Mental Meanderings

This evening the 13th Dublin Gay and Lesbian Film Festival will kick off and I greet the weekend with some level of trepidation, not because this isn’t a great event (even I – the chronically disinterested occasional film goer- can recognise how important and well-organised the festival generally is), but in response to the decision of the Committee to invite the current Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform to open the festival this evening. The Minister has, over the period of time he has been in this position, introduced and been responsible for a number of pieces of legislation that greatly reduced the level of rights protection for many members of minority groups including, particularly, members of the Traveler community, people with disabilities and asylum seekers. It’s for this reason that I find it so difficult to understand the decision to invite the Minister to open the festival – are we happy to provide a platform to someone whose policies are generally so anathema to a basic equality platform? I mean, are we really so selfish as to think that because the Minister has made supportive sounds relating to minimal rights for same-sex couples we should pander to him without thinking about the general attitude of inequality prevailing in Irish society because of the Minister’s decisions and policies? I am really just struggling with understanding the decision at all.

What has almost been more interesting, however, is the reaction to this decision within the LGBT ‘community’ here in Ireland itself (if we can use the word community to describe ourselves). Many people seem to think the decision was a good one, and the reasons vary from being generally supportive of the Minister’s policies to thinking this represents an opportunity to engage with the Minister (I don’t call being addressed without any potential for questions, conversation etc… engagement) to thinking that we should rather grudgingly welcome him to the festival in the hope that it will help to influence him to introduce legislation. Many others, myself included, have expressed dismay at the decision and do not support it for many reasons – I for example will attend the launch this evening (despite having been initially convinced that we should boycott) and not applaud the Minister.

Oh I don’t know – the whole thing ended up very messy altogether, and I don’t understand how anybody can seek rights for themselves and others and agree with the Minister’s policies, but clearly some people do. I find it amazing, but then again I am constantly amazed by this loosely connected group of people I refer to as my community; my chosen family. I don’t know how we can ever achieve anything unless we work together but egos, politicism, apathy and so many other factors seem to interfere, which I suppose is only natural given that we are in fact a diverse group of people bound together only by sexuality and oppression. Still – I like my utopian and admittedly somewhat Marxist vision of our community and continue the search to find it in pride, in the film festival, in online fora, everywhere…

Along the lines of my previous entry from today, I just took delivery of a book I’ve been wanting to read for a while: Clyde Prestowitz, Rogue Nation: American Unilateralism and the Failure of Good Intentions. Thus far I have only flicked through it, but I found a pretty nice section that I think reflects what I was saying at the end of my previous post. While speaking about American relations with other members of the ‘coalition of the willing’ and, in particular, Pakistan, Prestowitz writes “[i]n support of the war on terror the United States has concluded alliances and established bases in a series of Central Asian countries…that have some of the most despotic governments around. So when Condoleezza Rice says it is condescending to think Muslim countries can’t do democracy, she is no doubt correct, but one must wonder whether she really wants to be. The Bush administration has enunciated a major foreign policy objective [the spread of democracy] it can’t possibly desire to achieve. That everyone knows this except an American public kept in denial by high-flown rhetoric leaves the world cynical about US motives”.
(Prestowitz, Rogue State, (2003, New York; Basic Books), p. 293).

I have been reading about some recent happenings in Pakistan, a country in which I am bound to spend at least a few months over the next three or four years, and was struck by the report from Human Rights Watch of the escalation of marathon politics in Pakistan in the last month or so. Marathon politics may sound ridiculous but it’s a pretty serious business. When Musharraf came to power he spoke of leaving religious extremism behind him and concentrating instead on “enlightened moderation” – a pretty nebulous notion that he has never really attempted to define. As a reaction to this fact as well as to the continued use of religious extremists in Pakistan to bolster and retain military power (Musharraf took power in a military coup in 1999), people began to organize mini-marathons. Where’s the symbolism in that? Well – they were mixed gender mini-marathons in furtherance of government policy of encouraging sporting events for women.

These mixed-gender mini-marathons were met with disdain at best by religious traditionalists and the religious extremists had something to say about them too. On 3rd April the Muttaheda-Majlis-e-Amal (MMA), armed with firearms, batons and Molotov cocktails, attacked participants of a mixed-gender mini-marathon in Gujranwala. However, after being arrested, all MMA members were released without charge a few days later reflecting the MMA’s status as a serious political force bolstered by Musharraf’s military forces. The situation escalated, however, when the Pakistani police officers stripped and beat Asma Jahangir in the streets of Lahore as a result of her decision to organize a mixed-gender marathon in May. What is so remarkable about this is that Jahangir is the UN Special Rapporteur on freedom of religion in Pakistan and the head of the Pakistan Human Rights Commission.

Therefore even UN papers won’t protect you in Pakistan or, indeed, in a lot of other nations. But what is it about the world we live in that someone can be stripped and beaten in the streets in this way regardless of their international status? I think the answer is fairly clearly – American superpower. I have to elaborate on this I know but bear with me. Pakistan is clearly a nation through which funding for terrorism flows, from which terrorists emerge, and given its geographical location terrorists probably pass through it quite a lot. In addition it is country run by someone who seized power in a military coup without elections and where there are multitudes of human rights abuses from ‘honour crimes’ in the Punjab, to torture in police detention etc… Sounds like a perfect candidate for the ‘War on Terror’ doesn’t it? Well it isn’t an enemy in that nebulous War – it’s an ally. In return for an agreement to work with America in the War Against Terror (particularly useful as it’s a neighbour of Afghanistan and close to Iran and Iraq) the US government promised to help legitimise the Musharaff regime internationally. Therefore in order to spread this clearly reified notion of democracy propagandised by America, the country is bolstering undemocratic rule.

Isn’t it nice to see that the US has learned from the results of its past foreign policy?

Right, well, I'm not entirely sure how this blog thing works but I reckon it's probably a little like an open diary that all and sundry can read, which is interesting and presumably requires a smidgeon more self-censorship than is normally the case when people decide to keep a diary.

I have to admit to doing this out of selfish motives - I need something to discipline myself and by which I can judge my work level now that I work at home and I reckon that if I know people can read this at least it will act as an incentive to have something productive of which to be proud when I post. Or at least that's the theory.

Have spent the last three or so hours reading some absolutely fabulous stuff by Thomas Franck - anyone with an interest in international law or international relations should really read him - and also familiarising myself with sociological concepts around research methodologies. You see I am that most evil of things - that scourge on society - the perpetual student. And not only that, oh no, but I also fall into the second most hated category of social blights - a lawyer. That's right - a lawyer who is a perpetual student. It is a miracle the eco system can stand me not to mention anyone/anything else.

Not only have I been reading but I have also been following the reactions of friends and acquaintances in London to the apparent attempts to blow up three tube lines and a bus today - exactly two weeks (date wise, although not time wise) since the 07/07 bombings. It's amazing how the panic takes over immediately, followed by absolute white rage. However what amazes me most of all is how people are talking about introducing extra counter-terrorist powers, expediting trials, reducing the burden of proof etc... And I'm not talking about the Blairs and Bushs of this world, but the ordinary every day Londoner, including some otherwise very liberal Londoners. I find it fascinating that there is some panic microchip inside us that thinks that if we introduce new criminal offences that somehow stops crime. Or that if we expedite trials for terrorists there's no conceptual and libertarian difficulty with the notion of having to define someone as a terrorist initially- before any trial - in order to expedite trials and that this might have some effect on democratic processes and the presumption of innocence? I am truly baffled - it's almost like watching a huge social change - the spread of victim mentality followed by the almost inevitable protectionism through cracking down/zero tolerance/more police powers/tougher sentences etc... David Garland must have a lot to say about this stuff - I hope that he revises his book A Culture of Control in light of 9/11, the War on Terror (sic!) and 07/07. Sigh.

It's all so depressing and so fascinating at the same time. Reduction of basic rights in the name of human rights.Invasion and death in the name of human rights (allegedly at least).Deposition and colonisation (even if you would prefer to call it 'protective occupation') in the name of democracy.What have we created - a human rights system that allows for gross violations? A notion of democracy that does not allow for résistance, revolution or even in some cases protest?

What a crazy world.