Month: April 2007

Categories
Yemen

Female Genital Mutilation in Yemen (repost)

I recently read an article in the Yemen Observer and I was appalled. It’s a little gruesome, but I encourage you to read the rest of it OK, I knew that FGM (or female circumcision as it is euphinisticly called) is a big problem in Africa, but I never thought about it here. Yemen is very close to Africa, so it shouldn’t surprise me I suppose. Anyway, the most common method of doing this is to completely cut off the clitoris and labia minora. A more extreme version also sews the labia majora together leaving only small opening. This is done to girls somewhere between being newborns and adolescents. Since this is done in village settings mostly, no anesthetics are used. Some richer families will take their daughters to a health clinic where things are supposedly sterilized…

Why do people do this? There are a handful of reasons given, none of which are convincing of course. Some argue that it is for “hygiene” purposes, never mind the terrible complications due to blood loss, infections, abscesses, etc. This reason plays right into the whole “women are dirty” mind set… Some claim that it is necessary under Islamic law. This is totally false, there isn’t a single verse in the Koran about this, and I don’t believe any reputable scholar has endorsed this practice. As a matter of fact, a fairly straightforward argument can be made against it on Islamic grounds. To do this for the reasons stated implies that God made a flawed or purposeless part of a women. If you think you are “correcting” God’s mistake, you are committing blasphemy in the purest sense.

Then there are the people that get right down to it. They claim that by doing this they will make women less sexually active. This is supposed to lead to chastity before marriage and them being loyal to their husbands. Well, maybe it would, but my God! Talk about brutal! If a woman was crazy enough to want to do this for that reason, well, she’s crazy but at least it would be her decision. Can you imagine taking your 12 year old daughter to have this done to her? Can you imagine being that 12 year old? Or can you imagine finding out what had been done to you as a baby and “looking forward” to your wedding night? 

For me, this last reason is what it is all about. Arabic culture is accused of being brutal to women. Most people point to the veiling of women and their place in society as examples. To me, those things are a blend of culture and religion and I can’t definitively call them repressive. FGM is another matter, there is no excuse and it is nothing but brutality. FGM is a way to assert control over women and to deny them of sexual pleasure or even of sexual freedom. What really galls me is that the article gives short shrift to the “sexual problems”, possible physical complications, mental scarring, and the appalling lack of freedom that the daughters and mothers have in this choice and instead concentrate most of the negativity on possible complications during childbirth. “It’s all about having children!” is the basic point of the article. I guess the paper was playing to its audience, but I do wish that they had the guts to drive home the more repressive aspects of the practice. 

Oh, and the women that say “It’s a badge of honor and chastity” should just be shot. If its so damned honorable, why force women to do it? A really honorable woman would do it to herself following that line of “reasoning.” I suppose there is probably more than a little rationalization going on there. I guess if I had something that terrible done to me, I’d try to find meaning in it too… Anyway, I had heard of this issue before but I was never really aware of what was actually involved. I’m glad that I know about it now, but it saddens me to think that people could really do this sort of thing….

Isaac

Categories
Yemen

Women, veils, bluetooth and Yemen (repost)

I’ve been meaning to write a bit about how women dress here for a while. A common thought in the west is that men force women to wear what they wear here. I’m sure that there’s a lot of that going on, but I get the distinct feeling that most women here prefer wearing the balto/hijab/veil. Forcing them to not wear them would be like making a woman in the west take off her pants. Walking around in your underwear isn’t exactly scandalous, but it sure would be embarrassing to go to the supermarket like that. Wearing the whole getup is considered modest here, going without one of the items of clothing would be horrifying to most women here.

Having said that, if a (local) woman doesn’t want to wear some of those things, she’s in for a very hard time. Her family (male and female) will give her a very hard time and the men on the street will def. give her a hard time. Many women simply can’t choose what to wear because of their husband and/or family. As you might imagine, this upsets me considerably…

Then there is today’s Yemen Times. I’ll put the first couple of paragraphs up here…

”Fatima, 30, of Sana’a, who asked that her whole name not be revealed, was married and has three kids. Until recently, she was living happily with her family. Then, she was invited to a wedding party in her area. She prepared by putting on makeup and dressing up in a fancy dress to attend the party. 

At the wedding party, she spent a lovely time with the other women there. A short time later, her husband was at work, when a friend said to him, “if you want to see hot pictures, turn on your Bluetooth.” Bluetooth technology allows users to send information wirelessly from one device to another, say from phone to phone or computer to computer. Fatima’s husband was excited when he received the pictures, but when he saw them, he was surprised and angered in the same time, because he saw his wife in these pictures. 

He immediately went back to his home and asked his wife how her photographs got out. She did not know that some girls took pictures of her at the wedding party, and then sent them by Bluetooth to every mobile nearby. The husband did not believe her, however, and so he divorced her and the lovely family collapsed. Fatima is just one of the victim’s of the downside of new technology. While Bluetooth can be an excellent tool for working and communicating, it can also create serious problems when used irresponsibly.”

See the rest of the article
here.


OK, there are so many problems with this I don’t even know where to begin. How about the husband’s hypocrisy? What if someone had spied on her while she was dressing/undressing? If the pictures he saw were of her in some sort of state of undress, he probably would have killed her. No exaggeration, I would expect it, and I’m sure that most locals would too.

At some point, someone has to say that it isn’t a crime to want to see a woman’s face, that it isn’t unnatural to want to see her hair. In addition, it isn’t any sort of moral failing, and it does not reflect badly on a woman if she wants to show her face. There are rumblings along those lines here, but that’s in the big city. In the villages, especially further north towards Saudi, this type of talk is not tolerated. 

Just when I am about to give this culture the benefit of the doubt, something stupid like this comes up. I don’t bother discussing it with the locals, it would only piss me off. Today is one of those days that I wonder why this society isn’t even worse off than it is. It is shocking to see how low an opinion the men have of women here, it’s also shocking that they lay all of the supposed faults with sex drive at the woman’s feet. I have read two introductions to Islam for westerners and both have explained the balto/hijab/veil in terms of rape avoidance. According to Islamic thought (and I don’t think that this is supported by the Koran but an interpretation from bedouin circles) women are raped because of their beauty. There it is, it is their fault. Make no mistake, if a guy is caught raping a woman, he is going to die. But frequently, the woman is killed to “preserve their honor.” So called honor crimes are on the decline, but they are still prevalent. 

Abdul Summit told me that Yemen is like America in the 70’s. Maybe the 1870’s, but then again, I don’t think we were ever as backwards as they are with women right now…
Isaac

Categories
Economics

China and greed (repost)

On a recent post in a photo forum I haunt regularly, someone was bemoaning the fact that the Chinese government is so awful. I would have agreed with that, but he went on to say that he wished that “someone with some clout” would come and prevent companies (in this case Nikon) from doing business in China. He lamented that “greedy consumers and businesses” were making it tough on the Chinese. The sad thing is that this is a frequently used tactic to try to stop or hinder trade with China.

I asked the obvious question, would you rather live in China now or 20 years ago before those greedy corporations came in. There is no doubt when you would want to live there (if you had to), it would be now. Things were much much worse back then, even if there was less “greed”. People get very hung up on intentions and not enough on results. For the moment, I will assume that consumers really are greedy and that businesses are also at least as greedy and full of avarice. Would the Chinese have it any other way? Is there another system that would bring so many jobs to so many people year after year? China has made undeniable progress over the past 20 years, dramatically so over the last 10.

I see wanting the lowest price possible for a good as morally neutral. Instead of seeing the pursuit of profit as being greedy like so many others, I see it as a genuine positive activity. Here’s the thing, someone could be the biggest greedy bastard in the world, but the greedier they got, the more people they would be *forced* to support.

Unless they put the money under a mattress (which they wouldn’t since they have a voracious appetite for money) they would either have to spend the money or invest it. Spending has an obvious link with jobs created. If he wants his land landscaped, hair cut, pool cleaned, house built, or a new TV, someone has to be paid to do that.

Investment slips most people’s minds, but it is where most of the big money goes. Direct investment is the most direct way of creating jobs. If they see a business opportunity, either starting a new one or expanding an existing one, investment leads to new jobs. If they instead invest in financial assets, it is a little more vague, but just as effective. All interest earned is a fraction of the return on whatever that money was invested in (with the exception of government debt). Money into hedge funds, stocks, commodities, mortgages, etc. filters back to either individuals (who then face the same decisions about what to do with their money) or to direct investment into companies, which creates more jobs…

China (and India) shows what can be done if you simply allow people to pursue profits. Millions of people are lifted out of poverty while providing goods and services that people want. The jobs created by direct investment lead to other jobs. The Nikon factory worker needs to eat, get their hair cut, get to work, and have a place to live. In addition, they buy other products that employ the people that make those. Money begets more money and more wealth.

China’s government surely needs to change. They have an awful track record of civil rights abuses among other things. But at least the government is allowing its people to escape the grind of poverty. Compare China with Cuba, or any of a host of African nations. China’s people are on the upswing while other countries are falling or have already bottomed out (Zimbabwe, Cuba). Give credit where credit is due, it may not be a great government, but it is doing the right thing in one very important way.

Isaac

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Yemen

Well, I tried

I went back to the art galleries with money in my pocket, ready to buy something as a reminder of my trip. I ran into what I call the music store clench. It used to be that I would think of some music I would like to buy, would wander over to Tower Records (RIP) and not be able to buy a thing. I would pick up the cds I wanted and I just couldn’t check out with them. I have no similar problem when buying over the internet, Amazon, Amazon used, cd club, or Ebay. I’m sure it’s all about the price, Tower certainly didn’t win any price comparisons… Anyway, I went back to the galleries, saw the same things that excited me last time, but I couldn’t take my money out and buy anything. I guess it’s for the best. I’ll wander over there from time to time and see if there’s something that I can’t live without. I’ll also ask around and see if there are any other galleries around.

Isaac

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odds and ends

Do I announce how "green" I am?

So my web host (dreamhost) has announced that it has gone green. They are buying carbon offsets to counteract everything they do, including driving to work. There are little icons I can put on my site to announce this. Since I don’t really care one way or the other, should I put it on my site? My reasoning is this, I might not care, but it may mean something to a lot of other people. So what do you think?

Isaac

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Economics

Being controlled by corporations (repost)

I posted this almost a year ago on my old blog, but recent conversations have made think it is relevent again. Plus, with the new blog, every post is searchable by Google and the other search engines, so here it is again…

This idea of being controlled by corporations has come up several times in recent online conversations. It’s usually in the context of the government regulating something to protect us from the evil corporations. This puzzles and worries me on several different levels. What strikes me the most is this idea that we are slaves to various companies, that we have no choice in certain things and we are therefore controlled by these companies. Following that line of logic, we are in need of a protector, and most people want the government to play that role. With just a little thought you can see how backwards this really is.

Companies depend on us buying their products and services to survive. It is in their best interest to provide us with what we want. We are the ones that control of the corporations! This is easily shown by the fact that companies regularly go out of business. As long as there is competition between companies for our dollars, we are the ones in control. We always have options, we can buy from a company, not buy from them, buy from their competition, etc. If we do not like their price, their business practices, owners, or whatever, we can choose to do something else.

When we involve the government, our range of choices always decreases. Government ownership being the worst case scenario. Lets use a ridiculous example to make a point. Let’s say that the local power plant decides to start burning babies to provide power. There are people that applaud this decision since babies are messy and loud. Plus, they burn much cleaner than the traditional fossil fuels. You are outraged of course, but what to do, you need power! Well, you have options. You can use some sort of alternative energy source, maybe buy your own generator or install solar panels. In the worst case scenario, you could move somewhere else and use some other power source. The key is that you do not have to use their power and you no longer support what you don’t like. Now imagine that the government owns the power plant or at least subsidizes it as an alternative energy source. You could choose not to use the power, but you’d still be paying for it. If you decided to make a stand and not pay for it (as you should), you would be thrown in jail, or at least fined. Sounds silly, right? Well, just substitute your least favorite war, educational policy, political junket, or least favorite bit of bureaucratic red tape to see how relevant it really is. When the government is involved, you have to pay no matter what you think of the policies. That’s quite a bit more control than any business could ever have over you.


OK sure, but the government doesn’t own most things, and besides the poor need some sort of protection. They don’t have the same kind of options that you and I have. It’s true that the US government doesn’t own most things (thank God!) but that’s not the case in many countries. The government here may not own as much, but they certainly regulate quite a bit. Regulations have a similar consequence, they cause us to have fewer options. How? By forcing expenses on companies, it raises the cost of entry and operation. This prevents some companies from starting and can cause others to close. By stifling competition, we have fewer choices and pay higher prices. This gets us back to the protection of the poor. The poor wouldn’t need protection if they had adequate choices. In fact, they may choose an option that you wouldn’t because it would save them some money. I’d like to think that everyone, regardless of income bracket, would choose the nuclear power plant over the baby burning one. But not everyone would choose the nuclear plant over a coal burning one. Some would prefer the lower operating expenses of coal, some people just don’t trust nuclear power. Some people wouldn’t choose either, they’d rather pay the extra money and use wind or solar power. The key is that the more choices companies can offer us, the better off we are. They have no control over us, we control them. The government is the one you have to watch out for, it can either limit your choices or control you directly by threat of incarceration (or worse).


The same principles apply to ANY product or service that you can think of. If you let businesses pursue profits, you will have the most extensive range of options, including the lowest possible price. Regulations passed, no matter how well intentioned, will always interfere with someone’s choices. This limits them to them paying more and/or eliminating a service that they would rather have. Granted, environmental, educational, and national defense issues are complicated, but the fact remains that the government is the only one that can “control” us, the corporations of the world can only ask us for our money.

Isaac

Categories
odds and ends

The Ledoux and IC factor…

I love it, a couple of days after I mention a woman I went to IC with, they both find my blog. A while back I mentioned Daryl Lynn, a bass player in a band called flashlight and she found my blog a couple of days later. I mentioned Michelle Ledeoux and it looks she found me as well based on the log of my blog. Michelle you out there? I’m just impressed that I spelled her name right, LOL.

Isaac

Categories
Religion

My take on Islam so far

I’m disappointed. That’s the short version. I have been studying religions from my college days, I actually got a minor in religion and philosophy. Every religion I studied I was able to take away something positive and interesting. In some cases, they have had a lasting impact on me. Different forms of Buddhism (especially Zen), various sects of Hinduism, Judaism, and certainly all of the different versions of Christianity have left their mark. Islam, or at least the kind practiced here has left me cold. It is a very cut and dried affair. A cynic might say that it is a simple religion for simple people. I of course would never say such a thing:-).

I will admit to being drawn to the more mystical, experiential forms of religion and repelled by rules based systems. The Islam practiced here is certainly rules based. You pray 5 times a day not to be closer to God, to understand, or even to experience anything. You do it because that is what you are told to do. The entire religion seems to be like that. Questions are not encouraged, I really think that many people do not consider the mystery of God, creation, or why they are supposed to do things any of their business. I might change my outlook a bit if I came into contact with some Sufis, they are the one branch that does emphasize things that I’m interested in.

Oddly enough, as disappointed as I am in the religion, I have mostly good things to say about the people that follow it. I am well acquainted with Christian hypocrisy, many people never get past it and label the entire Christian experience as hypocritical. Many Christians could learn a thing or two from the people here. God is a constant part of their thinking. The standard response to the question “How are you?” is “God be praised.” Seriously, that is what everyone says, especially if they are going through bad times. When someone says that they hope to do something, or that they will do something in the future, it is always, always followed by the phrase, “Inshalla” which translates into “God willing.” The people here also abide by their rules pretty well. There are exceptions of course, but I do not fear that people are lying to me, or are trying to take advantage of me most of the time. When I finish eating my lunch (with my hands inevitably), I don’t hesitate to leave my case with my laptop on the table while I go wash my hands.

Having said that, do not cross these people. Revenge is a time honored tradition among Arabs and it is condoned by Islam in most circumstances. So yes, Islam promotes a pretty peaceful living condition, but in part that is due to the threat of revenge being taken out on you and your family. As a Christian, that’s a pretty foreign concept. I am going to hold off discussing women in Islam until I do a little more research, but my initial feelings are not good ones in that regard. And of course there are the punishments that most followers of Islam believe in. I always find it odd that someone that believes in God thinks that they need to exact justice right now. Can’t God do it better and more accurately? Once again I guess my Christian bias is showing…

So to summarize, the religion gets a big thumbs down, but the effects are (mostly) ok. I think being so close to Saudi is coloring the Islam I see practiced here, I don’t want to make a judgement based on looking at one sect. Judging Christianity by looking at the Jehovah Witnesses or Christian Scientists would certainly be a mistake. I don’t want to make the same mistake here.

Isaac

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Arabic

I know that Arabic is complicated, but really….

My teacher was telling me today that it isn’t my imagination, Arabic really is complicated. I met a guy on the bus who explained to me how easy it was for them to learn English. English grammar does seem like a piece of cake now. The trick with English is the vocabulary and the spelling. I do believe that English has, by far, the largest vocabulary of any language out there. Of course since we borrow from so many languages (A quote from our president, “The French have no word for entrepreneur.”) the spelling is all over the place.

Anyway, Abdul Summit (my teacher) tells me that at the local university you can take two years of classes on prepositions in Arabic, several more on verbs, etc. People spend their entire lives researching and innovating in the language itself. That’s pretty impressive…

One thing that I noticed today is how Arabic treats “to be”. In the present tense, simply being doesn’t require a verb at all. So “I am hungry” becomes “I hungry” in Arabic. The interesting thing is that because of the way words are derived from verbs, there are actually verbs for being surprised, hungry, sad, etc. The adjectives are derived from the verbs, along with the nouns. It can make translation a bit tricky, it certainly makes thinking about the sentences a workout… So here’s my understanding so far… There is a verb for “being happy”, from this we can derive the adjective “happy” and the nouns for the subject and object of the verb. The next form of the verb (which is pronounced slightly differently and also has slight conjugation differences) translates into making someone happy. From this we can derive the adjective for making someone happy, along with the subject (who is making someone happy) and the object (the person being made happy). Yes, there are words for all of these things. There are also different forms that I have not learned the meaning of yet. It’s an interesting system, but an expansive one. I’m starting to be able to recognize what part of speech words are even if I don’t know their definition, that’s handy. Participles and what we would consider gerunds are still giving me trouble. That leads to other problems, if I can’t tell the word is a noun, I can’t put definite articles (the ubiquitous AL-everything) on properly in strings of nouns and adjectives describing each other.

I picked up an Arabic newspaper today and tried reading an article. I’m making progress because unlike the last time, I was able to make some sense out if it. My estimate is that I was “getting” about 30% of the article. My teacher insists that that’s pretty good. It took me almost 5 minutes to read about 10 lines, so it’ll be awhile before I can just pick up a newspaper and start reading. I’m inching forward slowly….

Isaac

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Yemen

Crap!

I forgot that today is wednesday… It’s easy to do when you aren’t working. This means that I’ve missed my window for picking up my passport at the Chinese embassy this week. I’ll have to get it on sunday. Now the trick is to remember to do this on sunday…

I went bowling with Abdul Summit last night. He’s a really competitive person and it bugs him to lose. Lucky for him, I couldn’t do much right last night. I did beat him in bowling once, scoring a decent (for me) 129. Of course the next game he nearly doubled my score. Even in pool I was terrible. I’m a much better player than he is, but we split 4 games. He told me that he lay awake half the night thinking of his bowling shortcomings. I guess I’m lucky that I’ve never taken the game too seriously.

Isaac