PEOPLE WHO DON'T WANT TO SHUT ME UP

Wednesday, January 5, 2011

The Reality of Bullets

Salman Taseer and The Reality of Bullets

My condolences to his family. I don't know what kind of a person he was, and I won't make a speech about how great he was. He was a politician, and that's enough for me to not care. But the reason he was killed is important to me. I can talk about blasphemy laws for hours and still not be able to scratch the surface of how I feel about them. And since this seems to be a world full of crazy people (and even if it's not full of crazy people, even if you assure me you're all sane, all it takes is a single bullet, a single nut to kill someone who was living and breathing minutes ago), I won't say anything.

Pakistan sickens me. I just want to leave. I've had enough of this nationalism and all the talk about OH WOW WE CAN HAVE MODERATE PEOPLE! LET'S HAVE A MODERATE VIEW OF ISLAM!  and THE YOUTH CAN CHANGE THINGS and even SOCIALISM IS OUR ECONOMY is losing its potential to amuse.

I just wanna go away.

What I'm reminded right now is of Watchmen, the scene where there's a riot and The Comedian shoots a bunch of people.

Here's the exchange, from wikiquotes:


[Dan and The Comedian, in the midst of a riot]
Dan Dreiberg: But the country's disintegrating. What's happened to America? What's happened to the American dream?.
The Comedian[brandishing shotgun] It came true. You're lookin' at it. Now c'mon... let's really put these jokers through some changes.



Of course, the dialogue doesn't exactly cut it if you haven't seen the film. But i'm reminded of the essence of what The Comedian says here, the juxtaposition of this glorious, beautiful dream against the sad, crazy reality* in which it will always remain just a dream. And I get it, you know, I don't really like The Comedian because he's an asshole and because he goes around shooting people mindlessly, but now I'm kinda starting to get where he's coming from.**

Also it's funny how I'm analysing this using a fictional character...but I guess it's just because it's impossible to agree with people anymore, because that would mean you disagree with others, and then before you know it some idiot's got a fatwa against you.

I know it feels like I'm exaggerating but JUST LOOK AROUND YOU. I MEAN, REALLY. We've grown so used to people popping off all around us that we think, hey, that's not gonna be me. I think like that too, I suppose it's just necessary for survival or whatever. Well, right now, I'm honestly thinking that it can be me. Or anyone I know. It can be senseless or, well, it can be more senseless (there is no justification for murder, there never can be).

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Normally you don't quantify senselessness or how illogical something is but I think it's probably time to stop thinking in definitive terms and start measuring insanity too. And you know what you or I can do about it (I mean this state of affairs with murder as common as it is)? Absolutely nothing. We have no say over it, no control over it. No matter how many wonderful dreams you dream on 14th August and Pakistan Day and in these bourgeois speeches, all it takes is one bullet, one bullet per dream. Or six. Who's counting?

According to one figure I just got off the internet, popularly-used bullets cost about 25 cents per round. That's about Rs 20. Did you know your life costs less than Rs 20?
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This is why I don't fucking watch the news.

What also comes to mind is, why Salman Taseer? Why not the assholes who rob us blind? Apparently feeding the poor and taking away their rights is not a more important issue than a single ALLEGED case of blasphemy. Religious nuts are pretty awesome that way.
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Welcome to Pakistan, we have roses for assassins here.


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*reality is a confusing term, hard to define in sociological terms, but here I just mean the reality of bullets. Forget perceived and objective. I'm talking about

**I'm not for violence, just seem to be starting to understand his POV about his actions. WATCH THE FILM.

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