[Reader-list] Rape Victim ordered 200 lashes and prison bySaudi judges

[TaraPrakash]

How many places can one be obsessed with?
Why Shuddha only be expected to be obsessed with the oppression of Chinese 
in Indonesia, Tamils in Malaysia, Pashtoons in Pakistan, Bihari Muslims in 
Bangladesh, etc etc etc, plus the disadvantaged in all nooks and corners of 
the world, women, disabled, and other kind of have-nots?

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Shivam Vij" <mail at shivamvij.com>
To: "anuradha mukherjee" <anu.mukh at gmail.com>
Cc: <reader-list at sarai.net>; <shuddha at sarai.net>
Sent: Friday, November 30, 2007 7:42 AM
Subject: Re: [Reader-list] Rape Victim ordered 200 lashes and prison bySaudi 
judges


> Well the connection is, 'Look you are obsessed with Gujarat but not with
> Saudi Arabia'. It assumes that one condones oppression and violence when 
> it
> comes to "Muslims" and one is thus a "pseudo-secularist". Shuddha has
> demolished it well. Those who accuse others of pseudo-secularism are in 
> fact
> themselves guilty of partisan obsessions with oppression. Funny how they
> seek to transpose their bias onto others.
> shivam
>
>
> On 11/30/07, anuradha mukherjee <anu.mukh at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>> I think Shuddha's reply has summed it up beautifully. Why should a
>> horrible
>> incident in Saudi Arabia be brought up to shame those who are against a
>> particularly violent form of Hindutva being practised in India? What is
>> the
>> connection?
>> Best
>> Anuradha
>>
>>
>> On 11/30/07, shuddha at sarai.net <shuddha at sarai.net> wrote:
>> >
>> > Dear Pawan,
>> >
>> > Hell comes in different flavours, as I tried to explain in an earlier
>> > post,
>> > and as is evident from your posting of the brutal treatment meted out 
>> > to
>> a
>> > young woman who has been the victim of gang rape in Saudi Arabia.
>> >
>> > Being against one kind of hell does not mean that we have to be the
>> > partisans of other kinds of hell, elsewhere. The kind of intellectual
>> that
>> > I find interesting it the one who has no problem at all in terms of
>> > evolving an engaged critique of oppression, no matter what form it
>> takes,
>> > no matter where it occurs. That is why, despite our respect for people
>> > like
>> > Noam Chomsky, some of us took it upon ourselves to sharply criticize 
>> > his
>> > prevaricating apology for the 'Left Front' government's violence 
>> > against
>> > its own subjects in West Bengal
>> >
>> > And so, contrary to your expectations, some of those of us who have 
>> > been
>> > active on this list in arguing against the Indian state's military
>> > occupation of the Kashmir valley have had no problems at all in being
>> > determined in our opposition to oppression when it occurs in Left Front
>> > ruled West Bengal, in the current conditions of military dictatorship 
>> > in
>> > Burma and Pakistan, or for that matter when it occurs under the aegis 
>> > of
>> > the Ibn Saud dynasty in Saudi Arabia. Tomorrow, if North Korea were to
>> be
>> > discussed on this list, I would be certain that there will be clear
>> > arguments on this list against the imbecilic regime that rules North
>> Korea
>> > at the moment. The list can be justifiedly expanded to include Iran, 
>> > the
>> > United States, Russia and many other countries and states.
>> >
>> > Saudi Arabia is one of the most horrible places on the planet. It is
>> ruled
>> > by a corrupt, decadent ruling elite and kept in place by money, weapons
>> > and
>> > influence wielded by British and American corporate intersts and 
>> > foreign
>> > policy. If the international community was justified in operating a set
>> of
>> > sanctions against the hated South African apartheid regime, it should
>> have
>> > no business in cosying up to the sexist, slave-owning, xenophobic,
>> > anti-semitic Saudi regime which is the favourite retirement support
>> agency
>> > of third rate dictators like Idi Amin and corrupt rulers like Nawaz
>> > Sharif.
>> >
>> > The Saudi Monarchy, which rose to eminence as the stooge of British
>> > foreign
>> > policy in the middle east in the early twentieth century presides over
>> an
>> > imbecilic and paranoid gloss of Islam, and the particularly Salafist
>> brand
>> > of Islam that is held out as an ideal by the Saudi monarchy and its
>> rented
>> > clerics is rightly rejected by the majority of Muslims in the world. 
>> > Its
>> > significance lies only in that it is backed by petro-dollars and
>> American
>> > fighter jets.
>> >
>> > One does not have to link the decadence of current Saudi Arabia to the
>> > venality of Moditva/Hindutva. They are two different kinds of
>> abominations
>> > that need to be fought, and fought till they are destroyed. I would be
>> > just
>> > as happy to see Salafist Islamo-fascism perish in Saudi Arabia, as I
>> would
>> > be to see the short, sharp end of Moditva and Hindutva in Gujarat and 
>> > in
>> > India.
>> >
>> > regards.
>> >
>> > Shuddha
>> >
>> >
>> >
>> > On 2:13 pm 11/30/07 "Pawan Durani" <pawan.durani at gmail.com> wrote:
>> > > Would Someone Puhleez link this to Modi , RSS & Hindutva
>> > > ..........some intellectual surely would ..............
>> > >
>> > > http://www.themuslimwoman.org/
>> > > http://www.themuslimwoman.org/entry/rape-victim-ordered-200-lashes-and
>> > > -prison-by-saudi-judges/
>> > > What can be called a travesty of judiciary, the Saudi Arabia's Higher
>> > > Judicial Council has actually sentenced a rape victim to receive 200
>> > > lashes and prison while the perpetrators of humanity's most heinous
>> > > crime were allowed to walk free.
>> > >
>> > > The 19-year-old Shiite woman who was raped by six armed men was
>> > > originally sentenced to receive 90 lashes for traveling in the car of
>> > > an 'unrelated male' at the time of the rape. However after the woman
>> > > had the temerity of not unquestioningly submitting herself to be
>> > > tortured as punishment of being raped, the judges on Saudi Arabia's
>> > > Higher Judicial Council more than doubled her punishment for
>> > > attempting to influence the judiciary through the media.
>> > >
>> > > Her lawyer, human right activist Abdul Rahman al-Lahem, has been
>> > > banned from carrying her case further. His license has been revoked
>> > > and he has been called to appear before a disciplinary committee for
>> > > challenging the judgment, which only punished the victim of the crime
>> > > and not its perpetrators. The Sunni rapists were given a paltry
>> > > sentence of one to five years of imprisonment.
>> > >
>> > > This is the horrendous state of a country that keeps its women
>> > > forcefully behind veils only to extenuate and encourage heinous
>> > > crimes against them in the name of maintaining social discipline.
>> > > _________________________________________
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