absolutely alex’s adventures & times

“I do not agree with what you have to say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.”

-Voltaire-

Freedom of expression is one of the principal bases of living in an open, liberal society. We are allowed to say what we think and feel, but not without consequences, of course. Remarks or opinions judged inappropriate by society or the affected party usually have a way of coming round to haunt the utterer. Yet, we agree that in an open society, free speech is a basic right that we enjoy.

Against this backdrop, the online release of an anti-Islam, anti-Koran short film by notorious Dutch legislator Geert Wilders, should not receive the condemnation it has garnered. Wilders has a right to express what he feels, despite the efforts of some Dutch politicians to ban his film. What could be criticized, however, is the content of Wilders’ film.

Titled “Fitna,” Arabic for civil strife, the film painted Islam as violent, a religion that encouraged terrorism and provided gruesome images such as beheading and shootings in the name Islam.

While it is no secret that Islam has its extremist and violent wing, the vast majority of its practitioners are peaceful and law-abiding people. Wilders was unfair and one-dimensional in his film’s depiction of Islam. But he remained insistent.

“It is not a provocation, it is tough reality — a reality that some Muslims might not find comfortable,” Wilders — the leader of a far-right, anti-immigration Dutch political party, Party for Freedom — told the media.

His latest action comes in defiance of death threats that had been previously issued against him. Wilders has bodyguards protecting him around-the-clock.

A Dutch filmmaker, Theo Van Gogh, was killed in the streets of Amsterdam by an Islamic extremist in 2004, after he released a film critical of Islam’s treatment of women.

The Dutch Prime Minister Jan Peter Balkenende, in reflecting his country’s open and tolerant society, struck a balanced tone in handling Wilders. “The film equates Islam with violence: we reject that interpretation,” he said. “We believe it serves no purpose other than to offend. But feeling offended must never be used as an excuse for aggression and threats.”

The problem is that the radical Islamists would not take such a measured approach. Free speech is not something they would necessarily understand. This is a cultural and civilizational clash that will pit different ideologies and beliefs against each other, with devastating consequences likely. Balkenende is right to worry that Wilders’ film will not only provoke protests in Islamic countries; Dutch interests, be they soldiers, citizens or businesses, might also face backlash or even come to harm.

So it is a tough line to walk — other cultures might not understand or accept it, but we need to protect and guarantee freedom of expression. At the same time, unfortunately, managing the repercussions such as those that could be unleashed by Wilders’ film, is also going to be a tough prospect. But if it is a principle we believe strongly enough in, we must stand by it, just as Voltaire had so aptly stated.

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Power, as Mao had said, comes from the barrel of a gun.

His classic teaching to the Chinese Communist Party has sadly proved true once again in recent days in Myanmar, where the unflinching willingness of the Burmese military junta to use force to quell protests, have stifled the moral authority wielded by the country’s revered monks.

The groundswell of dissatisfaction and despair triggered by the rise in fuel prices was the latest in a series of protests by the repressed Burmese people to make political change happen in their country, after the most notable failed attempt in 1988. But they have all been ruthlessly quashed by the Burmese junta, which was quick to use its guns and fists to ensure they remained in power.

Though countries like the US have issued heavy sanctions against the Burmese regime, the US has simply lost the moral authority and the clout to enact change in Myanmar or help bring about democracy there, no thanks to its missteps in Afganistan and Iraq.

No power survives without economic backing and the Burmese junta is able to keep its coffer filled up, thanks to the complicity of neighbors who have no qualms about trading with it.

In this, Myanmar’s rich resources of oil, gas, minerals and timber that could have been the origin of the furniture in your home, have been both a blessing and a curse.

Myanmar’s trading partners in Asia are willing to turn a blind eye to its repressive regime and pay lip service to the idea of enacting change in Myanmar, as long the lucrative trade they have going is not affected.

In this, three parties stand as the guiltiest.

China, which is Myanmar’s third largest export market and its biggest importer, has always been reluctant to meddle in the affairs of its most odious neighbors, in the hope of not having to suffer similar consequences. China has invested too much in Myanmar to allow it to fail and have lucrative contracts voided by a less friendly government that might take the generals’ places. China’s interests there include hydropower and gas-and-oil projects. Its military has also found a friendly neighbour in Myanmar’s junta, which gives China access to the Bay of Bengal, according to The Economist.

Analysts have pointed out that Thailand’s acquiescence with Myanmar’s junta come from a slightly different angle. Thailand has kept mum about its neighbor’s troubles, but the historical baggage between both countries, which have been foes and fought bloody wars for centuries, has perhaps given Thailand an unfortunate sense of schadenfreude. That and the fear of refugees from Myanmar flooding in through its borders and the supply of cheap gas piped in from Myanmar being disrupted, are more reasons for Thailand’s inertia.

The regional group, the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean), is equally culpable in the mess. It admitted Myanmar into its grouping a decade ago, promising to use persuasion to soften the junta. Ten years on, little has been achieved by the grouping. Instead its member countries, such as Singapore, are supplying the Burmese generals with the weapons and guns that are used on the protesters and monks.

The United Nations itself, hamstrung by Security Council member China’s reluctance to put too much pressure on Myanmar, could only come up with a feeble resolution to “strongly deplore” the recent incidents there.

The divided reaction of the world to the misery of the Burmese people could only mean that much more blood will have to be shed by its desperate people, before change can truly happen.

The revelation that most of the terrorists detained and involved in last week’s UK and Glasgow car bombing plots being doctors put paid to the conventional wisdom that poverty and lack of education are the crucial factors that drive many a desperate young man towards extremism by blowing themselves and others up.

After all, the “biggest” terrorist of them all is Osama bin Laden, and he is no poor boy. The man comes from one of the richest families in Saudi Arabia, billionaires that are also well-connected to the Saudi royal family.

Not that the rest of the other terrorists are billionaires too, but a substantial majority of them are fairly well-educated, coming from middle-class families by and large.

Similarly, the members of the Southeast Asian arm of the al-Qaeda-connected group, Jemaah Islamiah, though halfway around the world, also had well-educated operatives, such as engineers and lecturers.

It is shocking and hard for most of us to understand why people who should theoretically be more able to reason and have more to lose, would willingly put themselves in harm’s way. But economic circumstances is a poor indicator that radicalism would take hold.

Princeton economist Alan Krueger told the Wall Street Journal that his research showed that as a group, terrorists are usually from “wealthier families than the typical person in the same age group in the societies from which they originate”.

He has a good point — most of the September 11 attackers were from relatively wealthy families. Being Saudis, they’re not your typical poor either.

Krueger and his team had also come up with other statistics to back their theory up. They found that research on 148 Palestinian suicide bombers showed that they were not from impoverished families, but were more likely to have graduated from high school than the general Palestinian population. Similar findings cropped up when they researched Hezbollah and Israeli terrorists.

More disturbingly, Mr Krueger and his team discovered that when public opinion polls were held in countries like Jordan, Morocco, Pakistan and Turkey, the better-educated ones from there were the ones likelier to reply that suicide attacks against Westerners in Iraq are “justified”. Conversely, Palestinian polls demonstrate no visible difference in the opinion between the educated and uneducated about support for terrorism as a way to reach political objectives.

On the other hand, the theory that terrorists spring from poverty hardly has data to back it up. It is an attractive theory though, that most people can easily wrap their heads around. Witness the Bush administration’s statements about fighting poverty in hot spots around the world to combat terrorism.

The Wall Street Journal points out that the 9/11 Commission itself came to the conclusion that terrorism is not brought on by poverty. Instead, Mr Krueger suggests that the suppression of civil liberties and political rights are more plausible causes. That perhaps makes things more alarming, given how many countries suffer from those factors.

Salman Rushdie is one of the most sublime authors in the English language.

So no one should be surprised that he is granted a knighthood to honor his considerable literary achievements.

The British ought to stick to their guns on this one and refuse to give in to blackmail, even as Islamist elements in Pakistan and Iran are protesting their rage and demanding a retraction of the knighthood. The UK government is sovereign and has every right to knight whomever it chooses, not least Rushdie, because of his literary accomplishments but also for his moral courage to write exactly what he thought and for braving the fatwa issued by ayatollahs for his death for a decade. The fatwa was in response to his book The Satanic Verses, which Muslims had claimed is blasphemous.

While Muslims have a right to protest, some of their more extreme comments are unlikely to gain sympathy, but perhaps more fear, suspicion and revulsion across the world.

What’s more disturbing is that a Pakistani minister had actually said Rushdie’s knighting is “justification” for suicide bomb attacks and is the root cause of terrorism.

“If somebody has to attack by strapping bombs to his body to protect the honor of the Prophet then it is justified,” Pakistan’s religious affairs minister told the National Assembly. He went as far as to suggest that Pakistan and other Muslim countries ought to suspend ties with the UK if the knighthood was not retracted.

Iranian officials have issued similarly threatening and hardline threats to Rushdie’s life.

Another radical group, the Organization to Commemorate Martyrs of the Muslim World, even offered Rushdie’s successful assassin a $150,000 reward.

It’s bad enough when fringe groups like that get all hysterical over what they perceive are the smallest slights, but when government officials do so too, that’s downright frightening.

This is a serious step back for Islam and moderate Muslims. These extremists hijack the agenda and the religion, ruining things for the majority of moderate Muslim practitioners that are progressive and tolerant. Senseless calls for murder is not going to help Islam’s image anytime soon and would instead entrench stereotypes of its being radical, backward, and violent. This troubling standard of not only suppressing freedom of expression but also threatening to kill others for having a difference of opinion is deeply troubling, even barbaric.

There should be no justification whatsoever for senseless and indiscriminate murder, especially of innocent lives who might be lost should the attack be carried out by a suicide bomber. Until radical Muslims start respecting the beliefs and lives of others, there is no way they would gain respect.

As mankind’s oldest profession, prostitution is never going to go away, no matter how much we might pretend it doesn’t exist.

The Dutch, in their progressive wisdom, has shown the world how legalizing and de-tabooing prostitution could lead to better health and protection of sex workers.

Mexico City’s legislators are following in those enlightened footsteps by introducing a bill that would lead to the legalization and regulation of sex workers in the city.

Prostitutes are a common sight, even in the trendy middle class neighbourhood where I live.

They stand at street corners late at night, or in the wee hours of the morning, scantily clad in the often-chilly weather, hoping for some Johns to cruise along and pick them up into their cars and out of the cold.

No sane person would want to be in the sex trade voluntarily. But if you saw the grinding poverty in Mexico City, you would understand why some women are driven to make a living off selling their bodies.

It’s a good thing that something is being done that could protect these women and contribute towards their safety, especially health-wise.

Legislators estimate some 50,000 sex workers exist in Mexico City. If they were registered and had access to public health and education, hopefully less would fall prey to diseases. While something like under-aged prostitution would probably never be completely wiped out, given the ugly truth of human nature, its incidences could be lowered with legislation.

The truth is, in a corrupt and anything-goes society like Mexico, there will always be illegal and under-aged prostitution, legislation notwithstanding. It would be thoroughly naive to think that just by having some laws passed. the reality of the situation would change. But it is an encouraging start to know that legislators are willing to take on some of these difficult issues.

At the same time, the Catholic Church, still a force to be reckoned with here, is also correct when it accuses Mexico City lawmakers of focusing on sensational matters such as prostitution, abortion and same-sex unions rather than on more pressing issues like poverty.

The Mexico City legislators have indeed been seizing on high-profile issues to champion and have made parts of this still-conservative society uneasy.

Opponents have called their actions political stunts, which could very well be true, given that Mexico City has the opposition party, the Party of Democratic Revolution, in power. The party’s candidate lost by a razor-thin margin at last year’s Presidential elections to the right-wing National Action Party’s candidate and is likely to be attempting to burnish itself into people’s minds with these thorny issues.

So while the abortion law that was successfully passed earlier this year faces challenges by the federal government in Mexico’s Supreme Court, the Mexico City lawmakers continue to chip away. And they look likely to win this latest round about legalizing prostitution, given the majority they hold in the city’s legislature. Cynical though their intentions might be, they would still be doing the city’s sex workers a service when the legislation eventually goes through.

Perhaps Samuel Huntington was right after all.

The clash of civilizations theory he espoused a decade ago is once again coming to the forefront.

Put aside the quarrel with Al-Qaeda and the ongoing Palestinian-Israeli clashes, new theatres proving Huntington’s theory that nations are seized with increasing threats of violence and conflict along religious/ cultural fault lines continually appear.

Witness the struggle in doggedly neutral Switzerland, against the building of minarets by its Muslim citizens.

The right-wing Swiss People’s Party is gathering surprisingly large numbers as it drums up support for the ban against the construction of minarets, with claims that minarets are not essential for worship, but act as symbols of Islamic law, making them incompatible with Switzerland’s legal system, the BBC reports.

The party is taking it further, hoping to garner enough signatures to eventually make it into a national referendum which would be binding.

“We don’t have anything against Muslims,” Oskar Freysinger, a member of parliament for the Swiss People’s Party, told the BBC. “But we don’t want minarets. The minaret is a symbol of a political and aggressive Islam, it’s a symbol of Islamic law. The minute you have minarets in Europe it means Islam will have taken over.”

More level-headed Swiss politicians have spoken out against the Swiss People Party’s initiative, but public opinion looks favorable towards the Swiss People Party, as polls showed 43 per cent of the Swiss favoring a minarets ban and objections have put paid to plans to build minarets in some cities.

In Malaysia, there’s religious persecution of a different stroke, as a Muslim-born woman takes her case to the land’s highest courts in her fight for the right to convert to Christianity. The case could bring to the surface Malaysia’s uneasy balance between the different races and religions, and even set a precedent for more converts from Islam to step forward. This in a place where leaving Islam is considered apostasy, the Washington Post writes.

If the woman, who has faced death threats, lost her job and whose case triggered protests, loses her appeal and persists in being recognized as a Christian, she could face apostasy charges, which carries a possible jail sentence.

Her case is testing Muslim-majority Malaysia’s very identity — whether it is a moderate Islamic state or prefers to be a secular state which guarantees religious freedom. Opponents see it as an impudent challenge of Islam’s position in Malaysia.

But religion may also have the power to make things better for some people, particularly those in India hoping to escape the condemnation of the country’s rigid caste system. Thousands of low-caste Indians and those from nomadic tribes converted to Buddhism recently in a mass conversion ceremony. Perhaps life will be better for these people, who would have been confined to a life of discrimination and deprivation under the Hindu caste system.

Taking the conversion route has been controversial in Indian society, but it has been a way for those of the lowest castes to obtain education and get jobs other than menial labor.

Huntington’s theories might have seemed overly alarmist and simplistic back then, but he might not have been hitting too far off the mark, and in fact have been explaining through a rather coherent model, judging by the tensions that our world is going through now.

I’ve always loved Thailand and Thais. What’s not to love about charming, easy-going and tolerant people with ever-ready huge smiles and a country of such natural gorgeousness?

Which makes the two recent political developments in Thailand extremely incongruent and distressing for Thailand’s image to the outside world.

One concerns the appointment of a former Thai “assassin” and commando to be the country’s supreme security adviser, the other, the willingness of the military interim government to declare Buddhism Thailand’s national religion.

Both developments are interlinked, unfortunately, to Thailand’s unresolvable problem in the South, its restive provinces with large Muslim majorities.

And both moves can be seen as being irresponsibly reckless by the junta.

Some might argue that it makes sense to declare Buddhism Thailand’s national religion anyway, seeing that over 90 per cent of its population are Buddhists, of which a large majority are devout.

But the decision is made under unsound motivations – largely a quick-fix populist move to gain more support for the coup leaders who overthrew former Thai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra last year, and stop radicalized Buddhist monks from marching on the streets, as dissatisfaction toward the coup leaders grow and more pressure is put on its already besieged administration.

Adopting Buddhism as the country’s religion also goes against the tenets of Buddhism, which essentially calls for tolerance and understanding of everyone, not just of Buddhists. The radicalized Buddhists who have been clamoring for the inclusion of Buddhism in the nation’s constitution as the official religion is regretfully misled in its campaign.

But most alarmingly, the adoption of Buddhism as Thailand’s state religion is likely to re-ignite, or even exacerbate tensions in the Muslim South. This, even as the central government have failed to stop the bloodshed that continues raging in the three southernmost predominantly Muslim provinces of Thailand.

According to the International Herald Tribune, more than 2, 000 people from both sides of the religious divide have been killed since 2004, with Muslims and Buddhists in open war sometimes. Mosques and temples alike have been bombed, while monks and civilians have perished in the fierce sectarian conflict.

Recognizing Buddhism is only going to fuel suspicions of marginalization by the Muslim minority, and may even make Thailand’s battle akin to that of Sri Lanka, experts told the IHT.

Add to this volatile mix, the appointment of former assassin and retired general Pallop Pinmanee as the security supremo, most likely brought in to tame the restive southern provinces.

What’s risible is Pinmanee’s blase disregard for the rule of the law, endorsing extra-judicial killings and declaring that if the government can’t make the Muslim insurgents surrender, they have to be “destroyed”.

I’m not sure how that type of brutal mentality is going to help in winning over Thailand’s Muslim population, which is already suspicious and resentful towards the government’s past tactics. It’s definitely not going to help in winning their “hearts and minds” when they know they’re dealing with such uncompromising personnel.

The coup leaders currently in government in Thailand clearly are besieged by their lack of demonstrable progress and are resorting to quick-fix methods to ease pressure off themselves. But if they were serious about doing good for Thailand as they’ve claimed, they’ll do very well to abide by the Buddhist principles they profess to espouse – show tolerance and understanding of others, remember the principles of karma and vipaka, and act such that they do no harm to others. Little victories might earn them some reprieve for now, but they should be keeping their eye on the long term and not do more damage for Thailand than they already have.

It’s hard for the secularists in Turkey not to be suspicious of the ruling party Justice and Development (AK) Party’s intentions.

Accused of having an Islamist agenda, it seems that secularists’ fears are unfortunately confirmed once again – this time with a ban on bikini ads.

In Istanbul, swimwear manufacturers say they were denied the right to put up advertisements of women in bikinis, and had to ask for permission, although there was never a need for that, the Guardian reports. The city’s urban planning department had reportedly told advertisers the advertisements were immoral, not up to European Union standards and could cause accidents.

Why the ban has been enacted when the dust has yet to settle on the furor over the conservative Muslim government’s attempts to vote one of its own, Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul, into Turkish’s presidency, is incomprehensible.

Coming so soon after the AK Party was forced to back down on pushing one of its candidates to the position of presidency, and having to call early elections, the latest episode adds fuel to suspicious secularists’ accusations of creeping Islamization in fiercely-secular Turkey.

In the past few weeks, millions of Turks had taken to the streets in protests, declaring their determination to uphold the secular principles of modern Turkey’s founding father Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, and insisting that the country will not become a land of Islamic shariah rule.

At the same time, the bikini ad ban will strengthen the arguments of those against the entry of Turkey into the European Union. They will conveniently say that Turkey’s traditions are too foreign from European norms and the secular Muslim country just does not fit the definition of “European”. The enthusiasm and will for membership talks for Turkey’s entry into the EU is likely to wane even further.

Turkey isn’t helped by the recent election of French president Nicholas Sarkozy, who has insisted on shutting Turkey out from the EU while promising to return France’s involvement in the EU into the forefront.

It’s unfortunate that while the AK Party-led Turkish government have enacted over 800 rules that bring the country more in line with European standards and made reforms such as removing the death penalty to make its chances of ascension talks with the EU more viable, it suffers from momentary lapses like the high-profile bikini ads ban.

By all accounts, the Turkish government has been largely successful at proving that it is different from the corrupt and inept secular governments that had come before. Turkey has also enjoyed stable growth in the past five years under the AK Party. But it has to stay vigilant against lapses and not give its enemies any room for criticism or worse, its army the excuse to intervene.

China, the 20 ton gorilla, has flexed its muscle once again.

This time, Belgium has bowed to its pressure, blocking the Dalai Lama from a scheduled visit this week to Tibetan groups in Brussels.

picture from the Dalai Lama official website www.dalailama.com

Belgium is the latest in a series of nations kowtowing to China, as many increasingly make political decisions with the view of China being the world’s fourth largest economy.

Poor Dalai Lama. His timing on this couldn’t have been worse. Belgium is sending a delegation to China next week, with the hope of boosting trade and business ties.

It’s not enough that China had invaded Tibet in 1950 and forced the Dalai Lama and his followers to flee and live in exile in northern India. China has constantly sought to discredit the Nobel Prize winner, calling him a separatist and isolating him by pressuring countries into refusing visas for his visits. And nations eager to be a part of China’s economic miracle willingly provide complicity.

Just last week, the place where I have recently made home – Mexico City – took a monumental legislative step. Women who are 12 weeks pregnant, or less, now have the right to abort their pregnancies. No more will they be jailed and tagged as criminals, thanks to 46 brave legislators, who voted to decriminalize early-term abortion.

Monumental, as Mexico City is the capital of one of the largest Roman Catholic populations in the world, second in fact, to Brazil. A little over 90 per cent of the Mexican population is Catholic. Out of Mexico’s 100 million, around 20 million people live in Mexico City. With stakes this high, it’s no wonder the Pope himself wrote to Mexican bishops asking them to oppose the measure.

Ground-breaking, too, if you factor in the “machismo” mentality pervasive in this country. The law can in fact be interpreted as a victory for women, who now have the freedom to take control of and make decisions over their own bodies and reproduction. Before, abortion was only allowed in cases of rape or if a woman’s life was at risk from the pregnancy.

Groups championing women’s rights have been campaigning for this change for years. They cite the estimated 200,000 illegal abortions done annually, and the 1,500 who die from botched procedures.

Weeks before the vote for the legislation, supporters of both sides of the issue were demonstrating passionately on the streets outside the assembly building. Riot police had to be mobilized to keep both sides from slugging it out. Death threats were also reportedly made against legislators supporting the change in law.

As a woman, I welcome the ability to choose. Since as long as I can remember, I had supported making abortion legal, my religion notwithstanding. I firmly believe that my body is mine and it’s nobody’s business but my own. Hence I applaud the progressiveness of the Mexico City legislative assembly.

But at the same time, I am conflicted about the innocent fetuses that will be terminated, probably when the pregnancy could be due to ignorance, or worse, folly.

Ideally, babies ought to be born to people ready and willing to give them happy homes. I’m old enough to know that that’s not always the case. Why bring another child to this world when one doesn’t have the resources, or worse, the inclination to give it a proper upbringing?

Perhaps the best way to avoid unwanted pregnancies and that unpleasant visit to the doctor’s office – legal or otherwise – is to educate people. About contraception, about the reality and responsibilities of raising a child.

Meanwhile, I’d admit that I’m still not sure which side of the debate I stand unequivocally on. I’m just glad that there’s a choice available for me.