Category Archives: Government Oppression

Last month, six students in Karnatakas Udupi district were barred from entering a college because they were wearing hijab. The incident soon snowballed into a controversy with raging debates on whether the hijab a veil worn by some Muslim women should be part of uniforms at educational institutions.

Over the next few weeks, the Karnataka government announced a three-day closure of all educational institutions amid increasing protests. On February 5, the state government passed an order stating that wearing a headscarf is not an essential religious practice for Muslims that can be protected under the Constitution. The states High Court is hearing a clutch of petitions challenging the government order.

While some said women should have the freedom of choice, others argued hijab is a form of oppression against women.

So, what does wearing a hijab mean to Muslim women?

Hijab has been a part of my life for more than 11 years now. I remember when I took admission in Hindu College, I met a girl who was surprised to meet a Muslim, as she had never come across one in her school life. She later shared how her parents have certain prejudices against the community. The conversation left a deep impact on me and also highlighted the Islamophobia that exists in Indian society.

When we started classes after a few weeks, I decided to wear the hijab as a representation of my community in a university where students from all over the country study a place where it is not an alien concept to befriend a Muslim. It was also my way of making them aware of my existence and an attempt to break stereotypes. But, this small step became quite prominent the moment I joined the dramatics society as I was the only one doing theatre wearing a hijab. I feel it is unfortunate that Muslims who have been pushed to ghettos through systematic othering have to be the ones to make an effort to be seen, heard and understood.

But, hijab is the confidence I have in my faith. It is not only a cloth covering my hair but a representation of who I am and where I come from. There have been times, especially post 2014, where I have faced blatant Islamophobia at work places, on trips, at restaurants or even in the markets, but my faith and my purpose is bigger than all the Islamophobia, and with time, this thought has become stronger. My hijab is my comfort and confidence in all the chaos around me.

-Mariyam H Siddiqui, 29, experiential educator, Delhi

I started wearing a hijab during my internship days, four years ago. It was completely my decision one that I reached on after reading a lot of books and thinking logically; until I was fully convinced. Then I accepted this blessing. Now, hijab is like my identity. Its the symbol of my love towards my God.

In the last four years, I have done my internship and postgraduate training in the field of paediatrics. Never did I feel I was not able to do any work or activity because of my hijab. Rather, the hijab is a sign of empowerment for me. I am a proud Muslimah and a proud hijabi. In my opinion, if someone wants to wear hijab or dress modestly an essential practice of Islam preventing them from doing so is against the fundamental and constitutional rights.

-Dr Sayeeda Zahan, paediatrician, Kolkata

Hijab is that valuable piece of cloth that gives us freedom to be selective of what we want the world to see. Its more a symbol of modesty than anything. Its our basic right to dress whichever way we want. As for me, my father didnt want me to wear a hijab. Hence, its my personal choice and not something I am forced to do. Hijab ban in the name of uniformity is communal hatred-inciting propaganda. Like you cant force similar dress code for males and females, you cant impose on Muslim women what we should or shouldnt wear.

-Mariyam Khan, student, Uttar Pradesh

I started wearing hijab in school after I saw most of my classmates wearing it. It was fascinating to me and I wanted to try and fit in. It did bring a certain sense of freedom from gaze, comments and judgment. There is a certain respect that comes with it. Eventually, it was both cultural and religious, so I never questioned it and wore it on and off until I was in my 20s.

If you wear a hijab, people assume you are pious and that was something I didnt want to be associated with. I wore a hijab not because it represented my moral character or my intelligence, my backwardness or my modernity, but because it made me feel grounded and whole. It is a part of my personality and identity. That doesnt give me the right to judge women who dont wear hijab; it doesnt make me a better Muslim than them.

Sometimes, I have worn it as a political statement in places where my identity as a Muslim woman needed to be established. I have chosen it not as an obligation, but as a choice, and that is something a lot of people find difficult to understand. The task of finding a job is certainly challenging in these times when appearance is as important as qualifications. As for the hijab, I have chosen to wear it not out of obligated servitude, nor as a symbol of oppression, but out of freedom.

-Mehwish, 25, engineering student, Kashmir

I started wearing hijab when I was 13 or 14 years old, because I wanted to. My parents never forced me; they supported me. At that time, I didnt know why people wear hijab. But the more I learnt about it, the closer I felt to Allah.

Hijab, for me, is absolutely a part of my identity now. I feel it is the most powerful tool that gives me courage and makes me fearless. It makes me feel I have a voice. Its up to me what I choose to do with my body, and not anyone else to tell me what I should and should not be doing, to not dismiss my intelligence but to accept it, to respect it.

But it is sad that in India today we dont have that respect, or acceptance. People dont leave any stone unturned in disrespecting Muslim women. There is this understanding that women who practise purdah are oppressed, illiterate or backward. Is that something we are going to allow to perpetuate in our society? People need to broaden their horizons, open their minds to realise there is a diverse culture behind what you are making a monolith of, that Islam in itself has diverse culture like any other religion.

The hijab is my right, my choice, and my life. It is not symbol of oppression, but a tool of empowerment for Muslim girls. This is the crown and the identity of us, and if you try to question our identity, then we will fight for it.

-Sadiya Riyaz Shaikh, 19, director and founder of Rahnuma Welfare Foundation, Mumbai

Hijab is my pride, it is my identification, and I personally believe hijab is a choice of each individual. It is a choice women, who want to cover their head for their religion, make. It never was, is, or will be a sign of oppression. I have some sisters who started hijab at the age of 5 as a sign of respect, while others chose not to. Its about hidayat (Gods will), making hijab a choice for one and all. I personally believe this is the end of democracy, an end of an era for people whove just started out, for children who are young and are going to schools, as the experience will never be the same again; for girls who have dreams and ambitions. This entire fiasco has left me with a lot of bewilderment as I didnt grow up in an India like this. I knew a different India and its only a matter of time before things go out of hand.

-Maliha Noor Siddiqui, 22, mass communication student, Kolkata

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It is my comfort and confidence amid the chaos: Women share what wearing a hijab means to them - The Indian Express

President Akufo-Addo (right) and ex-President Mahama

Oppression of journalists setting a dangerous blueprint, ex-President Mahama

Akufo-Addo's government cannot continue to criminalise speech Mahama

GIJ, Clergy silent because they are afraid of this dictatorial regime, Mahama

Former President John Dramani Mahama has cautioned President Nana Addo-Dankwa Akufo-Addo against the oppression of people he (Akufo-Addo) feels have offended him.

The ex-president said Akufo-Addo could not continue to criminalise statements against him since offensive speech is a civil issue.

In a statement shared on his Facebook page, Mahama said,

"President Akufo-Addo, you cannot continue to oppress the people, criminalise speech when these matters are essentially civil in nature; if you feel offended by them.

"I am appalled at the growing criminalisation of speech and journalism in Ghana under your watch in this 21st century."

The ex-president went on to list some actions by journalists that were wrongly criminalised, including the detention of radio and TV presenter Captain Smart and the recent arrest of radio presenter Oheneba Boamah Bennie who allegedly made offensive statements against the first family.

He lamented the silence of the senior journalists, the Ghana Journalist Association, and leaders of the various faith-based organisation in the country on frequent abuse of journalists by the government.

"It is even more sad that the Journalists Association and its senior members, many of our clergy and other moral leaders, scared because of the oppressive and dictatorial regime you are running, have remained quiet in the face of this disturbing development in our maturing democracy," he said.

"This is a dangerous blueprint you are fashioning for our dear nation, and it must not be encouraged. Your actions as president have totally discredited your self-acquired accolade as a human rights lawyer and activist. Ghana has long emerged from the unfortunate past where journalists were cowed by incarceration and brutalisation," he added.

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You can't oppress people because you feel offended by them Mahama to Akufo-Addo - GhanaWeb

Why do so many people think we Mormons are racists? As it turns out, it is not because of Brigham Young.

Brad Wilcox, a religion professor at Brigham Young University and one of Mormonisms most unfortunate pseudo celebrities, had a lamentable performance on the fireside circuit recently. In attempting to clarify why the all-male priesthood of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints was not bestowed on black men until 1978, Wilcox offered a couple of rhetorical questions: Brigham Young was a jerk? Members of the Church were prejudiced?

Well, perhaps. But as if the answer to these queries mattered, he went on to suggest, Maybe were asking the wrong question. Maybe instead of saying, Why did the Blacks have to wait until 1978, maybe what we should be asking is, Why did the whites, and other races, have to wait until 1829 one thousand, eight hundred, twenty-nine years they waited.

Apparently within the long history of race relations, the extended delay for those of African descent is not such a big deal. The real travesty, as Wilcox sees it, is the eighteen centuries whites had to wait. He might have pointed out that these long-oppressed whites were never excluded from the priesthood while others enjoyed the privilege.

Wilcox has since apologized for his misstep, though his apology rings hollow as additional videos surfaced in which he made nearly identical comments. This was not a careless, inadvertent mistake, but a rehearsed talking point in his stump speech.

Ironically, in his rush to defend Brigham Young and the churchs 19th century take on race, Wilcox inadvertently revealed that he (and we) have a far bigger problem. Color-blindness and tone-deafness have conspired to produce an almost inexplicable racial ignorance within the 21st century church. And yes, professor, asking why some blacks were ordained to the priesthood when the United States was still a slave-holding society and why the practice was abandoned until well after the Civil Rights movement is an appropriate question.

If this mistake were limited to Wilcox, it could be readily dismissed. But this error, although coming from someone who misappropriates the very history he purports to have mastered, does not make Wilcox unique. Racial ignorance among Mormons stems not from our history, but from our inability to learn from that history. For all the resources the church has invested in preserving and teaching history, we sadly dont seem to get it. We cling to persecution theology as the central tenet of our historical legacy and ongoing reality.

In the face of rising anti-Semitism, racially motivated redistricting, and voter suppression laws, prominent members of the church, both in government and at BYU, would have the world believe they represent a class of victims.

For example, before becoming one of Donald Trumps most dutiful disciples, Sen. Mike Lee criticized his partys presidential nominee in 2016 saying Trump had made some statements that some have identified correctly as religiously intolerant. He said Trump was wildly unpopular in my state, in part because my state consists of people who are members of a religious minority church a people who were ordered exterminated by the governor of Missouri in 1838.

Kathleen Flake, a professor of Mormon studies at the University of Virginia, told me Mormons were remarkably oppressed by both state and federal governments. But she says by only focusing on oppression experienced by Mormons and other Protestants we can easily neglect the ongoing oppression other religious groups face.

Most religious communities have been threatened or mistreated, she said, but Lee uses a narrow sliver of the Protestant story to tell the story of all America and then suggests that any other story is un-American. It is not a narrative true historians recognize, she said.

For Lee, Trumps heroism as an adversary of woke extremism outweighs any concern the senator may have had about the presidents intolerance toward Muslims or anyone else. Thus, the historical context of Mormon persecution went from being Lees reason to oppose Trump to his reason to support him.

Like Wilcox, Lee has not misspoken. Rather, he has betrayed an insensitivity to the suffering of others. Racism and religious bigotry are two sides of the same ugly coin. By refusing to acknowledge these twin forces, people like Wilcox and Lee belie true Christian empathy. They have so internalized the persecution narrative that they are incapable of seeing that the oppressed have become the oppressors. Thus, they refuse to let the dialogue be about anyone but themselves.

These lightweights masquerading as scholars and statesmen misrepresent and cheapen a belief system that for some of us is more than a system. On the tapestry of faith they have left a stain that the rising generation will purge in due course. In the meantime, the damage and disappointment are real, and the stakes could not be higher.

Addison Graham is a sophomore at Brigham Young University majoring in American studies and Spanish. He is currently studying abroad in Spain.

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Some members of the LDS Church have so internalized their victimhood that they can't see how others have been oppressed - Salt Lake Tribune

Since their turn towards post-structuralism in the 1960s, left-wing theorists have focused almost exclusively on the philosophical and political implications of human differences. They have typically rejected moral universalism, which holds that all of humanity shouldand eventually willagree on a single moral code that best supports human well-being and sweep all other views of morality aside. They regard moral universalism as at best unrealistic and at worst an ideological justification for marginalizing members of certain groups, arguing that it entails a rejection of differencea kind of othering of those who disagree, as Edward Said has put it. They believe that moral universalism can only be achieved by forcing those who disagree with the approved moral code to conform to it, either through the power of the state, or socially, through ostracism or invidious discrimination. They usually expect that such a state would be imperialist, racist and capitalist, and would divide the world into the worthy (those who agree with the approved moral code) and the unworthy (those who disagree). And they argue that a more humane politics would respect, accommodate and even welcome differences, whether metaphysical or cultural.

Although I respect this point of view, I think that many leftists fail to realise the extent to which they only welcome those differences that they approve ofthey often seem to assume that, if differences were welcomed, conservative and reactionary views would somehow be eliminated. But conservative and reactionary thinkers have their own philosophies about how to accommodate human differences. As the political theorist Sheldon Wolin puts it in his seminal book Tocqueville Between Two Worlds, By the late twentieth century postmodernity would have forgotten that its highly prized value of difference was once the property of traditionalists and elitists like Burke and Tocqueville. Leftists have tended to forget this history, which is one reason why theyve struggled to respond effectively to the far-right and postmodern conservative political movements that argue for an alternative way to accommodate differencesone that organises people into hierarchies and restricts their freedoms, as with the slide to nationalistic chauvinism and authoritarianism in illiberal Hungary and Poland.

The toleration of those that differ from others in matters of religion is so agreeable to the Gospel of Jesus Christ, and to the genuine reason of mankind, that it seems monstrous for men to be so blind as not to perceive the necessity and advantage of it in so clear a light.John Locke, A Letter Concerning Toleration (1689)

Although todays so-called classical liberals tend to disdain leftist ideas about multiculturalism and rhetoric about toleration and inclusion, the idea that we should respect human differences has its historical roots in liberalism. Seventeenth-century liberals such as Hugo Grotius and John Locke wrote lengthy treatises imploring governments to respect religious dissenters within the population. Their positions may in part have been a reaction to the tremendous suffering of many Europeans during the pyrrhic religious wars of the sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries: at the time, there was a widespread yearning to move past irreconcilable conflicts by promoting mutual toleration. But these thinkers were also making principled arguments for respecting religious differences, rooted in their belief that for the state to interfere with peoples religious convictions was paternalistic and even tyrannical. The nineteenth-century liberal socialist J. S. Mill framed this idea more positively: he argued that respect for differences wasnt merely a pragmatic concession or a safeguard against government oppression; rather, it was a requisite of justice. He wrote that a just world would be characterized by a vast array of experiments in living, each one reflecting an individuals unique inward force, which must be allowed to grow and develop itself on all sides.

Late-twentieth-century pluralists, such as John Rawls and Will Kymlicka, have suggested that those earlier liberals conceived of toleration, individual freedom and respect for difference in terms that were too narrow and that earlier liberal societies were not liberal enoughbecause they still tried to enforce conformity to certain widely held social norms, such as beliefs in Christian practices, nationalism, conservatism, sexual mores and the need for newcomers to assimilate into the majority culture.

The use of the abstractly universal slogan all lives matter serves to obscure the fact that it is black lives that are being lost to violenceespecially police violencein large and disproportionate numbers. We cant make all lives matter without making black lives matter: the universal can only be true when the particular that is embedded within it is true.Leo Casey, Dissent (2018)

Even though the radical leftist position on how to accommodate human differences has more in common with traditional liberal thought than many leftists might like to admit, it diverges from it in important ways. Radical leftist ideology has its roots in two separate traditions that are often conflated: the post-structuralism popular in many European academic circles, and the critical theory that fuels the current identity politics movement in the United States and elsewhere.

The philosophy of differences expounded by mid-twentieth-century post-structuralists such as Jean-Paul Sartre, Simone de Beauvoir and Louis Althusser gained traction in the 1960s as the popularity of socialist and Marxist radicalism declined. These thinkers criticised liberal capitalist political systems for supporting conformity, violence and imperialism. Putting their faith in Marxist or Hegelian beliefs about the universal movement of history or dialectical inexorability, they hoped that revolutionary change would eventually sweep across the world and replace structures of domination with universal solidarity and equality.

Later post-structuralist thinkers were disillusioned with Marxism and socialismconvinced that those ideologies had proven no better than liberal capitalist ideology at preventing countries from descending into authoritarianism and imperialism. They attributed this failure in part to the belief in moral universalism that is common to both socialism and liberalism. They preferred a more Nietzschean approach: they were suspicious of universalism in any form, because it could be used to justify the elimination of cultural differences among groups, and thus as a pretext to extend the reach of socialism or liberal capitalism and expand its adherents personal political power. They believed instead in accepting that human beings have or create an endless array of different values and cultures, many of which may be worthwhile or at least functional. The most radical post-structuralist philosophers, such as Gilles Deleuze, argued that the entire history of western philosophy and politics could be seen as an effort to subsume all differences into some overarching shared identity. The most cogent extension of this viewpoint was that all disciplinary and controlling institutions should be eliminated and somehow replaced with so-called radical communities and true democracyconcepts that these thinkers rarely defined.

Todays radical left ideologyis also rooted in critical theory. Critical theorists, such as Derrick Bell and Kimberl Crenshaw, are typically less interested in abstract philosophizing and metaphysics than in describing how liberal societies have historically failedand continue to failto be welcoming towards cultural and racial differences and to live up to their vaunted principle of freedom for all. Most of these theorists would probably agree that what Frederick Douglass said in his famous 1852 speech What to the Slave is the Fourth of July is no less true today:

Your boasted liberty, an unholy license; your national greatness, swelling vanity; your sounds of rejoicing are empty and heartless; your denunciations of tyrants, brass fronted impudence; your shouts of liberty and equality, hollow mockery; your prayers and hymns, your sermons and thanksgivings, with all your religious parade, and solemnity, are, to him, mere bombast, fraud, deception, impiety and hypocrisiesa thin veil to cover up crimes which would disgrace a nation of savages.

There is an ongoing debate as to whether it is most effective to challenge discrimination by promoting people from historically marginalised groups or whether it is better to reject such labels as means of oppression. For instance, radical feminists like Catharine MacKinnon demand respect for women because of their unique histories and needs, while theorists like Judith Butler suggest that the whole idea of womanhood as an identity needs to be questioned.

However, there is no denying that every country we think of today as liberal has historically advanced racist domestic policies, and that some of those nations have engaged in vast imperial and colonial enterprises. What is controversial, however, is the critical theorists claim that liberal states are still bastions of bigotrypatriarchy, heteronormativity, white privilege etc.and that, rather than respecting differences, liberal states have simply found new ways to advance old forms of discrimination. Unlike the post-structuralists, critical theorists claim to have extensive empirical evidence in support of their assertions. They argue that, in practice, various groups are disadvantaged or marginalized by theoretically neutral policies, such as allegedly meritocratic competition. However, like the post-structuralists, their proposed solutions tend to be less revolutionary than one might expect: their arguments usually end in calls for a more inclusive kind of liberalismof the sort that multiculturalists would probably find appealing. For example, Charles Mills, a critic of what he called racial liberalism, was adept at describing how liberal states have failed to respect differences, but acknowledged near the end of his life that he wanted, not an end to liberalism, but a kind of liberalism that was more radical, more welcoming of differences, more supportive of individual freedomand also cleansed of the taint of its history. This is a project I personally support. But for traditional Marxists like David Harvey, critical theorists apparent preference for reform over revolution is proof that their supposed radicalism isnt all that radical. Harvey argues that socialist universalism would be a much bigger threat to the status quo than the changes he believes critical theorists want, like more black female CEOs of large corporations.

There is an instinct for rank which, more than anything, is already an indication of a high rank. There is a delight in the nuances of respect which permits us to surmise a noble origin and habits.Friedrich Nietzsche, Beyond Good and Evil (1886)

For all their disagreements, liberals and leftists both tend to endorse the idea that, in general, societies should make space for peoples differences, because it is good for individuals and subgroups to be free to express their uniqueness rather than being pressured to conform. Both also often have egalitarian leaningsfor example, they tend to agree that the state should not make laws that arbitrarily treat certain groups more favourably than others.

Those on the political right tend to agree that there are fundamental distinctions between people and that these differences add to the colour of life. Some of them contend that they are more committed to respecting differences than leftists and liberals are, because leftists and liberals prioritise equality, which requires that people be treated as the same in certain ways, in spite of their differences, whereas they believe that a genuine acknowledgement of human differences inevitably entails treating people differently.

Traditional conservatives tend to think that accommodating human differences requires the formation of many different communities and the sorting of those communities into hierarchies. A well-ordered society, in their view, is one in which people are differentiated by rank and privilege, and in which each group, regardless of its place on the ladder, does its part to maintain society, while also maintaining its distinctiveness; when people challenge the legitimacy of those gradations and try to put everyone in the same class or rank in the name of egalitarianism, disorder ensues. Early conservative critics of liberal capitalism, such as Samuel Taylor Coleridge (17721834) and Fyodor Dostoevsky (18211881), wrote disapprovingly about the decline of the aristocratic landowning class and the rise of a democratic, consumerist urban society. They saw these developments as allowing those whom Edmund Burke (17291797) called the swinish multitude to degrade the culture and turn politics into a vulgar spectacle. These views are still around today. For example, Yoram Hazony has called for the development of a conservative democracy that would reject the universalist aspirations of liberal cosmopolitanism, which he compares to the imperial ambitions of Catholicism and the Holy Roman empire. And Sohrab Ahmari has argued that liberalism results in a kind of tyranny that eradicates conservative communities on the pretext of achieving tolerance.

Although leftist post-structuralists often cite the writings of Friedrich Nietzsche, he was, ironically, an advocate of what he called aristocratic radicalism. For Nietzsche, differences of rank and merit were among the most important kinds of human differences, and he chastised liberalism for being hostile to them. He saw liberals as adherents of what he called Christian slave morality, which rejected the noble, life-affirming values of the ancient Greeks and Romans. Liberals, he argued, insist that all individuals are moral equals, and this makes it impossible to justify allowing some to have more power or opportunity than others. He therefore advocated replacing western metaphysical and moral philosophy with a concern with greatness and vulgarness, health and sickness, the rarefied and the herd. Many left-wing postmodernists have been attracted to Nietzsche because of his criticisms of Christian and bourgeois moralism. But Nietzsche thought it would be a mistake to eliminate power hierarchies, and that the few individuals who were actually capable of obtaining and exercising power should do so without scruple, and use the herd as fodder for grander and more interesting projects than could be dreamed of by the mediocre minds of liberal democrats.

These right-wing approaches have two things in common. First, they evince a hierarchical mindset. Most traditionalist conservatives, past and present, believe that real differences emerge as a result of the differentiation of society into what Edmund Burke called little platoons and small scale communities, with different social roles and different degrees of authority. They see liberal arguments for equality and freedom as the biggest threat to the tolerance of differences, because achieving equality would require levelling society to the point at which everyone sees things from the same mediocre standpoint. The second thing most traditionalist conservatives believe is that, for peoples authentic differences to emerge, only the most capable or worthy should be granted political and cultural authority. Some conservatives think that effacing political distinctions between citizens and migrants would deprive the state of its capacity to enforce a shared moral and cultural identity and would thus also destroy the unique features of the nation concerned. Other conservatives think that if the herd were granted political power and agency, they would inevitably use it to tear down anyone who was excellent rather than average.

The right-wing political approach to managing human differences is fatally flawed because it assumes that some people are more deserving than others. Liberals and leftists would be well advised to recognise that respect for differences does not necessarily compel people to fight for greater individual freedom, equality and mutual respect. Indeed, historically, emphasising human differences has tended to prompt people to calling for discrimination and social hierarchies and led them to believe in the pursuit of excellence for the chosen few, rather than the pursuit of happiness for the many. We forget this at our peril.

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The Politics of Human Differences - Areo - Areo Magazine

It was around 6 am on a freezing, misty morning. I had woken up early to attend the flag hoisting ceremony at the local gram panchayat office in my village, Mhaswad, located in Western Maharashtra. All the prominent villagers had assembled there to celebrate our 73rd Republic Day.

I was gazing up at our flag and singing the national anthem when, in my peripheral vision, I saw a young girl standing outside the gate. As I looked at her, I noticed that she had sharp facial features and was singing the national anthem in a nervous manner. She was clutching a bunch of small plastic versions of the Indian tricolour in one hand and holding her younger brothers hand tightly with the other. They were both shivering; their teeth chattering due to the cold. I think she wanted to come inside the compound to sell those flags.

What stood in her way was a large chair by the entrance on which a man in his forties was seated, probably a security guard who had not donned his uniform that day. After the anthem, she exchanged looks with the guard, who stared at her with a mixture of haughtiness and anger. He was enjoying the authority the guards chair had bestowed on him. Witnessing this power spectacle, the girl took the hint and left the premises without saying a word.

The bitter truth: No place for twelve-year-old Savitri and her brother in the local Republic Day celebrations in a village in Western Maharashtra. Photo: Prabhat Sinha

Upon further enquiry, I discovered that the girl was named Savitri and she was twelve years old. Savitri hails from the nomadic Paradhi tribal community in Maharashtra, which was branded a criminal tribe by the British colonial government. However, even after decades of being denotified post-independence, the tribes criminal tag refuses to go away; the stigma endures.

I wonder what would have happened had that guard not seated himself at the entrance of that compound? Would Savitri have felt more comfortable approaching us then?

Just like that guard, thousands of official functionaries across India assume that sitting in an office chair gives them the power to brazenly dismiss such helpless Savitris. Is this the equality we were celebrating on Republic Day; the day our constitution which made all Indians equal before law came into effect?

As Article 14 of our constitution says, The state shall not deny to any person equality before the law or the equal protection of the laws within the territory of India. But are we, the people of India, really equal?

Also read: Whos Afraid of the Indian Constitution?

On Indias 73rd Republic Day, I was haunted by one question: are all people, sitting in their respective chairs of power at every level, virtually erasing Article 14 during the execution of their roles and functions on a daily basis? Is this the only narrative that the chair kursi in Hindi, khurchi in Marathi is capable of in a democracy such as ours?

Growing up in rural India and witnessing the spectacle of the chair and the power it wields over local social life has been a bewildering experience. It was only when I started working in the social sector that I became familiar with the nuances of these power dynamics.

It starts at birth. Savitri does not have a birth certificate since she was born in a temporary dwelling due to her Paradhi familys nomadic background. Her younger brother was born when her family was moving in a tempo and thus, the parents simply named him Tempo. He does not have a birth certificate either. Apart from this, the siblings have no permanent home and have never been to school.

I am not sure if Savitri and Tempos father has ever visited the offices of the gram panchayat or the nagar parishad to get their birth certificates or get them admitted into school, and I can understand his reason for not doing so.

In India, when you approach any administrative building, even before entering the premises, the guard will gauge your status from your appearance and the resources at your disposal and treat you accordingly. Even if someone from the Paradhi community were to muster up the courage to visit a government office, there are a number of challenges she or he will have to face.

First, the security guard will try to shoo them away at the entrance itself. If the guard is kind of heart and allows the individual inside, the peon sitting outside the officers cabin will tell them to go away with an imperious nod of the head, not least due to the stigma and oppression that the tribe continues to face.

Years of being at the receiving end of this kind of treatment has resulted in a mindset of submitting to the oppression and has created an ingrained feeling of servitude among the people belonging to this community, which is a microcosm of the feudal mindset still largely prevalent in our country. Savitri and her family are denied their basic fundamental rights because someone sitting in a chair of authority repeatedly turns them away.

The chair and the power associated with it have dominated our hierarchical social landscape in every possible way. Take Anandi tai (elder sister, in Marathi), for example, who used to work on our farm with my grandmother. She had never been to school; was married and widowed at a young age; and had been an agricultural labourer ever since. Owing to her life experiences, she would not make eye contact with anyone while speaking; she was constantly looking down. This is the bitter reality of the vast number of women in our rural areas.

When Anandi tai heard about the Sanjay Gandhi Niradhar Yojana in 2019, a scheme meant to give financial assistance to destitute, divorced and abandoned women, among others, she wanted to apply for it.

After getting approval from the concerned government office, Anandi tai was told that she was required to open a bank account to facilitate the direct benefit transfer. I accompanied her to the nearby bank to help her out with the Kafkaesque bureaucracy of our banking system. The much publicised idea of the bank as a customer-friendly organisation that constantly calls you to open an account or offer you a credit card is far from the reality, especially in rural areas.

The betel-spit stained staircase of a neighbourhood bank in rural, Western Maharashtra. Photo: Prabhat Sinha

The first sight that greeted us in our neighbourhood bank was a staircase, pock-marked with the spit of the banks paan-chewing staff. A clerk in one room asked us to fill out some very confusing and complicated forms. I politely asked him to help us out, but he did not even look at us; he just shrugged his shoulders. He was chewing paan with great concentration; no doubt he was one of the artists behind the crimson canvas we had seen while entering the building.

After some time, I asked him again to help us out. He stood up and spoke in a rude tone, I have other work to do. If you dont know how to fill the form, dont apply for the scheme!

This infuriated me. I asked him to take me to the branch manager. In response, he shamelessly pointed towards a cabin about ten metres ahead. On the door of the branch managers cabin was an unambiguous warning in Marathi: Do not enter without permission. So much for prioritising customer interaction.

We were reduced to watching the manager through the window, hoping he would see us and call us inside. But the manager gave us the royal ignore as he peered into his phone, laughing uproariously as he did so, revelling in the power of his chair.

Also read: Aadhaar and My Brush With Digital Exclusion

Outside the bank managers cabin, a no-nonsense warning in Marathi: Do not enter without permission. Photo: Prabhat Sinha

This Game of Chairs goes on at every level, everywhere in the country. Farmers, marginalised communities, women and the youth are always expected to respect the chair and its occupant, even if the chair rejects their pleas most of the time and treats them on the basis of where they were born, which community they come from, what they wear and how much money they possess.

I experienced this when I wanted to get a passport for Poonam, an athlete whom I mentor. She had been selected to represent India at a cross-country tournament in Virginia, USA. It was a fantastic opportunity for any young athlete, more so for Poonam, who hails from the marginalised Dhangar (shepherd) community. Because of the nomadic nature of her community, she did not have a permanent address, which is one of the requirements to apply for a passport.

It took us three days to get an American visa and three months to get an Indian passport for Poonam. Each time, the authority seated in the chair in the passport office gave us different reasons for rejection. I remember addressing him courteously as saheb during our interactions, but all he did was send us back to the village at least five times to get some document or the other.

The passport office is in Pune, a five-hour drive from Poonams village. By meeting all the sahebs and babus occupying different chairs, from the passport office to the police commissioners office, we got the passport for Poonam after three tedious months. We felt like we had won an international medal without even participating in the actual competition.

Ironically, every office we visited, from the gram panchayat office to the commissioners office, had pictures of Mahatma Gandhi, Mahatma Phule, Savitribai Phule and Babasaheb Ambedkar on the wall behind these chairs; the chairs from where they authoritatively say no to the neediest of people approaching them.

The authority of the chair and its subsequent abuse by the person sitting in it and uttering no is slowly destroying the power of knowledge and accountability in our society. I have discovered, through my experiences, that the chair which denies birth certificates to Savitri and Tempo; throws challenges in Poonams way while she tries to get a passport and prevents Anandi tai from enjoying the benefits of government schemes, is obstructing the very promise that Article 14 of our constitution makes to the people of India.

So, what exactly are we celebrating when we observe Republic Day year after year?

Prabhat Sinha is a former athlete, a sports agent and beehive catcher. He runs a sports programme for rural and tribal children.

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The Unequal Republic - The Wire

Cast Confirmed for controversial play TIANANMEN REQUIEM, running March 10 - 27, at The Players Theatre, 115 MacDougal St, NYC, is already the subject of controversy. An all Asian cast brings to life a deeply moving tale of a young gay couple trying to survive the Tiananmen Square crackdown and how their daughter - more than a decade later - is attempting to uncover one of her parents' secret ties to the Chinese military during the massacre. This tragic love story set against the backdrop of the Tiananmen Square Massacre displays the brutality of this terrible moment in history.

TIANANMEN REQUIEM has had its share of obstacles already. This play - one that the Chinese government doesn't want you to see - lost its director, cast members, and even one of its producers before reaching first rehearsal. Some simply quit without offering a reason. Even a university professor, a mentor to the playwright, refused to be involved - even as dramaturg. Finally now, a company has been gathered for what is bound to be a unique treatment of a controversial subject that bitterly divides the Chinese diaspora community.

Director Dennis Yueh Yeh Li has assembled a valiant group of actors including Charles Pang & Michael Benzinger; and Karina Wen, Joyce Keokham, Ethan Grant Wong.

Toney A. Brown & Marc Levine have taken over the role of producers with sponsors Wang Dan (Dialog China) and Rod Lathim (Santa Barbara Foundation) joining the team. Dialog China is an organization founded by famed Tiananmen student leader Wang Dan, who became China's "Most Wanted Man," in the aftermath of Tiananmen; he was imprisoned twice, and is spending his exile in America as an indefatigable human rights activist.

In his endorsement of the play, he wrote on Twitter in Chinese "Seeing those who were not born during the Tiananmen Massacre dedicating themselves to preserving history, makes me incredibly thrilled. Looking at the younger generation, I no longer feel lonely."

"The Tiananmen crackdown affected my family. In my family were educators, professors. When they witnessed students who were protesting peacefully being slaughtered, it was very painful," said the playwright, who wishes to remain anonymous to avoid any further danger to his family.

"Another of my family told me what they saw," they continued; "He had walked into a lane, it was lined with corpses that were flattened into color, it was just a smear of flesh."

"Tiananmen also affected my own life," they said seguing into his parents; my family is Christian and tried to escape religious oppression but had to leave me behind. That's because China wouldn't let them take their child with them, the government wanted to make sure my parents wouldn't flee."

"[This play] is my only way of dealing with the trauma."

The Tiananmen Square student movement is a controversial subject matter for the Chinese diaspora community, where opinions on this important historical event are heavily polarized.

TIANANMEN REQUIEM, running March 10 - 27, at The Players Theatre, 115 MacDougal St, NYC, is already the subject of controversy. An all Asian cast brings to life a deeply moving tale of a young gay couple trying to survive the Tiananmen Square crackdown and how their daughter - more than a decade later - is attempting to uncover one of her parents' secret ties to the Chinese military during the massacre. This tragic love story set against the backdrop of the Tiananmen Square Massacre displays the brutality of this terrible moment in history.

Here is the original post:

Cast Confirmed For Controversial Play TIANANMEN REQUIEM at The Players Theatre - Broadway World

"Squad" Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., claimed there is a "very real risk" that America will not be a democracy in 10 years and will "return to Jim Crow."

Ocasio-Cortez was asked if she believed the United States would have a democracy in 10 years, prompting her to push another wild claim in an interview that was published Monday.

"I think theres a very real risk that we will not," the New York Democrat told the New Yorker in an interview published Monday. "What we risk is having a government that perhaps postures as a democracy, and may try to pretend that it is, but isnt."

OCASIO-CORTEZ CALLS CLIMATE CHANGE OUR WORLD WAR II, WARNS THE WORLD WILL END IN 12 YEARS

Democratic Congresswoman from New York Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez speaks as Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer listens during a press conference in New York City. JOHANNES EISELE/AFP via Getty Images

"I think we will look like ourselves. I think we will return to Jim Crow," Ocasio-Cortez continued in her interview with the New Yorker. "I think thats what we risk."

The second-term congresswoman also claimed that Texas election integrity bills proposed in the state legislature are "Jim Crow-style disenfranchisement laws."

"You had members of the state legislature, just a few months ago, flee the state in order to prevent such voting laws from being passed. In Florida, where you had the entire state vote to allow people who were released from prison to be reenfranchised after they have served their debt to society, thats essentially being replaced with poll taxes and intimidation at the polls," she said. "You have the complete erasure and attack on our own understanding of history, to replace teaching history with institutionalized propaganda from white-nationalist perspectives in our schools. This is what the scaffolding of Jim Crow was."

Ocasio-Cortez also compared the laws to "the rise of fascism in post-World War One Germany."

"But you really dont have to look much further than our own history, because what we have, I think, is a uniquely complex path that we have walked. And the question that were really facing is: Was the last fifty to sixty years after the Civil Rights Act just a mere flirtation that the United States had with a multiracial democracy that we will then decide was inconvenient for those in power?" she said. "And we will revert to what we had before, which, by the way, wasnt just Jim Crow but also the extraordinary economic oppression as well?"

It is unclear whether Ocasio-Cortezs claim will coincide with her past claim that the world will end in just over a decade due to climate change.

Ocasio-Cortezs office did not immediately respond to Fox News Digitals request for comment.

See the original post:

AOC claims 'very real risk' America won't be democracy in 10 years, will 'return to Jim Crow' - Yahoo News

Members of some of the families have alleged they have been experiencing caste-based discrimination since birth in the village, and hoped religious conversion would help them escape.

Discussions on forced reigious conversions took centre stage in Tamil Nadu last month, after the suicide of Lavanya, a Trichy student who had alleged in a video recording that she was asked to convert to Christianity. The BJP and right wing groups in Tamil Nadu took up the issue immediately after her death.

However, despite Hindu groups in Tamil Nadu going hammer and tongs over the topic of religious conversions, in a small village in southern Tamil Nadu, eight Dalit families of 40 people voluntarily renounced Hinduism and converted to Islam. The mass conversion event happened in Dombucheri village in Bodinayakanur in Tamil Nadus Theni district, in December 2021. The family members insist that they converted for a reason, i.e., to break free from caste oppression that they have been experiencing in the village since their birth.

Men from Dombuchery offering Namaz in a room

Veeralakshmi changed her name to Rahima after her conversion. The young mother pins her decision to convert on the dominant caste Thevars in Dombuchery, who violently attacked her husband, Mohammad Ismail, on November 4, 2021, the day of Deepavali.

Mohammad Ismail

My husband had taken our aunt to the neighbouring village to meet a doctor. On returning, he saw that a group of 30 men from the Thevar community were attacking his uncle Vairamuthu and four other cousins. When he intervened, he was hit on the head and had to be hospitalised for 10 days, Rahima says. As per Rahimas account, the Thevar men had asked her husband and his relatives how they could afford to buy cars and bikes, and then proceeded to vandalise the vehicles.

Bike vandalised on November 4

They took two of our cars and four bikes. They also hit six of us, out of which two of us me and my uncle Vairamuthu were badly injured and had to be hospitalised in the Kanavilakku Government Hospital in Theni, Mohammad Ismail tells TNM.

On November 4, four bikes and two cars belonging to the Arundhatiyar community

Ismail adds that the above mentioned incident was not an isolated act of violence from the Thevar community. According to him, Thevar men would periodically visit the street where he and other Dalit families lived and target them. These men would start riots and damage the houses and vehicles of the Dalit families, he says. These men are jealous that we are able to buy cars and bikes. They ask how we Dalits are dressed so well and able to afford the vehicles? Ismail says.

The seeds of the November 4 violence were sown six months before it happened. According to Ismail, his uncle Palanichamy was attacked by a 22-year-old man, Alex, who belonged to the Thevar community. Alex, Ismail says, struck 38-year-old Palanichamy on the head with a knife. Badly injured, Palanichamy was immediately taken to a hospital in Theni, while Alex fled from the spot.

After a police complaint, Alex was arrested and remanded to 15-days of judicial custody following which he was released. However, the arrest triggered resentment and anger within the Thevar community. Although seemingly calm, communal tensions were simmering in Dombuchery.

Finally on November 4, Alexs brother gathered 30 Thevar men and entered the Dalit habitation. Arguments led to a violent clash which led to Ismail and Vairamuthu being badly injured.

Ismail after being attacked on November 4

Tamil Puligal partys North Theni secretary Mohammad Ali Jinnah, who was earlier known as Vairamuthu, says that ever since he remembers, dominant caste members of Dombuchery practised caste-based discrimination.

Dalit residents cannot get a hair cut inside the village, he says. The barber would only attend to Thevar men and the Dalit residents would have to go to neighbourhood villages to get hair cuts, he says. Similarly, if Dalit men visited the village tea shop, they could only sit on the floor and would be served in different tumblers, he explains. Rahima adds that Dalit men and women would be heckled if they walked to the bus stand, which was located close to the Thevar habitation. They would not be allowed to walk on the street or earlier and werent allowed to wear slippers, she says.

Vairamuthu explains that the BJP, RSS and the Hindu Munnani party in the district were spinning a false propaganda of forced religious conversion and that the Dalit people were accepting money to convert. However, the reality, he says, is that there was no need to force or offer money. People volunteered to opt out of Hinduism and embrace a religion that would accept them, he says.

The eight families were the first batch, and more members from the 400-strong Dalit community inDombuchery are expected to embrace Islam, according to him.

Men from Dombuchery offering Namaz in a room

These Hindu organisations did not come to our aid when we were attacked and our homes and belongings were vandalised. But after hearing that we converted, they met us and requested us to reconvert. Why should we? Mohammad Ismail asks.

Ismail cites denial of community acceptance and self respect as the major reasons for the eight Dalit families to convert to Islam When we were Hindus, the Thevar men addressed my grandfather and father by their names. They would not even respect my grandfathers age, he says. But Ismail insists that Islam has offered him and his community people equality, brotherhood, community acceptance, and most importantly self respect. The older Muslim members of the Theni mosque, which the eight families had visited in December, welcomed them with open arms, and offered them food and company, Ismail says.

With no mosque in Dombuchery, the eight families have been doing their namaaz or daily prayers in their houses. However, with more members converting to Islam, they hope to build a small mosque in the future.

However, the families are unsure whether their conversion would help lessen caste-based targeting and attacks from the Thevars. It has only been one month since we embraced Islam. We have to wait and watch how this will affect our dynamics with the Thevars, Ismail adds.

Both the AIADMK and DMK have significant control over the wards in Dombucheri panchayat. However, the local bodies are mainly run by the intermediary castes such as the Thevars.

A majority of the elected members including the district panchayat secretary, the union panchayat secretary and the branch secretaries etc., are from the dominant Hindu communities including the Thevars, explains Mohammad Ali Jinnah

And although these members do not support the dominant caste groups, they still do not interfere during caste-clashes between us and the Thevar men, as they dont want to upset the latter, says Jinnah.

Certain seats in the panchayat are reserved for the SC community, which includes the Arundhatiyar, Paraiyar and Pallar communities. However, these elected members are a minority and cannot take political stances or decisions in isolation. Usually they have to listen to senior members of their party i.e.,. the local wings of the DMK or the AIADMK, which will consist of UC men, Jinnah explains.

Original post:

Caste oppression is leading to Dalit families converting to Islam in this TN village - The News Minute

The Morrison government is in deep trouble as it lurches from one crisis to another, and its attempts to cover up its mistakes only dig it into a deeper hole. On the surface, the government seems utterly incompetent as it engages in backflip after backflip. But underlying the incompetence is a callousness driven by its main priorities: a strident defence of the interests of the big end of town and ensuring its own political survival.

The government has spent years making things easier for the rich. Private schools have been rolling in money. Private health insurance companies have had taxpayer funds thrown at them. Private childcare centres charge extortionate fees and are cosseted by government. Private aged-care providers are making money hand over fist.

The Morrison governments tax laws have allowed hundreds of big companies to pay no tax, year after year. Changes coming in 2024 will cut income taxes for those on more than $120,000 a year. This will knock $16 billion from government revenues that could have funded better healthcare or higher income support for the unemployed.

Thanks in part to enormous government handouts, company profits have jumped 28 percent since the start of 2020, and the countrys 47 billionaires have doubled their wealth. The richest 20 percent of the population now have 90 times the wealth of the poorest.

The military too have been big beneficiaries of decisions by successive Coalition governments to boost spending. Eight nuclear submarines at a lifetime cost of nearly $200 billion and twenty new tanks costing $3.5 billion are just the latest splash-outs on military hardware. The Morrison government is gearing up for a future war with China.

For those not in the Coalitions charmed circle, its stiff cheddar. Workers real wages are now falling. Everywhere, the bosses have used the pandemic to push longer working hours, unpaid overtime and greater flexibility. The share of national income going to workers is at its lowest level since 1959.

Many people are suffering under the Morrison government, and its decision to let COVID rip only highlights its indifference to the lives of ordinary people. More than 2,000 people have died since public health provisions were removed in December as Omicron began to spread like wildfire. People with disabilities are forced to wrangle the NDIS bureaucracy to get decent assistance and have suffered some of the worst infection and hospitalisation rates.

Elderly people have been left to the mercy of private aged-care operators failing to provide even the most basic measures to respond to the pandemic, such as sufficient numbers of properly trained and well-paid staff, adequate amounts of PPE and RATs, proper ventilation of rooms or a timely rollout of vaccine boosters. More than 500 people have died in aged-care homes since the beginning of the year. The up to 1,700 ADF personnel the Morrison government has promised to be used in aged care in response to the crisis is a pathetic gesture nowhere near sufficient to make a real difference. Morrison refuses to sack the appalling Aged Care Minister, Richard Colbeck, despite him being more interested in hobnobbing with the corporate elite at the cricket than in saving the lives of aged-care residents.

Aboriginal people are also suffering disproportionately from COVID, which is taking an enormous toll on those with existing co-morbidities, the result of years of neglect by every level of government. Refugees in cramped and unsanitary conditions of detention in hotels have experienced high rates of infection, while those who remain offshore in Papua New Guinea are left to rot for years on end with no prospect of a visa to come to Australia.

The Morrison governments grotesque sexism is obvious in the appalling treatment of women highlighted by Grace Tame and Brittany Higgins. All Morrison can offer is vague and meaningless promises and an empty parliamentary apology.

As for the environment, the Morrison government, with its subsidies to the coal, oil and gas industries, is sabotaging what needs to be done to slow, let alone reverse, global warming. Morrison also refuses to lift a finger to limit the relentless process of rural land clearing that adds to global warming.

Morrison has given succour to anti-vaxxers such as Coalition backbencher George Christensen and has parroted the extreme-right anti-vaxxers with his call in November for Australians to take their lives back. Morrison has allowed several of his MPs to attend and, on occasion, to speak at far-right demonstrations in Melbourne, and only under duress did he condemn Christensen for urging parents not to vaccinate their children.

The Liberals are racked by bitter divisions. In NSW, Morrison has managed to unite the hard right and the so-called moderates against him and his key factional ally and enforcer, Immigration minister Alex Hawke. Several sitting Liberal MPs, whom Morrison wants to protect, are facing preselection challenges, and there are threats of federal intervention into the NSW branch. He also suffered a significant defeat when five of his own MPs rebelled against the Religious Discrimination Bill.

Morrisons troubles have resulted in sections of the right-wing Murdoch press turning against him. Melbourne Herald Sun columnist Andrew Bolt declared ScoMo has got to go and called for Peter Dutton to be installed as prime minister, while Janet Albrechtsen, columnist at the Australian, wrote: Sorry PM, but youre just not up to the job.

All this means that Labor should be very well placed to win the election. The problem is that the ALP offers nothing.

In times past, Labor seemed to have a project, something to offer the working class, even if it invariably failed to deliver in office. Now its not even bothering to do that. The election strategy is simply to hope that people hate Morrison enough that theyll vote for the ALP.

Under Anthony Albanese, the party has eliminated any of the modest reforms previous leader Bill Shorten took to the 2019 election. The only income redistribution Albanese favours is towards the well-off. Labor has committed to keeping the Coalitions income tax cuts and has abandoned Shortens promise to reduce tax breaks for those with large portfolios of shares and rental properties. Thats tens of billions of dollars more taken from the budget, which future federal governments will use to justify spending cuts that hurt the poor.

Business will continue to prosper under an Albanese government. Labor has no plans to reverse the long-term decline in company tax rates.

The unemployed, however, will have to sit in line and wait. After years in opposition and numerous reports demonstrating that the dole is too low to live on, Labor will still only consider an increase in the JobSeeker allowance if it wins office. Low-paid aged-care workers will receive no help from Labor, which attacks the Morrison governments failure to support a wage rise for aged-care workers at industrial tribunal hearings but refuses to nominate a figure for what they should be paid or to throw its weight behind the union claim.

Labors whole project is not to fight for the working class but to work with the bosses at the expense of workers. In a speech to the National Press Club last month, Albanese said that Labor wants to tackle insecure work. His solution? To convene a Jobs Summit with government, business and unions. The agenda? Higher productivity (i.e. bosses screwing working more), more infrastructure spending (which these days usually means handouts to big construction businesses) and cutting red tape (i.e. reducing business accountability). No hint of support for stronger trade unions or workers rights. Labor will offer free TAFE places to students, but only in areas of skill shortage! Nothing to do with helping young people realise their dreams, only to make them valuable human capital.

Labor is as much an environmental vandal as the Morrison government. On global warming, the best that Albanese can come up with is a 43 percent reduction in carbon emissions by 2030, something so feeble that all the big bosses groups backed it. Labor now supports the federal government building a $600 million gas-fired power station in the Hunter Valley, something it initially rightly opposed as a giveaway to the fossil fuel companies. Labor boasts of its support for the coal industry and says it will do nothing to make it uncompetitive in global markets.

On Indigenous rights, Labor offers token measures at best. It promises to organise a referendum to enshrine a First Nations voice to parliament. But theres nothing about land rights, nothing about deaths in custody. Even when News Corporation and AFL clubs have supported changing the date of Australia Day, the ALP remains committed to 26 January, unwilling for now to support even this token change.

On refugees, Labor is still wedded to the longstanding and disgraceful policy of imprisoning them in offshore concentration camps. Immigration spokesperson Kristina Keneallys main line of attack on the Morrison government has been from the right: that the government has lost control of our borders when it comes to asylum seekers arriving by plane.

For the first two years of the pandemic, Labor was more concerned to present itself as a responsible partner with the Morrison government than as a force holding it to account or fighting for the best interests of workers and the poor. In the middle of one of the countrys greatest ever health and economic crises, Albaneses main contribution has been to lose 15 kilograms so that he appears more electable in his photoshoots with the corporate media. Talk about priorities.

An Albanese government will continue the Morrison governments largesse to the military without skipping a beat. He boasts that Labor was the party responsible for the US alliance and backs US military bases and spy stations in Australia and is prepared to spend even more when needed.

There is not a hint of opposition to any of this within the shadow cabinet. Both the left and right of the party are united on this program for what is shaping up as the most right-wing Labor government in history.

In short, at a time when the pandemic has demonstrated the need for dramatic overhaul of the basic structures of Australian society, Labor offers nothing. While the bosses are filling their pockets and workers are being squeezed, this supposed party of labour only wants to give the bosses a hand. When the very future of the planet is in the balance, Labor is making the situation worse.

There is nothing new about any of this. Throughout its long history, Labor has been fully committed to maintaining capitalism and advancing the interests of Australian imperialism. But the capitalist economy can continue to function only if businesses go on making substantial profits. Those profits in turn can be obtained only off the back of the workers, who produce the wealth of society.

That means that Labor is compelled to severely limit any reforms it grants to its working-class supporters, as any significant redistribution of wealth would undermine capitalist profitability and infuriate the bosses. Labor cuts its cloth to suit whatever big business will tolerate.

It would be great to see Morrison break down in tears on election night after a crushing defeat. But our satisfaction will quickly fade when we wake up the next morning and find capitalism continues to grind us down and Labor offers next to nothing to advance the interests of working-class people.

So voting Morrison out is nowhere near enough. We need to build a fighting socialist movement that campaigns against all the horrors of capitalism and for a new, genuinely democratic social order that puts the interests of the mass of people above the dictates of profit.

We need a socialist party that fights for working-class interests, not for the bosses. A party that sees social change coming through mass struggle and is prepared to lead such struggles of the exploited and oppressed, not one whose leaders look only to get themselves into parliament, where they may feather their own nests while serving the bosses. A party that fights for liberation, not for token reforms to the system of oppression that leave the foundations of injustice untouched.

We need a genuine socialist alternative to the Liberals and Labora party that does not bow down before the rich and powerful: a socialist party that seeks to spur on every manifestation of working-class resistance with the goal of getting rid of the exploitative capitalist system entirely.

Excerpt from:

Morrison's got to go, but the Labor alternative is pathetic - Red Flag

I read with great interest the excerpt from Simon Parkins book, Island of Extraordinary Captives, about Britains use of internment in the second world war (I remember the feeling of insult: when Britain imprisoned its wartime refugees, 1 February). One extreme case of abuse and insult not mentioned, although it may appear in the book, is the case of the notorious troopship HMT Dunera, which transported enemy aliens to internment camps in Australia.

My father, Sigmund Kirstein, was among the internees: a man in his 50s who had managed to reach Britain in 1939. The conditions on the Dunera and the abuse of the internees are a matter of record. Several of the crew were court-martialled after a journey of 57 days with 2,740 men incarcerated in a vessel meant for 1,600 troops.

The internees suffered physical abuse, verbal insults, shortage of food and water, and, according to my late father, the worst of all was that there were only 10 toilets for more than 2,000 men. The internees possessions were looted, and anything not considered to be of value was thrown overboard, leaving the men with just the clothes they stood up in.

Many of the men were orthodox Jews, and their prayer books and prayer shawls were also consigned to the waves by their guards. On arrival in Australia the men were interned, mostly at Hay in New South Wales, in very harsh conditions but, like the internees on the Isle of Man, they rallied and did their best to overcome the physical and psychological hardships.

There is, or was, a Dunera alumni association and a few of the internees remained in Australia. My father returned to Britain to be reunited with his wife in Llanelli, but carried the trauma of his ordeal throughout his life. It is good to see that a book about the dark chapter of enemy aliens during the second world war is now published.Yehudit Kirstein KeshetBeer Sheva, Israel

The letters (4 February) in response to Simon Parkins article show how those fleeing Nazi persecution were subject to imprisonment and humiliation by the UK authorities. My own family case adds a further twist to those of your correspondents. My father, fleeing Nazi persecution in occupied Vienna, was granted asylum in this country with the status category C not to be interned. But this counted for nothing and he was imprisoned in Lingfield Park racecourse stables.

This was a tad better than his brother, who was imprisoned on the Isle of Man and then transported to Australia under almost slave-ship conditions on HMT Dunera (hit by a torpedo that, luckily, did not explode). The British government acknowledged Hitlers Anschluss and, although they were Austrians, my father and his brother were considered to be Germans, unlike in the US, which considered my father to be stateless in his visa application.

Thus, when my mother (born in north Wales of Welsh parentage) married, she became an enemy alien and her rights were severely curtailed, ending her career as an opera singer. These restrictions included having to report to the police at frequent and regular intervals, not to own a bicycle or a car, and to report her intention to change her address. Her British nationality was not restored until 1948, three years after the war ended. All of these abuses and indignities followed from a campaign by the rightwing tabloids and the resulting internment decision, for which Winston Churchill carries personal responsibility.Tony MayerSwindon, Wiltshire

The use of internment started much earlier than during the first world war (Letters, 4 February). The British government practised it from at least 1709. Starting in 1708, the official propaganda machine oiled by Daniel Defoe seduced tens of thousands of Palatine peasants and artisans with promises of land to uproot their families and come to England. They were welcomed by internment in makeshift camps on Blackheath and Camberwell Green.

Unable to cope or to control the xenophobic mobs who attacked the invited guests, the government scattered them to Ireland, to increase the Protestant population; North Carolina, as part of a deal with property sharks; and New York, where they were forced into indentured labour as part of an impossible scheme to produce naval stores. Families were ripped apart and a large number died. When the project failed the government simply turned them loose and they were left to their own devices.

I imagine the US should be grateful: among those who were sent across the Atlanic were the Rockefellers, Wanamakers, Rittenhouses, the ancestors of Elvis Presley, and John Peter Zenger, who laid the basis for the freedom of the press.Dr Charles PosnerLavenham, Suffolk

John Greens letter rightly asks the question as to why refugees from Nazi oppression were interned when they were clearly not a threat. My father was one such refugee who was interned in Seaton and, later, at camps in Canada.

The events are even worse than portrayed by John Green. In addition to those interned in British camps in 1940, the British sent over 2,000 mainly Jewish refugees to Canada. They did this knowing that they were not a threat to the UK, while lying about the danger they presented to ensure that they would be taken. Most refugees from Nazi oppression sent to Canada were classified as safe by British tribunals; however, Britain had forced the hand of the Canadian government to accept a certain number of dangerous refugees from the UK and could not lose face by not sending the numbers previously quoted. Instead of dangerous Nazi paratroopers arriving in Canada, a large contingent of Jewish and other refugees from Nazi oppression disembarked there. While in Canada, refugees were initially interned in the same camps and sometimes the same huts as Nazi prisoners of war, and also faced antisemitic treatment from their Canadian captors.

After the sinking of the Arandora Star, the British government realised their mistake and public opinion turned. Large numbers of refugees started to be returned to the UK in 1940; however, not all were released until 1943. This terrible blunder by the UK government was in no small measure caused by a kneejerk reaction to public hysteria whipped up at the time by the Daily Mail and Daily Express. As they say, some things never change.Simon JamesIlston, Swansea

The photographs of the internment camp used to illustrate Simon Parkins article and the letters responding to it brought back memories of the time I lived in that road on the outskirts of Liverpool in the early 1940s.

My mother and I were allocated a house in Belton Road, Huyton following the destruction of our family home by enemy bombing. By the time we arrived at what was to be our home for the next eight years, all external signs of internment had been removed.

Inside the house was very different. The refugees had taken to expressing their frustration at their plight by illustrating the bedroom walls with graffiti, messages in various languages and illustrations. It was left to my mother, with the help of neighbours, to clean and redecorate the house.

Where the earlier residents were transferred to was never revealed to my mother.Tony ShortMaghull, Merseyside

Have an opinion on anything youve read in the Guardian today? Please email us your letter and it will be considered for publication.

Read more:

More tales of abuse from Britains shameful history of internment - The Guardian