Media
hype is created every now and then on some issue, its required for their survival, but
if we look at the Social media it appears that Mala is the only problem
of Pakistan .... this reflects a particular mindset of primitive
society of Jahelya 1400 years ago, when
girls were burred alive, now we see they being killed called HONOR
Killing. Unfortunately all this is being done on the name of Islam,
which is against such nonsense. These are cultural local taboos. Every
thing from West is not bad .. even this FACEBOOK and internet we are
using to express our views .... is not Muslim invention. West has bad
aspects and some good aspects. As we adopt good things from West for our
personnel comfort and convenience we should also see the humane aspects
among their common people. They are ahead because they practice "some
moral aspects" which used to be hall mark of Muslims.
We
must reject their bad aspects and appreciate good ones. NOW Taliban
verses Malala.... and those who curse Malala because she took stand
against Talilban. So while advertising her one should know that he is
standing on the side of Taliban ... does he know it? or doing it
inadvertently .... I am sure while some sympathize with Taliban as
"reaction" to corrupt rulers.... no sane person who knows little bit of
Quran can favor Taliban .... SOME ONE VERY CLEVERLY DIVERTED OUR
ENERGIES FORM THE MAIN ISSUE TO A NON ISSUE ........... BBC the
Western radio talk on this link is worth listening :http://www.bbc.co.uk/urdu/multimedia/2013/10/131011_malala_confusion_a.shtml ..... LOL
Also: http://pakistan-posts.blogspot.com/2013/10/blog-post.html
WHY do they hate her so? At least with the TTP it isn`t hard to
figure out: Malala has publicly and powerfully defied them. But why do
so many ordinary, seemingly normal folk hate her? Shame is an obvious
possibility. Malala is the world`s most famous teenager. Her bravery and
idealism have inspired millions. And yet, we`ve only had the privilege
of witnessing Malala`s bravery and idealism because Pakistan has become
the kind of place where a teenage girl is shot in the face for speaking
about a girl`s right to education.
That`s pretty grotesque stuff, and something the haters know the rest of the world fawning over Malala is aware of.
But
shame doesn`t cut it as an explanation. For where`s the rage against
the TTP then? If the victim has earned scorn for unwittingly bearing
testimony to the monstrousness that stalks this land, then why not
opprobrium for the perpetrators too? No, it feels less like guilt and
shame and more like resentment. Resentment against a teenager shot in
the face for speaking about a girl`s right to education? Surely, that`s
not what your average Pakistani has been reduced to? The easy and to
some, the obvious answer is: yes, that is in fact what we have become.
In
part because the implications of the simple answer are too horrifying
to dwell on and also because simple explanations rarely fit something as
complicated as societal perceptions, let`s try and search for a fuller
explanation.
Why are so many ordinary, seemingly normal people
consumed with anti-Malalaism? It`s fair to say that your average
Pakistani isn`t terribly impressed by the state. He loves Pakistan, he
is attached to the land that comprisesPakistan, he fiercely believes in
Pakistan as an idea, but when it comes to that most basic of questions
in the state-society equation how well does your state serve your needs?
he is not terribly impressed.Nor should he be. Pakistan is a declining
state. The ability of the state to positively intervene in people`s
lives or to create an environment that allows people to pursue their
life priorities as they see fit has been in decline for years, decades.
Forget
the Taliban for a minute. It`s the everyday stuff that the state is
supposed to provide the most that the state is failing at the most.
Basic
security in neighbourhoods and homes? It`s been outsourced to the
citizenry, rural and urban: higher walls, stronger gates and, for those
who can afford it, personal guards.
Education and health? It`s
been outsourced to the private sector, rural and urban: fee-charging
schools, afterschool tuition, private clinics, expensive medicines.
Justice? Fuggedaboutit.
Water?
Which brand of bottled water would you prefer? Entertainment or sport?
Head to your nearest mall. Parks? See your local land grabber first.
Public transport? Take your pick between a deathtrap on wheels or on
rails.
Sanitation? For Chrissake.
Electricity? If it ended
at that, perhaps it would be all right. But your average Pakistani
doesn`t just have to turn to the private market for virtually everything
the state ought to be providing, he has to spend to protect himself
from a predatory state.
Direct spending when it comes to dealing
with, say, thelower judiciary and the police; indirect spending when it
comes to dealing with, say, the health fallout of businesses and
industries that pollute.
It sucks to be a Pakistani in Pakistan. And it sucks, largely, because the state is in decline.
A
declining state engenders no love or loyalty. If the corpus of its laws
and rules fails to create a system that delivers meaningfully and
positively, why should the average citizen automatically rally to that
system`s defence when it is under threat? Sixty-six years into an
irreversible experiment, the state its structure, its systems, its rules
is still up for negotiation because the state has failed to make an
irrefutable case to its people that the present structure, system and
rules are the only ones that can work for Pakistan.
We`re still
collectively standing around the drawing board, unconvinced by the model
scrawled across it. And when you`re still stuck at the drawing-board
stage, there`s always the possibility that someone will elbow their way
to the board, chalk in hand, and present a different model.
Enter the Taliban.
Ever
wonder why the protalks brigade is so quiet about what exactly can be
negotiated with the Taliban? As in, what can we offer them in return for
them ceasing their violence? It`s fairly obvious: the bits about Islam.
Tweak a few laws here and there, suggest some modifications to the
judicial process, bring religion yet more explicitly into the
functioning of the state where`s the harm in any of that? That`s the
problem with a state that has failed to stamp an irreversible identity
for itself. By staying in the realm of the abstract, of the negotiable
and re-negotiable, it opened the door to an alternative discourse, a
replacement theory.
Folk may hate the Taliban`s violence, but few
would inprinciple argue against the Taliban`s basic idea for the state:
more religion will lead to peace, security and maybe even prosperity.
What
does any of that have anything to do with Malala? Why hate a young girl
with so evidently a beautiful mind and spirit? Because she speaks of
the old model, of a state that is rooted in universal and modern
principles and tenets, that delivers equally to all without recourse to
religion. But there`s a new theory in town and it`s spread far and wide
in this land of ours.
The Taliban have never been and will never
be the principal threat to the Pakistani state as it was once conceived,
but that failed to materialise. It`s the shared belief between the
Taliban and the public in the essence of the Taliban mission that is the
principal threat.
For better or worse, a state can`t exactly
swap out swathes of its population and replace them with new citizens.
But a state can, in theory at least, eliminate the purveyors of an
ideology that make it possible for so many to hate a teenage girl who
was shot in the face for speaking about a girl`s right to education.
But
can an already declining state do any such thing? Long live the
Taliban! Down with Malala! • The writer is a member of staff.
By Cyril Almeida:cyril.a@gmail.com Twitter: @cyalm
http://epaper.dawn.com/DetailImage.php?StoryImage=13_10_2013_009_005
MJ Akbar on Malala:
BETWEEN the prime minister of Pakistan, which 16-year-old Malala
Yousafzai wants to become some day, and a Nobel winner for peace, which
she might have become this week, the former is by far the better
destiny.
The Nobel generally comes to worthies when they have
long passed their sell-by date; and the last peace winner whose name I
can recall, President Barack Obama, has not fallen far short of a
superpower`s quota for international violence. A gong and a cheque would
certainly help Malala, not to mention a media anxious for saleable
headlines. A political career would help Pakistan.
Malala
Yousafzai is a brave girl, as much for dreaming of a better future as
for getting a bullet on a bus on her way to school from those who are
wrecking her country. Gender oppression, of the very worst kind, is
central to the DNA of Pakistani extremists seeking to drive a nation
back to the days of jahiliya, or prejudice and ignorance, which is how
the preIslamic tribal deserts of Arabia are often described.
Islam
won the hearts of Arab women by banning prevalent malpractices such as
female infanticide. Pakistan`s Taliban, and their numerous terrorist
associates, are a throwback to the 6th century, and a disgrace to the
religion they profess.
This has not, alas, diminished their
growing influence at the grass roots, or weakened the clamour among
Pakistan`s political elite for a `negotiated settlement` with the
Taliban.
The question that is rarely asked, and never answered,
is a simple one: what is there to negotiate? What should be on the
agenda in a dialogue with sectarians who have made random murder their
principal tactic, and perhaps the centralprinciple of their ideology as
well? The Taliban and its surrogates, barely disguised by thin labels,
want power. Is that on offer from Pakistan`s politicians? Does anyone
want to appease them with a share of authority in regions northwest of
the Indus? No one can stop their rhetoric, blasted into public space
through some mosques and public rallies.
Can they be bought off
with money? Unlikely, as they have enough funds from domestic as well as
external sources. Andhere is a delicate question: will they ever agree
to cooperate by turning their guns only in areas which suit Pakistan`s
covert interest, like Afghanistan or India, and leave cities like
Peshawar and Quetta alone? You cannot deal with inconvenient facts by
pretending that they do not exist.
If Malala is in a British
school today, it is because of them. If she hopes to challenge their
vicious grip through elected office, it is because she knows how
dangerous they are to the very sanity of Pakistan.
Malala is a
teenager. She has every right to dream, particularly since she has been
given a second life. Her dreams certainly make more sense than the
rambling, shambling fantasies of a 70-year-old has-been like [retired]
Gen Pervez Musharraf.
Musharraf can, and probably should, escape
to Dubai or America or wherever he can find a few dollars more, instead
of looking desperately for power, and posturing as a `saviour`.
Pakistan
has moved far beyond him in some ways, even as it has regressed in
other ways. But it is no longer a country for old dictators.
If
Pakistan is going to be `saved` then it needs to become a nation with
younger women and men in office, a new band of officials blessed by the
fact that they do not carry the burden of recent history. It must become
a land where Malala can return home.
Malala has everything she
could conventionally want at this age in Britain: an education, a
future, and the laudatory attention of a British media that has been
building her up in the expectation that she would win the Nobel.
I
am sure she wanted the Nobel even more than her wellwishers did. But
she wants to bring peace to Pakistan, not to Britain. She wants to be a
young woman in Lahore or Peshawar, not Bradford or Birmingham, to
challenge the forces of misogyny and fanaticism which still command the
streets.
What are the odds that this might happen? Not too good,
if one were to be honest. Nawaz Sharif has become prime minister at the
head of a stable government because voters believed that he could
restore calm to a nation whose nerves are on edge, and whose peace of
mind has been shattered.
So far, Sharif seems to be travelling at
a leisurely pace to nowhere. To be fair to him, he still has time. But
if Sharif fails, Malala and her generation will have to confront another
question: is there nothing anyone can do? A teenager who nearly lost
her life, but never abandoned hope, does not need the counsel of
despair. Dreams do not necessarily come true, but then how many get a
second life? • The writer is an author and editorial director of The
Sunday Guardian, published from Delhi.
Comments:
Malala is terrorist? Did she kill 45000
innocent Pakistanis, destroyed schools, mosques, churches, attacked
naval base Mehran, PAF Kamrah? Noble prize be given to Taliban, peace
loving pious only Muslims... don't be confused .. more at
http://TakfiriTaliban.blogspot.com/
Every
effort for education especially for girls must be supported. Malala is
just a symbol for this struggle. But one is perplexed to notice social
media campaign to project her as symbol of West. .. just reflect level
of ignorance , deprivation and sympathy for Talibans ... let's try to
educate these people this mindset ... rest will follow..
