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Taliban Cuts Off Ears, Noses

Beerina

Sarcastic Conqueror of Notions
Beerina
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Mar 3, 2004
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This could arguably fall under Politics or Social Issues, too.

Taliban Cuts Off Noses, Ears


I find it odd that one religion culture equally arbitrary and thus equally valid alternative worldview cuts off ears and noses, the other is struggling to build or grow artificial ones. One culture barks at the moon, the other goes there.
 
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Nobody is saying that all world-views are equal. Well, nobody sane anyway.

But it's that trying to paint Islam with the broad brush of all being the same and doing the same as some backwater group of nutters do, that some of us have a problem with.

Equally one could paint the whole Christianity with the broad brush that it's somehow all the same as those nutters who left a sick child to die, because the Lord would heal her. Or those who still hunt witches in Africa in the name of Christ (just like they formerly did in the name of their tribal gods.) Or those guys in IIRC Ethiopia who just made homosexuality a hanging offense, 'cause Leviticus says so. Etc.

The Taliban are nuts even by the standards of most Muslims.

And nobody says we should call them anything else than nuts.

But trying to act as if all muslims are the same as the Taliban is just stupid.
 
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Its a daily occurance in this backwater. Even my Kangal has no nose - go on, ask me how he smells.
 
This had a lot more to do with Afghan culture than religion. However, people use the religion to try and justify the culture in which it exists. This is very much as true here in the good ol' USA as elsewhere (Note the false "Christian roots" that some religious folks like to talk about when equating patriotism with religion).

In any case, it was a horrible thing to do.
 
Achán hiNidráne said:
Not a surprise given what passes for hygiene in that part of the world.
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It's somewhat o/t, but it reminds me of a taxicab ride from Taba, Egypt to Cairo I once took. After the long trip across the Sinai, we finally made it to Suez where our taxicab driver decided he needed to go to the bathroom. He stopped in the middle of the street we were on ... with traffic moving on all sides ... opened his door and squatted right there in the street, clinging to his door. The other people in the taxi (Egyptian citizens) didn't even bat an eye over it. When he finished making his "deposit", he got back in the cab and we continued on.

ETA: But to be fair, I've seen worse "hygienic choices" during Mardi Gras when I used to live and work in New Orleans :)
 
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Thread title should have been: Uneducated Cowardly Tyrants Use Religion as Excuse to Prove Their "Manhood" by Suppressing and Mutilating Women. "Honour" has nothing to do with this in any way. Quite the opposite, actually.
 
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Sadly, in a sense "honour" has everything to do with it.

"Honour" at its most basic is a word for one's worth and respect in their community. In other words, for how well you fit the local groupthink.

In ages where war was a yearly event, "honour" included such stuff as that you too want to pretend to not have your most basic self-preservation instinct. You'd have ten thousand greeks in some city, neither of which wanted to go risk their life in a war, but each thought the other 9,999 are all brave warriors and would shun him if he even as much talks about peace. So you got 10,000 people chest-thumping for that which neither of them really wanted to do, and booing at that which they secretly wanted to do.

That was military "honour" in a nutshell.

And in societies where the group-think spiralled down the drain of how verily a whole family's worth depends on controlling the women, "honour" gets to mean how well you do that. It's what affects one's standing in the community. It _is_ literally "honour."

And it's exactly the kind of aberration one ought to expect from groupthink exercises. And from having a personal goal not to do the right or smart or just thing, but just to fit in the herd.
 
hon·or
– noun1.honesty, fairness, or integrity in one's beliefs and actions: a man of honor.

2.a source of credit or distinction: to be an honor to one's family.

3.high respect, as for worth, merit, or rank: to be held in honor.

4.such respect manifested: a memorial in honor of the dead.

5.high public esteem; fame; glory: He has earned his position of honor.
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http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/honour

I think I respectfully disagree, Hans, and stick with my description of the situation: "Honour" had nothing to do with it.
 
Look at your own definitions 2, 3 and 5, really. They're saying exactly what I was saying. (Not to mention that even definition 1 is basically just that too, just narrowed down to a given culture's professed values.)

Some guy's respect and public esteem depended on his proving his "manhood" that way. Letting it slide would have diminished said respect and public esteem.

It seems to me like when you go strictly by the definition of "honour" -- as opposed to some personal sanitized ideal of what honour _should_ mean -- that's exactly what you get.
 
I can't see one shred of honesty, fairness or integrity involved in their behaviour. Quite the opposite.

I can't see one iota of credit and distinction either.

They certainly don't garner any respect or worthiness of merit from civilised adults. Only in their own twisted minds.
 
1. You're judging them from the perspective of your culture, not theirs. You're applying the criteria that are considered honour in your culture. Yes, they wouldn't get any respect from _you_. But the praise or shame that matters for them, the actual "honour" there, are those in their local community: it's by those people that they'll be respected or shunned.

2. Even going Eurocentric, it's not that far behind that we were not that much different. Odysseus slow-hanging the maids for the mere accusation sexual unchastity (and at that: no trial, no right to self-defense in court, no nothing) would not pass for an abomination to his audience, but as proper uncompromising morals. Arthur's wanting to burn Guineverre alive for unchastity didn't quite pass for an abomination to everyone in his court either. And nobody would call either of them dishonourable for that.

Not saying either act is _ok_, as it isn't. I'm merely that that's how flexible and relative the concept of "honour" is. Something which is tied intrinsically and by its very meaning to just how much your local community respects you, will vary as much as the customs of those communitites do.

3. You mention notions like integrity, and they're good and fine, but how do you measure them objectively?

Would a judge count as having integrity if he doesn't hesitate to sentence his own offspring for a crime? Did the Unabomber's brother have integrity for helping arrest his murderous brother?

I think most people would answer "yes". Putting justice above even family ties would certainly count as a lot of integrity, plus it clearly disassociates one from the crime of their relative.

Well, in this case the "crime" is running away from her husband, and it's a villainous crime in their view. Someone exacting harsh punishment in spite of family ties is one way to show integrity, which is why such mutilations or even "honour killings" are done by family members.

Again, for you or I it's an abomination. Not gonna defend it.

But what I'm trying to say is that the concept of "honour" is the real abomination and root of all these other abominations done in its name. Once someone's goal in life is just to fit in some group at all cost, and completely independent of other notions like "human rights" or "commensurate punishment" or even just "justice", then really they're gonna do any abomination they think is needed to fit in that group.
 
Just to make it clear, "fairness", "honesty" or "integrity" are not "honour", any more than you could say "gasoline additives" are the same as "driving". They're just the kinds of actions and traits that raise someone's "honour" in one particular culture. It's like the difference between playing football and the score.
 
Hans, I understood your point from the beginning, and thanks for making it clearer.

It seems that a small tribe's idea of "honour" is bound to how much personal pride they can impose on their family circle, and also how far they can swindle and lie to non-family pople and get away with it.

It's all very very primitive; so primitive that it is not so much "honour" as "standover tactics". It is essentially the same sort of behaviour that many herd animals have where the few males fight each other for the domination of the female pack or herd, and thus establish mating rights...and more.
 
It varies from tribe to tribe, really. You get extremes like the Bushmen on one end of the scale, and at the other end tribes where being a murderer confers one great honour and prestige and increases the chances of procreating. Since the whole idea of doing what you think the group would respect, is the very recipe for groupthink, it's not particularly surprising that you have as many different forms as there were groups.

But again you slip into what "honour" means for you or your tribe, when you decree that it's not so much "honour" as something else. But it is. That respect a tribesman gets from his peers is by definition "honour". That's what "honour" is. If standoff tactics and willy-waving are what the local groupthink will (pretend to) respect, that is honourable behaviour in that particular group.
 
Actually, I guess rather than repeating the same things like I'm the Bellman from The Hunting Of The Snark, the question I should ask is: in which way is it not "honour"?
 
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