From: Robin Khundkar <rkhundkar@earthlink.net>
Sent: Thu, Jul 15, 2010 6:08 am
Subject: [ALOCHONA] Fw: New Miss California of Bangladesh origin
Watch out the new Miss Calif does not like illegal immigrants.
By NATASHA ZOUVES
Updated 8:59 AM PDT, Wed, Jul 14, 2010
NBC NEWS
http://www.nbclosan
Newly crowned Miss California Arianna Afsar is not in the same competition as Carrie Prejean, but she may turn out to be just as controversial.
The UCLA sophomore is staunchly anti-amnesty for undocumented immigrants.
"I think that people who want to be a United States citizen need to come over here legally in order to get the privileges that every American receives," said the 18 year-old, during a webcam interview with NBCLA.
Afsar's own father is an immigrant from Bangladesh, who helped bring three relatives to the U.S legally.
"It ended up taking him 10 years, but he did it legally," said Afsar. "I don't think that if you are close to the border that you have the right to be given the rights of a United States citizen."
Afsar believes all immigrants should follow the same legal process as her father.
She was crowned Miss California in Fresno on July 10.
"I was completely sh ocked," recalls Afsar. "I'm definitely ready for the job, but I'm still a bit shocked."
Afsar should have no problem with national attention. The San Diego native was in the semi-finals of "American Idol," season eight.
Originally a judge's favorite, Afsar was praised as being "cute as a button." But her rendition of Abba's "The Winner Takes it All" prompted judge Simon Cowell to call her "absolutely terrible." Soon after, she was eliminated.
Afsar used her singing talent and her passion for helping the elderly to win the Miss California crown.
She created the "Adopt-A-Grandfrien
Afsar will take her platform, singing talents and poise to the Miss America pageant in January 2011.
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Saturday, July 17, 2010
Re: [ALOCHONA] Fw: New Miss California of Bangladesh origin
[ALOCHONA] RE: Khabor Dot Kom Group RE: Mujahid boastfully Justified Intellectual Murders in Mojlish-us-Sura meetings
Mr. Sayed Aslam
Al Badar were paid by Pakistan Army and they were a side wing of Pakistan Army. What Jamat e Islami as being of a civilian entity had rule over Al Badar. It might happen that a few supporter may join with that force as I always speaking Razakar and Al Badar Al Shmas all were Vote bank of Awami league.
90% Razakars were from Awami league. those who were from Rickshawala, Tela Wala or miscreant of the society joint to Razakar etc. for a salary of TK. 90 per month.
All Islamic Parties did not support Pakistan to be broken under the help of India. Everybody knows that India is a clear enemy of Islam and Muslim in this subcontinent. In 1947 millions of Muslim were killed by Hindus, in 1948 millions of Muslim were killed in Hydrabad when they were opposing indian occupation of free Muslim Hydrabad.
Actually India was waiting since 1947 for an opportunity to separate east and west wing of Pakistan and that opportunity they got in 1971.
Sheikh Muzib he himselp was trying to be the prime minister of pakistan, has never uttered for freedom of Bangladesh. Bangladesh was never been in question of independences if Military rulers of the west transfer the power, to sheikh Muzibur Rahaman.
All the olemas of Pakistan and all the islamic parties of pakistan never believed sheikh Muzib and India because if these get chanches they will destroy Islam and Muslim identity and their thought became true........true............true.......Sheikh Muzib introduced secularism and banned all the Islamic parties by his first constitution in 1971. Lanuthullah for this group of people.
Any misdoing ... raping ... looting ....killing by pakistani army or any other entity that were in 90% cases by that entities individual foe but not official administrative oreder by the military regimes but I strongly support those mis doers must brought to justice but we see Sheikh Muzib pardoned those 195 war criminals and returned them like as Jami Adar.
So be waken Mr. Sayed Aslam, open your eyes for last 200 years and for future 200 years and justify your standing.
Thanking you
Mohammed Ramjan Ali Bhuiyan
a fore front freedom fighter - 1971
Date: Sat, 17 Jul 2010 15:31:11 -0400
Subject: Re: Khabor Dot Kom Group RE: Mujahid boastfully Justified Intellectual Murders in Mojlish-us-Sura meetings
From: syed.aslam3@gmail.com
To: khabor@yahoogroups.com; notun_bangladesh@yahoogroups.com; chottala@yahoogroups.com; sonarbangladesh@yahoogroups.com
All are lies and fabricated, Jamat e Islami can never do such and no need to do such a thing, don't beleive all these propoganda war.
Date: Wed, 14 Jul 2010 12:27:31 -0400
Subject: Mujahid boastfully Justified Intellectual Murders in Mojlish-us-Sura meetings
From: syed.aslam3@gmail.com
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[ALOCHONA] New york Times - Bangladesh, With Low Pay, Moves In on China
By VIKAS BAJAJ
New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/17/business/global/17textile.html?_r=1&hp=&pagewanted=print
GAZIPUR, Bangladesh — The eight-lane highway leading from the Bangladeshi capital, Dhaka, narrows repeatedly as it approaches this town about 30 miles north, eventually depositing cars onto a muddy, potholed lane bordered by mangroves and small shops.
But this is no mere rural backwater. It is the sort of place to which foreign manufacturers may increasingly turn, if the rising wage demands of factory workers in
Already, in factories behind steel gates and tall concrete walls, tens of thousands of workers, most of them women, spend their days stitching T-shirts, pants and sweaters for Wal-Mart, H&M, Zara and other Western retailers and brands.
One of the Bangladeshi companies here, the DBL Group, employs 9,000 people making T-shirts and other knitwear. Business has been so good that the company is finishing a new 10-story building with open floors the size of soccer fields, planted with row after row of sewing machines.
"Our family needed the money, so we came here," said Maasuda Akthar, a 21-year-old sewing machine operator for DBL.
As costs have risen in
Li & Fung, a
"
The flow of jobs to poorer countries like Bangladesh started even before recent labor unrest in China led to big pay raises for many factory workers there — and before changes in Beijing's currency policy that could also raise the costs of Chinese exports. Now, though, economists expect the migration of
And while workers in Bangladesh and other developing countries are demanding higher pay, too — leading to a clash between police and protesters earlier this week in a garment hub outside Dhaka — they still earn much less than Chinese factory workers.
"The Chinese firms that are beginning to get into trouble are producing textiles, rubber footwear and things like that," said Barry Eichengreen, a professor of economics and political science at the
But
China's combination of a vast population of migrant workers, many with at least elementary school educations, along with modern roads, railways and power grids in its industrial provinces, has bestowed it with manufacturing capabilities that countries like Bangladesh cannot offer.
Most of
The country has a literacy rate of only 55 percent — compared with more than 92 percent in
Despite its handicaps,
Among developing countries,
And with nearly 70 million people of working age,
Still, some of the changes in
But a stronger renminbi could also hurt
And as in
Garment workers are demanding a 200 percent increase in the minimum wage, to 5,000 taka (about $71) a month — which is how much workers with several years of experience now earn. The government, which plans to announce a new minimum wage soon, last increased it in 2006, to 1,662.50 taka (about $24). Since then, inflation has been as high as 9.9 percent a year.
"Most garment workers live in slum areas where one room costs 2,000 to 3,000 taka," said Mushrefa Mishu, president of the Garment Workers' Unity Forum, an association that claims to represent more than 60,000 members.
Labor leaders want the government to make it easier for workers to form unions — very few factories are unionized today — and to require higher safety standards and better working conditions.
In January, H&M, Wal-Mart, Gap, Tesco and other Western clothing buyers asked the Bangladeshi government to raise the minimum wage and reset it every year, although the group did not specify what the wage should be. A spokeswoman for H&M, Malin Bjorne, said the company was willing to pay more for clothing to help support higher wages. It is unclear whether other companies would do the same.
But factory owners here argue that a big increase in wages would make them uncompetitive against
"If it's 5,000 taka, I would close all my factories," said Anisul Huq, a former head of the Bangladeshi garment industry's trade group and a factory owner whose customers include H&M and Wal-Mart. "Even if it's 3,000 taka, lots of factories will close within three or four months."
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[ALOCHONA] Beyond the Veil: A Response
Beyond the Veil: A Response
I'll begin my reply with a story. The day my article came out, I went to a White Sox game (the one in which my dear team took over first place!). I was there with two friends from Texas and my son-in-law, who was born in Germany and now has a green card. So, in Chicago terms, we were already a heterogeneous lot. Behind me was a suburban dad with shoulder-length gray hair (an educated, apparently affluent ex-hippie, like the "Bobos" of David Brooks's book), who took pleasure in explaining the finer points of the game (like the suicide squeeze) to his daughter and two other preteen girls in fashionable sundresses. On our right was a sedate African-American couple, the woman holding a bag that marked her as working for the "U. S. Census Religion subcommittee" of her suburban county. In front of us were three Orthodox Jewish boys, ages around 6, 10, and 18, their tzizit (ritual fringes) showing underneath their Sox shirts, and cleverly double-hatted so that they could doff their Sox caps during the national anthem, while still retaining their kipot. Although this meant that they had not really bared their heads for the Anthem, not one person gave them an ugly stare or said, "Take off your hat!" — or, even worse, "Here we take off our hats." Indeed, nobody apart from me seemed to notice them at all.
I don't always feel patriotic, but I did then. I would not encourage a child or relative of mine to wear tzizit or, outside of temple, a kipoh. I'm a Reform Jew, and I view these things as totemism and fetishism. But I would not offend strangers by pointing that out, or acquaintances unless they were friends who had asked my advice. And that's the way I feel about most of these things: it's not my business. Luckily, a long-dominant tradition in American culture and law agrees with me. From the time when Quakers and Mennonites refused to doff their hats, and when both Mennonites and Amish adopted "pre-modern" dress, we Americans are pretty comfortable with weird clothes, and used to the idea that people's conscientious observances frequently require them to dress in ways that seem strange or unpleasant to the majority. To the many people who wrote about how immigrants have to learn to fit in, I ask: what would you have liked to see at that ball game? The scene I witnessed, or three Jewish boys being ejected from the park because they allegedly failed to respect the flag? (And note that, like most minorities, they did show respect in the way they felt they could, without violating their conscience.)
Before addressing a series of points raised in the comments, two prefatory notes:
1. Throughout, I am speaking only about liberal democracies, not about autocratic regimes. It's only in such democracies where liberty of conscience is a reality anyway, so I think that examples of autocracy in Saudi Arabia are beside the point. We're talking about what limits liberal democracies may reasonably impose on freedom of conscience and expression while remaining consistent with their basic principles.
2. To those who described me as in an "ivory tower," let me point out that I have spent many years working in international development organizations and that I have particularly close ties with India, home to the second-largest Muslim population in the world (the largest being in Indonesia). I've written a book about interreligious violence in India ("The Clash Within: Democracy, Religious Violence, and India's Future," 2007), which turns out to be largely a story of Hindu neo-fascist organizations fomenting violence against Muslims. So in fact I am not in the ivory tower so far as these issues are concerned, and I've spent many years working with organizations that foster education and other opportunities for poor women.
All right, now to my argument. Remember that my contention was that pursuit of conscientious commitments is a very important human interest, closely linked to human dignity, which can rightly be limited only by a "compelling state interest." I then went on to argue that none of the interests standardly brought forward against the burqa is compelling, and, moreover, that any ban on the burqa in response to these reasons would require banning other common practices that nobody objects to because of their familiarity. As Annie rightly summarizes (126): "Hypocrisy isn't democratic."
1. The position of the Catholic Church. Stephen O'Brien points out helpfully that the "Catechism of the Catholic Church," in sections dealing with religious liberty and conscience (sections 1782 and 2106) takes a position that has been used by the Catholic Church in France to oppose a ban on the burqa. O'Brien and I once acted in a play together, during the time that both of us were undergraduates at N.Y.U., and in fact we had an intense argument about propriety in dress, which turned into a lasting collegial relationship. So I thank him for his intervention and his urging my study of the Catechism!
2. The special case of France. I did not discuss France in my piece, but since some readers did, let me comment. The French policy of laïcité does indeed lead to restrictions on a wide range of religious manifestations, all in the name of a total separation of church and state. But if one looks closely, the restrictions are unequal and discriminatory. The school dress code forbids the Muslim headscarf and the Jewish yarmulke, along with "large" Christian crosses. But this is a totally unequal burden, because the first two items of clothing are religiously obligatory for observant members of those religions, and the third is not: Christians are under no religious obligation to wear any cross, much less a "large" one. So there is discrimination inherent in the French system.
Would French secularism be acceptable if practiced in an even-handed way? According to U.S. constitutional law, government may not favor religion over non-religion, or non-religion over religion. For example, it was unconstitutional for the University of Virginia to announce that it would use student fees to fund all other student organizations (political, environmental, and so forth) but not the religious clubs (Rosenberger v. Rector and Visitors of the University of Virginia, 515 U. S. 819 (1995)). I must say that I prefer this balanced policy to French laïcité; I think it is fairer to religious people. Separation is not total, even in France: thus, a fire in a burning church would still be put out by the public fire department; churches still get the use of the public water supply and the public sewer system. Still, the amount and type of separation that the French system mandates, while understandable historically, looks unfair in the light of the principles I have defended.
3. Terrorism and safety. A number of the commenters think that the burqa creates unique risks of various sorts, particularly in the context of the legitimate interest in preventing acts of terrorism. All I can say is that if I were a terrorist in the U. S. or Europe, and if I were not stupid, the last thing I would wear would be a burqa, since that way of dressing attracts suspicious attention. Criminals usually want not to attract suspicious attention; if they are at all intelligent, they succeed. I think I'd dress like Martha Nussbaum in the winter: floor length Eddie Bauer down coat, hat down over the eyebrows, extra hood for insulation, and a bulky Indian shawl around nose and mouth. Nonetheless, I have never been asked to remove these clothes, in a department store, a public building, or even a bank. Bank workers do look at my ID documents, though, and I've already said that at this stage in our technological development I think it is a reasonable request that ID documents contain a full face photo. (Moreover, I've been informed by my correspondence that most contemporary Islamic scholars agree: a woman can and must remove her niqab for visual identification if so requested.) In the summer, again if I were an intelligent sort of terrorist, I would wear a big floppy hat and a long loose caftan, and I think I'd carry a capacious Louis Vuitton bag, the sort that signals conspicuous consumption. That is what a smart terrorist would do, and the smart ones are the ones to worry about.
So, what to do about the threat that all bulky and non-revealing clothing creates? Airline security does a lot with metal detectors, body imaging, pat-downs, etc. (One very nice system is at work in India, where all passengers get a full manual pat-down, but in a curtained booth by a member of the same sex who is clearly trained to be courteous and respectful.) The White Sox stadium searches all bags (though more to check for beer than for explosives, thus protecting the interests of in-stadium vendors). Private stores or other organizations who feel that bulky clothing is a threat (whether of shoplifting or terrorism or both) could institute a nondiscriminatory rule banning, e.g., floor-length coats; they could even have a body scanner at the door. But they don't, presumably preferring customer friendliness to the extra margin of safety. What I want to establish, however, is the invidious discrimination inherent in the belief that the burqa poses a unique security risk. Reasonable security policies, applied to similar cases similarly, are perfectly fine.
4. Depersonalization and respect for persons. Several readers made the comment that the burqa is objectionable because it portrays women as non-persons. Is this plausible? Isn't our poetic tradition full of the trope that eyes are the windows of the soul? And I think this is just right: contact with another person, as individual to individual, is made primarily through eyes, not nose or mouth. Once during a construction project that involved a lot of dust in my office, I (who am prone to allergies and vain about my singing voice and the state of my hair) had to cover everything but my eyes while talking to students for a longish number of weeks. At first they found it quite weird, but soon they were asking me how they could get a mask and filter scarf like the ones I was using. My personality did not feel stifled, nor did they feel that they could not access my individuality.
More generally, I think one should listen to what women who wear the burqa say they think it means before opining. Even if one feels convinced that depersonalization is what's going on, that might be a reason for not liking that mode of dress, but why would it be a reason for banning it? If the burqa were uniquely depersonalizing, we could at least debate this point: but, as I pointed out, a lot of revealing clothing is plausibly seen as a way of marketing a woman as sex objects, and that is itself a form of depersonalization. The feminist term is "objectification," and it has long been plausibly maintained that a lot of advertising and other aspects of culture objectify women, treat them as sex objects rather than as full persons. The models in porn (whether films or photos) are usually not conspicuous for their rich individuality. (Indeed, in the light of the tremendous cultural pressure to market oneself as a sex object, one might feel that wearing a lot of covering is a way of resisting that demand or insisting on intimacy.) In any case, what business is it of government to intervene, if there is no clear public interest in burdening liberty of conscience in this way?
At this point, I want to address the point about respect raised by Amy (115). I agree with her that we needn't approve of the forms of dress that others choose, or of any other religious observance. We may judge them ridiculous, or revolting, or even hateful. I do think that one should try to understand first before coming to such a judgment, and I think that in most cases one should not give one's opinion about the way a person is dressed unless someone has asked for it. But of course any religious ceremony that expresses hatred for another group (a racist religion, say) is deeply objectionable, and one can certainly protest that, as usually happens when the KKK puts on a show somewhere these days.
I do not think that a burqa is a symbol of hatred, and thus not something that it would be reasonable to find deeply hateful. It is more like the boys and their tzizit, something I may feel out of tune with, but which it is probably nosy to denounce unless a friend has asked my opinion. Still, if Amy wants to say that it is deeply objectionable, and that she does not respect it, that does not in any way disagree with the principles I expressed in my article. Her intervention prompts me to make a necessary clarification. I am not saying that all religious activities ought to be respected. Equal respect, in my view, is rightly directed at the person, and the core of human dignity in the person, which I hope Amy will agree all these people still have. Respecting their equal human dignity and equal human rights means giving them space to carry out their conscientious observances, even if we think that those are silly or even disgusting. Their human dignity gives them the right to be wrong, we might say. One religion that makes me cringe is an evangelical sect that requires its members to handle poisonous snakes (the subject of long litigation). I find that one bizarre, I would never go near it, and I tend to find the actions involved disgusting. But that does not mean that I don't respect the people as bearers of equal human rights and human dignity. Because they have equal human rights and human dignity, they get to carry on their religion unless there is some compelling government interest against it. The long litigation concerned just that question. Since the religion kept non-consenting adults and all children far away from the snakes, it was not an easy question. In the end, a cautious government decided to intervene (Swann v. Pack, 527 S. W. 2d 99 (Tenn. 1975)). But that did not mean that they did not show equal respect for the snake-handlers as human beings and bearers of human dignity and human rights.
What respect for persons requires, then, is that people have equal space to exercise their conscientious commitments, not that others like or even respect what they do in that space. Furthermore, equal respect for persons is compatible, as I said, with limiting religious freedom in the case of a "compelling state interest." In the snake-handler case, the interest was in public safety. Another government intervention that was right, in my view, was the judgment that Bob Jones University should lose its tax exemption for its ban on interracial dating (Bob Jones v. U. S., 461 U. S. 574 (1983). Here the Supreme Court agreed that the ban was part of that sect's religion, and thus that the loss of tax-exempt status was a "substantial burden" on the exercise of that religion, but they said that society has a compelling interest in not cooperating with racism. Never has the government taken similar steps against the many Roman Catholic universities that restrict their presidencies to a priest, hence a male; but in my view they should all lose their tax exemptions for this reason. (The compelling interest standard is difficult to delineate, and courts can get it wrong, which is one reason why Justice Scalia prefers the Lockean position.)
Why is the burqa different from the case of Bob Jones University? First, of course, government was not telling Bob Jones that they could not continue with their policy, it was just refusing to give them a huge financial reward, thus in effect cooperating with the policy. A second difference is that Bob Jones enforced a total ban on interracial dating, just as the major Catholic universities (Georgetown excepted, which now has a lay president) have imposed a total ban on female candidates for the job of president. The burqa, by contrast, is a personal choice, so it's more like the case of some student at Bob Jones (or any other university) who decides to date only white females or males because of familial and parental pressure. Amy and I would probably agree in disliking such behavior. But it does not seem like a case for government intervention. Which brings me to my next point.
5. Social Pressure and government intervention. When is social and familial pressure bad enough to justify state intervention with a conscientious observance? I have already said that all forms of physical coercion are inadmissible and should be vigorously interfered with, whether they concern children or adults. I would even favor no-drop laws in cases of domestic violence, since we know that a woman's withdrawal of a complaint against a violent spouse or partner is often coerced. My judgment about Turkey in the past — that the ban on veiling was justified, in those days, by a compelling state interest — derived from the belief that women were at risk of physical violence if they went unveiled, unless the government intervened to make the veil illegal for all. Today in Europe the situation is utterly different, and no physical violence will greet the woman who wears even scanty clothing — apart from the always present danger of rape, which should be dealt with by convicting violent men, not by telling women they can't wear what they want to wear. (And this too the law has now recognized: thus, in the case that became the basis for the excellent film "The Accused," a woman's sexually provocative behavior was found not to give the men who raped her any defense, given that she clearly said "no" to the rape.
Thus, in response to Samuel (44), my point about Turkey is not one about numbers: if even a minority were at risk of physical violence, some government action would be justified. Usually, what government will rightly do is to stop the assailants from beating up on people, rather than banning any religious practices. For example, the Supreme Court said that Jehovah's Witnesses have a constitutional right to say negative things about Catholics in the public street, and the sort of government intervention that would be appropriate would not be a ban on insults to Catholics, but rather a careful defense of the minority against coercive pressure both from the state and from private individuals (see Cantwell v. Connecticut, 310 U. S. 296 (1940): Connecticut's action charging the Jehovah's Witnesses with a breach of the peace for their slurs against Catholics violated their rights under the First and Fourteenth Amendments). The situation in Turkey was different, because the violence toward unveiled women was thought to be so widespread and so unstoppable that only a total ban on the veil could stop it. If the facts were correct, the decision was (temporarily) right.
When the pressure is emotional only, the case is much more difficult. On the whole, we tend to favor few legal limits for adults: thus, if someone is in an emotionally abusive relationship, that is a case for counseling or the intervention of friends and family, not for the police. Even when we can see that what is going on is manipulative — e.g. the man says, "I won't date you any longer if you don't do this or that sex act" — we think that is the business of the people involved and those who care about them, not of the police. I think that emotional coercion to wear a burqa, applied to an adult woman (threats of withdrawal of affection, for example, but not physical violence) is like this, and should be dealt with by friends and family, not by the law.
What about children? This opens up a huge topic, since there is nothing that is more common in the modern family than various forms of coercive pressure (to get into a top college, to date people of the "right" religion or ethnicity, to wear "appropriate" clothes, to choose a remunerative career, to take a shower, "and so each and so on to no last term" as James Joyce wrote in "Ulysses." So: where should government and law step in? Not often, and only where the behavior either constitutes a gross risk to bodily health and safety (as with Jehovah's Witness children being forbidden to have a life-saving blood transfusion), or impairs some major functioning. Thus, I think that female genital mutilation practiced on minors should be illegal if it is a form that impairs sexual pleasure or other bodily functions. (A symbolic pin-prick is a different story.) Male circumcision seems to me all right, however, because there is no evidence that it interferes with adult sexual functioning; indeed it is now known to reduce susceptibility to H.I.V./AIDS. The burqa (for minors) is not in the same class as genital mutilation, since it is not irreversible and does not engender health or impair other bodily functions — not nearly so much as high-heeled shoes, as I remarked (being a proud lover of the same). Suppose parents required their daughters to wear a Victorian corset — which did do bodily damage, compressing various organs. There might be a case for a ban then. But the burqa is not even in the category of the corset. As many readers pointed out, it is sensible dress in a hot climate where skin easily becomes worn by sun and dust.
At the limit, where the state's interest in protecting the opportunities of children is concerned, is the denial of education at stake in the Supreme Court case, Wisconsin v. Yoder (406 U. S. 205 (1972)), in which a group of Amish parents asked to withdraw their children from the last two years of legally required schooling. They would clearly have lost if they had asked to take their children out of all schooling, but what was in question were these two years only. They won under the accommodationist principle I described in my article, although they probably would have lost on Justice Scalia's Lockean test, since the law mandating education until age 16 was nondiscriminatory and not drawn up in order to persecute the Amish. The case is difficult, because the parents made a convincing case that work on the farm, at that crucial age, was a key part of their community-based religion — and yet education opens up so many exit opportunities that the denial even of those two years may unreasonably limit children's future choices. And of course the children were under heavy pressure to do what their parents wanted. (Thus Justice Douglas's claim that the Court should decide the case by interviewing the children betrayed a lack of practical understanding.)
6. How much choice is enough? Annie (126) and several others have pointed out that we all get our values through some type of social indoctrination, religious values included. So we can't really assume that the choice to wear a burqa is a free choice, if we mean by that a choice that has been deliberated about with due consideration of all the alternatives and with unimpeded access to some alternatives. But then, as Annie says, we can't assume that about anyone's choice of anything — career, romantic partner, politics, etc. What we can do, I think, is to guarantee a threshold level of overall freedom, by making primary and secondary education compulsory, by opening higher education to all who want it and are qualified (through need-blind admissions), and to work on job creation so that all of our citizens have some choice in matters of employment. Moreover, the education that children get should encourage critical thinking, expansion of the imagination, and the other humanistic ideals that I discuss in my recent book, "Not For Profit: Why Democracy Needs the Humanities" (Princeton University Press 2010). If a person gets an education like that (and it is not expensive, I've seen it done by women's groups in India for next to nothing, just a lot of passion), then we can be more confident that a choice is a choice.
Thanks to you all for taking the time to respond!
Martha Nussbaum teaches law, philosophy, and divinity at The University of Chicago. She is the author of several books, including "Liberty of Conscience: In Defense of America's Tradition of Religious Equality" (2008) and "Not for Profit: Why Democracy Needs the Humanities" (2010).
http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/07/15/beyond-the-veil-a-response/
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[ALOCHONA] RAB arrest another ULFA leader
The ULFA leader, Ranjan Chowdhury alias Major Ranjan, has been staying in Bangladesh since 1997 and has been maintaining contact with the group. Ranjan and his assistant Prodip Marak were arrested from Lakkhmipur area of the Upazila around 4.30am. The RAB recovered a foreign-made pistol, a revolver, four rounds of ammunitions and four hand grenades in their possession.
Ranjan Chowdhury is referred to as major Ranjan as he specialises in military training and has been working for ULFA since 1990, commander Mohammad Sohael Ahmed, RAB legal and media wing's director, said in a press conference at their headquarters on Saturday noon. "Ranjan received special training to use firearms and grenades. He escaped to Bangladesh in 1995 after serving a year in prison at India. However, he maintained constant contact with ULFA leaders in Bhutan and Nepal including its military wing chief Paresh Barua." Ranjan hails from Dhubrir Gouripur's Madhu Shoulmari area of Assam. He lived at Gazni in Jhenaigati Upazila in Sherpur in Bangladesh and married a Bangladeshi woman Sabitri Dum in 2001.
ULFA general secretary Anup Chetia is currently in a Bangladeshi prison.
"A party like the Awami League, which fought for Bangladesh's freedom, should try and understand our passion for independence. "We are fighting against Indian colonialism much the same way they fought against colonialism of Pakistan," the ULFA 'commander-in-chief' Paresh Barua said in a statement e-mailed to bdnews24.com.
Four other insurgent outfits of the troubled region--the outlawed Manipur People's Liberation Front (MPLF), National Democratic Front of Bodoland (NDFB), National Liberation Front of Tripura (NLFT), All Tripura Tiger Force (ATTF)--have also echoed the ULFA. "We know that the spirit of freedom has always prevailed, even against the strongest power on earth. "And we believe that in the spirit of freedom the people of Bangladesh will have sympathy and support for our liberation struggle transcending their government's contrary policies," they said in the joint statement with ULFA.
The ULFA has been pursuing an armed struggle since 1979 with the professed objective of liberating the hydrocarbon-rich northeastern Indian state of Assam from what they term as New Delhi's 'colonial rule'. Thousands have died during its insurgent campaign. Barua heads the armed wing of the outlawed organisation. The NDFB too is fighting for an independent homeland for two million Bodos, who live in parts of western Assam and are among the early settlers of the state.
The MPLF is a conglomeration of three secessionist rebel organisations of another northeastern Indian state Manipur. The NLFT and ATTF are also fighting against the Indian government with the objective of liberating Tripura from colonial rule of India. "The people of northeast India wholeheartedly supported the Bangladesh liberation war, so why should Bangladesh not support our struggle," Barua said in the communiqué from an undisclosed location.
The ULFA military chief's appeal to the AL government came a week after New Delhi announced the arrest of the outfit's chairman Arabinda Rajkhowa by the Border Security Force (BSF) near the India-Bangladesh border at Dawki in northeastern Indian state of Meghalaya. Raju Barua, the deputy commander-in-chief of ULFA's armed wing, was also arrested along with Rajkhowa on Dec 4 last
Sources in the Indian government's Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA), however, had said that Rajkhowa had been picked up from somewhere in Bangladesh and was unofficially handed over to the BSF. Dhaka has categorically denied that Rajkhowa was detained in Bangladesh. But Rajkhowa, himself, indicated that he had been arrested in Bangladesh. "Bangladesh has betrayed us (ULFA)," he had told journalists when produced in a court in Guwahati, the capital of Assam, on Dec 5.
The five insurgent outfits in their joint statement said that the "arrest and hand-over" of Rajkhowa and other leaders of ULFA by the Bangladesh government had deeply hurt the sentiments of the peoples Assam, Manipur and Tripura, who had contributed in no small way to the liberation war of Bangladesh in 1971. "It may be recalled that our region served the much needed rear base of the Bangladesh liberation war. The peoples of Assam, Meghalaya and Tripura provided generous shelters to hundreds of thousands of freedom fighters of Bangladesh. "And now our Region provides shelter for livelihood to hundreds of thousands of migrant Bangladeshis," the proscribed organisations stated. "It is, therefore, only natural that the peoples of our region now engaged in liberation struggles feel betrayed in their hour of need by this act of the Bangladesh government."
The ULFA military chief Barua also strenuously denied Indian media reports that his organisation was aplnning to launch attacks in Bangladesh to avenge the handover of Rajkhowa and other leaders. "We are not waging war against any other country, we are only fighting India, but we appeal to Dhaka not to fall prey to Indian colonialism," he said.
India and Bangladesh have not yet inked any bilateral extradition treaty. Delhi has also long been conveying to Dhaka its concern over Indian insurgents and terrorists having bases in Bangladesh. But some sources have suggested that Dhaka has recently accepted Delhi's proposal for a tacit understanding to track down and catch the fugitives of India illegally taking shelter in Bangladesh.
Last month two ULFA leaders – its 'finance secretary' Chitrabon Hazarika and 'foreign secretary' Shashadhar Choudhury – were arrested by the BSF near the Indo-Bangla border in Tripura. The ULFA alleged at the time too that Hazarika and Choudhury had in fact been picked up by some unidentified men from a residential area in Dhaka and later handed over to the BSF.
After the detention of the ULFA chairman and others, its military wing chief Barua is the only top leader of the outfit who is still absconding. Indian intelligence officials believe that Barua too was based in Dhaka, at least till recently. In March 2008, two men Mohammed Hafijur Rehman and Din Mohammed, both prime accused in the Chittagong arms haul case, had confessed in the court that the 10 truck-loads of weapons and ammunition that was seized in 2004 had in fact been meant for the ULFA. Rehman also revealed that Barua, himself, had supervised the arms-smuggling operation.
It is not clear now if Barua is still in Bangladesh or has fled to any other neighbouring country in the wake of the crackdown by Dhaka on Indian insurgents and terrorists. Amid speculation of a peace-process between the government of India and ULFA, Barua said if India was a people's democracy, it should allow the "voice of the people of Assam to be heard."
"Negotiations must be free and unfettered. Or else, India should hold a referendum or a plebiscite and let the people of Assam express themselves freely. If they say they want to be part of India, so be it. "We will accept the people's verdict but the conduct of the plebiscite should be free and fair and nobody should try to influence it," said Barua.
------------------------
Guwahati, Oct 27(bdnews24.com) — One of northeast India's strongest separatist groups, the United Liberation Front of Assam (ULFA), has offered negotiations for reaching a peaceful settlement, but blamed the Indian government for "creating roadblocks."
"Delhi is adopting different yardsticks for starting negotiations. While it continues to talk with the Naga rebel groups without insisting on them surrendering weapons, it is asking us to give up our arms before talks start," ULFA chairman Arabinda Rajkhowa said this week in an e-mailed statement. "Why should Delhi ask us to surrender weapons when it has never negotiated a deal with any major rebel group by insisting on such conditions?" he asked.
That gives the feeling that Delhi is not interested in achieving peace in Assam through negotiations, Rajkhowa said, insisting "we are always for a peaceful settlement." The ULFA has been decimated by a series of reverses leading to the arrest or death of many of its field commanders.
Indian intelligence says the new Bangladesh government of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina has also come down heavily on the ULFA, booked its leaders in many cases like the 2004 Chittagong 'ten truck arms' seizure and arrested a number of them. "Dhaka's tough attitude has made it difficult for the ULFA to thrive, so they will look for a breather," a senior official of India's intelligence bureau said.
"I am sure the moderate section of ULFA wants to talk," said Ajit Kumar Bhuiyan, editor of the largest circulated Assamese daily 'Pratidin'. "But I am not sure whether the peace feelers have the backing of the outfit's hardline military wing chief Paresh Barua," said Bhuiyan, who was also a member of the now defunct Peoples Consultative Group (PCG) that was set up in 2006 by the ULFA to facilitate talks with the Indian government.
In 1992, ULFA leaders led by Arabinda Rajkhowa did open parleys with the Indian government but Paresh Barua opposed the moves and the peace efforts fell through. The PCG folded in 2007 after Delhi called off negotiations, following three rounds of talks, blaming the ULFA for not enforcing a ceasefire. The ULFA was set up in April 1979 to fight for Assam's independence. Thousands have died during its separatist campaign.
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[ALOCHONA] The nun and the burqa
I live in France and one of the main cultural barriers is my Australian sense of dress — slobby and untamed. I often catch glimpses of sympathy from villagers as I lob up the street in 'male' clothes, i.e. Blundstones and jeans.
Admittedly, I find French fashion oppressive. The Sunday markets in the posh village near us are riddled with women in tight white pant suits, fake tan, gold bling and violently spiked heels. The uniform is completed by a ciggie hanging off one hand and a small dog tucked under the other. Plastic surgery is rife — faces like melted masks, with no laugh or grief lines and lips bursting out like helium balloons.
The predatory 'beauty' market is a challenge to feminism, and I resent the capitalist industry that drains money and energy from women by promising to transform them into mannequins.
In summer two extremes of fashion ideology — burqas and mannequins — line up at the market to buy bread. Many Saudi Arabian families come to this region for holidays. burqas, some diamond encrusted with Chanel markings, can be seen flying around as women pick out peaches from the stalls. The fabric drapes over the cobblestones as if claiming possession, and wings of fabric are nothing but graceful.
Burqas can be confronting as images of the Taliban come to mind, but I am distrustful of my own fear. These links, made in the subconscious and fed by the media, demand rigorous interrogation.
As my daggy clothes brush against burqas while we wander through the markets together, I'm well aware that my refusal to partake in French fashion doesn't affect me much. In the middle of 2008 France denied citizenship to a woman because her values were incompatible with laïcité, the principle of the secular State.
The Conseil d'Etat rejected Silmi Faiza's application because of her presumed subservience to her husband and her reclusive lifestyle. The evidence to illustrate her inability to assimilate French values, particularly equality of the sexes, was her refusal to give up wearing the burqa. As her husband and three children were already French, Faiza is the only member of her family denied citizenship. Equality of the sexes?
When the decision to reject Faiza's application for citizenship hit the media, strict Islamic dress codes were equated with radical Islamic values. One blogger claimed the burqa was a contemporary swastika. The case raised a plethora of issues: the compatibility of the secular state with religious practise, the use of the law to impose civic values and how equality of the sexes is defined.
If you took a substantive rather than formal view of equality of the sexes, it would be easy to equate plastic surgery consumers as proponents of commodifying capitalism. You could construct an argument that these 'mannequins' are incapable of assimilating in a state that upholds real equality of the sexes.
This argument would be howled down but is it all that far fetched? Faiza consented to the burqa, claiming no one forced it on her. Many consumers of plastic surgery decry the claim that they do it for the male gaze. 'It's for me,' is the common call.
Where plastic surgery consumers brandish their choice to be objectified, the burqa can be used to hide from it. Both are possible reactions to the male gaze, and they equally stir the disquiet of many feminists.
Whether or not the burqa is oppressive is contestable. But that aside, the State is opening a Pandora's Box if it presumes it can get under the fabric/skin of those it believes have consented to their own oppression.
Anyone who has worked with victims of domestic violence knows that it's problematic to question an adult's capacity to determine their own life. Free choice, a cornerstone of liberty, can be an insurmountable barrier when you're desperate to save a woman's life by convincing her to flee a lethal relationship, but she refuses to budge.
The State doesn't force women living with domestic violence to leave home, because its ingrained respect for individual consent is paramount in civil law and is embedded into Western cultural norms.
Issues of consensual oppression are difficult to adjudicate. Any democratic State that assumes a capacity to see though layers of culture, social conditioning and freedom of choice faces contradictions and accusations of totalitarian tendencies. Is a reclusive life inherently oppressive? How does one measure subservience? By your clothes?
Following the logic of the Conseil d'Etat inane analogies are all too easy. I wonder how a fully garbed nun, living a reclusive life of prayer and consenting to the authority of a male Pope/Bishop, would fare. I doubt the nun would be refused citizenship.
So I wonder if this decision epitomises French fear of Islamic religious practises, rather than an issue of equality of the sexes. As with the nun's garb, beneath the burqa, plastic surgery and my own 'men's clothes' are flesh and blood women who, regardless of their feminist position, religious practises and cultural choices, are entitled to equal access to the law and its resultant protection.
It's all too easy to create a victim and then pick on her clothes. And Germaine, leave Michelle alone.
Bronwyn Lay lives with her family in rural France. She is enrolled in a Masters of English Literature at the University of Geneva and is working on her first novel. Previously she worked as a legal aid lawyer in Australia with post-graduate qualifications in political theory.
http://www.eurekastreet.com.au/article.aspx?aeid=10396
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