How my eyes were opened to the barbarity of Islam

Is it racist to condemn fanaticism?
Phyllis Chesler

Once I was held captive in Kabul.
I was the bride of a charming, seductive and Westernised Afghan Muslim whom I met at an American college.
The purdah I experienced was relatively posh but the sequestered all-female life was not my cup of chai — nor was the male hostility to veiled, partly veiled and unveiled women in public.
When we landed in Kabul, an airport official smoothly confiscated my US passport. "Don’t worry, it’s just a formality," my husband assured me.
I never saw that passport again. I later learnt that this was routinely done to foreign wives — perhaps to make it impossible for them to leave.
Overnight, my husband became a stranger. The man with whom I had discussed Camus, Dostoevsky, Tennessee Williams and the Italian cinema became a stranger. He treated me the same way his father and elder brother treated their wives: distantly, with a hint of disdain and embarrassment.
In our two years together, my future husband had never once mentioned that his father had three wives and 21 children.
Nor did he tell me that I would be expected to live as if I had been reared as an Afghan woman.
I was supposed to lead a largely indoor life among women, to go out only with a male escort and to spend my days waiting for my husband to return or visiting female relatives, or having new (and very fashionable) clothes made.
In America, my husband was proud that I was a natural-born rebel and free thinker. In Afghanistan, my criticism of the treatment of women and of the poor rendered him suspect, vulnerable. He mocked my horrified reactions. But I knew what my eyes and ears told me. I saw how poor women in chadaris were forced to sit at the back of the bus and had to keep yielding their place on line in the bazaar to any man.

I saw how polygamous, arranged marriages and child brides led to chronic female suffering and to rivalry between co-wives and half-brothers; how the subordination and sequestration of women led to a profound estrangement between the sexes — one that led to wife-beating, marital rape and to a rampant but hotly denied male "prison"-like homosexuality and pederasty; how frustrated, neglected and uneducated women tormented their daughter-in-laws and female servants; how women were not allowed to pray in mosques or visit male doctors (their husbands described the symptoms in their absence).
Individual Afghans were enchantingly courteous — but the Afghanistan I knew was a bastion of illiteracy, poverty, treachery and preventable diseases. It was also a police state, a feudal monarchy and a theocracy, rank with fear and paranoia. Afghanistan had never been colonised. My relatives said: "Not even the British could occupy us." Thus I was forced to conclude that Afghan barbarism was of their own making and could not be attributed to Western imperialism.
Long before the rise of the Taleban, I learnt not to romanticise Third World countries or to confuse their hideous tyrants with liberators.
I also learnt that sexual and religious apartheid in Muslim countries is indigenous and not the result of Western crimes — and that such "colourful tribal customs" are absolutely, not relatively, evil. Long before al-Qaeda beheaded Daniel Pearl in Pakistan and Nicholas Berg in Iraq, I understood that it was dangerous for a Westerner, especially a woman, to live in a Muslim country.
In retrospect, I believe my so-called Western feminism was forged in that most beautiful and treacherous of Eastern countries.
Nevertheless, Western intellectual-ideologues, including feminists, have demonised me as a reactionary and racist "Islamophobe" for arguing that Islam, not Israel, is the largest practitioner of both sexual and religious apartheid in the world and that if Westerners do not stand up to this apartheid, morally, economically and militarily, we will not only have the blood of innocents on our hands; we will also be overrun by Sharia in the West. I have been heckled, menaced, never-invited, or disinvited for such heretical ideas — and for denouncing the epidemic of Muslim-on-Muslim violence for which tiny Israel is routinely, unbelievably scapegoated.
However, my views have found favour with the bravest and most enlightened people alive. Leading secular Muslim and ex-Muslim dissidents — from Egypt, Bangladesh, Iran, Iraq, Jordan, Pakistan, Syria and exiles from Europe and North America — assembled for the landmark Islamic Summit Conference in Florida and invited me to chair the opening panel on Monday.
According to the chair of the meeting, Ibn Warraq: "What we need now is an age of enlightenment in the Islamic world. Without critical examination of Islam, it will remain dogmatic, fanatical and intolerant and will continue to stifle thought, human rights, individuality, originality and truth." The conference issued a declaration calling for such a new "Enlightenment". The declaration views "Islamophobia" as a false allegation, sees a "noble future for Islam as a personal faith, not a political doctrine" and "demands the release of Islam from its captivity to the ambitions of power-hungry men".
Now is the time for Western intellectuals who claim to be antiracists and committed to human rights to stand with these dissidents. To do so requires that we adopt a universal standard of human rights and abandon our loyalty to multicultural relativism, which justifies, even romanticises, indigenous Islamist barbarism, totalitarian terrorism and the persecution of women, religious minorities, homosexuals and intellectuals. Our abject refusal to judge between civilisation and barbarism, and between enlightened rationalism and theocratic fundamentalism, endangers and condemns the victims of Islamic tyranny.
Ibn Warraq has written a devastating work that will be out by the summer. It is entitled Defending the West: A Critique of Edward Said’s Orientalism. Will Western intellectuals also dare to defend the West?

Phyllis Chesler is an Emerita Professor of Psychology and Women’s Studies at the City University of New York

Posted by Michael Blackburn on 11/11/2008

Barack Obama: Visionary Miminalist

By Kleinheider Posted on November 10, 2008 at 1:12 pm
From Cass Sunstein:

Political minimalism has a distinguished tradition in U.S. politics. In recent history, President George H.W. Bush stands as the leading minimalist.

To the extent that Bush succeeded, especially in foreign affairs, it was because he enlisted diverse people, and diverse views, on behalf of the policies he chose.
Other public officials are visionaries. They have a large-scale vision about the direction in which the nation should go. They believe in big steps, not small ones.
Above all, these visionaries seek to alter the nation’s self-conception. In changing policy on the economy, or on national defense, they are entirely comfortable with asserting that their vision is the superior one and that alternative visions should be rejected. When they succeed, they transform how the nation understands itself.
Our greatest presidents — including Washington, Lincoln, and Franklin Delano Roosevelt — have been visionaries. In recent American history, President Ronald Reagan stands as the leading visionary.
Obama is something new in American politics — and not just for the obvious reasons. He is a visionary minimalist. This is a key both to his extraordinary campaign and to his unique promise. It even helps explain his conception of public service.

http://politics.nashvillepost.com/2008/11/10/barack-obama-visionary-miminalist/

Time for a change

What appears at this point, to be an Obama victory, indicates that it is time for change on our part as well.
We need to get together and begin to heal the wounds that have developed in America over the last years.
We need to wish the President well and remember that its all about making the U.S. a better country, for all of us, and the world, and especially, our children and grandchildren.

Let us come together as one people.

Hello, everybody.
This is my regular Friday Blog.
A shout out to Michele, Toby, Mary Kate, Mary Ann, Michael, Nicky,Ashley, Logan,Dylan and All of You!

The U.N. record vis a vis Israel has been shameful.

The U.N.'s Record Vis A Vis Israel

Prior to the Madrid Conference, of '91, the office of Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir commissioned Shai Ben-Tekoa to do a statistical analysis of U.N. voting vis a vis Israel. The following is a summary of Mr. Ben-Tekoa's research.
Summary
Security Council:
175 Total Resolutions74 Neutral 4 Against the perceived interests of an Arab state or body97 Against Israel
General Assembly:
Cumulative Number of Votes cast with/for Israel: 7,938.Cumulative Number of Votes cast against Israel: 55,642.
Detail
SECURITY COUNCIL:
1946-89
Frequency:
Since the Council first convened in 1946, at least one Arab state sat on it in 39 of the body's first 43 years. Israel never sat on the Council. From December 1947, when the ?Palestine Question? first appeared on its agenda, to 1989, the Council held 2,682 meetings of which 747 (26%) were devoted to the Arab-Israeli conflict. During this period, the Council passed 605 resolutions of which 175 (29%) concerned this conflict.
Balance or Tilt:
Of these 175, 74 (42%) may be labeled neutral or balanced. Of the remaining 101, 4 (4%) criticized or opposed the actions, or judged against, the perceived interests of an Arab state or body.Ninety-seven resolutions (96%) were critical, or opposed the actions, or judged against the perceived interests of Israel. The last time a resolution passed the Security Council whose major thrust criticized Arab actions was on September 1, 1949.
Requests:
Between 1947 and 1989, the Council "called upon," "demanded," "requested" etc. Israel to "comply," "desist," "refrain" etc. 123 times. An Arab state, states or body was "called upon" "ordered" "requested" 65 times, or 47% less.
Specificity:
In these requests, Israel was explicitly named 105 times. References to Arab states were usually implicit, as in "...the parties concerned". An Arab state was identified by name 12 times.
Expressions:
The Council expressed its "concern," "grave concern," "regret," "deep regrets," "shock" etc. about Israeli actions 31 times. Regarding Arab actions, the Council never expressed negative sentiments.
Condemnations:
The Council "condemned, "censured," "deplored," "strongly deplored" etc. Israel 49 times. The Council never "condemned," "censured," "deplored" etc. the Arabs.
Warnings:
The Council "warned," "solemnly warned" etc. Israel 7 times. The Council never warned the Arabs.The above data concern the entire post-war period until 1989, but by isolating the period June 1967-1989, the numbers rise into even starker relief.
1967-89
Frequency:
The Council held 1,517 meetings. Of these 459 (30%) were devoted to the Arab-Israeli conflict.402 resolutions were passed. Of these, 131 (33%) concerned the Arab-Israeli conflict.
Balance or Tilt of U.N. resolutions:
Neutral, Of these 131, 43 (33%) were neutral. Of the remaining 88, all (100%) criticized or opposed the actions, or judged against the interests of Israel. 0 resolutions criticized or opposed the actions, or judged against the perceived interests of an Arab state or body, or the PLO (founded by the Arab League in 1964).
Requests:
The Council "called upon," "demanded," "ordered" etc. Israel to "comply," "desist," "refrain" 83 times. The Council "called upon," "requested" etc. an Arab state 29 times, 65% less. The Council never "demanded," "ordered" etc. the PLO to do or stop doing anything.
Expressions:
The Council expressed its "concern," "grave concern," "deep regrets." "shock" etc. regarding Israel"s actions 28 times. The Council never expressed negative sentiments regarding either any Arab state or the PLO.
Condemnations:
The Council "condemned," "censured," "deplored" Israel 43 times. No Arab state or group was ever condemned.
THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY:
The labor of the Assembly, the larger if less potent U.N. chamber, on the other hand, makes the above numbers testimony to the power and moderating influence of the United States in the Security Council, whose numbers now, by contrast, will seem in retrospect only mildly anti-Israel.
1947-89
Number of Resolutions or Resolution Parts Voted On : 690
Balance or Tilt: Of these, 205 (30%) were neutral. Of these, 64 (9%) were adopted without a vote, without objection or by consensus. 18 (3%) were adopted unanimously. Thus the adjusted number of balanced resolutions: 123 (18%)
Resolutions against Israel"s desires: 429 (62%)
Resolutions against Arab desires: 56 (8%).
Of the 56 votes not to the Arabs" liking, 49 concerned the establishment or financing of peace-keeping forces. Of the remaining 7, one concerned inviting the Jewish Agency for Palestine to address the General Assembly (May 1947); 1 concerned the Partition Plan (November 1947); 1 concerned establishing a trusteeship for Jerusalem; 3 concerned refugees (1948); 1 protested admitting Israel as a member to the UN. Discounting the 49 votes concerning peace-keeping forces, the last anti-Arab vote of the General Assembly was in May 1949.
Requests:
The Arabs were "called upon" to "comply," "desist," "refrain" etc. 4 times. Israel was "demanded," "ordered" etc. to do General Assembly bidding 305 times.
Expressions:
The Assembly expressed its "concern," "grave concern," "anxiety" etc. about Israeli policies or actions 179 times. The General Assembly expressed itself in similar terms about Arab policies or actions 0 times.
Condemnations:
Israel was "condemned," "vigorously condemned," "strongly condemned," "deplored," "strongly deplored", "censured," "denounced" by the General Assembly 321 times. The Arabs were condemned 0 times.
Cumulative Number of Votes cast with/for Israel: 7,938.
Cumulative Number of Votes cast against Israel: 55,642.
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