Chicken Yoghurt: I don't get it

I don't get it

Wednesday, March 22, 2006

Why all the fuss over Abdul Rahman, the Muslim who converted to Christianity? Some people need to grow up.

What are you complaining about? Isn't that why we bombed the crap out of Afghanistan and warmed the heels of the Taleban to the Pakistan border? So that Afghans have the freedom to put each other to death?

I mean, come on, you can't spend all that money on cluster bombs to improve a country's lot, to kill so many of them in order to free them, and then expect them not to act on that freedom. You can't have it both ways, greedy. Where's the logic and humanity in that, eh? Eh?

It would seem that current Western policy towards Afghanistan has been lifted from The Man Who Would be King, when Peachy Carnehan, realising that ruling Kafiristan is not all it's been cracked up to be, tearfully snarls:

Leave them to slaughtering babies, playing stick-and-ball with heads and pissing on their neighbours.

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12 Comments:

On March 22, 2006 10:53 AM, Luis Enrique said...

So this puts you in the "better to have left the savages to it" camp does it? You, with Albion4ever?

Maybe I am misinterpreting you [wouldn't be the first time]. Do you genuinely think that invasion of Afghanistan was a bad thing?

On March 22, 2006 11:04 AM, Justin said...

Doesn't put me anywhere, Luis. As you've said yourself: freedom is messy.

We bombed Afghanistan back to freedom. If that's freedom to hack each other's heads off then what are we supposed to say - "hang on, this isn't the kind of freedom we meant?" What do we do, bomb them again on the off chance they start behaving as we want them to next time?

I love the fact that we further human rights by cluster bombing children. It sets us above the savages, wouldn't you say? At least we didn't use machetes.

I love the grim humour of it all. The moral contridictions inherent in the Blair/Bush flavour of "humanitarian" intervention arouse me.

On March 22, 2006 12:00 PM, Luis Enrique said...

I getcha. Although I like to think that as well as hacking each other's heads off being not how we want them to behave, it's also not what your average Afghan wants either. But I guess you do too.

Anyway, what I meant to say was, your latest commentisfree post is a barnstormer.

On March 22, 2006 12:03 PM, Devil's Kitchen said...

This, you see, was the big mistake that Bush and Blair made: they thought that, given the choice, people wouldn't actually choose to behave like barbarians and nor would they choose to elect those who would behave thus.

As some army guy in the Balkans allegedly said to P J O'Rourke: "Give 'em better weapons and training, then seal the borders and let them get on with it..."

DK

On March 22, 2006 12:17 PM, Justin said...

Luis, I don't want to see Afghans cutting each others heads off. As a regular commenter here you should know that.

I've nothing against humanitarian intervention, it's just that I believe only a fool would trust Bush and Blair to do it for them - as the likes of the Abdul Rahman case shows.

On March 22, 2006 12:36 PM, Luis Enrique said...

Crossed wires somewhere. Not sure what gave the impression otherwise, but I don't imagine for a moment that your indifferent (in favour? that would be something) to head chopping.

On March 22, 2006 1:01 PM, Justin said...

Sorry Luis, I misread: "...it's also not what your average Afghan wants either. But I guess you do too".

On March 22, 2006 2:24 PM, Nosemonkey said...

Oi - Palestine! We want you to have free and fair democratic elections or else we'll have nothing to do with you!

Oh, you did. And elected people we don't like.

Erm...

Right, we're cutting off funding unless the people you elected abandon their central policy, which you democratically voted for in free and fair elections! Ha!

etc.

On March 22, 2006 3:30 PM, Rochenko said...

Wait a minute, you're all talking about representative democracy.
We dropped bombs for Freedom, which is the liberty to consume too many nonrenewable resources, work long hours for too little money, and to pretend that encouraging private enterprise to 'innovate' is the single most important thing on the fucking planet. How does all that conflict with the right to execute random innocent people? After all (wait for it)... the American judicial system manages it all the time!

B'dum tish.

On March 23, 2006 12:12 PM, David said...

You can protest to the Afghani embassy about this by writing here.

On April 03, 2006 11:33 PM, Laban said...

a) Carnehan certainly didn't say that in the book. He was a Gentleman at Large who wouldn't use such language.

b) Kafiristan people wouldn't have killed anyone for leaving Islam, as they weren't Muslims themselves.

http://www.nb.no/baser/morgenstierne/english/map.html

On August 22, 2006 7:01 AM, Champa said...

Yeah, life ain't fair, is it? That's prejudice, man. When a Christian converts to Islam, do we hear howls of protest?

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