In the news today: Hindu Fascists, Islamo-Punks, Women's Mosque

Just some tidbits I stumbled over just now:

The Coalition Against Genocide (CAG) calls for a demonstration tomorrow March 20th in NYC's Madison Square Garden to protest the visit of Narendra Modi, chief minister of Gujarat and labeled by them a "fascist leader responsible for the massacre of more than 2000 Indians."

Also in New York in a few hours' time, "Islamic Punk novelist" Michael Muhammad Knight is set to read from his novel The Taqwacores, addressing such issues as "progressive Islam, the possibilities of female spiritual leadership, "gutter-sufism" and other heretical forms."

Meanhwile, Amsterdam's De Balie today hosted what they call the first-ever Women's Mosque (Dutch article), a "friendly wink and an art project, but no less serious because of it," including a reading of "Rahma the Untamable" by Nahed Selim and directed by Adelheid Roosen ("The Veil Monologues") and a speech by islamic feminist Nawal El Saadawi. The event was broadcast live on the internet (RealPlayer required, or try De Balie's pop-up stream), and will be repeated in an hour tonight at 23:00 Central European Time.

It turns out that according to CAG mr. Modi has already been barred from visiting by the US government. See also Express India: America denies visa to Narendra Modi and The Hindu: A Slap in Mr. Modi's Face. According to the CAG homepage their "Victory and a New Resolve for Justice" Rally is to be held as scheduled.

Media is a blood-hound.

Is there a base to blame Modi for personally ordering and exhorting Hindus to butcher Muslims? Did it get a fair coverage in media....never.

The truth is far from realization...media frenzy evokes enough passion to see entirely new images in the blurring scene. The same frenzy wants a name to pin everything to. Everybody wants a scapegoat to cover their inability to see the truth. Modi's inaction and indecisiveness came in handy for the media to interpret the distortions to its own urgent needs and brand him as the perpetrator.

Narendra Modi is not guilty of inciting a mob. He is guilty of not being able to control a mob that had no motive to speak of.

But Narendra Modi is also a democratically elected representative of the people of his state. When the people of India did not oppose his quest for a people's mandate, they endorsed his democratic credentials when he got elected.
Today when his visa is denied and he is branded a fascist... the nation cannot sit quiet and blame his doings for this undoing. The visa is denied to a democratically elected people's representative.

Democracy's Great Saviour has fallen prey to the media frenzy. And the biggest democracy can only look and sigh!

It is certainly a dilema for the American authorities. Modi is democratically elected, but then so was Robert Mugabe (orginally).

From my understanding, he is at best culpable for doing nothing to stop the murder and bloodshed, and at worst a direct party to the slaughter.

Another question is, does India want this individual representing them on a world stage?

And so was Adolf Hitler, lest we forget.

Mind you I know too little about Modi to judge the situation or to call him a fascist or not (a line of arguing that usually stops any argument), I was just passing on three unrelated articles that I happened to stumble across. It is possible that he's being scapegoated; reading a bit here and there in trying to decide whether to post that article or not it seems most of the Indian press now doesn't speak too highly of him, but again that might be a way of laying the blame elsewhere. To hold a politician responsible for something is not to say he needs to have committed the act in person btw, it's a reflection on his or her responsibilities and power to interfere when those acts took place.

To me as an outsider it seems like an interesting predicament for the BJP who I am not a fan of you are free to know, having to choose now between the hardliners they grew big on or a more reasonable stance that might alienate their followers.

So was bush......... no, hang on......... well, in the sense that he got less votes than the other guy anyeay

Why Modi cant represent Gujarat when he was elected by the people of the state, unlike Musharraf with a 99.5% votes, who's welcome to US any time.

Isnt Bush a killer of thousands of innocent Iraqis. Wasnt Clinton a killer and Sr Bush.

Wasnt Rajiv Gandhi a killer of thousands of innocent Sikhs in Delhi, and he was most welcome in the US.

Truth is that US mends its laws to fit its requirements, and so do the so called Human Rights activists for whom Human Rights of an Extremist killing children and women in Kashmir is more important than the Rights of the poor children and women whom they kill.

Yup, don't disagree with you there at all on the US. Hypocracy is the word, especially when it comes to the Bush administration. For example yesterday they were telling Europe not to sell weapons to China, which is fair enough and something I agree with, but, doesn't it stink when you consider all the people the US have supplied weapons to over the years.

I don't know enough about Rajiv Ghandi's complicity (if any) in the slaughter of the Sikhs, so I won't comment on that.

I disagree with that entirely. As a member of Amnesty International, I know that the organisation deplores and campaigns against ALL violence, murder and crimes against humanity.

Amnesty deplores all such acts but highlights only when extremists are killed. havent heard Amnesty ever deploring killings of poor people or when extremists attack a village and kill 20 people. But hear a lot when 1 or 2 extremists get killed and they call it Fake killings

Clearly, you know far more about the organisation I'm a member of than I do.

you know from inside. i have seen it from outside. LOL

Interesting, as I spent many months looking at the organisation before I decided to join. It was a concious decision based on a lot of considered thought - from the outside. I wasn't born a member.

am giving an indian perspective.
cant say what Amnesty is doing elsewhere, may be good.

Judge for yourself. http://www.amnesty.org.uk/search?q=kashmir

Excellent link machadinha.

Fair enough- gs_uppal.
I think you'll find that all members deplore terrorism, as it is an infringement of human rights, in the same way that Guantanamo Bay is.
One recent campaign on Israel and Palestine pointed out atrocities committed by all parties, rather than just the treatment of prisoners.
We must also note that someone has to speak for the people that nobody else will speak for. A good measure of a society is how we treat our prisoners.