Ref: http://www.newsfrombangladesh.net/view.php?hidRecord=269578
Thanks to Major (Retd.) Zaman for going over the trouble in tabulating data on seized goods, including drugs, arms and ammos, by our BDR forces stationed around the border with India and Burma. Like most of our honest Army officers he is very concerned with any negative publicity or stereotype about our defense forces. One may recall that during the early hours of the BDR mutiny some rebel jawans read out a laundry list of their grievances against Army officers that were on deputation. This included charges of corruption, esp. against late Maj. Gen. Shaqil and his wife. In the absence of government probing to find the veracity of such accusations, we can only pray and hope that such accusations of corruptions are baseless and are not true.
As some of you may already know, as a certified six sigma master black belt, I get excited with numbers. The problem with these limited data, something that has also been acknowledged by Zaman, is that they do not help us one way or another to prove any claim, neither for nor against. If we were interested in proving that BDR has been doing a wonderful job in recent years, say, e.g., in the 2002-06 period, what we needed was the ratio of goods seized against total entering and exiting due to smuggling. But we don't have such figures, and what we have is just some raw numbers on what had been confiscated on our side. We have also only 5 data points (for all but value of seized goods), which is too little for any statistical inference.
Does higher number there mean, better or weaker performance by our BDR? We can't say without making some crude and irrational assumptions, which may be absolutely wrong. The yearly trends are not helpful here. There was a downward trend in value of goods seized since 2004 and falling to its lowest value in 2007 (after extrapolating the last data point on a yearly average). BTW: the bomb data had an outlier in 2006. What could explain such a big catch in that year in 2006, as against previous years? Was the BDR doing a lousy job before, and all on a sudden became extra alert that year? Or, that too much bombs entered/exited the country that year? Only the heroin had a somewhat upward trend overall. Does that mean, BDR was catching more as more heroin was coming in to meet greater addiction demand inside Bangladesh, or that they really were lucky with some big catches while the internal demand remained the same?
Nevertheless, I tried to find any correlation between the various variables. I failed to find any strong correlation between most of these factors. The only strong ones are: between phensidyl and wine, followed by heroin and ammo, followed by revolver and wine. So, here is a caveat for our wine drinkers: you are very prone to take phensidyl, and use revolver to settle your disputes; and the heroin users are more prone to collect ammo!
Wednesday, June 17, 2009
Comments on the so-called BDR interrogation audio tapes
From the interrogation of Jawans reported in the audiotape the only thing that one can accuse against some politicians was that they were contacted by the Jawans with their grievances against the Army officers. Even if we are to assume that the tape is authentic and the statements of the jawans are true, nowhere is there a claim that those politicians contacted had approved a blueprint for the killing of officers. I failed to hear such in the tape.
We are told that there was a long list of grievances including alleged corruption with the dal-bhat program and many other promotion related issues where the Jawans felt that they were not fairly treated by the officers. From the TV interviews of some retired officers it also came out quite clear that the use of 'tui' rather than 'tumi' was also the norm rather than exceptions against the jawans. I was told by some friends here just last weekend about corruption of late Maj. Gen. Shaqil, whose wife used to visit Houston, TX. So, there may be some truth to those allegations. And Allah knows best. But no matter how bad those charges were, there is absolutely no justification for killing anyone, not even Shaqil's wife. It is cold-blooded murder!
It is not difficult to understand that some BDR reps met and spoke with some politicians to air their grievances, who themselves might not have liked heavy-handed treatment of theirs following 1/11. The human nature is to interact with people who had their share of bad experience. I remember following Saqa's grab of my parental properties, how often some other victims of land-grab would write and call me to share their sad stories and how I could assist them.
Sympathy does not necessarily translate into condoning a crime. So, while the politicians were sympathetic to the Jawans on their grievances, they may not have known at all about the criminal intent of the few masterminds that had decided to kill officers if their issues were not solved before the Darbar Hall meeting on the fateful morning of 2/25. That is why they were well prepared with all their criminal plans.
Was there a foreign hand involved? From the reports submitted, we don't know at this time as much we don't know if the CIA was involved in the killing of Sk. Mujib. We also don't know if Gen. Zia himself was involved with Dalim-Rashid-Faruq-Huda gang, something that is accused of him by some historians. That is the unfortunate reality of our time with many such conspiracies, even with the 9/11! These are not too thorough. Before any investigation, within minutes the Bush Administration declared that OBL was behind, and all subsequent investigations appeared to establish that hypothesis. Ignored were all other theories of how the 9/11 episode was an inside job to justify neocons’ war against the Muslim world where the twin towers were brought down not as a result of planes hitting the buildings but because of a “planned implosion.” Do most Americans agree with the government version? How about the conspiracy theory? I am at least glad to see that official investigation reports on the BDR carnage did not establish views expressed by some government ministers who were too keen on establishing a connection with religious extremists. Similarly, we shall probably never know if India/Pakistan and/or Ershad were involved in the killing of Gen. Zia, and subsequently Manjur. I am told by a retd. Brigadier who was close to Manjur that the latter had nothing to do with the killing of Zia, and that the assassination was done by two hot-headed FF officers Moti and Mahbub, who did not like how Zia was allowing more and more control to the repatriated and Pakistan-minded officers and politicians. So instead of bringing Zia to the cantonment they simply killed him. Many people suffer from temporary insanity and do things that they later themselves cannot justify!
While many conspiracy theorists would like to discover conspiracy - local and/or foreign - with everything, proving such assertions are quite often very difficult. It is all that easy to finger point either India or Pakistan with the BDR massacre. But proving involvement is quite difficult without hard evidences - the smoking guns. Many big players also take a long term approach in matters of strategy realization thus making it difficult to establish a causal relationship. Hopefully one day, when the cloud is gone we shall be able to see the horizon better!
We are told that there was a long list of grievances including alleged corruption with the dal-bhat program and many other promotion related issues where the Jawans felt that they were not fairly treated by the officers. From the TV interviews of some retired officers it also came out quite clear that the use of 'tui' rather than 'tumi' was also the norm rather than exceptions against the jawans. I was told by some friends here just last weekend about corruption of late Maj. Gen. Shaqil, whose wife used to visit Houston, TX. So, there may be some truth to those allegations. And Allah knows best. But no matter how bad those charges were, there is absolutely no justification for killing anyone, not even Shaqil's wife. It is cold-blooded murder!
It is not difficult to understand that some BDR reps met and spoke with some politicians to air their grievances, who themselves might not have liked heavy-handed treatment of theirs following 1/11. The human nature is to interact with people who had their share of bad experience. I remember following Saqa's grab of my parental properties, how often some other victims of land-grab would write and call me to share their sad stories and how I could assist them.
Sympathy does not necessarily translate into condoning a crime. So, while the politicians were sympathetic to the Jawans on their grievances, they may not have known at all about the criminal intent of the few masterminds that had decided to kill officers if their issues were not solved before the Darbar Hall meeting on the fateful morning of 2/25. That is why they were well prepared with all their criminal plans.
Was there a foreign hand involved? From the reports submitted, we don't know at this time as much we don't know if the CIA was involved in the killing of Sk. Mujib. We also don't know if Gen. Zia himself was involved with Dalim-Rashid-Faruq-Huda gang, something that is accused of him by some historians. That is the unfortunate reality of our time with many such conspiracies, even with the 9/11! These are not too thorough. Before any investigation, within minutes the Bush Administration declared that OBL was behind, and all subsequent investigations appeared to establish that hypothesis. Ignored were all other theories of how the 9/11 episode was an inside job to justify neocons’ war against the Muslim world where the twin towers were brought down not as a result of planes hitting the buildings but because of a “planned implosion.” Do most Americans agree with the government version? How about the conspiracy theory? I am at least glad to see that official investigation reports on the BDR carnage did not establish views expressed by some government ministers who were too keen on establishing a connection with religious extremists. Similarly, we shall probably never know if India/Pakistan and/or Ershad were involved in the killing of Gen. Zia, and subsequently Manjur. I am told by a retd. Brigadier who was close to Manjur that the latter had nothing to do with the killing of Zia, and that the assassination was done by two hot-headed FF officers Moti and Mahbub, who did not like how Zia was allowing more and more control to the repatriated and Pakistan-minded officers and politicians. So instead of bringing Zia to the cantonment they simply killed him. Many people suffer from temporary insanity and do things that they later themselves cannot justify!
While many conspiracy theorists would like to discover conspiracy - local and/or foreign - with everything, proving such assertions are quite often very difficult. It is all that easy to finger point either India or Pakistan with the BDR massacre. But proving involvement is quite difficult without hard evidences - the smoking guns. Many big players also take a long term approach in matters of strategy realization thus making it difficult to establish a causal relationship. Hopefully one day, when the cloud is gone we shall be able to see the horizon better!
Monday, June 15, 2009
Does Race Have Anything To Do With IQ?
Remember the colonial days when vast territories of Asia, Africa and Latin America were under white men’s rule? The failure of the non-Whites to resist European colonization and plunder of their territories automatically relegated them to a lower human status. In the 19th century, thus, in addition to the rise of social Darwinism, anthropologists contributed to racism. The search for the “missing link” between apes and Homo sapiens became a passionate pastime among the anthropologists and social Darwinists. They studied aborigines to see if they would fill the gap. Since anthropologists were Europeans and white, their race was put at the apex of hierarchy and the blacks at the bottom. The fact that both black and white human beings shared some common features with apes did not matter; apparently their thick lips, origin in Africa and black color reinforced the stereotype of association between apes and black people. Conveniently ignored were other signs, e.g., the apes have thin lips (it is the jaw that protrudes for apes), straight hair and ash-white skin (once the black hair is removed) showing closer resemblance of apes to the white people.
Count Arthur de Gobineau (1816-82) was one such theorist who turned racism into a cultural and political issue, by saying that the deterioration of the modern age resulted from the mixing of superior and inferior races. He divided humanity into the black, yellow, and white races, and claimed that only the pure white, or Aryan, race was and could be truly noble. According to him, some societies remain in embryonic state, e.g., the pure blooded yellow and black races, which are unable to achieve the level of a civilized nation. He held to the belief that racial groups were physically, mentally and morally different and any attempt to civilize these embryonic groups would meet with failure.
In his chapter on “Characteristics of Human Races,” Gobineau provided the traits of the black and yellow races as follows. Black: “The animal character … is stamped on the negro from the birth… mental faculties are dull or even nonexistent… He kills willingly for the sake of killing…” Yellow: “little physically energy and inclined to apathy … desires are feeble, will-power obstinate… tends to mediocrity in everything… He is practical, in narrowest sense of the word… does not dream or theorize… invents little.” He described the white race as a superior type in beauty, intelligence and strength. Finally, he determined that all civilizations, e.g., Indian, Egyptian, Assyrian, Greek and Roman, were all created from one primary source – the white race.
Probably we should pardon Gobineau on the ground that like most Christians and Jews of his time, in his denunciation of the black people, he was motivated by inherent racism that he discovered within the Bible. In his book, Racial Myths, professor Juan Comas, says, “In the Old Testament we already find the belief that the physical and mental differences between individuals and groups alike are congenital, hereditary, and unchangeable. The Book of Genesis contains passages apparently assuming the inferiority of certain groups to others: “Cursed be Canaan; the servant of servants shall he be unto his brethren,” while some sort of superiority is implied … with Abraham and his seed.” Following such Biblical teachings, the Blacks were considered not to possess souls!
Following Gobineau’s theory, it was all too natural for Europeans to believe that they were on a God-given mission to civilize others. Much later, during Hitler era we would see the worst form of application of Gobineau’s theory in Nazism where only Germans were considered superior to all other races. Truly, Nazi ideology cannot be separated from racism. Through this ideology, Nazis were able to "justify" their horrible actions by making the Jews seem less human.
Racism went hand in hand with degradation of the “other” people who were perceived inferior to those practicing it. In the 1870s, the Chinese immigrants to the USA were perceived as being “inferior to any race God ever made” and as people without any “souls to save, and if they have, they are not worth saving.” The Japanese Americans did not fare any better in the early 20th century. A 1913 article in the Sacramento Bee captures the mood of the time, “The Jap will always be an undesirable. They are lower in the scale of civilization than the whites, and will never become our equals.”
In a recent article, “Rising Above I.Q.” (NY Time, June 7, 2009), Nicholas Kristof mentioned something that many of us knew for quite some time: there is no genetic or racial contribution to the black-white difference on I.Q. Drawing upon research findings from psychologist Professor Richard Nisbett’s book - “Intelligence and How to Get It”, he says that there also seems to be no genetic difference in intelligence between whites and Asians. It is education and the drive to succeed which are most important factors that translate into success. These findings must come as a shock to all those racists that believed too long in lies and myths spread by Gobineau and other Social Darwinists.
In his study on intelligence, Dr. Nisbett studied three groups of people in America – Jews, Chinese-Americans and West Indian (Caribbean) Blacks and found these groups to outperform others. For example, Jews have received about one-third of all Nobel Prizes in science received by Americans. One survey found that a quarter of Jewish adults in the United States have earned a graduate degree, compared with six percent of the population as a whole. Asian-Americans (especially the Chinese-Americans), in general, have earned better grades than other students (much in contrast to Gobineau’s characterization that yellow race tends to mediocrity). West Indian blacks with roots in the Caribbean are one-third more likely to graduate from college than African-Americans as a whole, and their median household income is almost one-third higher. Nisbett says that the evidence is overwhelming that what is distinctive about these three groups is not innate advantage but rather a tendency to get the most out of the firepower they have. A common thread among these three groups may be an emphasis on diligence or education, perhaps linked in part to an immigrant drive.
As we know quite well, a country that has allowed immigration has always prospered better than those countries that did not. American success story owes it to its immigrant community who had energized the country through their hard work and drive to succeed. Even if the first generation immigrants were not all highly educated, they made sure that their children studied hard and worked harder than others to succeed. Immigrants are also a small minority and as such their smallness in number in the society has put an extra burden to succeed in their adopted homes.
Jews always have been minorities in the countries they lived (outside the Zionist state). They have also known from their bitter experience that they could lose or be robbed of everything they possessed except their intellect, and as such, they have inculcated the importance of education within their own family. It is no-brainer that they are more educated and have been controlling top positions in both academic and corporate world.
When comparing the social status of most Black Americans with others, including those from the Caribbean islands, one usually forgets that most Black Americans come from broken families who don’t have father figures in their families; most children are raised by single mothers. Then for centuries they saw how they were discriminated and badly treated. None of these factors helped to encourage a young Afro-American to understand the wisdom behind education and hard work. If you factored in such information, it is not difficult to understand why they are behind West Indians whose success has been identified to be rooted in: the classic diligence and hard work associated with immigrants, and intact families. [Digression: In the article, I was somewhat intrigued to see General Colin Powell’s name mentioned as if his IQ had something to do with his success. He is from Caribbean parents who settled in the USA. However, he was a C-average undergraduate student in NY. The reason behind his success is hard work plus Republican leaning, a rarity amongst Blacks in America. Thus, the Republican governments, keen on getting support from the Blacks, who are traditionally Democrats, found a natural ally in Powell, who during Reagan and Bush Sr. Administrations was promoted to become a 4-star general, superseding many qualified White Americans. The rest is history.]
Unfortunately, what the Nisbett study does not say is that success, like failure, has ripple effects in the society it originates. Thus, one’s success story in the community can encourage others to follow his/her footsteps to better their lives. And as long as there is no discrimination, such successes can boost the morale of others to succeed. But when a person is denied success in spite of all the right characteristics, such can adversely demoralize others that are close to that person. And the sad fact of our life is discrimination happens too often. I know many such examples where persons with less education, less skill, less experience, and less qualification have been chosen over more talented, educated, qualified, better candidates. Jews in the pre-Hitler era in Germany have been accused of such discriminatory practices against Germans, monopolizing the entire system wherever they had been able to grab some important positions. They denied entry of Germans into many coveted positions.
Today, top positions in many important institutions, financial and otherwise, in the western world, esp. the USA, government/public and private sectors, are held by Jews. Such role models of success can have a tremendous positive impact to boost the latter generation of Jewish people to succeed. Thus, as a race, they are more prone to succeed, something that others can’t claim as much. Based on years of analysis, some analysts have even accused that once the Jewish people had held those top level positions, they ensured that the next in line would also come from their group (e.g., by forcing early retirement or firing of a talented non-Jewish aspirant for the position). If such accusations are true, one can only ponder as to how long can such discriminatory practices be sustained! Have not these guys learned anything from their German experience?
Success can also have a caustic effect. Success of a community can translate into a belief that it is more deserving of those high positions than someone coming from outside its racial, ethnic group. It can instill a racist mentality. Thus, discrimination of others becomes part of success story of a particular group. I remember while working as a Director of a multi-billion dollar global company how often I was tutored by my boss and peers about the importance of perception in the business world, and how I should do succession planning in leadership so that someone perceived better suited for a job was preferred over a more qualified and talented person. I was literally told that so and so did not really fit the position compared to someone else who appeared more like them. Interestingly, my experience was at odds with their perceptions.
In spite of the reality that prejudice and discrimination are quite common in our world, and that education and hard work may not always translate into success, there is no denying that Professor Nisbett is right in that “Intelligence and academic achievement are very much under people’s control.” Let’s motivate our children and loved ones to excel in these two sectors without worrying too much about the outcome – the material success. Let future take its own course while we take control of the present. That would hopefully be the beginning of our drive to regain our lost heritage. That will be enough for now.
References:
Milton Kleg, Hate, prejudice and racism. State University of New York Press, pp. 95-6.
Ibid., p. 98.
As to Islam, Professor Comas says, “Mohammedans have never displayed racial intransigence or intolerance to other peoples so long as those peoples adopted the faith.”
Nor should we be oblivious of the fact that Nazis were greatly influenced by Protestant leader Martin Luther’s writings against the Jews. He described the Jews as seeds of the devil.
This statement was made by Frank M. Pixley, representing the city government in San Francisco, in his 1876 testimony before the Congressional Joint Special Committee on the question of Chinese immigration. As quoted in Kleg, op. cit., p. 108.
Kleg, op. cit., p. 109.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/07/opinion/07kristof.html
Count Arthur de Gobineau (1816-82) was one such theorist who turned racism into a cultural and political issue, by saying that the deterioration of the modern age resulted from the mixing of superior and inferior races. He divided humanity into the black, yellow, and white races, and claimed that only the pure white, or Aryan, race was and could be truly noble. According to him, some societies remain in embryonic state, e.g., the pure blooded yellow and black races, which are unable to achieve the level of a civilized nation. He held to the belief that racial groups were physically, mentally and morally different and any attempt to civilize these embryonic groups would meet with failure.
In his chapter on “Characteristics of Human Races,” Gobineau provided the traits of the black and yellow races as follows. Black: “The animal character … is stamped on the negro from the birth… mental faculties are dull or even nonexistent… He kills willingly for the sake of killing…” Yellow: “little physically energy and inclined to apathy … desires are feeble, will-power obstinate… tends to mediocrity in everything… He is practical, in narrowest sense of the word… does not dream or theorize… invents little.” He described the white race as a superior type in beauty, intelligence and strength. Finally, he determined that all civilizations, e.g., Indian, Egyptian, Assyrian, Greek and Roman, were all created from one primary source – the white race.
Probably we should pardon Gobineau on the ground that like most Christians and Jews of his time, in his denunciation of the black people, he was motivated by inherent racism that he discovered within the Bible. In his book, Racial Myths, professor Juan Comas, says, “In the Old Testament we already find the belief that the physical and mental differences between individuals and groups alike are congenital, hereditary, and unchangeable. The Book of Genesis contains passages apparently assuming the inferiority of certain groups to others: “Cursed be Canaan; the servant of servants shall he be unto his brethren,” while some sort of superiority is implied … with Abraham and his seed.” Following such Biblical teachings, the Blacks were considered not to possess souls!
Following Gobineau’s theory, it was all too natural for Europeans to believe that they were on a God-given mission to civilize others. Much later, during Hitler era we would see the worst form of application of Gobineau’s theory in Nazism where only Germans were considered superior to all other races. Truly, Nazi ideology cannot be separated from racism. Through this ideology, Nazis were able to "justify" their horrible actions by making the Jews seem less human.
Racism went hand in hand with degradation of the “other” people who were perceived inferior to those practicing it. In the 1870s, the Chinese immigrants to the USA were perceived as being “inferior to any race God ever made” and as people without any “souls to save, and if they have, they are not worth saving.” The Japanese Americans did not fare any better in the early 20th century. A 1913 article in the Sacramento Bee captures the mood of the time, “The Jap will always be an undesirable. They are lower in the scale of civilization than the whites, and will never become our equals.”
In a recent article, “Rising Above I.Q.” (NY Time, June 7, 2009), Nicholas Kristof mentioned something that many of us knew for quite some time: there is no genetic or racial contribution to the black-white difference on I.Q. Drawing upon research findings from psychologist Professor Richard Nisbett’s book - “Intelligence and How to Get It”, he says that there also seems to be no genetic difference in intelligence between whites and Asians. It is education and the drive to succeed which are most important factors that translate into success. These findings must come as a shock to all those racists that believed too long in lies and myths spread by Gobineau and other Social Darwinists.
In his study on intelligence, Dr. Nisbett studied three groups of people in America – Jews, Chinese-Americans and West Indian (Caribbean) Blacks and found these groups to outperform others. For example, Jews have received about one-third of all Nobel Prizes in science received by Americans. One survey found that a quarter of Jewish adults in the United States have earned a graduate degree, compared with six percent of the population as a whole. Asian-Americans (especially the Chinese-Americans), in general, have earned better grades than other students (much in contrast to Gobineau’s characterization that yellow race tends to mediocrity). West Indian blacks with roots in the Caribbean are one-third more likely to graduate from college than African-Americans as a whole, and their median household income is almost one-third higher. Nisbett says that the evidence is overwhelming that what is distinctive about these three groups is not innate advantage but rather a tendency to get the most out of the firepower they have. A common thread among these three groups may be an emphasis on diligence or education, perhaps linked in part to an immigrant drive.
As we know quite well, a country that has allowed immigration has always prospered better than those countries that did not. American success story owes it to its immigrant community who had energized the country through their hard work and drive to succeed. Even if the first generation immigrants were not all highly educated, they made sure that their children studied hard and worked harder than others to succeed. Immigrants are also a small minority and as such their smallness in number in the society has put an extra burden to succeed in their adopted homes.
Jews always have been minorities in the countries they lived (outside the Zionist state). They have also known from their bitter experience that they could lose or be robbed of everything they possessed except their intellect, and as such, they have inculcated the importance of education within their own family. It is no-brainer that they are more educated and have been controlling top positions in both academic and corporate world.
When comparing the social status of most Black Americans with others, including those from the Caribbean islands, one usually forgets that most Black Americans come from broken families who don’t have father figures in their families; most children are raised by single mothers. Then for centuries they saw how they were discriminated and badly treated. None of these factors helped to encourage a young Afro-American to understand the wisdom behind education and hard work. If you factored in such information, it is not difficult to understand why they are behind West Indians whose success has been identified to be rooted in: the classic diligence and hard work associated with immigrants, and intact families. [Digression: In the article, I was somewhat intrigued to see General Colin Powell’s name mentioned as if his IQ had something to do with his success. He is from Caribbean parents who settled in the USA. However, he was a C-average undergraduate student in NY. The reason behind his success is hard work plus Republican leaning, a rarity amongst Blacks in America. Thus, the Republican governments, keen on getting support from the Blacks, who are traditionally Democrats, found a natural ally in Powell, who during Reagan and Bush Sr. Administrations was promoted to become a 4-star general, superseding many qualified White Americans. The rest is history.]
Unfortunately, what the Nisbett study does not say is that success, like failure, has ripple effects in the society it originates. Thus, one’s success story in the community can encourage others to follow his/her footsteps to better their lives. And as long as there is no discrimination, such successes can boost the morale of others to succeed. But when a person is denied success in spite of all the right characteristics, such can adversely demoralize others that are close to that person. And the sad fact of our life is discrimination happens too often. I know many such examples where persons with less education, less skill, less experience, and less qualification have been chosen over more talented, educated, qualified, better candidates. Jews in the pre-Hitler era in Germany have been accused of such discriminatory practices against Germans, monopolizing the entire system wherever they had been able to grab some important positions. They denied entry of Germans into many coveted positions.
Today, top positions in many important institutions, financial and otherwise, in the western world, esp. the USA, government/public and private sectors, are held by Jews. Such role models of success can have a tremendous positive impact to boost the latter generation of Jewish people to succeed. Thus, as a race, they are more prone to succeed, something that others can’t claim as much. Based on years of analysis, some analysts have even accused that once the Jewish people had held those top level positions, they ensured that the next in line would also come from their group (e.g., by forcing early retirement or firing of a talented non-Jewish aspirant for the position). If such accusations are true, one can only ponder as to how long can such discriminatory practices be sustained! Have not these guys learned anything from their German experience?
Success can also have a caustic effect. Success of a community can translate into a belief that it is more deserving of those high positions than someone coming from outside its racial, ethnic group. It can instill a racist mentality. Thus, discrimination of others becomes part of success story of a particular group. I remember while working as a Director of a multi-billion dollar global company how often I was tutored by my boss and peers about the importance of perception in the business world, and how I should do succession planning in leadership so that someone perceived better suited for a job was preferred over a more qualified and talented person. I was literally told that so and so did not really fit the position compared to someone else who appeared more like them. Interestingly, my experience was at odds with their perceptions.
In spite of the reality that prejudice and discrimination are quite common in our world, and that education and hard work may not always translate into success, there is no denying that Professor Nisbett is right in that “Intelligence and academic achievement are very much under people’s control.” Let’s motivate our children and loved ones to excel in these two sectors without worrying too much about the outcome – the material success. Let future take its own course while we take control of the present. That would hopefully be the beginning of our drive to regain our lost heritage. That will be enough for now.
References:
Milton Kleg, Hate, prejudice and racism. State University of New York Press, pp. 95-6.
Ibid., p. 98.
As to Islam, Professor Comas says, “Mohammedans have never displayed racial intransigence or intolerance to other peoples so long as those peoples adopted the faith.”
Nor should we be oblivious of the fact that Nazis were greatly influenced by Protestant leader Martin Luther’s writings against the Jews. He described the Jews as seeds of the devil.
This statement was made by Frank M. Pixley, representing the city government in San Francisco, in his 1876 testimony before the Congressional Joint Special Committee on the question of Chinese immigration. As quoted in Kleg, op. cit., p. 108.
Kleg, op. cit., p. 109.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/07/opinion/07kristof.html
Thursday, June 11, 2009
Obama’s Speech Tries to Close the Gap with the World of Islam
President Barack Obama was in Egypt on Thursday, June 4, delivering a seminal speech on improving relationship between the world of Islam and the USA. From the troubling relationship, it is difficult to believe today that it was the Muslim kingdom - al-Mamlaka al-Maġribiyya - more commonly known to the outside world by its Latinized name - Morocco that was the first country to recognize the new state – the USA when others had taken on a wait-and-see approach. In his speech, as much as Obama wanted to reassure his 1.6 billion intended audience about the dawning of a new era, he also had to remind his own constituencies back in the USA about facts that they have forgotten.
A vast majority of the Africans brought to the new country to work in its fields as slaves were Muslims who had lost their God-given human rights in the hands of White slave masters. They were responsible for laying the foundation for the new civilization that was to become the envy of our time being the most powerful nation on earth. Many of the children of those former slaves have gone back to their roots to reclaim the faith of their forefathers before they were brought in chains to this country, while others have chosen to at least name their own children with Muslim names. Some of these Afro-American Muslims have excelled as great poets, writers, singers, musicians, actors, athletes, sportsmen and business entrepreneurs.
America today has over seven million Muslims, mostly from immigrant background. Through their vibrant culture, integrity and work ethics, they have enriched their adopted home. They have excelled in every field from literature and arts to science and technology. Their talented engineers and architects have built and designed some of the tallest buildings in the USA. Their gifted doctors and researchers have developed life-saving drugs. Their brilliant minds have won Nobel Prizes. There is hardly a university today in the USA where no single American Muslim is teaching. Similarly, there are very few hospitals without a Muslim physician. Not surprisingly, their income and education are higher than average Americans. They have remained part of mainstream America and for the first time have been able to send a Muslim to the Congress who took the oath of office as a Congressman at the Capitol Hill by placing his hand on the Qur’an.
Yet, American relationship with the Muslim world has been a thorny one since 9/11, which saw some 3000 people die on this side of the Atlantic Ocean. With a Christian fundamentalist occupying the White House, war was declared first against Afghanistan and then Iraq that saw the arrogance of Pharaohnic power killing hundreds of thousands of Muslims and maiming millions. The world has never seen before so much violence committed by the powerful against the powerless, unarmed civilians. The world has never witnessed so much bombing and so much destruction of towns and cities. It was a genocidal campaign that discriminated none. Nothing within Iraq, the cradle of civilization, was spared from such vindictive savagery. She saw her museums looted, treasury robbed, libraries gutted, historical sites ruined, religious shrines and ancient mosques desecrated and demolished. The invaders forgot that what Rome and Greece are to western civilization, Baghdad is to Islamic civilization.
Bush’s global war on terror saw American government violating established international laws on treatment of prisoners and detainees, committing the worst kind of war crimes the world has ever seen. Through her beastly acts in places like Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo Bay, America gave new meanings to words like sadism and torture. Overall, the war brought out the worst in America sowing seeds of deep anger and hatred throughout the Muslim world that produced the likes of Zarqawi who would tarnish the image of Islam with their insane criminal activities.
And worse yet, Iraq did not pre-empt any activity to qualify her for attack from the USA. There was no WMD. It had no link with al-Qaeda. The Bush-Cheney Administration lied to its own people, the UN, the EU and rest of the world and provided false information to justify its war against Iraq. The world saw how an international body like the UN would be exploited and later sidelined by the most powerful nation on earth. It seemed UN’s very existence depended on sanctifying America’s whims and unilateral moves.
The war saw the worst form of yellow journalism justifying America’s illegal hostilities and discovered new terminologies like “embedded journalism” and “extraordinary rendition”. The war also witnessed how independent journalists questioning America’s deception and war tactics would be shot at point blank.
In this culture of war on terror, America soon forgot that those who attacked America on September 11, 2001 were once trained by her own CIA and that the Talibans that sheltered the al-Qaeda’s leader were also once financed by the USA to fight America’s proxy war against the Soviets. By some accounts, 9/11 was a blowback phenomenon. The Mossad, the Israeli spy agent, had known all about its preparation and yet deliberately failed to inform her counterpart agency in the USA of the impending attack so that the American government might be pulled on its side to do Israel’s dirty war in the Middle East and Palestinian rights totally ignored. 9/11 also allowed Israel to unleash her worst form of savagery upon the Palestinian people. Every day within the occupied territories felt like a Nakba – the day of catastrophe - for the Palestinian victims.
Too many things were wrong in the Muslim-American relationship during Bush’s era. Something had to be done soon to mend the relationship. America had lost too much in her war efforts in the Muslim world – more than 4500 soldiers, and hundreds of billions of dollars. But more importantly, American victory in the battlefield seemed unsustainable and was feeling like Pyrrhic victory. The American economy is in shambles. If the war were to continue indefinitely, as was desired by the military industrial complex, signs were all clear to predict America’s premature death as the global mega-power.
So when Obama chose to speak on June 4, his was to call a truce with the world of Islam. He could not afford a Pyrrhic victory for America. He needed Muslims to rescue America from the curse of war brought about by his dim-witted predecessor. He did not come to lecture but to open a dialogue. And he could not have found a better place than Cairo to deliver his message. Cairo is undoubtedly the heart of the Arab world and the largest metropolis in the Middle East. Obama’s hosts included Al-Azhar and the Cairo University. Al-Azhar remains the oldest surviving university in our world. It has stood as a beacon of Islamic learning for more than a millennium. And for over a century, Cairo University has been a source of Egypt's advancement. Together, these two institutions of higher learning represented the harmony between tradition and progress. And who can deny the importance of finding that harmony, something that has sadly been missing from much of the Muslim world?
Obama sounded sincere and not arrogant – the latter trait becoming the trademark of America’s presidents since the days of Reagan, and more visibly with the Bush Jr. presidency. In spite of Obama’s assurance to the Israelis, the enemies of peace will paint him negatively for deviating from the war-mongering days of Bush. His speech will not be welcomed by the Zionist extremists who have hijacked Judaism and have gotten used to taking a free ride on the back of the USA, pushing the country to fight their proxy war in the Middle East. With the kind of blind, robotic support they enjoy amongst the “Amen Corner” within the Capitol Hill, they will not relent from their evil ways to push Obama into fighting yet another war – this time against Iran. Obama will also have his ears full from the extremist, pro-war forces and groups within America that are closely linked with the military industrial complex. They are against change and want the USA to pursue the old, failed hegemonic ways, which during the Bush-era had not only antagonized the vast majority of Muslims and other peace-loving citizens around the globe but also isolated the USA from the European friendly states that got tired of America’s bullying.
As Obama has rightly acknowledged no single speech of his could eradicate years of mistrust between the world of Islam and the USA, esp. in the aftermath of 9/11 and America’s wars in the Muslim world – now ravaging from Pakistan to Somalia. But it is important that the healing process starts. With that speech in Cairo, Obama has taken that first baby step towards translating mistrust into trust and giving hope where there was none before.
Barack Obama’s most important viewers were the Muslims from Indonesia to Senegal. If the election result in Lebanon is one way to measure the impact of his message, there is no denying that he has immensely succeeded in relaying his message. There, just days before Obama’s speech, no one had predicted defeat of Hizbullah-led coalition to a pro-Western coalition in legislative elections.
It seems that Muslims are ready to trust Obama and give him the opportunity to mend fences with the world of Islam. The trillion dollar question is: will the war-party allow him to continue on this fence-mending task?
A vast majority of the Africans brought to the new country to work in its fields as slaves were Muslims who had lost their God-given human rights in the hands of White slave masters. They were responsible for laying the foundation for the new civilization that was to become the envy of our time being the most powerful nation on earth. Many of the children of those former slaves have gone back to their roots to reclaim the faith of their forefathers before they were brought in chains to this country, while others have chosen to at least name their own children with Muslim names. Some of these Afro-American Muslims have excelled as great poets, writers, singers, musicians, actors, athletes, sportsmen and business entrepreneurs.
America today has over seven million Muslims, mostly from immigrant background. Through their vibrant culture, integrity and work ethics, they have enriched their adopted home. They have excelled in every field from literature and arts to science and technology. Their talented engineers and architects have built and designed some of the tallest buildings in the USA. Their gifted doctors and researchers have developed life-saving drugs. Their brilliant minds have won Nobel Prizes. There is hardly a university today in the USA where no single American Muslim is teaching. Similarly, there are very few hospitals without a Muslim physician. Not surprisingly, their income and education are higher than average Americans. They have remained part of mainstream America and for the first time have been able to send a Muslim to the Congress who took the oath of office as a Congressman at the Capitol Hill by placing his hand on the Qur’an.
Yet, American relationship with the Muslim world has been a thorny one since 9/11, which saw some 3000 people die on this side of the Atlantic Ocean. With a Christian fundamentalist occupying the White House, war was declared first against Afghanistan and then Iraq that saw the arrogance of Pharaohnic power killing hundreds of thousands of Muslims and maiming millions. The world has never seen before so much violence committed by the powerful against the powerless, unarmed civilians. The world has never witnessed so much bombing and so much destruction of towns and cities. It was a genocidal campaign that discriminated none. Nothing within Iraq, the cradle of civilization, was spared from such vindictive savagery. She saw her museums looted, treasury robbed, libraries gutted, historical sites ruined, religious shrines and ancient mosques desecrated and demolished. The invaders forgot that what Rome and Greece are to western civilization, Baghdad is to Islamic civilization.
Bush’s global war on terror saw American government violating established international laws on treatment of prisoners and detainees, committing the worst kind of war crimes the world has ever seen. Through her beastly acts in places like Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo Bay, America gave new meanings to words like sadism and torture. Overall, the war brought out the worst in America sowing seeds of deep anger and hatred throughout the Muslim world that produced the likes of Zarqawi who would tarnish the image of Islam with their insane criminal activities.
And worse yet, Iraq did not pre-empt any activity to qualify her for attack from the USA. There was no WMD. It had no link with al-Qaeda. The Bush-Cheney Administration lied to its own people, the UN, the EU and rest of the world and provided false information to justify its war against Iraq. The world saw how an international body like the UN would be exploited and later sidelined by the most powerful nation on earth. It seemed UN’s very existence depended on sanctifying America’s whims and unilateral moves.
The war saw the worst form of yellow journalism justifying America’s illegal hostilities and discovered new terminologies like “embedded journalism” and “extraordinary rendition”. The war also witnessed how independent journalists questioning America’s deception and war tactics would be shot at point blank.
In this culture of war on terror, America soon forgot that those who attacked America on September 11, 2001 were once trained by her own CIA and that the Talibans that sheltered the al-Qaeda’s leader were also once financed by the USA to fight America’s proxy war against the Soviets. By some accounts, 9/11 was a blowback phenomenon. The Mossad, the Israeli spy agent, had known all about its preparation and yet deliberately failed to inform her counterpart agency in the USA of the impending attack so that the American government might be pulled on its side to do Israel’s dirty war in the Middle East and Palestinian rights totally ignored. 9/11 also allowed Israel to unleash her worst form of savagery upon the Palestinian people. Every day within the occupied territories felt like a Nakba – the day of catastrophe - for the Palestinian victims.
Too many things were wrong in the Muslim-American relationship during Bush’s era. Something had to be done soon to mend the relationship. America had lost too much in her war efforts in the Muslim world – more than 4500 soldiers, and hundreds of billions of dollars. But more importantly, American victory in the battlefield seemed unsustainable and was feeling like Pyrrhic victory. The American economy is in shambles. If the war were to continue indefinitely, as was desired by the military industrial complex, signs were all clear to predict America’s premature death as the global mega-power.
So when Obama chose to speak on June 4, his was to call a truce with the world of Islam. He could not afford a Pyrrhic victory for America. He needed Muslims to rescue America from the curse of war brought about by his dim-witted predecessor. He did not come to lecture but to open a dialogue. And he could not have found a better place than Cairo to deliver his message. Cairo is undoubtedly the heart of the Arab world and the largest metropolis in the Middle East. Obama’s hosts included Al-Azhar and the Cairo University. Al-Azhar remains the oldest surviving university in our world. It has stood as a beacon of Islamic learning for more than a millennium. And for over a century, Cairo University has been a source of Egypt's advancement. Together, these two institutions of higher learning represented the harmony between tradition and progress. And who can deny the importance of finding that harmony, something that has sadly been missing from much of the Muslim world?
Obama sounded sincere and not arrogant – the latter trait becoming the trademark of America’s presidents since the days of Reagan, and more visibly with the Bush Jr. presidency. In spite of Obama’s assurance to the Israelis, the enemies of peace will paint him negatively for deviating from the war-mongering days of Bush. His speech will not be welcomed by the Zionist extremists who have hijacked Judaism and have gotten used to taking a free ride on the back of the USA, pushing the country to fight their proxy war in the Middle East. With the kind of blind, robotic support they enjoy amongst the “Amen Corner” within the Capitol Hill, they will not relent from their evil ways to push Obama into fighting yet another war – this time against Iran. Obama will also have his ears full from the extremist, pro-war forces and groups within America that are closely linked with the military industrial complex. They are against change and want the USA to pursue the old, failed hegemonic ways, which during the Bush-era had not only antagonized the vast majority of Muslims and other peace-loving citizens around the globe but also isolated the USA from the European friendly states that got tired of America’s bullying.
As Obama has rightly acknowledged no single speech of his could eradicate years of mistrust between the world of Islam and the USA, esp. in the aftermath of 9/11 and America’s wars in the Muslim world – now ravaging from Pakistan to Somalia. But it is important that the healing process starts. With that speech in Cairo, Obama has taken that first baby step towards translating mistrust into trust and giving hope where there was none before.
Barack Obama’s most important viewers were the Muslims from Indonesia to Senegal. If the election result in Lebanon is one way to measure the impact of his message, there is no denying that he has immensely succeeded in relaying his message. There, just days before Obama’s speech, no one had predicted defeat of Hizbullah-led coalition to a pro-Western coalition in legislative elections.
It seems that Muslims are ready to trust Obama and give him the opportunity to mend fences with the world of Islam. The trillion dollar question is: will the war-party allow him to continue on this fence-mending task?
Wednesday, June 10, 2009
Is IQ related to Race?
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/07/opinion/07kristof.html
In a recent article, Rising Above I.Q. (NYT, June 7, 2009), NICHOLAS KRISTOF mentioned something that many of us knew for quite some time: there is no genetic contribution to the black-white difference on I.Q. Drawing upon research findings from psychologist Prof. Richard Nisbett’s book - “Intelligence and How to Get It”, he says that there also seems to be no genetic difference in intelligence between whites and Asians. It is education and the drive to succeed which are most important factors that translate into success. This finding may come as a surprise to those who had believed otherwise. One may recall that following Gobineau’s theory of racial superiority of Whites, it was all too natural for Europeans to believe that they were superior human beings with God-given mission to civilize others. Much later, during Hitler era, we would see the worst form of application of that theory in Nazism where only Germans were considered superior to all other races.
In this study, Dr. Nisbett studied three groups of people – Jews, Chinese-Americans and West Indian Blacks and found these groups to outperform others. For example, Jews have received about one-third of all Nobel Prizes in science received by Americans. One survey found that a quarter of Jewish adults in the United States have earned a graduate degree, compared with 6 percent of the population as a whole. Asian-Americans, esp. the Chinese-Americans have earned better grades than other students. West Indian bl acks with roots are in the Caribbean are one-third more likely to graduate from college than African-Americans as a whole, and their median household income is almost one-third higher. Nisbett says that the evidence is overwhelming that what is distinctive about these three groups is not innate advantage but rather a tendency to get the most out of the firepower they have. Well, I have slight disagreement here, since Jews do have some innate advantage over others. A common thread among these three groups may be an emphasis on diligence or education, perhaps linked in part to an immigrant drive.
As we know quite well, a country that has allowed immigration has always prospered better than those countries that did not. American success story owes it to its immigrant community who had energized the country through their hard work, and drive to succeed. Even if they were not all highly educated, they made sure that their children studied hard and worked harder than others to succeed. Immigrants are also a small minority and as such their smallness in number in the society has put an extra burden to succeed in their adopted homes.
Jews always have been minorities in the countries they lived (outside the Zionist state). They have also known from their bitter experience that they could lose everything they possessed except their intellect, and as such, they have inculcated the importance of education within their own family. No wonder that they are more educated and have been controlling top positions in both academic and corporate world.
Unfortunately, what the study does not say is that success, like failure, has ripple effects in the society it originates. Thus, one’s success story in the community can encourage others to follow his/her footsteps to better their lives. And as long as there is no discrimination, such successes can boost the morale of others to succeed. But when a person is denied success in spite of all the right characteristics, such can adversely demoralize others that are close to that person. And the sad fact of our life is discrimination happens too often. I know many such examples where persons with less education, less skill, less experience, and less qualification have been chosen over more talented, educated, qualified, better candidate. Jews in pre-Hitler era in Germany have been a ccused of such discriminatory practices. They started monopolizing the entire system wherever they had been able to grab some important positions. They denied entry of Germans into many coveted positions. Today, most of the top positions in many important institutions in the western world, esp. the USA, government /public and private, are held by Jews. Jews succeed because they have many success stories that they can still relate to, something that others can’t claim as much. Rumors are ripe that once they had held those positions, they ensured that the next in line would also come from their group. How long can they sustain such a process is questionable!
Success of a community thus can translate into a belief that it is more deserving of those high positions than someone coming from outside its racial, ethnic group. Thus, discrimination of others becomes part of success story of a particular group.
It is undeniable that most Black Americans come from broken families, they don’t have father figures in their families; most children are raised by single mothers. Then for centuries they saw how they were discriminated and badly treated. None of these factors hel ped to encourage a young Afro-American to understand the wisdom behind education and hard work. That is it is not difficult to understand why they are behind West Indians whose success have been identified to be: the classic diligence and hard work associated with immigrants, and intact families. [Digression: I am somewhat intrigued to see General Colin Powell’s name. Yes, he is from Caribbean parents who settled in the USA. However, he was a C-average undergraduate student in Geology at City College of New York. The reason behind his success is hard work plus Republican leaning, a rarity amongst Blacks in America. Thus, the Republican governments, keen on getting support from the Blacks, who are traditionally Democrats, found a natural ally in Powell, who during Reagan and Bush Sr. Administrations was promoted to become a 4-star general, superseding many qualified White Americans. The rest is history.]
In spite of the reality that discrimination is quite common in our world, and that education and hard work may not always translate into success, there is no denying that Professor Nisbett is right in that “Intelligence and academic achievement are very much under people’s control.” Let’s motivate our children to excel in these two sectors without worrying too much about material success. That would hopefully be the beginning of our drive to regain our lost heritage. That will be enough for now.
Endnote: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colin_Powell
In a recent article, Rising Above I.Q. (NYT, June 7, 2009), NICHOLAS KRISTOF mentioned something that many of us knew for quite some time: there is no genetic contribution to the black-white difference on I.Q. Drawing upon research findings from psychologist Prof. Richard Nisbett’s book - “Intelligence and How to Get It”, he says that there also seems to be no genetic difference in intelligence between whites and Asians. It is education and the drive to succeed which are most important factors that translate into success. This finding may come as a surprise to those who had believed otherwise. One may recall that following Gobineau’s theory of racial superiority of Whites, it was all too natural for Europeans to believe that they were superior human beings with God-given mission to civilize others. Much later, during Hitler era, we would see the worst form of application of that theory in Nazism where only Germans were considered superior to all other races.
In this study, Dr. Nisbett studied three groups of people – Jews, Chinese-Americans and West Indian Blacks and found these groups to outperform others. For example, Jews have received about one-third of all Nobel Prizes in science received by Americans. One survey found that a quarter of Jewish adults in the United States have earned a graduate degree, compared with 6 percent of the population as a whole. Asian-Americans, esp. the Chinese-Americans have earned better grades than other students. West Indian bl acks with roots are in the Caribbean are one-third more likely to graduate from college than African-Americans as a whole, and their median household income is almost one-third higher. Nisbett says that the evidence is overwhelming that what is distinctive about these three groups is not innate advantage but rather a tendency to get the most out of the firepower they have. Well, I have slight disagreement here, since Jews do have some innate advantage over others. A common thread among these three groups may be an emphasis on diligence or education, perhaps linked in part to an immigrant drive.
As we know quite well, a country that has allowed immigration has always prospered better than those countries that did not. American success story owes it to its immigrant community who had energized the country through their hard work, and drive to succeed. Even if they were not all highly educated, they made sure that their children studied hard and worked harder than others to succeed. Immigrants are also a small minority and as such their smallness in number in the society has put an extra burden to succeed in their adopted homes.
Jews always have been minorities in the countries they lived (outside the Zionist state). They have also known from their bitter experience that they could lose everything they possessed except their intellect, and as such, they have inculcated the importance of education within their own family. No wonder that they are more educated and have been controlling top positions in both academic and corporate world.
Unfortunately, what the study does not say is that success, like failure, has ripple effects in the society it originates. Thus, one’s success story in the community can encourage others to follow his/her footsteps to better their lives. And as long as there is no discrimination, such successes can boost the morale of others to succeed. But when a person is denied success in spite of all the right characteristics, such can adversely demoralize others that are close to that person. And the sad fact of our life is discrimination happens too often. I know many such examples where persons with less education, less skill, less experience, and less qualification have been chosen over more talented, educated, qualified, better candidate. Jews in pre-Hitler era in Germany have been a ccused of such discriminatory practices. They started monopolizing the entire system wherever they had been able to grab some important positions. They denied entry of Germans into many coveted positions. Today, most of the top positions in many important institutions in the western world, esp. the USA, government /public and private, are held by Jews. Jews succeed because they have many success stories that they can still relate to, something that others can’t claim as much. Rumors are ripe that once they had held those positions, they ensured that the next in line would also come from their group. How long can they sustain such a process is questionable!
Success of a community thus can translate into a belief that it is more deserving of those high positions than someone coming from outside its racial, ethnic group. Thus, discrimination of others becomes part of success story of a particular group.
It is undeniable that most Black Americans come from broken families, they don’t have father figures in their families; most children are raised by single mothers. Then for centuries they saw how they were discriminated and badly treated. None of these factors hel ped to encourage a young Afro-American to understand the wisdom behind education and hard work. That is it is not difficult to understand why they are behind West Indians whose success have been identified to be: the classic diligence and hard work associated with immigrants, and intact families. [Digression: I am somewhat intrigued to see General Colin Powell’s name. Yes, he is from Caribbean parents who settled in the USA. However, he was a C-average undergraduate student in Geology at City College of New York. The reason behind his success is hard work plus Republican leaning, a rarity amongst Blacks in America. Thus, the Republican governments, keen on getting support from the Blacks, who are traditionally Democrats, found a natural ally in Powell, who during Reagan and Bush Sr. Administrations was promoted to become a 4-star general, superseding many qualified White Americans. The rest is history.]
In spite of the reality that discrimination is quite common in our world, and that education and hard work may not always translate into success, there is no denying that Professor Nisbett is right in that “Intelligence and academic achievement are very much under people’s control.” Let’s motivate our children to excel in these two sectors without worrying too much about material success. That would hopefully be the beginning of our drive to regain our lost heritage. That will be enough for now.
Endnote: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colin_Powell
Monday, June 8, 2009
More comments on NFB postings on the Tipaimukh Dam
Ref: http://newsfrombangladesh.net/view.php?hidRecord=267804
and http://www.newsfrombangladesh.net/view.php?hidRecord=267803
It is good to see Mr. Meer Husain's informed views on great dangers posed by the dams. As a concerned expatriate and environmental geologist he has been at the forefront of making a scientific case that relates arsenic poisoning found in groundwater of Bangladesh and the West Bengal with the dams like the Farakka. In this write-up he has put up a couple of rhetorical questions and offered valid suggestions, which I am afraid, Govt. of India will ignore, as it has done in the past a number of times. A visit to the Teesta and Padma rivers during the dry seasons is good enough to see the devastating effect of Indian dams on Bangladesh. A friend of mine who recently had taken a boat ride on the Teesta wrote to me, "We had to physically push the boat like you push a bullock cart." That says a lot about what these Indian dams are doing to Bangladesh!
On the Indian side of the proposed Tipaimukh Dam, thousands of Manipuri Indians will be displaced from their villages, and most of the once-beautiful place will be submerged under water for most of the year. The decision to build hydro-electric dams to alleviate hunger and poverty has never worked; more people have become poor than rich. And yet, India, with the highest number of dams in the world, is determined to add not only this one, but few hundred ones over the next decades, which will inevitably bring in untold misery to the people on all sides. Arundhati Roy had her losing battles with the Indian Government trying to stop the Narmada Dam projects.
In his recent write-up Barrister Munshi has mentioned about a litigation filed at the Supreme Court of Bangladesh to challenge the 1996 Treaty on Farakka. I am not convinced of any good outcome from such a litigation either. As I know during the signing of the 1996 Treaty, the 1997 UN Convention on the Law of the Non-Navigational Uses of International Watercourses and the 2004 Berlin Rules on Water Resources simply did not exist. It is not difficult to understand why the 1996 Treaty had failed to omit internationally accepted safeguards and guarantees that those latter conventions contained.
As we all know having a treaty between dissenting parties is usually better than not having one since the absence of it, as the JRC findings on share of water on the Ganges have repeatedly demonstrated, gives the stronger party the bullying right to unilaterally withdraw as much as it wants without any restriction. However, we have also found out through our bitter experience that India has never kept her side of the treaty obligations on ensuring Bangladesh's share of water (that were agreed between the two parties). She has violated many clauses of the 1996 Treaty. If she had honored her side of the treaty clauses, the situation on Bangladesh side would not be this bad today. This comment of mine should not in anyway be interpreted as my endorsement of hydroelectric dams or the ensuing treaties to safeguard the weaker party. Much like Arundhati Roy, I am totally opposed to such dams and prefer alternative eco-friendly means to cater to energy needs of our people. To confine our choices on technology to those envisioned and formulated in the 1920s and 1930s, is simply stupid.
As I have mentioned in my writings, sadly, self-interest rules our world in which the powerless has hardly anything to demand or bargain for a fair share. Bangladesh is a smaller and weaker nation compared to its giant neighbor. International agencies like the WB, IMF and ADB are all too eager to finance dam projects of this kind.
My more important question has been: what options are left for Bangladesh to make her case to stop construction of such killing dams when hard facts on the ground, protests and complaints have failed to produce desired results with an arrogant and short-sighted neighbor like India? Can our intellectual community invest its valuable time, away from political bickering and blame-game, into suggesting options that are meaningful? Issues like Tipaimukh and Farakka Dam are too important for every concerned citizen to find these confined to narrow partisanship that plagues Bangladesh politics. We cannot afford another self-destructive and suicidal choice with the Tipaimukh. The sooner the better.
and http://www.newsfrombangladesh.net/view.php?hidRecord=267803
It is good to see Mr. Meer Husain's informed views on great dangers posed by the dams. As a concerned expatriate and environmental geologist he has been at the forefront of making a scientific case that relates arsenic poisoning found in groundwater of Bangladesh and the West Bengal with the dams like the Farakka. In this write-up he has put up a couple of rhetorical questions and offered valid suggestions, which I am afraid, Govt. of India will ignore, as it has done in the past a number of times. A visit to the Teesta and Padma rivers during the dry seasons is good enough to see the devastating effect of Indian dams on Bangladesh. A friend of mine who recently had taken a boat ride on the Teesta wrote to me, "We had to physically push the boat like you push a bullock cart." That says a lot about what these Indian dams are doing to Bangladesh!
On the Indian side of the proposed Tipaimukh Dam, thousands of Manipuri Indians will be displaced from their villages, and most of the once-beautiful place will be submerged under water for most of the year. The decision to build hydro-electric dams to alleviate hunger and poverty has never worked; more people have become poor than rich. And yet, India, with the highest number of dams in the world, is determined to add not only this one, but few hundred ones over the next decades, which will inevitably bring in untold misery to the people on all sides. Arundhati Roy had her losing battles with the Indian Government trying to stop the Narmada Dam projects.
In his recent write-up Barrister Munshi has mentioned about a litigation filed at the Supreme Court of Bangladesh to challenge the 1996 Treaty on Farakka. I am not convinced of any good outcome from such a litigation either. As I know during the signing of the 1996 Treaty, the 1997 UN Convention on the Law of the Non-Navigational Uses of International Watercourses and the 2004 Berlin Rules on Water Resources simply did not exist. It is not difficult to understand why the 1996 Treaty had failed to omit internationally accepted safeguards and guarantees that those latter conventions contained.
As we all know having a treaty between dissenting parties is usually better than not having one since the absence of it, as the JRC findings on share of water on the Ganges have repeatedly demonstrated, gives the stronger party the bullying right to unilaterally withdraw as much as it wants without any restriction. However, we have also found out through our bitter experience that India has never kept her side of the treaty obligations on ensuring Bangladesh's share of water (that were agreed between the two parties). She has violated many clauses of the 1996 Treaty. If she had honored her side of the treaty clauses, the situation on Bangladesh side would not be this bad today. This comment of mine should not in anyway be interpreted as my endorsement of hydroelectric dams or the ensuing treaties to safeguard the weaker party. Much like Arundhati Roy, I am totally opposed to such dams and prefer alternative eco-friendly means to cater to energy needs of our people. To confine our choices on technology to those envisioned and formulated in the 1920s and 1930s, is simply stupid.
As I have mentioned in my writings, sadly, self-interest rules our world in which the powerless has hardly anything to demand or bargain for a fair share. Bangladesh is a smaller and weaker nation compared to its giant neighbor. International agencies like the WB, IMF and ADB are all too eager to finance dam projects of this kind.
My more important question has been: what options are left for Bangladesh to make her case to stop construction of such killing dams when hard facts on the ground, protests and complaints have failed to produce desired results with an arrogant and short-sighted neighbor like India? Can our intellectual community invest its valuable time, away from political bickering and blame-game, into suggesting options that are meaningful? Issues like Tipaimukh and Farakka Dam are too important for every concerned citizen to find these confined to narrow partisanship that plagues Bangladesh politics. We cannot afford another self-destructive and suicidal choice with the Tipaimukh. The sooner the better.
Suggestions for a productive dialogue on a national issue
Comments on M. T. Hussain's "India’s Farakka Barrage to Tipaimukh: Bangladesh’s Options"
One would like to believe that as an elderly writer Dr. M.T. Hussain, who claims to have had a very close rapport with (late) Mr. B.M. Abbas, is better positioned to guide our younger generation on a complicated issue like India’s construction of a hydroelectric dam at Tipaimukh. In the past, his articles have shown a penchant for demeaning everything Awami League (AL) – more like opposition for the sake of opposition, something that he may have learned quite well from his iconic leader – Mowlana Bhashani[1] who was termed the “prophet of violence” by the Time magazine in 1969.
If we were expecting something constructive this time, Dr. Hussain has disappointed us again. Like most of his articles, this one, too, is rich with rhetoric that outruns facts. It is loaded with accusations, mostly unfounded as I have shown elsewhere [2], against the AL leadership for the problem with the Farakka Barrage but short on substance offering meaningful solutions that we could have taken in the past and what our generation could do today with the latest threat of the proposed Tipaimukh Dam. He ought to know that his deplorable partisanship is counterproductive, let alone being silly, for a healthy and objective dialogue that we need today on a plethora of issues that matter to Bangladesh. As the recent election in Bangladesh has adequately demonstrated, the new generation that is born after 1975 is not as narrow-minded, dwelling upon the old past but is more concerned about things that affect them presently. As much as the days of political idolatry are absurd these days, politics for the sake of politics is equally insane!
Instead of wasting time of his readers reading silly accusations that belie facts, let him invest his valuable time to offering suggestions that are meaningful to our generation so that we can defeat hegemonic powers like India on issues that affect our people. Can he do that?
Endnotes:
[1] http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,844753,00.html
[2] http://www.newsfrombangladesh.net/view.php?hidRecord&7807
One would like to believe that as an elderly writer Dr. M.T. Hussain, who claims to have had a very close rapport with (late) Mr. B.M. Abbas, is better positioned to guide our younger generation on a complicated issue like India’s construction of a hydroelectric dam at Tipaimukh. In the past, his articles have shown a penchant for demeaning everything Awami League (AL) – more like opposition for the sake of opposition, something that he may have learned quite well from his iconic leader – Mowlana Bhashani[1] who was termed the “prophet of violence” by the Time magazine in 1969.
If we were expecting something constructive this time, Dr. Hussain has disappointed us again. Like most of his articles, this one, too, is rich with rhetoric that outruns facts. It is loaded with accusations, mostly unfounded as I have shown elsewhere [2], against the AL leadership for the problem with the Farakka Barrage but short on substance offering meaningful solutions that we could have taken in the past and what our generation could do today with the latest threat of the proposed Tipaimukh Dam. He ought to know that his deplorable partisanship is counterproductive, let alone being silly, for a healthy and objective dialogue that we need today on a plethora of issues that matter to Bangladesh. As the recent election in Bangladesh has adequately demonstrated, the new generation that is born after 1975 is not as narrow-minded, dwelling upon the old past but is more concerned about things that affect them presently. As much as the days of political idolatry are absurd these days, politics for the sake of politics is equally insane!
Instead of wasting time of his readers reading silly accusations that belie facts, let him invest his valuable time to offering suggestions that are meaningful to our generation so that we can defeat hegemonic powers like India on issues that affect our people. Can he do that?
Endnotes:
[1] http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,844753,00.html
[2] http://www.newsfrombangladesh.net/view.php?hidRecord&7807
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