Drone Strikes In Pakistan
Dr. Munazza Yaqoob (right) and Dr. Mumtaz Ahmad seated beside her
This was posted in Intersections International in 2013
May 22, 2013 - I recently traveled to Pakistan to screen my film “Feminist: Stories from Women’s Liberation.” While I was there I had the opportunity to listen to Pakistani people tell me their opinions about the United States drone strikes. I didn’t visit Pakistan to discuss drones, but the topic came up regularly throughout my stay.
"Intersections International” is a non-governmental organization that, according to it’s mission, works with “communities in conflict” and promotes “peace through dialogue.” The discussion on April 22, 2013 at the Serena Hotel centered on US-Pakistani relations. I had been invited to attend by my hosts Dr. Mumtaz Ahmad and Dr. Munazza Yaqoob of the International Islamic University. The Serena Hotel is located within the diplomatic enclave in Islamabad and is surrounded by embassies from around the world.
The conference room was large and there were about 20 people in attendance. There were many women at the table and there was a mix of religions including Christians, Jews, and Muslims. About half of the attendees were Pakistani.
They were given an opportunity to vote on which topics they felt were the most important to discuss. Drone strikes topped the list along with U.S. foreign policy towards Pakistan. The number of drone strikes has increased dramatically during the Obama administration. From 2004 through April 30, 2013 there have been 368 drone strikes in Pakistan and 316 of them have been under President Obama.
My hosts, Dr. Mumtaz Ahmad, executive director of the Iqbal International Institute for Reasearch and Dialogue and Dr. Munazza Yaqoob Chairperson of the Department of English on the female campus of the Islamic University spoke about the affect of U.S. foreign policy on Pakistan.
Dr. Mumtaz Ahmad and Dr. Munazza Yaqoob
Dr. Ahmad began by describing the opinions of Pakistanis towards the United States. He said that he reads local papers and mingles with people of varying backgrounds. Dr. Ahmad has his ear to the ground.
He said President Obama’s "Cairo speech" in 2009 was received well by Pakistani people, but the last several years of his presidency have been a series of disappointments. (One American woman, with eyes downcast, nodded in agreement.) As he said these words I could feel the settling of people’s spirits in the room. If someone had dropped a pin, you would have heard it.
He told us that an overwhelming number of Pakistanis have false beliefs about U.S. foreign policy that might surprise Americans. Among these beliefs is that the United States wants to “take control of Pakistan” and that a “war on terror is a war on Islam.” They believe that the U.S. wants to “impose India’s hegemony over Pakistan.” He said that Pakistanis have a deep-rooted sense that America “wants to break up” Pakistan.” Shockingly he stated that, according to what he has read, many Pakistanis believe that the U.S. wants to take control of Pakistan’s nuclear assets.
Dr. Ahmad understands that none of this is true. He wondered why the U.S. President or the Secretary of State doesn’t stand up and say to the Pakistani people that none of this is true. Ahmad felt that for the U.S. to state clearly that it is a friend of Pakistan and that U.S. commitment to Pakistan is for the long term, it would make a huge difference in how Pakistanis felt towards Americans.
Dr. Munazza Yaqoob, addressed the drone strikes specifically. The strikes are happening in areas of Pakistan where there are not adequate educational programs and unemployment is a chronic problem. These areas are rural and border Afghanistan. Dr. Yaqoob said that the people who live here “are already on the periphery.”
The drone strikes increase the problems in these areas because they kill innocent people including children.
Mossarat Qadeem
There was a woman at the table whose work amazed me. Mossarat Qadeem, the Minister of Information and Education in Khyber Pakhtunkhw risks her life to turn boys away from the Taliban. She travels to the homes of boys who have been recruited and convinces them to reject the Taliban. In order to speak to these boys she must drive through areas of Pakistan that are so dangerous even workers from the United Nations won’t enter. She speaks with the mother’s of these boys first. (The mothers are often the first to call Ms. Qadeem when they see their sons have been recruited.) Then she talks to the boys. She has successfully turned 100 boys away from the Taliban.
Interestingly when Ms. Qadeem started to speak at the roundtable she did not mention this work specifically. An American man made a point of telling us of her successes. Ms. Qadeem and many others want peace in their country. They are speaking against terrorism and they want to engage us in dialogue.
Traveling to Pakistan to screen a film about the American women’s liberation movement of the 1960s filled my mind with many different scenarios about what would be discussed during my trip. Drone strikes were far from my mind. Yet, I found that they were a main concern of the people I met and I was a part of this dialogue. If peace is our aim shouldn’t we be having more dialogues with the people of Pakistan?
This post originally appeared in Feminist Stories.
THE HATEFUL PEPE AND THE FASCIST RIGHT OF AMERICA
by Jennifer Hall Lee
A tweet to Cheri Jacobs
This presidential race was bound to be close and I thought I was prepared. I was going to power through this election. I didn't foresee that Donald Trump, and then a frog, would stop me in my tracks and make me think hard about our current situation.
It is surprising how many people identify as nazis and anti-semites. They are called white nationalists and Trump has brought them out into the wide open. They are also called the alternative right, or alt-right. They are the far, far-right who are bound together by their disdain for everyone else. They hate immigration.
Trump, Pepe, the alt-right. They all go together in a big basket.
Like all groups the alt-right has images and symbols that help identify them on the web. One of these images is a frog.
His name is Pepe and he is the defacto mascot for the alt-right. He isn't pretty. In fact he is paunchy, crudely drawn and he barely smiles.
It's a disturbing time in America, but I haven't yet seen a collective shudder among the electorate. Either people haven't put the pieces together or they are rationalizing the bizarre behavior on the part of Trump. It's time to put the bricks together and form the structure that is hiding in plain sight.
The alt-right. The name isn't going away anytime soon. They are super excited that Hillary gave them a big shout-out which identified them to the country. The alt-right is now on the political map. They refer to themselves as racialists and believe in the separation of the races.
Alt-righters are everywhere and they have been hidden in the deep layers of the web, until now.
Proud and emboldened they even have a logo: two letters A and R, both constructed out of three triangles.
Richard Spencer, a prominent white supremacist gave a press conference two days ago before Trump gave his speech on values.
For them, it is their time. They have arrived.
The Fascist Mascot
The alt-right trolls the web with their icon Pepe the Frog. Some of us post kitten pictures or images of Gene Wilder for a laugh. The alt-right pushes Pepe.
Pepe harasses, insinuates, leers and when depicted with Hitler and Mein Kampf, he is downright evil.
I know there are many who say, “Time Out! Many people have tweeted Pepe with no ill will.” This is true, Pepe was not born in the alt-right world, but the alt-right claimed him as one of their own.
Pepe has been born-again. He has a message, “Pepe is one of us and we will prevail.”
This frog is a bully and his online antics have placed him in a lawsuit filed by GOP communications pro Cheri Jacobus against Donald Trump and his past campaign manager (now a CNN commentator) Corey Lewandowski. She is suing both of them for defamation.
Her Trump travails start on May 17, 2015 when Ms. Jacobus gets contacted by a man connected to Trump (the campaign was in its early stages) who asked Jacobus to join the Trump train as the Communications Director. Trump is a high profile guy and Jacobus is a professional so she takes the meeting.
The second meeting is where it gets tricky. Corey Lewandowski, according to the summons, behaves in an “erratic” way. He was talking loudly and inappropriately and was generally a "powder keg." He even brags about yelling at Megyn Kelly.
Jacobus smartly declines their offer of employment and goes back to her role as news commentator. Her brief foray into Trump's world safely behind her, or so she thought. Jacobus was at the start of another round of unprofessional behavior.
What happens to her is a roller coaster of a ride through the Trump sewer of retaliation and lies.
While on the Don Lemon show, in January, she criticized Trump's debating skills among other things. She is, after all, a commentator. But Jacobus got under Trump's thin skin.
Both Trump and Lewandowski engaged in a takedown of Jacobus' character on talk shows and on the web. For weeks they claimed that she “begged” them for a job and was turned down..
Many other anonymous tweeters joined in and they brought Pepe along to help them fight their sordid battle. (Who are these hidden tweeters?) In early January one tweet showed Pepe, with blond Trump-style hair, pointing a machine gun with a message for Cheri: this triggers @CheriJacobus
She responded.
Pepe reads Mein Kampf
Then later that day another tweet appeared. It is a two-paneled image of a blond woman with her head on a chopping block and her hands tied behind her back. She has a hatchet on her neck. In the next panel Pepe is raping the headless torso.
The message to Cheri: #MakeAmericaGreatAgain
That image is cited in Jacobus' lawsuit.
I have altered this tweet with the black bar
Trump continued his tirade against her. In his signature juvenile style he tweeted about Jacobus: "A real dummy!"
Trump can't stop, he continues the online assault against Jacobus.
The tweeting persecution of Jacobus contines to this day. Just recently another tweet appeared showing Pepe holding Hitler's Mein Kampf with a message to Jacobs: Do you really think you can win against Shitlords? #LOL
And two days ago, on September 11, a day of rememberance and honor, Donald Trump Jr. tweeted an image with Pepe standing to the right of Donald Trump's shoulder. It's a parody of the movie poster for The Expendables. All of the heads have been photoshopped. These are Trump loyalists, all men.
By placing Pepe in the image this becomes a direct message to the alt-right Trump followers. No shame for the hateful.
We can rationalize these events and say to ourselves "It's just Trump being Trump. Pepe is a character used by many."
Pepe is used specifically by the alt-right.
People lie to themselves all the time when we don't want to see the truth. We can be forgiving or dismissive of cruelty as in the case of Cheri Jacobus, or we can be brave and admit to ourselves that this no ordinary election.
These alt-righters are the “basket of deplorables” that Hillary alerted us to and for good reason. She wanted us to see them.
Beware of Pepe.
- Read the lawsuit for yourself, it's pinned at the top of her Twitter page
Slut-Shaming Versus The Male Gaze
Am I a Slut-Shamer or just another feminist?
There are a few photos of a nude Melania Trump being passed around the web. I consider them to be feminist viruses that scream “click me.” They are invading our Facebook pages and our psyches.
These images are examples of the classic feminist concept called the Male Gaze, a term created by Laura Mulvaney in 1975. Mulvaney's academic framework was brilliant and enabled us to finally analyze cinematic imagery with a feminist eye.
What is the Male Gaze? It is the male point of view. We see the male gaze in pornography, comics, movies, and billboards. It is the lens through which we peer when seeing women and girls depicted for male consumption.
Good examples of the Male Gaze are the sexualized images of Marilyn Monroe. Ms. Monroe portrayed a woman as a mix of sexuality and girlish innocence in numerous movies. She was a pre-feminist cultural definition of the desirable female. She fought this description of herself because she wanted to have good roles with dramatic depth without success.
The women's liberation movement was too far into the future for her and she couldn't break through. Monroe stays forever embedded in the patriarchal milieu of pre-feminist movie-making.
When I first saw the images of Melania Trump I couldn't help but to apply the Male Gaze and I critiqued them for what they are: images for men.
Then I posted them on Facebook and commented that our girls really didn't need to see these pictures of a First Lady.
And that's where the Slut Shaming cudgel came flying through the web to try and knock me out.
But, I was ready with my Wonder Woman power cuffs and deflected the assault.
Am I a Slut-Shamer or just another feminist?
The accusation of Slut-Shaming can be seen as a way to silence a woman for criticizing the patriarchal male gaze.
We are in an election where we have the chance to break the all male deadlock in the Oval Office. It is the first time we have a female nominee for president who has a good chance of being President. It is interesting these images have surfaced at this time.
The presence of these photographs challenge us at this historic point in time; Are we ready for a woman President or do we want to keep women as simply sexual beings?
The photo I posted, when I got my slut-spanking, had layers of meaning any progressive feminist would be excited to dissect and analyze. Let's give it a try.
Melania is nude and lying provocatively on a bed with tousled white sheets. She looks alluring and is staring straight at the camera – at us. We are looking down at her. Her body is vulnerable with spiky high heels that would hobble her if she tried to leave. Her jewelry consists of two heavily jeweled cuffs on both wrists and a jeweled choker around her neck. This bed is owned by someone. Her? I don't think so and here's why. She is on the bed, but she is handcuffed to a man's briefcase. Who has the key? The owner of the briefcase. The owner of the bed. The owner of her.
She is chained to him, capitalism, money, and patriarchy. If images could talk this would say, “If you have the money you can have me too."
I'm a feminist, sure I can criticize it.
Some say Trump is the bigger issue and these photos are minor compared to what he could do to our country if he becomes President. In a world where male presidents lord over us as the ultimate power image, with wives as appendages, yes he is the bigger issue.
However, these images will trot alongside the images of an all male presidential ticket reinforcing an unequal relationship of power and gender.
And as a feminist mother I have a job to do. I have to help my pre-teen navigate her way through this country and show her how to criticize the images of semi-nude women and yes, provocative images of girls, from television to the streets of my city. (Last night's stroll along Sunset Boulevard brought me to a towering image of a young woman in a tight bathing suit with butt cheeks exposed. )
Our daughters now stand at a moment in time where they can hold in their young minds images of a female President when deconstructing the images of the Male Gaze.
A teen girl has to grow with a sense of her own power that is not sexual power.
But, thanks to the New York Post, if Trump wins, we have more images of the potential First Lady that will be very visible on the internet. The recent photos of Melania from the 1990s show her acting as a lesbian vixen and as a wet and waxed nude woman with no real pubic hair (an encouragement of pre-pubescent female sex). These clearly compound the problem ahead.
I didn't slut-shame Melania Trump. I criticized the image with a feminist point of view.
As a thinking person I have to allow myself to entertain the possibility that Melania could be First Lady.
A girl's discovery of these photos on the internet coupled with the fact that every single President in our history has been male is a tangled web of gender, power and sex that will have to be confronted if Trump wins.
And that's just pondering the result of girls (and boys) seeing these images here in the United States.
What will children in other countries think?
This isn't slut-shaming. This is a feminist issue. Keep talking.
Photo of Melania Trump courtesy © Glenn Francis, www.PacificProDigital.com
FEATURE: PIONEERING WOMEN OF VISUAL EFFECTS
Approximately 25 people worked in the ILM optical department. The few women in this department - Peg Hunter, Lori Nelson, Mary Walter, and me - were effects pioneers in a male world.