By Rabia Ahmed Pakistan Today 20 September 2011
Probably the most versatile tool man uses is not physical at all, it is religion. People who reject religion such as socialists like Trotsky (who called religion an imaginary knowledge of the world), use it just as much as those who profess to accept it.
It is in few hands that any religion is recognisable for what it is meant to be. Hitler professed to be a Christian all his life, and spoke in Mein Kampfof the "creator of the universe" and "eternal Providence.” He condemned the crucifixion of Christ, and used this condemnation to justify his killing of Jews, because he held the Jewish race to be the killers of Jesus. He also believed it to be his duty to preserve the purity of the Aryan race, since it was created by God. Again in his book he states that ‘it would be a sin to dilute the Aryan race through racial intermixing. He used this argument as well to justify his murder of the Jews. Hitler is further said to have expressed an admiration for Muslim war tactics, and to have instructed Himmler to copy them. What is far more likely is that he was using the Muslims and their known mistrust of Jews to support his own anti-Semitic views.
The Jews on the other hand have used the idea of Israel being the ‘promised land’ to deprive Palestinians of their homeland.
Traditionally in the French National Assembly, the nobles sat to the right of the President while the commons to the left, and these were forerunners of the ‘right and left wing’ political parties of today. The British Conservatives, the American Republicans and the Australian Liberal party as right wing parties, while the Labour, the Democrats and the Australian Labour party as left of centre all use religious views as political tools to hold or gain seats. The ‘right to life’ lobby, the socialist wings with their rejection of religion, Bush’s prohibition of stem cell research and the Republicans’ endorsement of this prohibition, this is all based on certain views of religion.
Why then do we condemn the ‘Islamic’ militant groups for wielding their religious views the way they do?
The reason for this is not just the views of the groups themselves, much as they are to be deplored, but the support they get from the Pakistani public, a public which feeds these militant groups with their approval, enabling them to grow like the monsters they have become.
The difference between the people of developed countries and those of Pakistan is one of education. Religious views are most distorted by lack of education which produces a certain resistance to baseless, even blatant manipulation. Among illiterate uneducated persons there is little resistance. They are easily swayed to the point of being a danger to everyone.
The literacy rate in Pakistan is very low, under 70 percent for men and under 60 percent for women. As a result, the average Pakistani’s view of religion is myopic. It is a view handed down by generations of uneducated persons, a view used by the mosque’s mullahs, the poorly educated teachers, the regional pir, the feudal lord, the neighbourhood witchdoctor – to retain their stranglehold on the public.
A confused mentality such as that of the Pakistani public’s when shot through with the pain of poverty is a potent mix. Unused to rational thought and analysis we hate the Jews because we interpret the Quran in ways that tell us that Islam wants us to hate Jews. We hate the Americans because they befriend the Jews. We hate the Indians, because we hate the Indians (and because they’re Hindu) and so on, ad nauseum.
James Baldwin pointed out that ‘one of the reasons people cling to their hates so stubbornly is because they sense, once hate is gone, they will be forced to deal with (the) pain.’ This hate is manipulated by militant groups, by politicians and by the list of aforementioned persons, the mullahs, feudals, etc, who feed upon it like a Lernaean Hydra, the Greek multi-headed serpent.
This is the reason our so-called leaders are able to garner and hold support by means of slogans. ‘Allah-o-Akbar’ before spouting falsehoods, before committing the most heinous crimes, ‘Allah maalik hai’ before committing horrendous crimes of omission. This is how they are able to divert attention from their own ineptitude, by appealing to the public to pray for divine forgiveness for their faults, in other words saying that the floods this year and the last, the mosquito borne illness dengue and other‘affaats’ that beset this country are all because the public has angered God. It is most intriguing: how is that these tragedies mostly beset the poor? How come the mullahs are getting fatter, the politician a healthier account in foreign banks? Does God’s ire explain this situation better, or could it be administrative ineptitude, or a slothful greedy leadership, in other words: cause and effect.
But the public that blames all its ills on America, Israel, and India prostrates itself in abject self-delusion. Forgive us, Allah. We are crass idiots.
It is in few hands that any religion is recognisable for what it is meant to be. Hitler professed to be a Christian all his life, and spoke in Mein Kampfof the "creator of the universe" and "eternal Providence.” He condemned the crucifixion of Christ, and used this condemnation to justify his killing of Jews, because he held the Jewish race to be the killers of Jesus. He also believed it to be his duty to preserve the purity of the Aryan race, since it was created by God. Again in his book he states that ‘it would be a sin to dilute the Aryan race through racial intermixing. He used this argument as well to justify his murder of the Jews. Hitler is further said to have expressed an admiration for Muslim war tactics, and to have instructed Himmler to copy them. What is far more likely is that he was using the Muslims and their known mistrust of Jews to support his own anti-Semitic views.
The Jews on the other hand have used the idea of Israel being the ‘promised land’ to deprive Palestinians of their homeland.
Traditionally in the French National Assembly, the nobles sat to the right of the President while the commons to the left, and these were forerunners of the ‘right and left wing’ political parties of today. The British Conservatives, the American Republicans and the Australian Liberal party as right wing parties, while the Labour, the Democrats and the Australian Labour party as left of centre all use religious views as political tools to hold or gain seats. The ‘right to life’ lobby, the socialist wings with their rejection of religion, Bush’s prohibition of stem cell research and the Republicans’ endorsement of this prohibition, this is all based on certain views of religion.
Why then do we condemn the ‘Islamic’ militant groups for wielding their religious views the way they do?
The reason for this is not just the views of the groups themselves, much as they are to be deplored, but the support they get from the Pakistani public, a public which feeds these militant groups with their approval, enabling them to grow like the monsters they have become.
The difference between the people of developed countries and those of Pakistan is one of education. Religious views are most distorted by lack of education which produces a certain resistance to baseless, even blatant manipulation. Among illiterate uneducated persons there is little resistance. They are easily swayed to the point of being a danger to everyone.
The literacy rate in Pakistan is very low, under 70 percent for men and under 60 percent for women. As a result, the average Pakistani’s view of religion is myopic. It is a view handed down by generations of uneducated persons, a view used by the mosque’s mullahs, the poorly educated teachers, the regional pir, the feudal lord, the neighbourhood witchdoctor – to retain their stranglehold on the public.
A confused mentality such as that of the Pakistani public’s when shot through with the pain of poverty is a potent mix. Unused to rational thought and analysis we hate the Jews because we interpret the Quran in ways that tell us that Islam wants us to hate Jews. We hate the Americans because they befriend the Jews. We hate the Indians, because we hate the Indians (and because they’re Hindu) and so on, ad nauseum.
James Baldwin pointed out that ‘one of the reasons people cling to their hates so stubbornly is because they sense, once hate is gone, they will be forced to deal with (the) pain.’ This hate is manipulated by militant groups, by politicians and by the list of aforementioned persons, the mullahs, feudals, etc, who feed upon it like a Lernaean Hydra, the Greek multi-headed serpent.
This is the reason our so-called leaders are able to garner and hold support by means of slogans. ‘Allah-o-Akbar’ before spouting falsehoods, before committing the most heinous crimes, ‘Allah maalik hai’ before committing horrendous crimes of omission. This is how they are able to divert attention from their own ineptitude, by appealing to the public to pray for divine forgiveness for their faults, in other words saying that the floods this year and the last, the mosquito borne illness dengue and other‘affaats’ that beset this country are all because the public has angered God. It is most intriguing: how is that these tragedies mostly beset the poor? How come the mullahs are getting fatter, the politician a healthier account in foreign banks? Does God’s ire explain this situation better, or could it be administrative ineptitude, or a slothful greedy leadership, in other words: cause and effect.
But the public that blames all its ills on America, Israel, and India prostrates itself in abject self-delusion. Forgive us, Allah. We are crass idiots.
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