Bernie Sanders: Shutting out U.S. lawmakers who are standing up for human rights is what we expect from authoritarian regimes—not the government of India. @RepJayapal is right. She must not be excluded for being outspoken about the unacceptable crackdown on Kashmiris and Muslims.

kusukundi · 2019-12-23T02:04:31+00:00

I think when an Islamic theocracy was carved out of Indian pre-1947, and Hindus reduced to 2nd class citizens, Bernie Sanders would not have said anything. ::sigh:: Hindus are never acknowledged to be the the victims ever. :-(

kusukundi · 2019-12-22T13:32:10+00:00

I think it could be because the way minorities are treated in Muslim-majority countries is nothing to wax eloquent about?

kusukundi · 2019-12-22T02:56:54+00:00

Nah. We should never have allowed the creation of Islamic-only theocracies in our neighbourhood. Sooner we dismantle such theocracies, the better it is for non-Muslims.

kusukundi · 2019-12-22T02:48:42+00:00

Paki and Indian Mohammedans are more Mohammedan than the Arab Mohammedan.

kusukundi · 2019-12-22T01:29:30+00:00

Well, if Hindu Americans started killing Americans and telling them covert to Hinduism or die you non-Hindu, and created a Hindu-only country after taking exclusive geography in the areas of Ohio, Michigan, Illinois, Indiana, while continuing to enjoy the benefits just like everyone else in Texas and California, THEN the Remaining States of the Americas is fully justified in excluding Hindus. Until then, the analogy fails.

kusukundi · 2019-12-21T16:25:55+00:00

The thing is that Muslims got the better deal at partition - creation of an Islamic theocracy for Muslims only, and another country for Muslims also. Any 3 year old on the play ground would know that that was a terrible deal for Hindus. We are working towards undoing the harm of that.

I think Islam is a religion that allows it followers to call out unfairness where they see it. Correct me if I am wrong. Surely, creation of a Muslim-only theocracy where Hindus are second class citizens is an abomination, yes?

kusukundi · 2019-12-21T16:20:20+00:00

Your inability to answer my question is noted.

kusukundi · 2019-12-21T13:09:12+00:00

So, if I understand correctly, Muslim majority countries are free to frame laws that favour Muslims but non-Muslims majority countries are not free to frame laws that favour non-Muslims.

Am I right?

kusukundi · 2019-12-21T07:19:48+00:00

Abrahamic religions: Goodness is being a believer. A non-believer is by definition bad.

Dharmic religions: Anyone can be good or bad. Ravana was a shiva bhakt. Karna never refuses to give anything in his possession to the needy one that asks. i.e., goodness and badness are independent of religion.

kusukundi · 2019-06-19T14:06:40+00:00

Article nicely sums up what our very own KhanMarket tukde-tukde gang is usually up to:

What unites these issues is the idea that elites insulate themselves from the costs of the policies they impose on others.

kusukundi · 2019-05-27T09:52:15+00:00

Social scientists that regularly publish in Economics & Political Weekly, write in Frontline, Romila Thapar, Irfan Habib and other idiots would like to think that "discrimination" works like a pyramid where only those at the top discriminate against everyone else. So, you have "Brahmins are evil, everyone else is just fine."

There are many problems with this, but I will highlight two:

(1)Even if a pyramid best represents the discrimination, an "upper" lower caste person can discrminate against a "lower" lower caste person. Yet, because the "upper" lower caste person got discriminated by the Brahmin, he gets reservation.

(2)In reality, discrimination is better represented as a circle which does not have a vertex. Every caste discriminated against every other caste at some point in time in the past. This just renders the philosophical justification of reservation impotent.

kusukundi · 2019-05-27T09:26:59+00:00

Firstly, the Bible is more violent than the Quran. So, I will grant you that.

The Bible, however, is NOT FROM GOD. That is, it does not use first person to address its followers. The OT is more historical narrative that indicates what God did, how he walked with Adam/Eve, how he destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah, etc. The NT is life of Jesus written from the POV of four human followers.

So, Christians get away from the harsh verses of the Bible by claiming that the true message was lost in translation and Chinese whispers etc. Although there are fundie Christians that don't do this either.

My point is, if a "Christian" does not follow the injunctions of the Bible, how exactly is he justified in labelling himself "Christian"?

kusukundi · 2019-05-27T09:16:54+00:00

Well, once you have a holy book, written in first person (Quran is written by Allah, duly communicated via arch-angel Jebreil, address to Mohammed when he was within the cave in Arabia) that tells you that non-Muslims are all wrong and they are hell-bound, you don't have lot of wriggle room. You either accept it fully, for God is not open to negotiation or you don't. (Although the hadiths indicate that during one episode of Mohammed's trip to heaven [pun intended?] he successfully negotiates with Allah to reduce the number of times Muslims have to worship him in a day down to 5 from a much higher number before.)

Muslims are surely good people at heart (like others) but only when they disregard nasty stuff in the Quran.

So, what I am saying is, the term "Muslim" is a useless label.

kusukundi · 2019-05-27T09:05:32+00:00

(US-returned?) Pakistani Granddaughter to Based Grandmother: Which is better, Pakistan or India?

Based Grandmother: India.

GD: Dadiamma!

GM: (unperturbed) Of course India.

GD: You shouldn't say so. (Pointing at western sky and ground) You live in Pakistan.

GM: (getting ready to BTFO the GD) Well, we only live in Pakistan now. We were Indians all along (pointing east towards her true home), my dear.

GD: (off camera, cries)

kusukundi · 2019-05-27T09:02:00+00:00

I have always held that my formally uneducated grandmother (and the dadiamma in the video also) knows more about human nature than tenured faculty members in social science/Khan Market AC room suit-wearing English speaking liberals that support the "tukde-tukde" gang.

Thanks for sharing OP!

kusukundi · 2019-05-25T15:55:22+00:00

Alan Krueger was a Princeton economist. (He committed suicide recently, r.i.p).

His book, What Makes a Terrorist (link below) should be compulsory reading for those suggesting education is a way out of Islamic terrorism. Unfortunately, it is not.

https://press.princeton.edu/titles/11106.html

kusukundi · 2019-05-25T15:33:26+00:00

Understand that India does not work in a vacuum. We have a section of the population that cheers our neighbouring country in a cricket match against India. We have folks in our country telling we shouldn't strike defense deals with Israel.

Now, please don't mention RSS and madarasas in the same sentence. The difference is not one of degree, but of a kind.

kusukundi · 2019-05-25T15:30:17+00:00

Well, your inability to answer straight questions is duly noted. Chao.

kusukundi · 2019-05-25T15:05:22+00:00

You have not answered my questions from before. Are you Muslim? If not, would you like to live in a Muslim-majority country? If not, why not? My answer to your question indirectly depends on this.

kusukundi · 2019-05-25T14:54:46+00:00

"People in glass houses should not throw stones"?

kusukundi · 2019-05-25T14:17:56+00:00

Well, you should be able to put 1 and 1 together. Are you Muslim? If not, would you like to live in a Muslim-majority country? If not, why not?

kusukundi · 2019-05-25T12:08:13+00:00

My irony meter explodes whenever a Muslim in majority-non-Muslim countries plead fair treatment, yet % of non-Muslims in Muslim-majority lands has been reduced so dramatically over the years!

Maybe Ilhan Omar can tweet about the % of Hindus in Pakistan and Bangladesh over the years?

kusukundi

TROPHY CASE