I hesitate to link to the Daily Mail, but this is interesting.
Islamic extremists are fuelling the spread of “honour” based violence against women in Britain, the country’s most senior Muslim prosecutor has warned…”When you talk to women who are victims of this type of behaviour you often find that they will say that their husbands or fathers have been radicalised in the way that they think about women,” he said. “They will use Islam as a justification for telling women how to behave and for punishing them. There is no religious justification for forcing your children to marry or harming them because they behave in a particular way, but there are people out there who are using their faith as a reason to do this. In the past, they might have said ‘do this because I’m your dad’, but when they are radicalised it is making them feel more confident about the way they behave towards the women in their family. It is allowing the man to say ‘my religion says you must behave this way’ and it puts a lot of extra pressure on the women in their families and can make them feel that they should toe the line because it is about faith and their culture.”
The bit about feeling more confident is especially interesting. Plausible, and interesting, and depressing. It’s not good if people feel more confident about bullying and oppressing other people. We don’t want people to feel more confident about that, we want them to feel timid and hesitant and doubtful and uneasy; we want them to feel so hesitant and uneasy that they end up not doing it. Confidence is usually framed as a good thing, but of course it isn’t necessarily; it depends. ‘Confidence’ is another of those words and concepts, like loyalty and courage and tolerance and even freedom, that are not unqualified goods but tend to be deployed as if they are.
Nazir Afzal is saying something quite significant there, I think, which would repay a lot of thought and investigation. Religion and probably some kinds of politics and certainly ideology do work to make people ‘feel more confident about the way they behave towards’ various others – and that can be a very good thing, or it can be a horrible nightmare. There’s a lot of the nightmare around right now.
Comments
29 responses to “Confidence”
“The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.”
Nothing like righteous indignation to put a spring in one’s step and force in one’s fist. Bullies and thugs will always be among us – but when they feel righteous as well, pity their victims. And when they are the ruling party as in Nazi Germany. . .
Yes, what a brilliant idea. Do stop saying that, GT.
Tingey,
Since all religions yadda yadda yadda, why not apply the same to the Vatican (sorry, Rome), Borabadur and Canterbury?
Imbecile.
Yes, I don’t think you use a nuclear hammer to crack a religious nutter.
Bedtime, goodnight.
That crap you’ve been describing gives hono[u]r a bad name! As for nuking religious sites, remember that fallout can drift; there’s enough stuff in the air already…
G.Tingey,you are the new messiah!come let us adore him.
I’m sure he only meant microwave it.
Because, however much I dislike the bishop of Rome and his minions, the Vatican library is too valuable.
Borabodur is a monument, not a working temple.
Canterbury? A minor provoncial town.
But Mecca is the centre of pilgrimage – no Mecca, no Hajj, and no black, meteoritic stone, either.
Killing the pope is useless, but we do want to kill off the office of pontiff.
Actually, all you need to do is vapourise the K’aaba, and remove and eradicate all the other objects of the Hajj …..
Anyone got a better method?
But, seriously, Ahmenidjad IS a religious nutter, quite prepared to use nukes.
However, over at Harry’s Place, it would seem that his popularity is declining as fast, or even faster than the Shrub’s, so we can hope ……
(see: http://hurryupharry.bloghouse.net/
)
Clerihew for you:-
Mr G Tingey
Is never stingy
With letting his name appear
All over the blogosphere.
(If it should be Ms and her, feel free to edit.)
G Tingey’s posts
Are like burnt toasts
They’re black and crude and bitter
But we know better than to titter…
G.Tingey’s posts
Have seized the attention of hosts,
Who are distinctly unsmitten;
The biter, it seems, is bitten.
G. Tingey’s posts
are a’bomb’inably frumpy,
’cause he canna’ distinguish
between, hooker and nookie
kno’ the fule, he be honkie.
[Only joking of course.]
A G Tingey post
Is an open boast
That he’s the bold man saying
We should nuke anyone praying
Nick S. & Elliott:-
Your rhyming posts had me laughing out loud.
Marie-Therese:-
Needs footnotes – couldn’t understand those words.
Now I thought ‘a’bomb’inably’ was a dang good pun.
“Needs footnotes – couldn’t understand those words”.
KB Player
G. Tingey’s posts
are a’bomb’inably frumpy,
’cause he canna’ distinguish
between, the hookers and nookies
kno’ the fule, he be the honkie.
[Only joking of course.]
| Marie-Therese O’ Loughlin | 2007-03-28 – 17:17:20 |
G. Tingey’s posts are likened to
Frumpy = unfashionable girls.
Abominable: = unequivocally detestable
Hookers: = temptation, danger, aids, and time-bomb.
Nookies: = sex, pleasure, debauchery. nukes, [sounds like]
“A”bomb”inable” could mean the opposite as in “pseudo profundity,”
“the ordinary could be extraordinary”
Meaning the Girls could be boring frumpy girls, or bombshells, or a wow factors.
Third meaning could literally be “nukes”
The unfashionable girls = “boring posts” = purely because of the continual mention of “nukes”.
1)The unfashionable girls = could quite profoundly be a bombshells – if only “he” knew.
2)But how can he know that the girls are a “dishes2 if he cannot differentiate between the temptation and pleasure and all that emanates from the debauchery.
3)In knowing him and the messing around he is inclined towards. What can one expect.
This caucasoid man wants to cause havoc to all and sundry.
But there is a price to be paid for all this tomfoolery.
“Erm, nuke Mecca?” (After giving everyone who lives there time to get out)”
As any “fule kno” (yes Ophelia, I read your cross-post) …. see above post.
Honkie = African American slang for white woman.
’cause = because. Canna = cannot. = slang.
The frumpy girls are albeit very multifaceted and multidimensional and are an intrinsic part of G. Tingey.
Re: “Honkie,” oops, for the possible Freudian slip is a a derogatory term for a Caucasian person. Not “WOMAN”
there are three main theories for the origin of the word:
1. the word originated from the practice of white males wishing to hire African-American prostitutes in the 1920’s, and going to the appropriate part of town while honking their car horns to attract the whores. Some versions state that the reason for this was that the white men were too afraid to actually stop in those neighborhoods, so the honking would bring the hookers to them. Others say that since few African-Americans could afford cars back in that time, the honking signaled a higher-paying white client and would quickly gain the prostitutes’ attention.
2. the term comes from the word “honky-tonk”, which was used as early as 1875 in reference to wild saloons in the Old West. Patrons of such disreputable establishments were referred to as “honkies”, not intended as a racial slur but still a disparaging term.
3. “honkie” is a variation of “hunky” and “bohunk”, derogatory terms for Hungarian, Bohemian, and Polish immigrant factory workers and hard laborers in the early 1900’s. African-Americans began to use the word in reference to all whites regardless of specific nation of origin.
Also apelled “honky”.
>”Distinguish betweem them, the hookers and nookie.” < correction.
Honky Tonk Wimmin then ?
Oh, dearie me!
I think “must try harder” is the mark for those rhymes, though a couple made me smile.
And, to repeat something ..which readers here seem to have forgotten or misunderstood –
If some people want to follow their deluded religion, I don’t care, they can get on with it.
What I do object to is the believers: a] Bringing it onto the street and frightening the horses,
and
b] Then telling me (and you) what to do, because their imaginary friend told them. And, of course, making threats if you don’t comply.
“And, to repeat something ..which readers here seem to have forgotten or misunderstood”
Tingey, this will be on your flipping tombstone matey. That’s the point.
“Tingey, this will be on your flipping tombstone matey. That’s the point.”
Tingey’s tombstone:-
RIP
G Tingey
His last post
Comments box
G Tingey
No it’s not. Nuke somewhere, anywhere.
I confess that I have sometimes thought that “Nuke Mecca” would make a bonzer bumper sticker, but in these nervous times only those who could afford to employ a full-time chauffeur cum bomb disposal expert could afford to display such a message.
No, better to stick to relatively safe slogans, such as “Unionize Wal*mart”
Comments box on a tomb-stone? KB, brilliant – do YOU work in marketing ???
Been done ..
I think the great “Spike” (Milligan’s) stone says …
“I TOLD you I was ill.”
“Been done ..”
As Nick said – That’s the point. Cf. “To repeat”.
How about nuke Mecca on the tomb stone!death threats wouldnt be a problem.
Tingey’s B&W swan song should be definitely be “the last post” the honkie tonkie mon ami boy will surely approve. Kno the fule -an a marg!?!
“The Last Post bugle call commemorating TINGEY who … The “last post” was thus the last point of his at – B&W.
YEAH,
The hounds of Baskerville will surely do the honours. And for good measure the international dog chorus can be thown in…………..
Afrikaans: woef
Albanian: ham ham / hum hum
Arabic (Algeria): haw haw
Bengali: ghaue-ghaue
Catalan: bup, bup
Chinese (Mandarin): wang wang
Croatian: vau-vau
Danish: vov
Dutch: woef
English: bow wow, arf, woof, ruff ruff
English (Old English): Hund byrcð.
Esperanto: boj
Estonian: auh
Finnish: hau hau /vuh vuh
French: ouah ouah
German: wau wau, wuff wuff
Greek: gav
Hebrew: haw haw (/hav hav)
Hindi: bho:-bho:
Hungarian: vau-vau
Icelandic: voff
Indonesian: gonggong
Italian: bau bau
Japanese: wanwan, kyankyan
Korean: mung-mung (/wang-wang)
Norwegian: voff / vov-vov
Polish: hau hau
Portuguese (Portugal): au au au (nasal diphthong)
Portuguese (Brazil): au-au
Russian: gav-gav
Slovene: hov-hov
Spanish (Spain, Argentina): guau guau
Swedish: vov vov
Thai: hoang hoang (with falling tone)
Turkish: hav, hav
Ukrainian: haf-haf
Vietnamese: wau wau
WUFF WUFF, good night.