How gruesome! These people, put simply, are barbarians! What more can be said?

Posted by: Mark at September 24, 2005 5:29 PM

In 2002, also in Pakistan (they seem to specialise in this brand of brutality), Zahida Parveen's husband cut off her ears, nose and tongue, and gouged out her eyes. She was 6 months pregnant at the time.

http://www.rozanehmagazine.com/julyaugust02/Mayjune02new/wpakistan.html

Pictures:

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2002/02/0212_honor1.html

Posted by: Silvester at September 24, 2005 6:14 PM

And Pakistan is Bush's ally against terror. Go Figure!

Posted by: Alert at September 24, 2005 6:15 PM

If we don't lick them, we will have to beat them. The vast majority of Westerners do not want even the idiot war we have now in Iraq, so figure how the idea of war against any other country is going to fly. We're going to lick till we retch, and then you'll see our leaders turn and grin and say it wasn't so bad after all. The West will be down on its knees and it'll be paying cold cash from that position for years.

Most Westerners are terrified, not by Islamic terrorism, jihad, but they are terrified of war. The more terrified of war Westerners become the more emboldened will become the Muslims, and their terrorism will increase. It's stupid to accept this, and there's nothing to do about it. We won't likely find one sane man in a million who wants a war against Islam, so we'll have a giant war against Islam. The saner we are the stupider we'll act. The more we protest against war the greater the war will be. We'll lick till we puke.

If the people don't want war, we'll have a war that'll engulf the whole world. If we turn a blind eye to the atrocity that is Pakistan, they'll poke out our eyes. If we ignore them they'll kill us. If we pay them off they'll kill us. If we run away they'll kill us. If we stand they'll kill us. If we beg....

Our leaders don't want war because we elected people who represent our wishes to avoid war. So we'll have war. In the meantime everyone will suffer. Girls will have their eyes poked out. We'll wait our turn. And then, someday, we'll start fighting back and kill a whole lot of people for nothing.

Is there an alternative? The vast majority of the world's populations do not want to consider it. You can't make them vote for it. To counter the will of the majority is a dangerous thing, even if they're leading us all to the abyss. To do nothing but follow them complainingly is a cowardice we might find equally intolerable.

Posted by: sonofwalker at September 24, 2005 7:20 PM

Disgusting... Just disgusting. And when the JWers and other clear-eyed citizens are trying to bring these acts of Islamic barbarity to light, we're being accused of being intolerant and 'slandering' a religion. Meanwhile, I haven't seen any Jews or Christians doing the same to their wives. Just as I haven't seen equivalences of 4:34 in their Holy Books.

-----------------------------
dolphin, CAGE co-founder.
http://www.acage.org

Posted by: dolphin at September 24, 2005 9:14 PM

"Who are we to judge" -sez KT.

Indeed:

How can we ignorant fools judge such a "great religion?"

http://www.acage.org/articles/?id=0081

Posted by: sheik yer'mami at September 24, 2005 10:38 PM

from posting above:

"Who are we to judge" -sez KT.

Indeed..."

Indeed, indeed. What appears to be barbaric to us may be perfectly normal in Pakistan -- One must also keep in mind that all the facts aren't in on this one -- it would be good to know exactly what the girl did to dishonor her husband... Who knows?

Also, since all cultures are roughly equivalent, and since it would be harsh to judge Muslims by our own standards, (as they would unfairly nearly always come up short and lacking...) isn't it better to just take note of this without judgment? Remember that to Muslims, the charging of interest on debt is a crime so loathsome and vile in its criminality and barbarity, that to contemplate such may cause Allah to shrivel one's nether regions to dried up waste... As such, they might view the payment each month of, say, a mortgage, to be far more ugly than the expedient mentioned in this article to compensate the Husband's honor. Who can place values on these cultural disparities? Certainly not we?

Posted by: jsla at September 24, 2005 11:08 PM

I should have added to my post above that many Muslims also consider being non-Muslim so utterly heinous as to require the murder of such a person -- In light of that cultural and religious trait, doesn't the slicing off of lips seem tame by comparison? I'd also add that the chopping of noses and clitorises, or the chopping off of any body part which suits the Muslim on that particular day all seem to be mild rebukes when the proper context is found for the comparison! As some of the Muslim posters here will always remind us, all things should be seen in their proper context when considering Muslims and Islam!

Posted by: jsla at September 24, 2005 11:19 PM

Its always being drummed into us by Paki govt. that such things occur only in a small tribal area of NWFP. But to best of my knowledge Punjab is no tribal area, its the heart of Puke-e-stan

Posted by: Vikrant_Camberleykar at September 24, 2005 11:28 PM

That's an interesting point, I think. Where do we draw the line between obeying the law and not?

I've argued here before that there are legitimate laws and not, and legitimate nations and not. How do we react to a nation that is clearly barbaric but allied to ours? The sharia laws are legitimate in terms of the Treaty of Westphalia, i.e. they're made and passed by sovereign rulers of sovereign states, and to a greater extent than not they have the backing of the people therein.

If we deal with positive law as the basis of law, of convention rather than natural law or no law at all, then where do we find the arguments to defeat our paralysing relativism?

If we break our own legitimate laws of non-interference in the internal affairs of other nations, how do we escape criminality? If Pakistan is non-belligerent, what do we do? If Pakistan is a criminal but lawful regime, then what do we do? We agree to rule by legitimate law, and if it's criminal we have to look at our position carefully.

Am I the one who argues in favor of my distant relative William Walker and the trashing of the Treaty of Westphalia? Oh,damn. Well, there's always tomorrow.

Posted by: sonofwalker at September 24, 2005 11:34 PM

Good Job sonofwalker. Damn good job.
Now, get it to the public.

Posted by: el greco at September 24, 2005 11:35 PM

this is funny. what has been done here is in every way against Islamic teachings. true Islam as practiced by the prophet would punish that man.

is it gruesome, of course it is, but tieing it to Islam is as valid as tieing the son of sam murders to America, or Christianity.

Posted by: Jbravo382 at September 25, 2005 12:25 AM

If we break our own legitimate laws of non-interference in the internal affairs of other nations, how do we escape criminality? If Pakistan is non-belligerent, what do we do? If Pakistan is a criminal but lawful regime, then what do we do? We agree to rule by legitimate law, and if it's criminal we have to look at our position carefully. Posted by Sonofwalker

One very simple thing we can do is defend the sanctity of our superior civilization from the ravages of third world Islamic savages and their bestial culture. Multiculturalism is a scourge and a menace to Western civilization. People are not the same and disparate cultures cannot coexist in harmony. Oil and water will never mix and it's time for the left-wing social engineers to face up to that reality. Forced multiculturalism is the perfect recipe for perpetual civil unrest.

Our options to influence cesspits like Pakistan may be limited, but we do have the power to keep its deranged citizens from importing their volatile, incompatible, bellicose, barbaric religion and culture to our countries. It would be much simpler for all concerned to contain Islamic fanaticism and depravity to their indigenous geographical realms. Like any deadly, contagious plague, Islam should be isolated, not unleashed to infect and threaten the entire world.

How did Western societies become self-hating, nihilistic, and suicidal? I'm trying to figure out how I escaped the collective brainwashing that has addled the brains of so many otherwise intelligent people. Human rights mean nothing to imbeciles with human bodies and brains fried by Islam. Islam kills more brain cells than alcohol and drugs combined. I will not tolerate or condone this savage culture of death, depravity, pain and suffering in my world. How could I, when it is the antithesis of universal human rights? It should be blatantly apparent to anyone with even an iota of morality that all cultures are not equal; some cultures should be permanently obliterated for the sake of humanity.

Posted by: Susanp at September 25, 2005 2:12 AM

`but tieing it to Islam is as valid`..posted above.

Cutting noses, flaying alive,and all the lovely other stuff that goes along with that is in the trsditions, histories, etc etc.
which are the guide to living a `holy` life:

`Another story is that of Abdullah Bin Jahash, who on the eve of the Uhoud battle (in 625, in the Arabian peninsula against the Kureish tribe), told Allah that during the battle, he intends to fight with such devotion, that if any of the enemy gains over him, that Abdullah will let him cut off his nose and ear. When Allah asks him the next day why his nose and ear have been cut off, Abdullah said, he will answer his Creator: for Allah and His prophet. The next day, one of the Moslem commanders related that he found Abdullah dead, with his nose and ear cut off and hanging by a thread. The commentator Ismail el-Radwan of the Sheikh Ajalin mosque in Gaza, who related this story in a sermon broadcast on PA television last August, used the example of Abdullah, among other reasons, to explain that even when the body parts of a shahid are scattered, he rises to Paradise and meets there with Allah and with the Prophet Mohammed.`

http://israelbehindthenews.com/Archives/Feb-26-02.htm

Posted by: leavingtheleft at September 25, 2005 7:26 AM

We have a standard to which the whole world can aim: The Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

I would think that Pakistan is one of the signatory states to this Declaration. The treatment of this young girl violates this declaration - it doesn't matter that the act is viewed as criminal by the local authorities (even so, their search for the perpetrator will likely be lukewarm), what matters is that this kind of brutal mutilation is, if not common, then at least not unheard of, and this implies a tacit social acceptance. (Incidents such as this are likely under-reported.)

What we are lacking is the means to enforce this Declaration. The United Nations has shown itself to be corrupt and ineffective (putting it mildly) and therefore useless as an enforcer. But what it could do in cases such as this would be to put heavy pressure on Pakistan to "clean up its act" - educate the public, legislate and enforce severe penalties, empower women, protect the victims, etc., and last but not least, root out the misogynist elements in Islam (or any other religion). I know, I know - this would be a monumental task.

We must recognize that where universal rights are violated, the state's authority is violable.

That now, would be a giant step for humankind!

Posted by: Jen at September 25, 2005 9:31 AM

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights is for civilized Human Beings and not for the barbarians and animals.

Posted by: iqbal at September 25, 2005 10:04 AM

Who are we to judge? One might ask the same of Muslims that judge us.

Posted by: epg at September 25, 2005 10:55 AM

The link below better work because it's a beauty, setting up as it should the Islamic Declaration of Human Rights. No, not that jahaliyyah universal standard the rest of us try to abide by but the sharia version of Human rights.

It's a serious project for some of them. Maududi wrote tons of commentary on this, as I recall, and so do others.

The question I posed above, in a perhaps too oblique fashion, not wanting to get myself bounced from here, is what do we do in the face of the contract we have with our societies to which we pledge, however informally, not to break our own laws? We give our states the sole legitimate use of force. We arm our police and military to act violently, if they must, on our public behalf. America, different of course, allows the state to be co-armed with its citizens. But most nations have a monopoly on the legitimate use of force. We, as citizens, agree to abide by our own laws, even if we might not like them all, all the time. We elect representatives to act on our behalf in congress with others. We have levels of conflicting power to keep the bastards off our backs for the most part, and if we can't vote them out we can form a posse comitatus to oust them. So far, given that we voted for these idiots, we can't complain that we aren't getting what we asked for. We can't legitimately act against our own nations' will by being more vigilant than we are here on Spencer's site. We gave up that right when we claimed legitimate citizenship in our respective nations. We are more than private people, we are public citizens. We paid for our admission, and if this show sucks, we're stuck till the next one comes round. We can, if we choose, exit voluntarily. If we remain, and if we violate our own agreements, then we are lawbreakers.

We are not obliged to obey laws that are against our person. Hobbes, in a lovely paragraph, writes that even a condemned man is within his rights to fight for his life. And J.S. Mill points out that even if the majority has the right to rule it does not have the right to abuse the minority in a democracy. And Kant, in spite of some variant readings of him by some of our posters here, puts the rights of Man very clearly in relation to the majority: he does not have to suffer the ill of immorality because it is the duty of the moral man to ensure such things do not occur.

In our civil nations we citizens have freely set aside some of our own rights in favour of allowing others to act on our public behalf. We let the administration of justice to take its legal course in the community in spite of the clear evidence that God invented lamp posts to hang people from. We let the police, the courts, and juries of fellows to deal with criminals by set procedures in codified laws. We base our laws on common convention, on reason and rationality. We, in spite of often being outraged, agree to abide by the rule of law. And more, we agree to a great deal of inequity to come for the sake of preserving the spirit of our laws that are based on reason and rationality. We follow traditions in law that we know will piss us off, and we do so because we do not wish to have revolutions in justice from day to day, regardless of the urgent need on some days for just such. Unstable law is not legal justice even if it's rightly just. Law must be the same for all, everywhere, at all times, not to be set aside for the ocassion. We agree to law because we know what we've agreed to. We don't agree to helter-skelter.

If the law changes radically without our will, then we are not obliged to obey the sundered contract. And if the law changeds by the will of the people and still violates the rights of the minority, or even the majority, we are not bound to obey it. If for example, a Muslim majhority impose sharia on the nation we are not obligated to obey it. We didn't enter into a contract to be Muslims or dhimmis. We cannot legitimately discard the rights of minorities. Nor can we legitimately violate principles os universal justice and morality. And finally, we cannot act against our own lives even if the legitimate state is going to kill us. In all those cases we are obligated to resist. As much as we might be sigusted by Bush and Blair, we are not in a position to legitimately resist the force of our legitimate legal societies. If Bush and Blair convert to Islam, the story is different only if they try to enforce sharia on us, and it doesn't matter if the majority of the nations convert with them. Until that happens, we must stop at red lights.

But, (and here we ask that Spencer take up time on a speaking engagement,) there is national positive law, and there is universal law, codified and clear. We are under no legal obligation to obey illegitimate law. Excuse me if I'm offensively old-fashioned here but I argue that there is such a thing as personal moral obligation to act for the Good. Who the hell am I, King Tolerance asks? I got lucky there. I thought he never would.

I am, by good fortune, a son of Walker. William Walker. Yes, he would be the nasty little creature who invaded large parts of Central America and killed off anyone who got in his way as he did so. He's the very same man who intended to expand the slave-states of the American South by incorporating Central America into the [pre-]Confederacy, who tried to enslave the native populations of Central America, who intended to import more slaves to the area. Admittedly, he was not as charming as I. But in terms of our discussion on the nature of our reaction to the barbarisms of Islam charm doesn't enter into it.

The difference between the Islamic Declaration of Human Rights and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights isn't anything to do with Islam but with universality. There cannot be universal Human rights for many and exceptions made for Muslims. If exceptionalism, forget universality a priori.

Walker Sr. was in his own way similar to the triumphalist Mohammedans in that he was a universalist. Both share, as do I, a vision of manifest destiny. One lawful ring to bind us all. Walker Sr. dreamed of an ante-American universality, as it were, and he used force to install it on the unwilling, the resistant populations of Central America. We rational people dream of a universalist Modernity, and I for one am prepared to back that up by force of arms. It brings me into conflict not only with Islamic reactionaries but possibly with my own legitimate government.

Where do we part company then, we triumphalists with guns? If they kill people and if I kill people, then what's the difference? If they do so by virtue of codified and positive law as well as by virtue of traditional and natural law and I do so by virtue of my own will, then what makes me moral and legitimate and what makes them evil and worthy of destruction and death at my hand?

Some will argue that there is no objectivity. If there is not, then I cannot argue my point against them. Also, I can legitimately kill them if I choose to. If for no other reason than prudence I refrain. But I go further: I object that there is universal objectivity, and that it is moral and knowable in deed and logic and intuition. I argue too that though we must act on the best evidence of our time we must also follow the wisdom of aporia, of not closing the moral inquiry too soon, if ever. In the meantime we can if nothing else follow Kant in, simply, doing no harm. And in that universality of not doing evil we might do harm to others rightly by not allowing others to do that which must not be done for the sake of not allowing ourselves to do such harm or to stand by while it's done. It is universally wrong to stand by while a girl has her eyes poked out. Any other moral objection to our action of prevention is worthless. Our universal duty to do good includes the demand that we do not allow the act of evil. Poking out a girl's eyes is a bad thing where I come from, that being the planet Earth. The harm done to the girl poked is so far offensive that nothing right can be claimed for it. And it is a moral obligation to stop it if one can. We don't wait for the police. We don't consult the law texts. We kill. It is moral, and it is universally so.

The state does not have a superior claim to your life. It's yours. It doesn't belong to your husband or the landowner or the king or the Church. It's yours because you say so-- by virtue of being able to realize that. Here we are in total conflict with Islam. There's no way out. Man, being rational, is free to choose. Being free, he is obligated to take responsibility for his choices of action. If one chooses to give up ones life for the greater good of the state in a time of war, for example, then it is the free choice of the individual who can otherwise leave or even join the enemy. That subjective choice is objective. It's universally available to all men.

Those who refuse to act in defence of the undefended, who stand by while a girl is mutilated and murdered have crossed the boundaries of morality. It's objectively true because one might oneself fall victim to such harm, and one would not willingly and free and legitimately call upon oneself such action. One has no right to deem oneself worthy of death by violence. Life itself supersedes that right. One has not only a right to live but a duty to live. If you have that right and duty, so do I. If someone tries to violate your rights and obligations, I have a right and duty to stop that. As do they. And you. The state be damned. In the face of the individual's right and obligation to life itself the state has no higher claim. Every man has a right and a duty to preserve and protect every man's right and duty to make his own free decisions, and that doesn't mean allowing one to let another poke out ones eyes. We have no legitimate right to allow the state to allow the man to poke out a girl's eyes. We have a duty to stop such things, regardless of the conventional law. We have a moral obligation to kill people who do that kind of harm to others.

No man's privacy is any of my concern. When he violates another's right to life it is not only my business, it's my duty to stop him by whatever means required. I do not need the police to advise me. When a nation state violates the rights of individuals it's not a legitimate corporation acting within the confines of legitimate privacy. It's an outrage, and it doesn't require the assistance or permission of the police to intervene. There's no exceptions to be made. It doesn't matter if the criminal is the mayor of the town. Universality is universal. Urgency prevails. The laws be damned.

And here I return to William Walker. He made some socio-political mistakes, granted, but other than that he had a good plan: to conquer and enslave native populations of non-universalists, of primitives who do not have the rule of universal legitimate protection of individual life and privacy. Yes, he killed a lot of people and wanted to enslave the rest, but look at the bright side: If he'd succeeded we would today have a free Central America of prevailing universal Human rights. It's our moral duty to enforce universal freedom and personal privacy. If we have to kill a lot of people to do so that's just too damned bad for the dead.

I'd better end here before Spencer returns from lunch. He gets upset sometimes when I write about things like this.

In conclusion, I write that we do not have to obey illegitimate laws of our own nations even if that puts us in conflict with our own legal systems if the higher law of preventing murder is at risk. I argue that we have a moral obligation to impose freedom and privacy on those who do not have that option now, even if they resist. If in a free environment they choose to give up their rights as autonomous beings in favor of vice, Islam, or suicide, that's a matter of individual choice that we shouldn't involve ourselves in. The fact that our governments and our voting populations might not agree with us is irrelevant in terms of the urgency of stopping harm. I argue that William Walker had the right plan, of intervention into unlawful and immoral non-universalist systems for the greater good of Humanity, however flawed he might have been in practice.

On the other hand, we have the Islamic view of reality.

http://www.alhewar.com/ISLAMDECL.html

Posted by: sonofwalker at September 25, 2005 2:57 PM

sonofwalker:
The Shiite-Sunni Divide can be and should be exploited to maximum effect.
It will save on resources (men, materials etc).

Posted by: leavingtheleft at September 26, 2005 1:11 AM

Men's lives are poker chips. No one but a fool wants to throw his away for a stupid risk, but for a good bet, go for it. Win it all. Life is for the living, but it's also for the future; and sometimes to gain the future we have to play the game of chancing our own lives, a thrill in itself, a game that kills, and one that men can play knowing the consequences: that as chips in the hands of Fate it's the life of man to win or lose his life for the thrill of living his life. I like it. I love it.

Posted by: sonofwalker at September 29, 2005 12:25 AM