muslim terrorists just because they share the same skin color.

Hey thats cool, HN browns like you disgust me as well. The above comment clearly shows that you speak from a position or ignorance and privilege. AALDEF does not defend terrorists, it defends people who are ensnared by the FBI and the government's attack on brown people.

I'm talking about the left-wing useful idiots of Hindu descent who stop the deportation of Muslim fundies...fundies who'd slit their throat if given the chance.

Before labelling the entire set of people who AALDEF and similar organizations have represented at deportation hearings as "fundies" try talking to one of them. Even one. Because I'm willing to bet a lot of money you've never done so.

(Disclaimer: I don't work for AALDEF).

I'm talking about Indians who blur the difference between "Indian" on the one hand and "Pakistani/Bangladeshi" on the other hand...a cultural difference of utmost importance when it comes to the propensity for terrorism.

Go read "India for Beginners" or something. Maybe a dictionary, I dunno, its a waste of time educating you. Newslfash: India, Pakistan and Bangladesh are different countries, not cultures. Many groups in India share the same culture/language/ethnicity as many groups in Pakistan and Bangladesh. And you seem to equate Muslim culture with terrorism, I thought I'd inform you that India has the largest Muslim population of any country in the world.

Courtesy goes a long way.

You are not the person to be raising this point on this thread to me.

Courtesy unresponded to sometimes has the unfortunate consequence of turning into rudeness. I'm not the first person to bring up related points and I won't be the last; I'm just the only one that's managed to provoke a response in recent times (and an inadequate one at that), and this is unfortunately what it took. Perhaps someone more courteous than me will get through to you; or perhaps someone will have to do the same thing again three months from now. As Black Sheep says, the choice is yours.

The accumulation of capital doesn't automatically demand expropriation ;)

Correct. It demands claims of accountability by the people who have contributed to it and are potentially affected by it, rather than quiet obedience or departure in the face of nonresponsiveness. As it turns out, one of the more unfortunate quirks of human nature is that people in control of resources often don't like to be questioned on how they use them or what they're doing with them.

Great post on the India Day parade; I'm sure the absence of a corresponding one on the Pakistan Day Parade beyond a throwaway line (or perhaps even a post on the problems with national identification for people who identify as South Asian!) has nothing to do with the points I raised above ;)

gc, your post disgusts me.

Yes, lots of white people hate Muslims, and if they could tell the difference, would leave the sikhs and hindus alone to persecute the Muslims. However, if all the muslims were put in camps or deported or whatever, then they'd focus on the non-Muslim desis. You don't think Americans are upset over outsourcing, etc, and wouldn't continue such remarks like dothead or sand nigger? Even if all muslims were wiped out, the Christians would turn their attention to Hindus, etc.

gc, YOU don't understand sharia. They're defending the sharia that governs inheritance laws, divorce, family living, and a hierarchy of authority of scholars that leads with a caliph, a Muslim pope basically. I mean, it wasn't extreme when Catholics worldwide wanted a new Pope chosen, the same with Muslims.

You're saying that people who defend Sami Al-Arian and the Buffalo Five are insane, far-left, and undermining America and our safety? Puhlease. Sami Al-Arian is a weak case, accused of being a mastermind and secret head of a terrorist organization, at a trial brought after he was failed to be fired by a college for being pro-Palestinian. The Buffalo Five were basically declared innocent by a judge, but were forced to plead guilty to some minor weapons violation or whatever because the Bush administration threatened to make them Enemy combatants because, well, just because.

If you want to say that race isn't important but religion is a basis to judge and discriminate people, then you're breaking the First Amendment and being a real jerk. Are you saying don't profile all brown people, just Muslims? Let's go sew gold stars, no, gold crescents to everyone's shirts again and repeat history.

You are not the person to be raising this point on this thread to me.

Since you're unaware of what causes offense, let me spell it out: Hijacking another thread, flaming someone's choice of topic and not asking whether there's a legitimate reason to close comments is rude. Repeating it is rude. Your repeated rants about this blog are already a minor legend. Harping on how you would write this blog does not help your cause.

... people in control of resources often don't like to be questioned on how they use them or what they're doing with them.

I missed the part where a free blog with zero revenues done by people in their spare time suddenly became Halliburton. The 'resources' I 'control' are what I say and how I say it, and I'll defend that freedom to the death.

Great post on the India Day parade; I'm sure the absence of a corresponding one on the Pakistan Day Parade beyond a throwaway line... has nothing to do with the points I raised above ;)

Or maybe the fact that the parade hasn't happened yet.

Or maybe that we're not a paper of record, we're a blog. Where we write about things which interest us. And where we have every right to write about, and exclusively about, India Day, Cthulu Day or Flying Spaghetti Monster Day as the whim strikes.

You might want to spend less time trying to control what others write and more time writing what you want to read. You're increasingly sounding like those who see something they want and dress up coercion in the guise of morality.

If you don't like the blog, don't read it. If it's missing what you'd like to read, write it. Simple as that.

In the meantime, Saurav, I think you're 'hegemonist' and morally bankrupt for not writing about the underrepresented topics I obsess about: literature, motorcycling and salsa. It's beyond me how you can sleep at night ;)

It is a game you have repeatedly lost in the past and will continue to do so.

You do realize this sentence is ungrammatical, don't you? Writing this in earnest is like wearing a T-shirt emblazoned with "your retarded"...minus the sense of irony. In fact, that particular faux pas is characteristic of your verbal diarrhea:

Fuck all yall...you wont listen, thats cool...goddamned idiot. Hows that?...how AALDEF propogates...Thats like...Afghan mujahadeen...I suppose its all...Its the...thats cool

In case you *still* don't get it, I'll demonstrate with a sentence: "You're retarded." (Note that tricky apostrophe!)

You don't want to play the "I'm smarter than you" game with me, bucko.

Heh:

Overall, the results showed that incompetence is even worse than it appears to be, and forms a sort of unholy trinity of cluelessness. The incompetent don't perform up to speed; don't recognise their lack of competence; and don't even recognise the competence of other people.

David Dunning explained why he took up this kind of research: "I am interested in why people tend to have overly favourable and objectively indefensible views of their own abilities, talents and moral character. For example, a full 94% of college professors state that they do 'above average' work, although it is statistically impossible for virtually everybody to be above average."

In any case, what's with this sudden focus on IQ? Don't leftists believe that intelligence is a construct of the white patriarchy? Isn't everyone "equal", after all, according to your dogma -- from the boyz in da hood to the semiliterate professional ethnics like yourself? I'm interested in finding out how you reconcile this belief with the facts on the ground. Specifically, I suppose the perenially "underrepresented" can at least claim "racism" to explain away their sorry academic performance...but what excuse do you have for not cracking 1000 on the SAT?

HN types

I'm an American nationalist and an atheist, not a Hindu nationalist. But with respect to the issue of Muslim terrorism at least, Christians, Hindus, and Jews -- and Americans, Indians, and Israelis -- are all on the same side as us atheists. Hypocrites like yourself who selectively apply secularism to the *least* medieval religions might not understand this.

try talking to one of them.

Oh, I know the type far too well. Fundies are fundies. I've lost family to Muslim terror in India. In this case, familiarity breeds contempt. It's kind of like the sight-unseen contempt you have for Christian conservatives and Hindu nationalists...except it's justified.

Your belief system is a canonical example of backwards leftism: hatred for Christians and Hindus (and Jews"Zionists") along with oodles of tolerance for those pooooor, misunderstood jihadists -- the ones who're really teddy bears when you meet them in person, when they're not screaming "Death to the Great Satan!", that is...

TAMPA - A new tape submitted in the trial of Sami Al-Arian provided some of the most memorable images yet for jurors who will decide if the former USF professor is a terrorist ringleader.

It's not the first video of Al-Arian at a conference or meeting that the jury has been shown, but what made it significant was the blatant talk of terrorism and violence -- with Al-Arian in the middle of it all.

The video begins with chanting children -- young girls singing, "Death to Israel." Minutes later, Sami Al-Arian takes the podium, rallying the crowd with talk of jihad, saying at one point, "Jihad is our course. Victory is to Islam and death to Israel." Al-Arian goes on to tell the crowd God made the Jewish people into monkeys and pigs.

So tell me, vurdlife...does hearing "one of them" in living color count as "talking to one of them"? Did you become convinced of the essential goodness of Islamic fundamentalists after the line about "American pig dogs", the one on "Hindu devil worshippers", or the bit about "Jewish monkeys"? Curious bystanders want to know.

This, by the way, is the motivation for Hindutva. I certainly don't sign on to the whole package, but what you don't get is that Hindu fundamentalism is a reactive ideology, a reaction to Islamic terror. Take away the Muslims, and Hindus are pretty docile. Proof: look around the world at the Hindu diaspora. Compare and contrast to the Islamic diaspora. As demonstrated by a glance at any map of the world's ongoing wars, there is an obvious pattern: Islam has bloody borders. From the Balkans to Indonesia, from the smoking crater of Ground Zero to the smoking crater of the London Underground, Muslim minorities cause trouble -- often violent, explosive trouble.

And when they aren't blowing stuff up, they're agitating for sharia in Canada, forcing their women to wear jilbabs in Britain, committing 'honor' killings in Germany, defending the stoning of homosexuals in the US of A, and mugging the leftists stupid enough to defend them in France.

And, of course, setting off four hundred simultaneous bombs in Bangladesh.

you seem to equate Muslim culture with terrorism, I thought I'd inform you that India has the largest Muslim population of any country in the world.

Oh, you'd inform me, would you? :) Hahahaha, well...I hate to break it to you, but the country with the largest Muslim population is actually Indonesia, with more than 195 million Muslims. If you knew *anything* about the subject, you might remember that they had some star performers recently on the world stage...star performers who got a slap on the wrist for the cold blooded murder of 200 people. Guess those "moderates" didn't show up at sentencing!

For your edification, number two with a bullet (or a well placed bomb, as is often their choice) is Pakistan with 135 million. India is only number three, with 120 million practitioners of the "Religion of Peace".

Can you salvage anything from this glaring display of ignorance? At first glance...no. Given the patented vurdlife combination of factual error and hysterical grammar, one might think your original sentence fragment actually had negative information content. After all, if you believed it, you'd know less about the world than you did before you heard it! That's not surprising, because it bears the mark of the leftist levelling impulse gone berserk; all must be "equal" in guilt, whether they be Hindu and Muslim -- or killer and victim. And lies don't matter if you're PC, for standard operating procedure is to "balance the ledger" through legerdemain.

But be that as it may, to the extent this non-fact corresponds to reality, it might explain *why* India is the number one victim of Muslim terror. So how exactly does it mitigate against my central thesis? To restate:

you seem to equate Muslim culture with terrorism

The equation is simple: more Muslims = generally more terrorism. Given that Muslims are blowing things up from Bali to Britain, from Chechnya to China, and from Israel to Iraq...and given that Muslim-owned TV cheers them on as shahids all the way...and given the hundreds of millions of Muslims with positive opinions of Osama bin Laden...forgive me if I think there is much to this equation.

Damn, did I miss Cthulu Day again?

Since you're unaware of what causes offense, let me spell it out: Hijacking another thread, flaming someone's choice of topic and not asking whether there's a legitimate reason to close comments is rude. Repeating it is rude. Your repeated rants about this blog are already a minor legend. Harping on how you would write this blog does not help your cause.

So your argument is that you, by fiat, closed comments on a thread with a potentially controversial topic (the writing of which, incidentally, completely failed to reflect your own alleged beliefs about South Asian unity) without providing any explanation. As a response, other people should therefore not comment publicly on that in a participatory site in the spaces that are available to them that, for better or for worse, designed to address desi issues that the MSM doesn't cover (by your description). I'll leave it to other people to decide which is more uncivil, given our respective power to express our opinions in this space on this set of issues.

But I won't deny that I was unnecessarily rude in this thread and some others. I apologize, but, again, I point out, I haven't always been on issues which touch on this overaching topic of inclusiveness and how it reflects in the blog posts and the blog as a whole.

I missed the part where a free blog with zero revenues done by people in their spare time suddenly became Halliburton. The 'resources' I 'control' are what I say and how I say it, and I'll defend that freedom to the death.

Hence I used the term social capital. Look into it. It's only if you make money from something that you're responsible to the people potentially affected by it?

By the way, let's not pretend that this social capital you have, down the road, is not convertible to financial gain if you chose to do so (which there is nothing to stop you from doing since you largely deny claims of accountability to your readership or the community that you write about).

In any case, you're not writing on your individual blog here--you're writing on a collective space in which there's a significant contribution by people like me and many, many other who sustain a dialogue and that reaches tens if not hundreds of thousands of people over the course of a few months? Hence there's a need for balance between creative direction by you guys and your responsibility to your readership and the people you affect (you know, like how you think cartoonists and radio DJs have that responsibility?).

All I've done is angry, loud, vehement, semi-controversial individual critique in the context of the space you set up and largely according to its rules. The farthest I went towards suggesting some form of structural regulation on what you say and don't say in this post was to implicitly propose a public editor or an ombudsman of some kind.

Obviously you can write what you want and there's little I can do to stop you from doing that on the long run wiithout bothering to engage in tactcs that I'd rather not spend the time or energy on. So have fun.

Or maybe the fact that the parade hasn't happened yet.

You're right and I apologize. It was a badly chosen example of a trend. I should have just pointed to the Indian National Independence post.

You might want to spend less time trying to control what others write and more time writing what you want to read.

Why?

You're increasingly sounding like those who see something they want and dress up coercion in the guise of morality.

Okay.

If you don't like the blog, don't read it. If it's missing what you'd like to read, write it. Simple as that.

If you don't like what cartoon writers produce or the Jersey Guys say, then just ignore them. Produce your own cartoons or radio broadcasts. Simple as that.

In the meantime, Saurav, I think you're 'hegemonist' and morally bankrupt for not writing about the underrepresented topics I obsess about: literature, motorcycling and salsa. It's beyond me how you can sleep at night ;)

You made it through almost an entire comment without being unnecessarily glib and offbase in a way that totally ignores the context of the conversation. Oh well.

And as a final note, I don't think any of you are morally bankrupt--especially given that I don't know you, just like you don't really know me. I just think your politics about collective blogs and identity politics (especially as reflected in this blog and how you choose to construct it and approach it) are narrowminded, shallow, and, most generally, suck.

I'd frame it in a more polite way, but I'd rather be good to myself than to you right now.

The farthest I went towards suggesting some form of structural regulation on what you say and don't say in this post was to implicitly propose a public editor or an ombudsman of some kind.

i'm curious-- is there a blog that does this? how would it work? i've never read a blog with an ombudsman. you said many things, but this is what i can't stop pondering...

You do realize this sentence is ungrammatical, don't you? Writing this in earnest

It wasn't in earnest, this is a blog for Krishna's sake, not one of those intro level courses you TA'ed at Podunk University. Is that the best you can do?

but what excuse do you have for not cracking 1000 on the SAT?

Ahahah. Lets put it this way. It is mathematically impossible for you to have done better on the SAT's than me. Figure that out genius.

Fundies are fundies.

For your edification, number two with a bullet (or a well placed bomb, as is often their choice) is Pakistan with 135 million. India is only number three, with 120 million practitioners of the "Religion of Peace".

Don't leftists believe that intelligence is a construct of the white patriarchy? Isn't everyone "equal", after all, according to your dogma -- from the boyz in da hood to the semiliterate professional ethnics like yourself?

No, you are clearly an idiot.

Given that Muslims are blowing things up from Bali to Britain, from Chechnya to China, and from Israel to Iraq

Americans are blowing up things all over the world too. Does that mean American culture should be equated with terrorism? How many innocent civilians have died in Iraq and Afghanistan vis a vis how many died due to Islamic terrorism in all of its forms?

i swear, i'd pay good rupees to see you and gc diss debate each other in person. all the bluster of cable pundits, none of the wrinkly pink skin. ;)

Podunk University

You have no idea. :)

It is mathematically impossible for you to have done better on the SAT's than me.

Interesting, because the same is true for me (and, if I'm not mistaken, Manish). If you don't believe me, just email Manish, Vinod, Razib, etc. So I guess we'll have to call that a tie.

But a 1-1 score there means nothing when you've lost every other point -- for what exactly is your link supposed to prove other than that you were wrong, again?

Although 80.5 percent of the people are Hindus, India is also home to the third largest population of Muslims in the world

*Not* the largest as you claimed. With respect to the specific figures, those depend on the year and source of citation...but the rank order's remained invariant for quite a while now. So your attempt to draw an equivalence between Islamic fundamentalism and Indian civilization by stressing the absolute number of Muslims in India simply failed. You know as well as I do that majority Muslim countries -- unlike India -- generally don't have elections or a democratic tradition. You also know that nations ruled by Hindus and Christians are tolerant of Muslims, but the converse is generally *not* true.

But yet you persist in drawing ludicrous equivalences like the following:

How many innocent civilians have died in Iraq and Afghanistan vis a vis how many died due to Islamic terrorism in all of its forms?

Afghanistan was ruled by the Taliban. Were you really against deposing the *Taliban*? You know, the guys who converted soccer stadiums into open-air execution chambers where they shot innocent women in the head?

As for Iraq, the majority of civilians who've died there have been blown up by Islamic fundamentalists -- *on purpose*. If America wanted to kill civilians at random, there'd be a *lot* more dead people than there are now.

But something about this country makes us refrain from running Humvees packed with explosives into groups of children while yelling "Allahu Akbar". That something's called *civilization*.

your boy Pat Robertson

You're desperate. You're really scraping the bottom of the barrel here. Pat Robertson is a moron, and I've never defended him. I'm an American nationalist and atheist, not a Christian evangelist. Robertson could die tomorrow and the earth would be a better place.

Can you say the same for the Islamic fundies? I think not...which is why you're an apologist:

Before labelling the entire set of people who AALDEF and similar organizations have represented at deportation hearings as "fundies" try talking to one of them. Even one.

The clear implication here is that if I talked to one of them -- *any* of them -- I'd see that they weren't fundies. You're a liberal caricature in living color, the kind of person who believes Christian fundamentalism is a bigger threat than Islamic fundamentalism...the kind who variously maintains that Islamic fundies don't exist, or aren't a threat, or that we deserve their tender mercies anyway for fighting the Cold War.

And insofar as you enable Islamic fundies to carry on in this country, contributing to the defenses of the Sami Al-Arians and Abdul Rahmans, you're part of the problem.

Push it far enough, and you'll end up like Lynn e Stewart:

A New York jury on Thursday convicted U.S. attorney Lynne Stewart and two other defendants of helping terrorists and lying to the U.S. government.

Stewart was found guilty of all five counts naming her, including conspiracy to defraud the United States, providing and concealing material support, and making false statements....

Stewart, Sattar and Yousry had been on trial for seven months, accused of abetting terrorism by distributing messages from imprisoned Sheik Omar Abdel-Rahman.

An Egyptian Muslim cleric, Abdel-Rahman is the spiritual leader of the Islamic Group, an organization the United States labels a terrorist organization that sought the overthrow of Egypt's government.

Rahman, 66, is serving a life sentence after being convicted in 1995 of conspiring to bomb bridges, tunnels and landmark buildings in Manhattan. Followers of the sheik were among the terrorists who bombed the World Trade Center in 1993.

That's what happens when you move over the line, from simply defending Muslim fundies at every opportunity to actively aiding and abetting them. But I'm sure that AALDEF and its ilk would never do that...

Abdul Rahmans

Heh. You know, for a second I confused Abdel-Rahman -- Stewart's "client" -- with Abdul Rahman:

Abdul Rahman Yasin is wanted for his alleged participation in the terrorist bombing of the World Trade Center, New York City, on February 26, 1993, which resulted in six deaths, the wounding of numerous individuals, and the significant destruction of property and commerce.

First, it's funny that there are *so many* Muslim terrorists out to destroy the US that they had a namespace overlap of this kind. And it's not the first -- there's also the potential Mohammed Atta confusion in the Able Danger business. Funny, isn't it, how there aren't *two* Gandhis, Wangs, Cohens, or Smiths on the FBI's most wanted terrorist list -- let alone *one*. Why is that, I wonder? :)

Second, this Abdul Rahman was born in America -- in Bloomington, Indiana. But don't question his patriotism!

It is mathematically impossible for you to have done better on the SAT's than me.

only on a brown blog would the "my dick is bigger" contest hinge on SAT scores. ;) hilarious.

only on a brown blog would the "my dick is bigger" contest hinge on SAT scores.

And only on such a blog would 1600's be essentially unexceptional... ;)

So who scored 170+ on LSAT here ?

So who scored 170+ on LSAT here ?

Correction: Did anybody (gasp) score less than 170 here ?

It is mathematically impossible for you to have done better on the SAT's than me.

Interesting, because the same is true for me (and, if I'm not mistaken, Manish).

You're mistaken.

sigh. say it ain't so, manish. now i have to crush on you a little less. ;)

wow...

so this is my first time on this site...and I don't know whether to be offended or amused at the absurdity of GC's posts.

I read through all the posts but I'm not sure if I'm understanding his/her point...so one quick question for GC: I'm a fairly religious Muslim but not a fundo, I think my past occupations and career aspirations will prove that. I was raised in America but have family back in the homeland, some of whom have been killed as a result of terrorism. I also hope to one day have children and pass on my Islamic values to them.

Now maybe it's because I didn't rock the SAT like you (to be honest, I never took the SAT)...but when you say "more Muslims = generally more terrorism" are you calling me, a cute little Muslim girl from the midwest, a terrorist? Or that my procreating will result in more terrorism??

Or when you say I am a part of "a community that...would treat [non muslims] ... poorly" that I'd, God forbid, slit the throat of most of my friends, co-workers, or college roommates?

These are only a few questions that came to mind while reading through your scary posts.

This is in no way a provocation, I'm not trying to fight, diss, or debate you because that would be futile endeavor. There is no logical way to argue against a ludicrous generalized statement. I mean, isn't that what they tell us not to do in debate club? (To make generalized statements and debate scaries like you)

If I'm understanding your posts correctly; trying to change your opinion is as easy as convincing the "fundies" (I'm not using your definition of this term. I mean the real fundos, not the average Joe...or more accurately - the average Ahmed) that not all Americans are evil ...or as easy as building a time machine, sneaking into Nazi Germany and trying to convince Hitler that Jews have the right to exists. Yeah...it'll be that difficult.

Sooo, in conclusion, my point is that I know I'm not a terrorist and I know I don't support terrorism...but do you think my existence perpetuates terrorism?

Hopefully, due to my lack of prowess in coastal standardized tests, I did misunderstand your posts. Maybe you can clarify your position a little?

If I didn't misunderstand and you answerd yes to my question...then you're wrong, frighteningly so. Also, you're probably ugly.

wha?! so maybe I am provoking you.

Maybe you can clarify your position a little?

Ugh don't bother engaging him, he's the resident troll on SM. The opportunity cost is just too high.

Most of your points issue from a place of presumption, presumptuousness and down-right ignorance, but I'll address them anyway, mostly to educate you my child.

So your attempt to draw an equivalence between Islamic fundamentalism and Indian civilization by stressing the absolute number of Muslims in India simply failed

Study Indian history. Muslims and Muslim culture have helped shape India into what it is today. If you want to ascribe success to India, you indirectly invalidate your own harangues against Muslims.

Push it far enough, and you'll end up like Lynn e Stewart:

Robertson could die tomorrow and the earth would be a better place.

Can you say the same for the Islamic fundies? I think not...

Show humility. You are in no position to assign value to human life. You haven't "earned that shit".

Interesting, because the same is true for me

The clear implication here is that if I talked to one of them -- *any* of them -- I'd see that they weren't fundies. You're a liberal caricature ...[seething, frothing drivel]

That is not the implication, that is the point.

That's what happens when you move over the line, from simply defending Muslim fundies at every opportunity to actively aiding and abetting them. But I'm sure that AALDEF and its ilk would never do that...

If America wanted to kill civilians at random, there'd be a *lot* more dead people than there are now.

But something about this country makes us refrain from running Humvees packed with explosives into groups of children while yelling "Allahu Akbar". That something's called *civilization*.

"Yeah we kill a lot of innocent people, but not like those others guys"....look who is desperate.

You also know that nations ruled by Hindus and Christians are tolerant of Muslims, but the converse is generally *not* true.

I am glad that someone out there remembers Niger. On the 15th, the "president" of Niger kicked the BBC out of famine-stricken areas and told the local media--which, in Niger, mostly means radio---to shut up about "the situation" or be considered to have joined the mutineers. (According to the last BBC post to BBC International Online, which was print only, there was another mutiny beginning within the army in Niger; the army seems to be armed by France, the U.S., and the Chinese.)

There has been virtually no news on Niger since then. One vague, confused Washington Post article about the worsening famine from somewhere near the border. For all we know there may be another Rwanda happening in Niger right now but there seems to be a total media blackout. For some reason, however, there is all sorts of news about the war in Somalia.

This president of Niger has to be seriously sociopathic because he said, last week, that "the people of Niger are obviously well-fed." I wrote to ask the BBC why they weren't screaming about this; I can imagine several reasons, but that and calling the embassies of Niger and France were all I could think to do. I landed on this site looking to see if there was any more news on Niger. This is what I got.

What has muslim culture down for India or any country? There have been no real post-islamic advances in societies. All the advances made by islamic culture were actually previously made be the pre-islamic peoples of the region or the recent converts. Islam creates a completely stagnant society. Regardless of what the Greeks, Indians, Persians, Mesopotamians, Egyptians etc in the past were made without islam.

As for partition, there are still muslims within India, while both Bangladesh and Pakistan were allowed to eliminate all Hindus inside their borders. This is the religion of peace. The concept of jihad and islamic law. A muslim is allowed to insult or provoke a person of any other faith by whatever means necessary, but a non-muslim cannot insult islam. A non-muslim must pay a tax for being non-muslim and if they do not they face lethal consequences. Stop paying the jizya tax and see what happens to the infidel. A person can become an infidel by simply not paying a tax for being non-muslim. Lest we not forget the millions of christians, jews, Zoroastrians, Hindus and Buddhists killed in islamic holy war. While other religions may have fanatics that claim they do not act in the name of the respective religion. It is very well outlined in the koran how and exactly what to do with an infidel. The abrahamic twins of christianity and judaism are not much better, and all have one singular world view which is undeniably true. Whereas Hinduism allows people to believe in their own way, without infringing upon the beliefs or rights of others. There is only a one way path in all abrahamic religions, which makes it completely incompatible with Indian religions.