Moborate

What a fucking waste of a Sunday. Here I was minding my own business, trying to do some work, relax a little bit, surf the net and... I ended up watching 15 minutes of some five-day old desperate-for-ratings morning show on Samaa TV , hosted by an even more desperate-for-recognition C-grade actor called Maya Khan . I usually steer clear of vapid morning programming on all channels but I watched because so many people were feeling so outraged by what had gone on in the programme that I thought I might as well check. And guess what? Everyone who was outraged by this show is perfectly right to be outraged. I am outraged. No, actually, outrage seems a small term for what I felt while watching the shenanigans of this miserable cow Maya Khan and her motley crew of rich Defence-type airheads and gossipy burqa-clad crusaders. I felt physically nauseous. This was a new low in sensationalist television crap. Here were a bunch of television vigilantes serving as the television arm of the Jamia H...

Ab roshni hoti hai ke ghar jalta hai dekhain Shola sa tawaaf-e-dar-o-deewaar karay hai - Mir Taqi Mir [Will it lead to light or the house burning down, we'll have to see A spark of sorts is circling the walls of our home] Some people still don't get it. They don't understand why people like us have been so incensed over the murder of Punjab Governor Salmaan Taseer and the deplorable shenanigans that have followed it from those who have felt no shame and have in fact celebrated it and from those who have not come forward to condemn it in the strongest terms. They question why we are insistent on turning a worldly politician into a saint (we aren't) or why Taseer's death has taken precedence over all the other killings taking place in Pakistan (I will explain this). I read recently some comments on the journalists' mailing group PressPakistan where the convenient and insufferably lazy bogey of 'extremists on both sides' has been trotted out to explain dem...

Further evidence of the depths to which some in Pakistan have sunk. This is a short video of the Murtid Qadri being presented in court yesterday, charged with the murder of Punjab Governor Salmaan Taseer , where he was lauded by some lunatic lawyers, showered with rose petals, garlanded and even kissed. (Link courtesy Shahid Saeed.) This is an account of his presentation in court today  from the Express Tribune , where the lunatics once again greeted him. In addition to the lunatic lawyers, most religious   fitna parties have refused to condemn Taseer's murder, with many going out of their way to praise the "valour" of the deranged criminal. They include the so-called "sufism-inspired", "moderate" Barelvi parties (Qadri is from the Barelvi sect) who in fact have been at the forefront of defending the murder. Many in the media seem also to be hemming and hawing, refusing even to attach the word " shaheed " [martyr] to Taseer (whereas they ...

" Mera azm itna buland hai ke paraye shaulon ka dar nahin Mujhe khauf aatish-e-gul se hai, ye kaheen chaman ko jala ne de " [My resolve is so strong that I do not fear the flames from without I fear only the radiance of the flowers, that it might burn my garden down]  — Shakeel Badayuni couplet referenced by Salmaan Taseer on Twitter, 8 hours before his assassination  I had been hoping that I could post something light-hearted, more entertaining at the start to the new year, but today's Pakistan it seems is not the place for these sort of things any more. Four days into January and we already have yet another tragedy that has evoked not only pain and sadness but also immense amounts of disgust at the depths to which we, the unfortunate inhabitants of this blighted country, have sunk. Assassinated Punjab Governor Salmaan Taseer: last man standing (Photo: APP/Dawn) Punjab Governor Salmaan Taseer 's brutal and senseless murder in Islamabad today (Tuesday) is not only a...

Also, since we're on the topic of the Daily Times , here's something that I've been itching to write a short post about since I flipped through it's Sunday magazine this past week . Look at the following photographs from its Eye Spy section, which focuses on the social elite. The photographs depict a Halloween party thrown by Punjab Governor Salmaan Taseer 's son and daughter-in-law (in leading photograph): Another world is possible? Now, I am no prude or killjoy, I enjoy a good party as much as the next person and I really don't have a problem with people enjoying themselves (something this country could really stand to have more of). But I kept wondering about two things while looking at these photographs. The first was, who ARE these people who expend such effort and time on dressing up and take Halloween parties so seriously. I mean, one knows who some of them are, but you know what I mean. The second thing I kept wondering about was the mindset of such e...