The presence of NATO troops in Afghanistan is bound to involve a culture clash, but soldiers from Europe and North America find the custom of keeping catamites difficult to deal with.
The problem is too large to be ignored, and a story about it made The National Post this past week.
Defending freedom to abuse
Canadian soldiers in the main guard tower at forward operating base Wilson last summer winced when I asked about the sudden lineup of teenage boys along the mud walls of the neighbouring Afghan market.
“Wait a few minutes. You’ll see,” said one, his lip curling. “It’s disgusting.”
Sure enough, a handful of uniformed Afghan police officers emerged from their rundown detachment, walked through the barricades and started chatting up the dozen or so teens, some looking decidedly pre-teen.
A few minutes after they returned, the selected kids were waved through the main gates and went straight inside the police station. An hour later, when I left the observation post, the boys were still inside.
This evening ritual is often derided by soldiers as man-love Thursdays.
Afghan officials insist the notion of men and boys getting together the night before the Muslim holy day for sex is a myth. And, sure, it’s theoretically possible the cops were merely good-deed-doers giving these teens reading lessons.
But Canadian soldiers insisted we had just witnessed the regular Thursday evening negotiation for sex between Afghan men and boys, apparently for gifts or money.
This kind of behavior tends to develop in cultures in which women are scarce. Where polygamy is practiced, rich and powerful men monopolize the available nubile women, leaving a large cohort of young men with no normal outlet for their impulses. Since Islam does not condemn the use of pre-pubescent boys as sex objects for men, a culture of pederasty develops.
- - - - - - - - -
What’s worse, young men may develop a taste for this kind of gratification, so that they continue their habits even after they are old enough and prosperous enough to marry.
Hence the saying, “Women for reproduction; boys for pleasure.”
Hence also, “man-love Thursdays”.
The Canadians are having trouble reconciling their sensibilities with their obligation to be polite guests while in Afghanistan:
It raises the disquieting question of how much responsibility Canadian soldiers shoulder, being military guests and all, to stop Afghan activity that would result in rape or child prostitution charges back home.
It should be stressed that the activity at FOB Wilson does not mean Afghan police and army officers are engaged in an epidemic of juvenile sodomy.
But the issue was given fresh legs last week by a military chaplain named Jean Johns, who reported that soldiers under treatment for posttraumatic stress syndrome had been told to “ignore” any assaults or rapes on Afghan civilians they had seen.
This, unfortunately, is what “nation-building” means in practice.
We cannot change the culture in Afghanistan quickly, if in fact we can change it at all. Sharia is enshrined in the Afghan constitution, women are forced into marriage, converts to Christianity face a possible death sentence, and little boys are routinely sodomized by grown men. There is very little that Coalition troops can do about these things.
If Canadian soldiers had intervened between Afghan police and boys clearly selling themselves for sex, for example, an important partnership would quickly sour. Now that several years’ worth of Taliban prisoners have been freed during the Kandahar prison breakout, we arguably need what passes for an Afghan police force more than ever.
Still, Defence Minister Peter MacKay told the Commons he’d met with military leaders yesterday and insisted soldiers “report any allegation of unlawful activity they see.”
That’s easy for him to say, as Canadian soldiers rumble LAVs through marijuana crops or swaths of opium-producing poppies so vast, a single field would net Canadian law enforcement its annual seizure.
We may need troops in Afghanistan as a northeastern bulwark against Iran, or as a northwestern front against the coming Islamic Republic of Pakistan. But let’s not pretend that we’re building a modern Western democracy when the facts on the ground so clearly contradict that notion.
Our ideals should never be discarded, but we need to be honest and straightforward about what we have gotten ourselves into.
Our interests required us to install the Karzai government and allow it to function the way it does. It’s not something that we would deal with if we didn’t have to.
Nancy boys, opium, the hijab, and sharia. No lipstick on this particular pig.
Hat tip: TB
22 comments:
Well.. what can you expect from a religion created by a pedophile?.
It makes my blood boil that we accept any criticism whatsoever from this religion of boy lovers. We have to tip-toe around the sensibilities of their sand god and his pedophile lunatic prophet while they do this.
Reason # 2,109,543,827 for why Islam must go the way of the dodo bird.
Is there really any way to change Islam? Perhaps the best course of action is quarantine. Don't let them out of their cages. Seriously, how do you change what has been considered normal and acceptable for 1000+ years? It's like freedom in the West, we can't conceive of life any other way. Why should we expect anything different of the Muslims?
See, this is why Paul wrote Romans 1.
And we think Fred Phelps is bad. Phelps has done .nothing. like what is written above.
"Know ye not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God? Be not deceived: neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with mankind, Nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners, shall inherit the kingdom of God." I Corinthians 6:9,10.
"Knowing this, that the law is not made for a righteous man, but for the lawless and disobedient, for the ungodly and for sinners, for unholy and profane, for murderers of fathers and murderers of mothers, for manslayers, For whoremongers, for them that defile themselves with mankind, for menstealers, for liars, for perjured persons, and if there be any other thing that is contrary to sound doctrine; According to the glorious gospel of the blessed God, which was committed to my trust." I Timothy 1:9-11.
"Even as Sodom and Gomorrha, and the cities about them in like manner, giving themselves over to fornication, and going after strange flesh, are set forth for an example, suffering the vengeance of eternal fire." Jude 7.
Take heed, followers of Uncle Mo'.
homophobic horse,
You quote scripture. So will they.
You believe in the correctness of what is contained in your holy book. So do they.
The way I see it, this sort of thing is massive a fallacy. Those that believe can yell stuff from their holy books at each other all day long, and neither side will budge an inch. Unless you count the guys like the archdhimmi's and such.
Seems to me, the legitimacy of one side or the other is shown in how successful a society becomes in that it progresses in both war and peace time, and an effective campain of defense/offense in war. In this western society has always been superior until relatively recently when we've not just lost the will to fight, but gone a complete 180 and are on the path to destruction...no chance to survive, make your time.
My own thoughts on God aside, just saying that quoting scripture won't change this fight. Noting that there are other beliefs out there that won't destroy the whole of hummanity is good, but the words contained in them alone won't do a damn thing without the will to defend them, defend the countries under attack, and ultimately yourselves and your families. That's what we probably should be concentrating on, and should remind ourselves of every chance we get. They wish to destroy us utterly, kill us, kill and enslave our families, burn our works and scatter our lives to the dust and the winds until not a thought or dream of us reamins...as if we never existed at all.
Only thing that's going to stop it is our will and action to stop it.
And on that subject, I'm a little tired of talking. I'd like to know what can be done. Not these vague ideas I've seen tossed around, but a planned out and in the works strategy designed for the purposes of taking back our lives, our country, and even our world. I have no gift for such things myself, but I consider myself intelligent enough to contribute to its formation and execution if a plan were in the works.
Boy belly-dancers have been a common entertainment for tribal men (Beduin) in the Arabian Peninsula for centuries. The seductively dancing boys could enter male-only tents without having to bend over in low-hanging tents. These boys dance to arouse the men sitting around the diwan.
Ashan: Boy belly-dancers have been a common entertainment for tribal men (Beduin) in the Arabian Peninsula for centuries.
Was that "belly" dancer or lap dancer?
Western governments have to start demanding changes like an end to this sort of abomination - and definitely an end to Shari'a law's hold on the Afghan constitution and legal system - or this mission is going be to a completely useless waste of time, life and resources. It's obscene that U.S., Canadian and European soldiers are upholding a Shari'a law regime over there and being obliged to stand by helplessly watching this sort of thing. Meanwhile our own homelands are being colonized and terrorized by equivalent riff raff. NATO is beginning to remind me of the UN in the former Yugoslavia.
It's time to dictate an end to it. If Karzai's government doesn't like it then ignore them and set up safe zones in areas under the control of NATO or other Western missions over there. If that means we end up at war with the ANA, the Northern Alliance and other "allies" over there (including Pakistan) that's okay by me so long as we get the troops out quickly rather maintaining a protracted and futile struggle against the inevitable. Even if we lose in the attempt, so be it. We can bring our forces home proud of having stood for enlightened, civilized values over there. Then we can concentrate our blood, our strength and our treasure rather than squandering them on another 30, 50, 70, 100 years (?) of this debilitating nonsense. We are not accomplishing anything over there at this rate, notwithstanding the great, courageous and commendable efforts of our soldiers, including any notable resistance to Iran or the Islamist thugs in Pakistan.
Afghanistan is doomed to be an irrelevant backwater as long as its people don't want any better for themselves than for Western governments to provide foreign military and material aid to protect them from themselves and the logical and predictable results of their own shortsightedness, backwardness and stupidity, which is exactly all any of this is right now. It's a country that can likely never be pacified militarily (so history suggests) but can be isolated and quarantined. So if this is the best we can do there, bring the troops home, stop dissipating our strength there, and let's turn our attention to preparing for the real fight that may inevitably be on its way from places like Pakistan and Iran, especially since they're the source of the problem anyway.
Apart from that I have one other thought, somewhat OT but related just the same as one of the factors that may be helping the insurgency, so I'll make it all the same. As long as we ARE there, we might as well take up the suggestion that's been floated for so long now of using Afghanistan's opium crop for medical purposes so that it can have a legitimate role in the building of a legal economy and provide the rest of the world a benefit as well. That idea makes perfect sense to me.
The unit I deployed to Iraq with had previously been deployed to Afghanistan (before I joined them) and they had all kinds of stories about Man-love Thursdays - civilians (not police) screwing kids in plain sight of the towers. Absolutely disgusting - and a regular weekly occurrence.
Of course, the unit we took over from in Baghdad had overhead camera footage of some dude screwing a goat right outside the gate as well - so I guess it takes all kinds.
Rier: Western governments have to start demanding changes like an end to this sort of abomination - and definitely an end to Shari'a law's hold on the Afghan constitution and legal system - or this mission is going be to a completely useless waste of time, life and resources. It's obscene that U.S., Canadian and European soldiers are upholding a Shari'a law regime over there and being obliged to stand by helplessly watching this sort of thing.
... It's time to dictate an end to it. If Karzai's government doesn't like it then ignore them and set up safe zones in areas under the control of NATO or other Western missions over there.
I've said this many times before and I'll cheerfully repeat it here:
It was a mistake of astounding proportions to have liberated Afghanistan and Iraq only to let them re-adopt shari'a law. Far better would have been to establish a strigent military dictatorship and ruled them with an iron fist for two generations until shari'a began to lose its grip than allow this Islamic rubbish to persist.
Shari'a law is a cornerstone of Islam, without which it and terrorism cannot survive. Shari'a is nothing but one massive abuse of human rights just as Islam is an ongoing crime against humanity. Neither have any place in our civilized world.
As long as we ARE there, we might as well take up the suggestion that's been floated for so long now of using Afghanistan's opium crop for medical purposes so that it can have a legitimate role in the building of a legal economy and provide the rest of the world a benefit as well. That idea makes perfect sense to me.
Most likely, your suggestion simply is not economically feasible. Modern chemical processes can probably synthesize morphine derivatives of greater purity and reliability at a price far lower than anything that could be extracted from afghanistan's opium crop.
That said, in light of how we spend something like ONE MILLION DOLLARS AN HOUR on these military campaigns, I suggest we simply buy the entire crop at prices above whatever the criminal syndicates offer the farmers and then just burn the crap. Any farmers who do not comply have their crops burned free of charge without pay.
It is far cheaper than our idiotic domestic war on drugs and would starve out the crime families in less than 36 months.
If we could ally with Stalin in WWII, we can ally with anyone.
Zenster:
I don't rule out your responses but I do have the following questions that would have to be convincingly answered before I could agree.
1. Given the brutality of many military dictatorships, isn't there the possibility of introducing repression arguably as bad, or possibily even greater, than that typical of most Shari'a states into those societies, with all sorts of consequences, including an eventual backlash against the Coalition? (There's a lot of ill will in Latin America today because U.S. support for repressive regimes there over many years.)
We would somehow have to ensure, at the very least, that the vast majority of the people experienced an enormous improvement to their standard of living and quality of life to secure their acquiescence, not to mention being able to live with ourselves over it. This may require something on the scale the Marshall Plan and I don't know what resources Afghanistan has to build that kind of growth on. (Even Iraq's oil may not be of much use to it for long because of pending energy and environmental reforms around the world, including the U.S., China, Russia and India. Plus we may need the wisdom of Solomon to be able to discern the right to time to ease up in favour of democratic reform and to ensure that the reforms would take, without opening the door to a resurgence of Islam.
2. Consequently, would we not put at risk the moral credibility we need in order to continue to promote liberal democracy?
3. Who would enforce the dictatorship? The Afghans (and/or Iraqis) themselves? Are there enough of them reliable enough (not already too brainwashed by Islam) to maintain the secularist policies of the regime, or could the military and security agencies, even under such a dictatorship, be infiltrated by Islamists enough to threaten the state? On the other hand, if the Coalition is gonna be running the place, then we'd be attempting an occupation likely to be no more successful than any of the others that have been attempted in Afghanistan's past.
4. Hasn't this already been tried? Turkey was under a military dictatorship for many years, as was Iraq during the Saddam era, and both of these were secularist and anti-Islamist. Yet we see Islamist resurgences in both of these. (This calls into question your contention that simply outlawing Sharia would, by itself, eliminate Islam.)
All things considered, wouldn't it be better, if Afghanis really don't want the kind of help they need, to seal them in to their hellhole, and concentrate on dealing with the other bigger threats in the region?
Rier, I was specifically referring to a military dictatorship controlled by American forces. There is no sense of moral credibility that we need to maintain in the face of Islam. Clearly, Russia and China are so busy triangulating against us that maintaining our own moral credibility is only a liability to us in their eyes.
My notion of a stringent military dictatorship is one where there are strictly enforced curfews, summary execution for terrorist activity, demolition of homes for abetting terrorism, heavy curtailment of Islamic practices and so on. Such dictatorships would also help to seal off these Islamic cesspits and limit their ability to distribute arms and fighters in the region.
Your points are all valid. Banning shari'a law will not, in and of itself, destroy Islam. However, it will severely weaken it to the point where democracy can take root in some way. With shari'a in place, democracy is foredoomed.
I just happen to feel that the window is closing rapidly on our opportunity to strangle the militant Islamic baby in its cradle. Once nuclear weapons have proliferated throughout the MME (Muslim Middle East), all bets are off and the West has even more to lose in an even shorter time frame.
"I just happen to feel that the window is closing rapidly on our opportunity to strangle the militant Islamic baby in its cradle. Once nuclear weapons have proliferated throughout the MME (Muslim Middle East), all bets are off and the West has even more to lose in an even shorter time frame"
Posted by Zenster
I agree with that without question. Thanks for your replies. Your ideas definitely deserve some urgent consideration. Hopefully, policy makers, or at least some of the people who advise them, are having similar thoughts as well.
Zenster - belly-dancers, obviously. For great insights into Arab male psycho-sexuality, read Shrinkwrapped, The Arab Mind:Part VII (http://shrinkwrapped.blogs.com/blog/2008/03/the-arab-mind-3.html. The whole series is very enlightening.
Islam and Boys? Young Boys? Check this out, the Taliban Codex. A few quotes:
19) Mujahideen are not allowed to take young boys with no facial hair onto the battlefield or into their private quarters.
If its not a common thing for an Afghan muslim Taliban to mess with adolescent boys, it wouldn't be mentioned in the Codex, isnt it? Another few quotes from the Taliban Codex that provide more reasons not to give a penny nor show any mercy to them savages:
24) It is forbidden to work as a teacher under the current puppet regime, because this strengthens the system of the infidels. True Muslims should apply to study with a religiously trained teacher and study in a Mosque or similar institution. Textbooks must come from the period of the Jihad or from the Taliban regime.
25) Anyone who works as a teacher for the current puppet regime must recieve a warning. If he nevertheless refuses to give up his job, he must be beaten. If the teacher still continues to instruct contrary to the principles of Islam, the district commander or a group leader must kill him.
26) Those NGOs that come to the country under the rule of the infidels must be treated as the government is treated. They have come under the guise of helping people but in fact are part of the regime. Thus we tolerate none of their activities, whether it be building of streets, bridges, clinics, schools, madrases (schools for Koran study) or other works. If a school fails to heed a warning to close, it must be burned. But all religious books must be secured beforehand.
This point in the Taliban Codex, number 26, also mentions Madrassa's. Very dissapointing for the Dutch government, especially Bert Koenders, the Socialist minister for Development Aid who loves to throw away money to racist, pro apartheid, anti civilization indoctrinated little muslim boys.
A very interesting shindig u have going here. Quite sad really but nice enough for all you narrow minded people to show how much you don't know.
Just so u know, pederasty began and is synonymous to Hellenic culture (for those who don't know what that is, its called Ancient Greece and if u want details of man-boy love, read Plato's work).
Secondly, before condemning Islam and pinpointing it as a breeding ground for pederasty due to women being 'scarce'and in hijab and what not, look at Christianity. I have no disrespect for the religion but many a priest have been condemned for such practices, and pederasty was accepted until the late 19th century in Russia, which is would u believe a oh-so orthodox land. German aristocrats still fight for acceptance of this which began as a movement in the the late 60's.
So really is this a 'Afghanistan' thing that only occurs there due to their religious practices? Clearly not but how would u tell that to a bunch of rednecks who think they know it all? Apologies to those who have actually learnt something from this.
Blame the people. Not the religion. I don't accept pederasty as something that should be ignored, but next time u want to put up a post/article like that at least do ur bloody research.
And before I end this, its funny how u post up the 'abuse' that the soldiers saw in Afghanistan, yet failed to include any abuse that those soldiers committed to the citizens of the land? And if u say 'oh but the soldiers are innocent n have only been doing their job'- think again coz you'll only voice ur ignorance.
Peace out
And another thing, Islam does NOT accept homosexual relationships and condemns it in its books like Christianity.
The punishment for such is death.
These soldiers that have watched this event every thursday are NOT upholding Sharia law hence I have no pity for them if they allow for these activities to take place before their eyes as they are simply viewing this as entertainment. If it struck them as wrong, they'd intervene. Considering its only struck them as 'odd', it means they accept it not because their hands are tied but because they find this grossly amusing.
This has nothing to do with the government, rather what people are happy to turn a blind eye to.
Genuine acts of sexual abuse should be prevented by the government. However, the west frequently tyrannizes consensual sexual relationships that we just don't relate to. Plato and Socrates, two of the most ethical men the world has produced, both had romantic relationships with boys.
These relationships are not always abusive, sometimes boys love an older male and want to be in a relationship. Our western bias is similar to when we lynched all black men who had sex with white women, regardless of whether it was rape, or a love affair.
Our society needs to not condemn all relationships between adults and minors, but only those that are abusive. If two people are involved in a consensual relationship, and we interfere and prevent them from being together, than WE are the ones violating someone's rights.
Quote:
Our society needs to not condemn all relationships between adults and minors, but only those that are abusive. If two people are involved in a consensual relationship, and we interfere and prevent them from being together, than WE are the ones violating someone's rights.
end
Let me remind you that everyone below the age of 18 is too young to give consent to ANYTHING let alone a sexual relationship with an adult.
Since you are so enthusiastic about boy love, why don't you submit to Islam? Immediately?
It's clear that you see nothing wrong with the elements of slavery, submission and brutalization of youth that are the underpinnings of Muslim culture.
You fancy that a child is free-- and in so doing, you animalize, brutalize, the child.
You demean childhood itself.
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