the brothel and the bamboo danda
“We are not authorised by the government to arrest them, but we are authorised by our religion, because this [prostitution] is evil.”
She said they would not be harmed and would be released if they promised to close the brothel.”" (Female seminary student Seema Zubair, 20, told The Associated Press)
A whole group of women took over a brothel in Islamabad, the capital of Pakistan - and shut it down. Now, I don’t wanna glorify this situation too much - ’cause I know these sisters probably don’t have a very positive view about Shi’a Muslims. At the same time, I gotta say: good for them!
There is an interesting twist to all of this: According to most of the corporate media, this action is a sign of “Taleban type activities” spreading in Pakistan, and poses a challenge to the “authority” of the US puppet Musharraf.
Since when exactly, did such an action by Muslim women students become a “Taleban type” action? But I do agree, the US puppet probably does derive at least some of his support from the men who frequent these places, and who are only too happy to have a puppet ruling Pakistan whose definition of being “enlightened” “moderate” and “liberal” includes tolerating casinos, alcohol clubs and bars, and brothels.
Pakistan does have a long history of prostitution - so I won’t put the blame entirely on the puppet. However, there is a correlation between prostitution and the capitalist/free market economics (obviously). A few links to some interesting readings below:
Women in the Labor Market by Bernard Shaw
The Sex Industry and Global Capitalism
Globalization, Militarism, and Sex Trafficking
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March 31st, 2007 at 12:57 pm
it’s tough, though, because people’s most reliable defense against exploiters, and the human sympathy and empathy they receive just for breathing, is taboo, which has its own problems — maybe less important problems than they seem to people outside the group, but, when one wields absolutes, one must be conscious of precedent.
but what else is one to do when a democratic structure is turned to abuse and that corruption is defended by force of arms, except turn one’s community into a ball of spikes and roll downhill toward the obstacle.
March 31st, 2007 at 1:27 pm
Those weilding absolutes are the not necessarily the ones who you may think — the ones doing so are those who talk about liberalism and democracy - they are the real absolutists. This is, of-course, not unexpected - given whose puppets the “liberals” and “democrats” are…
March 31st, 2007 at 5:13 pm
and those people — or my people — or someone — they/we provide an excellent example of the recklessness and destructive power of putting one principle ahead of all others, and ahead of empathy. any move away from empathy is dangerous, i think, whether it is to make numbers match on a spreadsheet or to bring heaven to earth, and the more powerful the individual, the more terrible the consequences of their inattention.
obviously one must be fully prepared to judge the wisdom of a proposal, fairly, not to agree with it on a blind spirit of cooperation. and a situation where a proposal cannot be rejected except by force is unacceptable. evangelists make proposals, and feel that that is their duty, and often that it is also their duty to prevent refusal.
in a way a brothel is a proposal, like a loan or the sale of a gun or an invitation to prayer, a suggestion of how society can work, how relations between individuals can work. the proposal of the brothel is made in good faith, for the people who would benefit from it, but not in wisdom, for those people or any others. it is to be accepted or rejected.
no one will ever quell the evangelical spirit of people. we want others to gain from our experience. if it were otherwise our children would starve for information, no one would tell them anything.
this is the wrong place to be mulling this over. it would be better to attach this to a general discussion of human trafficking and the sex trade, so that it was clearer that my comments about absolutes are the central forces at work, not this reaction.
March 31st, 2007 at 5:16 pm
*are about the central forces at work