Chandrahas Choudhury's new book....

is superb. Here is a review of Arzee the Dwarf, on Interjunction
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Further: Decriminalizing Homosexuality in India

Harsh Kapoor, who runs South Asia Citizens Wire, notes in the July 2-3 despatch that conservative forces from religio-political lobbies, as he terms it, will unite in their homophobia to oppose the decision.

Regarding the scope of the decision, Soli Sorabjee points out in The Indian Express that the decision does not legalize nor endorse homosexuality but only decriminalizes it. Sorabjee lauds the decision as a step in preventing the police from extorting people by harassing them through the use of Section 377.
The Wall Street Journal, however, has a story titled, "Delhi High Court Legalizes Gay Sex." Vir Sanghvi rightly points out, in an excellent piece, that the law should be scrapped altogether.

Something that our Indian secular and left intellectuals need to note here is that several of the people who are protesting against the High court's landmark decision are often touted as bastions of secularism, inter-faith harmony, and so-called 'progressive' values.

A prime example of such would be Islamic scholar, Maulana Wahiuddin Khan. Khan's regrettable reaction to the decision- "As far as the practice of homosexuality is concerned, I think that is completely wrong." Khan is known as Islam's "spiritual ambassador" to the world, according to his Wikipedia entry.

Representatives of the All India Muslim Personal Law Board, which constantly paints itself as a defender of minority rights in India, have also taken a similar stand.

Lalu Prasad, who claims to be a secular leader, when he is not stealing from animals, insists that homosexuality is a crime.

This astrologer is unhappy.

Bhanu Pratap Narayan Mishra, an astrologer and a politician was of the opinion that man should not go against nature. "God created man and woman to procreate. The concept of homosexuality goes against the laws of nature. It disturbs nature's balance. Homosexuality is the aberration of a miniscule minority. They are setting a bad example for the society which bores ill for the society," he said.
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The Delhi High Court decriminalizes homosexuality

A landmark ruling and historic day. Homosexuality is no longer criminal in India. The July 2-3 dispatch of South Asia Citizens Wire has a number of articles on the matter.

The Catholic Church in India, the Islamic seminary Deoband, Marthoma Syrian Church of Malabar, the Vishwa Hindu Parishad, and media-hungry sleazebag, Amar Singh have all reacted in a predictably unfortunate manner, judging from the mean-spirited nature of their remarks.

For some inexplicable reason, the West and America are being blamed for the judgment.

This is Indian Catholic church spokesperson, Paul Thelaket's response: "Legalising gay sex will open up the society to some sort of sexual anarchy. Perhaps Indian culture is being eroded by the western promiscuous culture." (The Wall Street Journal also notes, "A grouping of Indian Catholic bishops said the church doesn't oppose the decision but doesn't support extending marriage rights for gay or lesbian Indians.")


This is the response of Kamal Farooqui, Member, All India Muslim Personal Law Board, "This judgement is just to please our western and american friends."

Especially surprising is the homophobic reaction of religious minorities. They appear not to see the contradiction in their insistence that religious minorities should have special rights in India but not sexual minorities. Imagine if LGBT communities were to petition the Indian courts asking them to take away the rights of religious minorities.

Here is a brief excerpt from Shohini Ghosh's piece in the HIndustan Times, which notes that the legislation was drafted by Macaulay.

END TO UNNATURAL EXCLUSION

by Shohini Ghosh

Hindustan Times
New Delhi, July 02, 2009

In a historic judgement, a two-judge bench comprising Chief Justice A P Shah and Justice Murlidharan has decriminalised non-heterosexual sex between consenting adults. In an eloquently argued judgement of 150 pages, the bench has struck down Section 377 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC), a colonial legislation drafted by Lord Macaulay in 1860, that criminalised “carnal intercourse against the order of nature” punishable by imprisonment extending up to ten years. India was one of the few countries left in the world that criminalised and discriminated on the basis of sexual orientation. By overturning Section 377, the Delhi High Court has foregrounded the importance of sexual rights, lent dignity to people of different sexualities and upheld the Constitutional values of democracy and equality.

.....

Here is the ruling itself.

Gay sex among adults ’not criminal’ in India - Full Text of Delhi High Court Ruling of 2 July 2009
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David Horowitz, Islamic fundamentalist?

It is a familiar trope in literature: adversaries who need each other and come to resemble each other over the years. This describes David Horowitz's relationship to Islamic fundamentalists perfectly. If Islamic fundamentalists didn't exist, Horowitz would need to invent them. They are the reason he exists in his public persona.

Horowitz is an 'activist' involved in any number of conservative causes. Among his achievements: encouraging students to spy on their 'liberal' professors, and who, with co-activist Daniel Pipes, has been on a mission to battle what he terms 'Islamo-fascism' (though it is not very clear what the term itself means)

Horowitz and Pipes also have the distinction of using free speech arguments to attempt deprive others of their right to free speech: in particular, university professors and members of minority communities.

Watching HBO's terrific documentary, "Shouting Fire: Stories From the Edge of Free Speech," I was struck by the extent to which Horowitz and Pipes sounded like fanatic mullahs who are utterly convinced about their theories. Among self-appointed spokespersons for Muslim communities in India or elsewhere, one often finds a disturbing streak of anti-Americanism and anti-semitism. Everything is an American or Zionist conspiracy, according to these individuals. Anyone attempting to present a contrary viewpoint is labelled an 'American agent'. Horowitz and Pipes are carbon copies of these mullahs, with the object of their suspicion inverted. Islam and Islamic culture are suspect in their eyes. Everything that Muslims do is an anti-American or anti-Jewish conspiracy. Anyone who disagrees with them is accused to either promoting an Islamic agenda to undermine America or is condemned as a sympathizer with Islamo-fascism.

The documentary also brought to light the fact that in America folks like Horowitz can get away with generalizations about Muslims (and, by implication, possibly about Hindus and Buddhists) that would provoke outrage if they were attributed to other religious or ethnic groups, such as Baptists, Methodists, Jews, or European-Americans.

I had the same thought when a few years ago Horowitz had taken out a vile advertisement in the Emory Wheel, Emory University's student newspaper. The ad does not seem to be online but I remember that it teemed with the worst kinds of generalizations about Muslims and Islam.

For me, HBO's thought-provoking documentary raised, among other questions, two sets of key issues:

One, who does free speech exist for in America? And does it exist equally for all communities? What does it mean when some powerful individuals and groups use free speech to deprive others of free speech?

And, two, why has there been such a silence in the media on the patently unfair and hypocritical actions of Horowitz & Co.? Why don't the likes of CNN and MSNBC not take up such issues. Is it, in part, because of their strong political connections? The widespread support that their views seem to have among sections of American society?
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Capitalism for us and them

Nobel laureate Joseph Stiglitz has an article in Vanity Fair, titled "Wall Street's Toxic Message," about the double standards of the US on free market principles with regard to the current global crisis and the earlier east Asian crisis of a decade ago. (reference via the peerless 3 Quarks Daily). As the article illustrates, what's sauce for the goose is clearly not sauce for the gander.

Here is an earlier post of mine, "Double standards in the coverage of the global capitalism crisis", which address some similar themes.
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Sri Lankan Astrologer Arrested

The authorities in Sri Lanka have arrested a popular astrologer who predicted that the president will be ejected from office, police say. More here from BBC

One more example of the follies of Third World politics. What do the authorities hope to achieve by arresting the astrologer? If they believe that his prediction will come true, then arresting him will not change that. If they believe that his predictions are worthless, again, no point in arresting him.

Like the poet Cinna who was killed by the mob in Julius Caesar for his bad verses, the astrologer's crime may just be to speak or even exist.
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Thomas Friedman's metaphors

This from Friedman's op-ed."The Green Revolution(s)," in the NYTimes today: "President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad behaves like someone who was born on third base and thinks he hit a triple."

What does this even mean?

I am toying with the idea of writing a short story in which Friedman's metaphors save the world. That leaves me with the immensely enjoyable task of mining Friedman's past Op-eds for gems of this sort.

Here is Matt Taibi on the politics of Friedman's commitment to another kind of green revolution: Flat N All That. Among other insights on Friedman, Taibi's picked out some of the columnist's best and most senseless metaphors

And here is an old Friedman classic from this edition of the New York Times. Heh
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Sandip Roy on Indian Mangoes

Sandip Roy has a delightful little story on NPR about the journey of Indian mangoes to America.

Enjoy...
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Iran I: the very short memory of American media

CNN reports that, Reza Shah Pahlavi, the son of the former Shah of Iran, spoke at Washington's National press club, which defines itself as "the world's leading professional organization for journalists." Pahlavi paints the Shah regime as secular and pro-Israel and, laughably, the article implies that the Shah regime was a bastion of enlightened civil society and democracy.

That Ahmedinajad and the mullahs who make up the current Iranian regime stand for the worst kind of fundamentalism is not in doubt. But the' secularism' of the Shah regime was no more than a vile fascism that claimed the name of modernity. It is also common knowledge that Iran under the Shah was nothing more than a client state of the US.

CNN and others are painting themselves as the guardians of human rights, truth, freedom and democracy in their coverage of events in Iran. Utterly convinced of their own moral superiority and goodness, they paint themselves as the voices of the Iranian masses, but do nothing more than cheapen the efforts of the Iranians standing up to the mullahs.

I wonder where this gusto, love of right, and love of the rule of law was when it came to the lead-up to the illegal occupation of Iraq. At that time, CNN, like much of the American media, was scrambling to prove its 'patriotism' in the worst, most unprofessional, and jingoistic manner possible. Ironic that the fundamentalist regime in Iran also defends its actions in the 'national interest.'
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Princeton, Lockheed Martin, and Irony

From the July 2009 issue of Harper's Magazine. Priceless...

The ironic cloud

By D. Graham Burnett and Jeffrey Andrew Dolven

By D. Graham Burnett and Jeff Dolven, from “Irony in the National Defense.” Last winter, Lockheed Martin Corporation approached Princeton University with a request for research initiatives. In April, Burnett, an historian of science, and Dolven, a professor of English, submitted the proposal, the cost of which they estimated to be $750,000; Princeton declined to forward it to Lockheed.

Irony is a powerful and incompletely understood feature of human dynamics. A technique for dissimulation and “secret speech,” irony is considerably more complex than lying and even more dangerous. Ideally suited to mobilization on the shifting terrain of asymmetrical conflict, inherently covert, insidiously plastic, politically potent, irony offers rogue elements a volatile if often overlooked means by which to demoralize opponents and destabilize regimes. And yet while major research resources have for forty years poured into the human sciences from the defense and intelligence community in an effort to gain control over the human capacity to lie (investments that led to the modern polygraph, sodium pentothal–derived truth serums, “brain fingerprinting,” etc.), we have no comparable tradition of sustained, empirical, applied investigation into irony.

Read the entire proposal here.
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