Many ideologies are dreadful but this one takes the cake (at least in this day and age). Malala’s school van was stopped by 2 gunmen. They asked the driver to show them who Malala is. He said he couldnt show his girls to strangers (exact dialog uncertain, but something like that..brave man..btw, will codepink protest this use of patriarchal honor codes to try and protect a girl from terrorists? one wonders). One gunman asked the girls in the van. They looked towards Malala, he shot her in the head (and shot two other girls for good measure). Details here.
The Taliban have taken the time to explain why they shot her and how shooting a 14 year old girl as she comes home from school is the Islamic thing to do (argument from Quran and Hadith, with references): https://www.facebook.com/boltapakistan1/posts/408721602528919
OK. I know about riots in India. I know child soldiers and suicide bombers were used by the Tamil Tigers. Thousands of Bengalis and Biharis and Punjabis and Balochis have died for Islam, Pakistan, Hindustan, whatever. MANY thousands more die of poverty, disease, malnutrition etc. Police beat up more people every day than the Taliban do.
But in which case has a supposedly modern state failed for more than 10 years to even identify its enemies?
Pakistan is a special case.
That doesnt mean any of Zachary’s posts about the great capitalist/IT/education/whatever success stories of Pakistan are wrong. Its still people. 200 million of them. Its a big economy. Its home to ancient cultures that developed many sound survival mechanisms, including our much maligned nepotism and pragmatic determination to help our kith and kin even when they have sinned. But the state ideology was confused and dangerous from day one and the elite’s inability to change course has put more pressure on our ancient strengths than those ancient strengths can bear.
The elite will have to wake up before its too late.
I think they will. But they will do it as late as possible. I want them to hurry up a little. Take a few short cuts instead of waiting for every bad idea to blow up in our face before we decide to dump it. Dont take my advice. Take Zachary’s. But please, dont take Ahmed Qureshi’s and Imran Khan’s.
Actually, even take Imran Khan’s advice if thats the only way left. A number of Western commentators (especially journalists from cricketing nations; Bob Crilly, I am looking at you) seem to have decided that the poor retarded brown people cannot do any better and its Imran Khan or bust. Maybe they are right. White people sometimes are. Maybe he is exactly the kind of confused moron we need to put up as a distraction while the army changes course more thoroughly. Allah works in mysterious ways.
But please, lets not have codepink visit us again for a few years. And if their need for street cred in NYC overwhelms them again, can we please send them to guard girls schools in FATA instead of making the poor souls suffer without toilets in SUVs on the bumpy road to Tank?
I was going to say nasty things about our upperclass university pomo poco bullshitters as well, but better sense prevailed. It is our fault for paying attention to them. Let them discuss Humera Iqtedar’s thesis (summarized with some creative license by history buff Shahid Saeed as: “TTP attacked b/c Malala promoting secularism. She is promoting secularism b/c of Taliban attacks. TTP secularizing public space” ) and let them congratulate each other and thrill to the applause of other equally Western educated members of the elite. More urgent problems deserve attention.
btw, here is the great white hope himself: Imran Khan on live with Talat. Watch near the end (36 minute mark onwards):
Talat: who attacked her?
IK: someone must have.
Talat: why dont you say their name. Who?
IK: Could be Taliban (Talian hon gey)…but we have a constraint (hamari majboori hai). We are present all across KP and FATA. IF i say big things against the taliban, WHO WILL SAVE THOSE PEOPLE? WILL THE POLICE SAVE THEM?
Indeed. It is a dilemma for Khan sahib. If he says anything against the Taliban, who will save his people?
The ANP says things everyday and look what has happened. Hundreds of their workers have been targeted. Mian Iftikhar Hussain has lost his only son. Khan sahib will not make that mistake (even though his sons are in UK and his daughter, who he wont acknowledge, is in America). He thinks about the safety of his people. If Malala and her dad had thought about their OWN safety, she would not be in ICU today. Silence is golden.
His vice chairman, the odious Shah Mahmood Qureshi has also been on TV, lying through both sides of his mouth. The future looks really bright for PTI.
Everyone is to blame. The clueless, corrupt and incompetent Zardari regime. The two-faced army, oscillating between shit-scared of Taliban and shit-scared of America and still working on their hundred onion and hundred slaps strategy. All the other political parties. Even the ANP, a party with many heroes, but also a “leader” like Asfandyar Wali.
But I still think the elite will not commit suicide. After exhausting all other possibilities they will find some way to protect the golden goose that actually works (my serious prediction: one day GHQ will ask the Indo-Tibetan Border Police to please come and help defend Islamabad). But I happened to speak with a friend in NYC who keeps a close eye on such things and he is not hopeful. His view: The elite is stuck deep in paknationalism and Islamism. Neither can be abandoned. Both are fatal in the Pakistani context, where the army managed to arm and train 50,000 holy warriors when it was dreaming of empire in the 1990s and has created a constituency for both in the public. Now those warriors cannot be disarmed without appearing to betray Islamism and Pakistan. And yet they must be disarmed, so Islamism and Pakistan must be betrayed. Immovable object meets irresistible force.
I am optimistic. I think both Islamism and Pakistan can be modified and betrayed and they willl still surviive and will in fact thrive. My friend thinks I am too optimistic. Betrayal and change is too hard. Even for a corrupt elite that happily betrays everything else and believes in absolutely no principle whatsoever…its not that they are so loyal to Islamism or Paknationalism. Its that they are too dumb to figure out whats needed. Lack of imagination is at the heart of their problem. That makes it hard. But not impossible. The moment will produce the man..
Time will tell. I guess.
A friend from Lahore asked for more abuse directed at poco pomo bullshitters and I made some rude comments about the upcoming Madison South Asia conference (see comments below). I now want to make amends by stating on record:
1. I dont think they are all bullshitters. In fact, almost all the people at that conference are serious academics. They do real research. They write papers. They teach classes. They know stuff. Frequently, a lot of stuff about their particular narrowly focused “area of interest”. Sometimes a lot of stuff, period. SOME are surely good old-fashioned bullshitters, but thats par for the course in academia (or almost any other field…less so in science, but it does happen there too).
2. There are a lot of things we would never know if one of these people had not put in months or years of work to dig it up out of archives and letters and other obscure sources. Thank you sirs. (and madams)
3. The overall worldview and political views are heavily biased; colored by upperclass western liberal groupthink and fashion; irrelevant or frankly wrong when it comes to proximate political struggles and actual decisions taken by various actors in real time. That too is par for the course. These people are not especially dumb. They are smart people. They are, for the most part, good people. But they are all goldfish and all the goldfish in that pond speak goldfish language..you cannot really communicate unless you talk the same way too. And fo course, none of the goldfish are catfish or bass or crabs or octopusses or other lifeforms that actually DO politics and fight battles (though there is a touching and romantic subculture of academics joining some obscure leftist party’s study circles or “street theater” to acquire street cred…but then, we are all human). Their language makes perfect sense to them. Their views are normal for their subculture.
4. Professional historians/students/teachers of “South Asian studies” are bound to think they know more than anyone else about what is REALLY happening in South Asia. That cannot be helped. It is our job to ignore them when they are wrong, not their job to shut up.
I hope that clarifies things.
This, btw, is the schedule of the conference: http://southasiaconference.wisc.edu/schedule/schedule.asp
Post postscript: the question of drone victims versus Malala is being discussed a lot. I wrote a short comment on Dhume’s WSJ article and am reproducing it here: all war involves killing and many have involved killing bystanders as well. To aim towards an end to ALL wars and all means of violently ending another person’s life is a worthy aim and much to be admired, but to bring up drone attacks in this context is to miss the point: Drones, F-16s, artillery shells, IEDs, all of these kill and maim in horrible ways (drones being the most discriminating and accurate of the lot, but still, its 25 pounds of high explosive…the results are much less dreadful than conventional war, but hardly pretty), but slowly, painfully, almost imperceptibly, humanity has reached a point where MOST communities and most individuals find the thought of walking up to a school van and shooting a 14 year old school girl in the head for something she said on TV, an unacceptable deviation from “normal” human behavior. These same communities and individuals (unfortunately) are still willing to countenance wars and all the horrors of wars (most being much worse than drones) as long as they feel their cause is just. This event is shocking because it is outside the hard-won limits our species has managed (loosely) to place around the use of violence for political ends.
That still matters.
Drone attacks are an at of war. Whether the war is justified or not, whether they are EFFECTIVE or not, whether the US president has the legal right to order warlike acts without specific authorization from congress to wage war on the Islamic emirate (it is important to realize that Pakistan has no control over the areas being targeted…this is between the Islamic emirate and NATO, with both parties clear that this is a war between them) are all important questions, but they are not relevant to Malala’s shooting.
What is even more disturbing that people without mask
are hovering over her. It is like these people have not
heard of bacteria, swelling of brain and meningitis, etc.
She should be in quarantine with the brain sealed as soon as
possible. NO amount of prayer is going to fix it just the best
trauma doctors. It seems Pakistan doesn’t even have that.
You didn’t ask the right question.
What does KSA want.
If America doesn’t get its way in Iran then it will focus on Pakistan.
It is all about the economy whether Pakistan can pay its debts to IMF.
Their trade with India might not rescue anything.
After Americans leave Afghanistan, it will be a free for all in their
with Pakistan army busy sending the Taliban to take over.
So the Army is waiting for Elections and Withdrawal especially
when American payments will stop as well.
It is in autopilot. with flooding, global warming, price of oil will determine
the poor people’s fate and the elites will hide in the cities and their gated community with bodyguards.
Your penultimate paragraph should be printed on a shirt and distributed at every gathering of paknationalists across the world…
I co-chaired a meeting of Ahsan Iqbal two nights ago, who I believe is the Secretary General of PML-N.
I was impressed by the broad, educated and liberal view that this man of the right had. I even told him that though I was strictly apolitical I was very encouraging of all his and his party’s effort; he made an extraordinarily convincing case.
For this man who is more technocrat than politician (for instance Pakistan apparently was the first country west of Singapore, either in Asia or the world I’m not so clear, that apparently installed fibre optic lines for the Internet) or a whole host of achievements that Pakistan has made furthermore PML-N are very keen on a comprehensive Indo-Pak settlement (before Mush went renegade the Lahore resolution between Vajpayee and Shariff included several far reaching protocols including the peaceful settlement of the outstanding Kashmir issue and a joint IndoPak representation at WTO); deep state really seems to have mucked it up.
I hope young Malala and her family are transported out of Pakistan to the West; until Pakistanis clean up their act they don’t deserve to have a different narrative other than the one of basket case and terror hub as imposed on them by the rest of the world.
Finally it always seems peculiar that the gravity of the attacks now seem to have shifted towards the most vulnerable; young girls. It’s symptomatic of the sick mindset that has infested Pak society that now those who should be protected are now on the front line.
btw, until last night the PMLN had not been able to use the word “Taliban”. They condemned the attack very sincerely, but could not bring themselves to say the word Taliban. Its going to be a long climb out…
Fear or sympathy?
I think mostly fear..
Hopefully this will be the wake up call Pakistan needs, but how many times has that been said before.
As long as the military keeps playing their intermission tapes while people feel the urge for a new party, existing Elites will keep sticking to their chairs. PPP/ANP/MQM/Leaue & Baloch Nationals will be voted by people as a reaction to the military. Awam meanwhile shall keep fighting Elites internal conflicts of interest. But one thing is also sure, Pakistan is not going down as Twin Towers as most would like to see or believe.
So what is the reluctance in freely using the word Taliban. The Pakistani Taliban has taken responsibility for this shooting. What is the downside for Imran in saying that? Though to be precise, the question asked by the moderator was “Who is behind these killings, bombs, attacks on army, institutions etc.” and not specifically about who shot the girl.
first i wish that you had said those nasty things! a quick thought. i agree to most of the things that you have said and any future prediction depends largely upon how one sees the glass. but it is also a question of capacity. suppose at some point in time the deep state decides to reverse its policy but some group of talibans go renegade and look for support elsewhere. does our military have the capacity to fight them? i seriously doubt that. plus the space paknationalism/islamism has carved out in the public sphere is unprecedented (secularism may also be on the up but its mostly inconsequential because the followers are toothless and homeopathic). this increased support for paknationalism coupled with anti-west sentiment and deteriorating economic situation is indeed a very unpleasent specter. there is another odious development, and that is the amount of fear the terrorists and even the lowest of the clergy have been able to create in public mind and that does not exclude top civil and military bureaucracy and the judiciary as well as the politicians. i guess the old order that came into being at the beginning of of the last century is about to come to an end in this part of south asia.
or may be i’m too furious to make any sensible prediction.
I urge you to write more. You know what is going on at ground level. Corrections from the ground are urgently needed.
The pomo poco bullshitters are gathering in Madison WI this weekend. If I had the time (and the money to waste..If I remember correctly they actually charge money for attending their BS) I would go and see whats up. But time is short and my usual happy tolerance is not at Zachary level this week.
Maybe later.
Having blown off some steam about out upperclass pomo poco brothers, I must add that its not all bullshit in Madison. I have added a short note to the post above to clarify…
I never understood why Imran the politician has a fan club. he seems opportunistic and a coward at best. What does he exactly represent to his followers? And the most dangerous thing is that Khan also takes his messiah image seriously. What Pakistan needs right now is an Ataturk. Someone who can take the religious lobbies head on and put them in the ground. Imran is way too cosy with the islamists and may be he is one.
Ataturk was a product of his time, when the fashionable sentiment in the West was not to tolerate barbarism in the Oriental world. The pomo poco bullshitters (as omar puts it) write the Western narrative now. So, for a high-class elite Pakistani immersed in Western culture, the idea of secularizing and developing his own country is very far from the fashionable! He will be encouraged at every turn to blame America/Israel/India, ask for more foreign aid, denounce “racism” and “Islamophobia” etc etc.
In this milieu, I think the emergence of an Ataturk-like figure is impossible. I do hope I’m wrong though.
Ataturk was also a staunch Turkish nationalist and despised ‘the religion of the Arabs’ in his own words. You are giving too much credit to the western attitudes.
Maybe I am but I was only trying to explain what I believe to be the limiting factor. I guess you’ve identified another limiting factor – possibility of being a nationalist without being wedded to the religion.
In Islam’s and only in Islam’s case it is immensely possible. Every muslim even if he lives in Timbuktu, has to bow down towards Mecca. Signifying the supremacy of the birth place. If you can turn someone into a nationalist and give them a semblance of reason they will find it offensive to their nationalism.
http://tribune.com.pk/story/447920/game-of-drones/ this is a pretty good article about the status of Pakistan tribal areas and Khan’s moral blindness and cowardice.
Pakistan needs an Ataturk— not going to happen.
It’s called the “Islamic Republic of Pakistan”–taking the Islamic out of that name is an impossible task and will not happen barring some major crisis. (And the majority of people in Pakistan would not want Islam taken out of public life…. that’s reality)
Talking about ground realities—life in Lahore goes on as normal…. Pakistan is not imploding tomorrow contrary to what some people on this site would like to happen!
Inevitability is never inevitable. Muslims thought they had it made after 1453. Things turned out very differently.
I think Imran Khan has a fan club because there is a constituency out there that desperately needs a leader. Middle class educated Pakistanis who were taught Paknationalism and mild-Islamism in school and who want to be microsoft professionals and IT entrepreneurs or whatever. They want to have their middle class microsoft cake and eat their paknationalism too. Nobody else is selling that combo. Khan sahib is good looking, he is a genuine sporting hero, he has done good work in charity, he seems sincere and he mindlessly repeats their favorite paknationalist tropes and seems to actually believe them. They desperately WANT to believe in someone like that. So all the contrary evidence, the political missteps, the U-turns, the contradictions…those are resolutely deleted from short term memory because they contradict the dream.
Actually having kaptaan in power will create problems, but until then his core constituency will buy almost any bullshit from him.
But is Khan sincere or is he a charlatan giving what the audience wants?
Truth be told, I don’t mind charlatans in politics. It is just that politics should not be run by people who believe in their own bullshit. A self aware charlatan like Bill Clinton is fine.
I think IK is BOTH. He is the worst of both worlds. Sincerely believes in his Islamist-socialdemocratic-Swedish-Paknationalist bullcrap and insincerely dances around taliban, army, drones etc.
Worst of both worlds.
His issue I feel is one of constantly rigidity.
Apparently his “tsunami” is now 30-50 seats only; will split the right vote.
Why now? Why not earlier? Much earlier? Anyone have any idea?
Omar,
Are you seriously passing up the opportunity to be lectured about “neglected progressive possibilities” of the Communists in Pakistan who were overtaken by nationalism and neo-liberal dacoits? How can you resist, “The entire history of the left in Pakistan raises critical questions regarding the weakness and missteps of democratic politics, which precluded their effective organization and thus hobbled their capacity to steer the course of events.” It’s only a lecture about how the Pak left lacked a Gurbanguly Berdymuhamedov of their own.
The Sri Lanka panel looks substantive, grounded in reality and actually interesting. “Governance.” What a silly bourgeois concern such that only one panel would even mention it. Go check that out.
All ye academics, can you tell me who the author of the abstract Nandlal quotes is likely to be? would Kamran Asdar Ali (chair of the session) have written this? or someone else?
Just curious.
I am talking about this panel: http://southasiaconference.wisc.edu/schedule/schedule.asp
It actually seems like an interesting conference–you can go hear people talk about such things as “Writing Telenganga” and “Drone Strikes–the Lost Pakistani narrative” among other stuff like conjugality and polyamory and what not–as far as academic conferences go, doesn’t sound too bad…..
Goes to show the US is losing its global power, when TTP and Altaf Hussain can threaten IK to silence, but he does not stop threatening the US for full-fledged war. Damned !
Omar, great article. But I’m afraid your friend from New York is right. The elite will not be able to deal with this. The cancer has already metastasized. A few years ago, perhaps it could have been done, but this has gone on too long. The government has no ability to even identify what to do, let alone do it. And there’s nothing that could really be done in the short term. The only thing that can turn things around is a revolution where a great majority decides that everything they have been taught, all the pious nonsense they have been fed, was just crap, and that a completely new start must be made. That kind of rethink usually requires much more trauma than has been suffered so far by the denizens of drawing rooms and coffee houses. The problem, as you indicate too, is that the seeds of Pakistan’s destruction were sown in its creation. In a nightmarish way, what we are seeing today is the logical consequence of “Pakistan ka matlab kya, laa ilaaha illallah”. It was not the extremists who decided to value the abstract “word of God” more than the welfare of humans; it was well-meaning leaders and their fervent middle-class followers who made that choice and thus created a country where humans would always be subordinate to any craziness that could be branded as Islam. Our parents and grandparents (well, some of them) hatched a holy baby monster. Now it is fully grown and hunting for prey. Instead of killing it young, the elite actually fed it on human flesh and blood, so that is what it hunts for.
I’m sure that, eventually, the problem will be “resolved”. It always s – even the Mongols left. But not before things get much, much worse. I wish I could think otherwise – as I once did.