More like Veena, please

and I'll go to bed at noon

Bravo. I sincerely hope she has some good security, though. If government ministers who oppose blasphemy laws are fair game to these lunatics, I can only imagine what they'll make of a woman having the temerity to challenge their dogma. I hope I'm wrong :|

Oedipus Rex

Does that Imam bloke post here on this blog under the name of 'Erica Blair' perchance?

Good for her - genuinely brave given the cultural circumstances of Pakistan these days.

Ed H

I think me and Rahul would get along.

Fergus Pickering

Yes, good for her. And shame on the crawler who introduced the programme, whoever he might be.

Ophelia Benson

Brave as six tigers. I hope she flourishes.

normanc

Mmmmmmmmm, mufti.

Simone

My goodness, what a brave and articulate lady.
It's so refreshing to see a Muslim woman speaking her mind and refusing to be intimidated.

Keith

What a woman.

rippon

Lazy, sloppy thinking from Nick Cohen.

This interview has nothing to do with any ‘clash of civilizations’.

There is certainly a clash: the interviewee is in favour of giving more space to cultural influences that promote self-obsession and narcissism in society (as the Big Brother show does over here); she is clashing with others who want Pakistan to be very conservative (religiously and otherwise).

That clash is internal to Pakistan and is for Pakistanis to resolve. At most, one might, at a considerable stretch, describe it as a ‘clash +within+ a civilization’.

It is no more a ‘clash of civilizations’ than when Mary Whitehouse’s brigade of moralists condemned media (e.g. BBC) output in this country.

By Nick Cohen’s sloppy logic, feminists battling with the soft-porn industry (e.g. all the lads’ mags out there), would be a ‘clash of civilizations’. But that’s nonsense, of course: it’s just a vigorous debate about what character we want our society to have – the same thing that Veena and the religious conservatives in Pakistan are clashing over.

‘Clash of civilizations’ occurs when, for example, Christian countries invade Muslim countries. So, “If we are going to avoid a clash of civilisations” (as Cohen puts it), that would be achieved if we had *less like Cohen* (“More like Veena” is an irrelevance).

Pop goes another theory

rippon,

Your theory works if Pakistan exists in isolation from the rest of the world. The Pakistani diaspora in UK is how many?

You're like a great big perch...

MairT

Oedipus Rex
March 22nd, 2011 6:25pm Report this comment

Does that Imam bloke post here on this blog under the name of 'Erica Blair' perchance?

Good for her - genuinely brave given the cultural circumstances of Pakistan these days.

No, it is probably Patricia Shaw but, come to think of it, I think E Blair and the above noted are one and the same if not from the same sty

Fergus Pickering

I don't think, rippon, that you understand what a civilisation is and how it is constituted. Mobile phones and shopping malls and pretty television stars are just as much a part of civilisation as churches and houses of parliament and blokes rabbiting on about everything going to the dogs.

Sam Armstrong

About 30sec in or so, the newsreader suggests she may have contradicted Pakistan's "ideological foundations".

Ideological? I thought Islam was a religion.

Liz

This may be the greatest thing i have ever seen. Such an inspiration...

Jesse G.

Wow my new role model. So ferocious. She doesn't put up with SHIT. It almost makes me sick the way they treat women there.

Stephanie

Wow, she is amazing! Somebody get this woman into politics!

A. Lewis

Breathtakingly poignant! She is such a courageous woman to defend herself and her actions in a society that would condemn her. I wish her the best, and I hope that her courage and kindness is emulated by other women in her society.

Johnnydub

And how long will it take to prove what a nutty place Pakistan is, when this beautiful woman is murdered by a bunch of sexual inadequates?

Lisa Jane

And this is different from Christians who, whenever a woman in the western world is raped, react with "she must have been asking for it," or "what was she wearing," or "she should have known better than to go into that neighborhood" how?

John Norman

Bootiful, as jamie Oliver would put it. Full of brave fire and lovely to look at. What do we poor saps in the UK get: Clare Short (ugly); Jenny Tonge (stoopid, as Jamie Oliver would have it but still booted up to the Lords); Caroline Lucas (motor-mouth fanatic). Why don't we export these three and take the Pakistani firebrand in exchange.

Baron

the girl should be careful, hire reliable body guards and stuff, the mufti’s yapping felt more dangerous than Erica’s.

rippon, sir, what the heck are you ranting about, it’s more than bleeding obvious it’s indeed a clash between the world of reason and one of darkness, its manifestation may differ in detail depending on the local conditions, the substance of it can only be questioned by someone who’s either blind or talks to plankton. I take it you’re challenged in the vision quarters, right?

Erica, dear, our behaving badly here and there ain’t a systemic feature of our culture, more often than not it’s bad individuals doing nasty things, in no way does it justifies the religious nutters to promote intolerance vis-a-vis us all.

vildechaye

RE: And this is different from Christians who, whenever a woman in the western world is raped, react with "she must have been asking for it," or "what was she wearing," or "she should have known better than to go into that neighborhood" how?

If you don't know that intuitively, my dear, I'm afraid there's no hope for you. But let me spell it out one more time. You are comparing unsubstantiated "comments" after a rape that have no legal or moral force by bloggers or otherwise ordinary powerless people, with religious and professional leaders in a country where conservative, fundamental islamic values hold sway, and where politicians / celebrities who try to liberalize (e.g. apostasy laws, modesty laws, etc.) must live in fear of their lives and often are attacked and killed. If you still need to ask what the difference is, there truly is no hope.

Stephen W

As you say, brave, beautiful and fantastic. I just hope she doesn't end up a corpse on the floor. It chills my blood that I have to say that, but after recent events in Pakistan one cannot really be sure.

rippon

Pakistanis are in far greater danger of becoming corpses as a result of US drone attacks and the tyranny of their dictators that we support than as a result of censure from conservative clerics.

It’s an elementary moral principle: if we are concerned about others (e.g. Pakistanis), then look first at what +we+ are doing to harm them before pointing the finger at others. Pointing at others is always easier (and self-serving) than looking in the mirror. Cohen has plenty to say (all fatuous) about Muslim clerics but nothing to say about US drone attacks. His shameful record on Iraq shows that he is one of the cretins who believes that the way to help people is to bomb them.

newjerseypatriot

Rippon,

Perhaps the predator attacks will stop when Pakistani's stop harboring those who want to murder Christians, Jews, and the west. They should get their own house in order before they start complaining about those who are defending their own civilization.

Navin R Johnson

Rippon=Fail

rippon

newjerseypatriot said: “They should get their own house in order before they start complaining about those who are defending their own civilization.”

Firstly, it is relief organisations and Pakistani civilians who are complaining - that American bombs cause death and misery and promote revenge violence.

The people who the Americans claim to be targeting, radical Islamic jihadis, aren't complaining at all. They love it. It bolsters their philosophy of hate and buttresses their propaganda that American actions today are simply a replay of mass-murdering Christian crusades of the past.

Moreover, like Cohen habitually does, you have missed the essential point: you talk about others needing to put +their+ house in order when that onus actually lies overwhelmingly on the West, which has a long history of backing the most odious dictators and Islamic fascists (e.g. in Pakistan). This is the real source of the 'clash of civilisations'. Everyone would do well to read the output of a genuine thinker and writer - Mark Curtis 'Secret Affairs: Britain's Collusion with Radical Islam' - than the fatuous output of a pseudo-intellect like Cohen. The reason the West colludes is for strategic and material interests: we generally oppose democracy in the Islamic world because the democrats there suffer the socialist delusion that their country's resources and economy should be geared towards the benefit of their population rather than the enrichment of foreign governments and corporations. The dictators and fascists make far better clients: they will happily sell oil cheaply and buy expensive arms because their people's welfare is of zero concern to them.

Lazy simpleton that he is, Cohen prefers to talk instead about some actress who wishes to promote more sexuality on television - as though that trivial issue is of any relevance.

Erica Blair

It makes it very difficult to follow a thread if people respond to a post that has been deleted.

I merely pointed out that Nick Cohen supported the invasion of Iraq which turned out to be a disaster for a lot of women like Veena.

I wonder if Nick demanded its removal.

rippon

Yeah, I got confused by that. I thought I had seen an Erica Blair post on this thread. Then I couldn't see it later. Then I thought my memory must have been playing tricks!

rippon

Funny to hear a ‘Blair’ *opposed* to military aggression.

Christine

That was some seriously beautiful stuff. I am so happy to have seen that video, I'm sending it to all of my friends. More people like Veena would make this world a better place.

miso

Benazir Bhutto, RIP, was the last Pakistani woman to show such public bravery.

Steve Shearsby

how come these monkey's always look like the couldn't get laid in a room full of blind hookers? Now wonder they are terrified of women.