So Veena Malik Marries a Pukhtun Man & Pukhtuns Go Berserk.

 The hottest totally pointless news emerging from Pakistan these days is Veena Malik's marriage to some Pashtun businessman named Asad Khattak. Pukhtuns on the internet have gone berserk, many of them ashamed of the Pukhtun who dared to marry a woman much of Pakistan has unanimously declared a "slut" (because she's a bold woman, you see - she once even stood up to a mullah! Don't you just love it when a female celebrity understands patriarchy and can counter it with intelligent remarks? Of course, though, she's far from perfect, like all of us: I've seen videos of hers participating as a judge in modeling shows in which she mocks the way women who are less light-skinned than herself look ... just because they're not light-skinned. She still buys into the whole "my skin color is whiter than yours, and so I'm better than you! In your dark-skinned face!" business, so no respect for her from me in that department.)

I envy people who believe in a loving, merciful God.

I got the idea for the below post from a friend who's going through a rough time in her life right now and who, too, was raised being taught only about a mean, judgmental god to whom she finds it hard to turn in times of need.

Sure, all except one of the 114 chapters of the Qur'an begins with the phrase "In the name of God, the most merciful, most beneficent," but that's not the same God I grew up being forced to believe in. But I envy anyone who does believe in that God. I need a loving God. I'm sick and tired of the mean one. And I'm sick and tired of anyone who talks to me about the mean one. Go to hell - you know who you are, you so-called "god-fearing" hypocrites and meanies.

This is what happens when the first things we teach our kids are about what sins not to commit or what's sinful and what's not or don't do this and don't do that. Or that "God is watching you." Or "God will punish you." Screw you and that god of yours. No one ever taught me that God was actually very loving and merciful.  

On Homosexuality and Islam - again.

A (Muslim) friend on Facebook posted an article called "Meet America's First Openly Gay Imam." Almost all of the responses, as we can probably imagine, were repulsive, homophobic, disturbing, and ignorant. And very arrogant, I must add. But I'm so, SO happy that this article exists, that homosexual Muslims and Imams exist, and that it's publicly being discussed at last. I'll share my thoughts below on the topic, mostly in responses to the homophobia in the comments to my friend's original post. Some of the comments said, of course (because this is a common thing we hear from a lot of people, whether Muslims or non-Muslims), that homosexuality is a disease and needs to be cured and that we need to help gay people. Dot Dot Dot. And then most of the other comments were further about the whole "I don't have a problem with gay people, but to publicize it and promote it ..." stuff that our ears and minds hurt to hear so much around us all the time when we find ourselves in a world that is oh so miserably being wasted with all sorts of oppression. One of these sorts of oppression is the suppression of views and practices and sexualities and identities we cannot personally relate to and that we have very little understanding, if any understanding at all, of.

Anyway, here goes something that may or may not be worth a share. Peace to all!