Two Sikh women, angry at Sikhs being mistaken for “Muslim extremists” wrote a post earlier this year, ‘How to tell a Sikh from a Taliban.’
Do to a certain shallow, outward physical resemblance to some Muslim extremists, our Sikh community has been under attack since the 9/11 terrorist attacks by those who don’t know any better. Now events in Pakistan, where the Taliban has attacked the Sikhs of the SWAT Valley, forcing them out of their homes, make a comparison of the two groups mandatory for anyone who really wants to understand world events. (And to stop picking on innocent Sikhs, as well.)
And a disclaimer:
Before I start, let me say that in writing about the Taliban, I am not indicting the Muslim community, which has many good, upright adherents, some of whom I am honoured to include among my friends. Please do not construct anything I say about Taliban to apply to the millions of Muslims who are peaceful, constructive and valued citizens of countries all over the world.
And then they really let the Taliban have it…
cbarwa 8:54 am on December 27, 2009 Permalink |
Yeah, we don’t have anything against Muslims, just don’t please mistake us for one of THEM.
PMSL!
johnpi 9:08 am on December 27, 2009 Permalink |
lol. I took it to be a Taliban thing rather than a Muslim thing.
Generally, I find some of the more surprising and unexpected blogs and websites when I’m searching for photos, which is how I found that one. I got sucked in when I started reading the stories about their familys’ massacres at the hands of Hindu extremists in 1984 when I noticed the Taliban post.
cbarwa 2:05 am on December 28, 2009 Permalink |
To be fair I didn’t click on the link before but have checked it out now. There is some confusion, I wasn’t sure whether the author was referring to Sikhs in Pakistan or the ‘West’ as such. I would have thought that most Pakistani Muslims would not have any trouble in distinguishing Sikhs from the Taliban. This is all too reminiscent of some banners I saw post the WTC attacks declaring that ‘Sikhs are not Taliban’ when some Sikhs were beaten up and in one instance killed in the US in a wave of hate crimes.
The site is peppered with inaccuracies though, the Taliban are Pashtuns not Arabs and it is ironic that the author tries to show the superiority of Sikhism by contrasting how girls are schooled in that tradition but face acid attacks under the Taliban. The author chooses to forget, that Khalistani separatists did threaten to kill female students who chose to wear a sari as opposed to a salway khameez publicy, the former seen as a Hindu dress and did indeed throw acid in the faces of several girl students who did. I find the supposed gender equality he tries to show exists in Sikhism irritating, while doctrinally true, the reality is actually not so rosy. The Punjab has one of the worst sex-ratios in the country, owing to the widespread practise of female foeticide, leading to a serious imbalance in the population. This is nothing but a reflection of a systematic under-valuation of the girl-child and women in general. No doubt these are due as much to cultural and other social factors as opposed to just religion but the blunt fact is that most religions having been founded by men, regulated and interpreted by men, don’t tend to be that favourable towards women and no religion has a monopoly on this.
Mai Harinder Kaur 11:42 pm on December 31, 2009 Permalink |
This post was written solely by me, one of the three women who started the blog. A friend supplied me with a few of the [pictures.
True enough, I don’t like being taken for what I’m not under normal circumstances. I have not written in the blog how I, along with some other women in an interfaith group donned hijabs shortly after 911, so the public wouldn’t know if a woman was a Muslim or not. We saw this as a way of protecting our Muslim sisters. Perhaps this seems silly or even insulting to you, but it arose from the need to do something, which is certainly better than doing nothing.
As for your statement: “Yeah, we don’t have anything against Muslims, just don’t please mistake us for one of THEM,” I rather imagine you would be a bit put out at being taken for a Sikh – or a Buddhist or a Jain or a Hindu or a whatever. And the unhappy truth is that being taken for a Muslim extremist (and with our turbans and male beards, it’s always extremist) does put our lives in danger.
In this particular post, I was aiming specifically at the American situation because I live in the USA, although I an a Canadian.
I would like to point out that I have written strongly against female foeticide, calling it not only immoral and unSikh, and also suicidal to the Sikh community. While it is true that the Punjabi culture is strongly patriarchal, the Sikh religion is not and we Singhnis have a sound religious base for rising up against male oppression. It is taking some time, but this happening, at least in the West.
You have said so much here that answering it would simply take me too long. However, I will make you this offer: If you would like to write a rebuttal article, I will be happy to publish it unedited – as long as it says nothing either obscene nor illegal. I would simply state that this is a guest post and the opinions expressed are those of the author(s). I hope you have the desire and courage to accept this offer; I would really like to read what you have to say.
My e-mail is simayanan@gmail.com.