Is Malala Yousafzai a dupe of US imperialism who deserved it?
Submitted by Bill Weinberg on Tue, 10/09/2012 - 21:51
Yes, let us hope for more such examples of people's justice!
10% (1 vote)
She's a dupe, but maybe the Taliban over-reacted just a tad.
20% (2 votes)
No, the US is defending secularism in the Islamic world, she was on the right side.
30% (3 votes)
Who cares? Our only responsibility is to protest the drone strikes.
0% (0 votes)
She had tragic illusions—and anti-imperialists bear some responsibility because of their failure to oppose political Islam.
40% (4 votes)
Total votes: 10
Don't get fooled by mainstream media.
Malala is a revolutionary socialist.
http://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/2012/10/501143.html
Not fooled, no worries
Yes, as we have noted.
Be cautious
But we also have to be cautious about this claim, since there isn't much information in that article. I feel that stronger evidence is needed to claim her as a socialist or a sympathier, especially after I saw this in Wikipedia:
O God bring peace to Swat and if not then bring either the US or China here.
—Malala Yousafzai, quoting her younger brother, 3 March 2009[27]
We don't want any innocent kids getting murdered or Swat getting bombed, and we don't want to manipulate truth for our own causes either. So perhaps we can only wait and observe at this stage, in this case.
You be cautious too, please
If you go to the original source, the full quote is actually:
She is quoting her brother's words, not expressing her own sentiment.
This comes closest, but we have still seen nothing that validates the Taliban accusation that Malala is a cheerleader for US imperialism. On the contrary, she appears to be in the orbit of a UK-based Marxist current that is forthrightly anti-imperialist.
M Cisco
No fourteen year old girl deserves to be shot. I would vote for either three or five, but I don't believe the US is defending secularism so much as it's promoting its own interests, which has meant buddying up to thugs of all stripes. Regarding option five, I don't know if I would say what her illusions may or may not be; we may lay blame, I think, with justice, at the feet of the Taliban primarily, and then begin to look at the enablers and the not-enoughers.
Dupe thesis revised
As noted below, this question was written on the assumption that Malala had praised Obama, which is now starting to seem dubious. "M Cisco"?
M Cisco
M. Cisco is my name -- I must have mistaken the subject line for a login.
she's not the dupe
the dupe is the one who equates opposing US imperialism with the Taliban. Or who smears those opposing the empire as a matter of habit. Paul Berman does it better, but you've done your part, Bill.
I'll stop "smearing" anti-imperialists...
...when they stop rallying around bloodthirsty clerical reactionaries.
Now stop equivocating and answer the poll, "Anonymous."
Malala not a dupe
I still encourage readers to vote, but the "imperialist dupe" thesis has been dealt a blow by the photo which has emerged of of Malala speaking at a Marxist gathering in Swat. Note that her putative expression of support for Obama has only been attributed to her by the Taliban mouthpiece who took responsibility for the assassination attempt. I cannot find any such quote on her blog. The whole thing is starting to smell like a smear. If anyone can produce a link to her verbatim Obama-boosting, please post it here. Until then, I will remain skeptical that it exists. It is starting to look like she is far more sophisticated—and far more courageous—than initial accounts would indicate.
None of those options are right.
None of those options are right. A dupe for US imperialism's too harsh, Bill -- on her, I mean. But, it's true that the left haven't been vocal against political Islam, and we always should have been.
The question wasn't right either...
I enjoy a good, provocative question and the vibrant, raucous discussions it can generate as much as the next guy. But --- really? --- of all the really good questions you could have asked on this issue, the one you chose to survey was whether a 14 year old girl advocating for girls' literacy "deserved" to be shot? The question is imbecilic because the answer to that question is always an emphatic and succinct 'no'.
No child, under any circumstances, deserves to be shot. Period. Whether Malala spoke in favor of Obama or not, whether she's really a Marxist or only spoke at a Marxist school... makes absolutely no difference. To argue otherwise is to aruge that it's necessary for this 14 year old girl to pass an ideological purity test before she's worthy of our compassion and solidarity. That is a morally bankrupt position and one I'm sure none of the readers of this blog actually hold.
Better, less sensationalist question for the next survey, please.
My sarcasm is lost on the literal-minded
In case you failed to grasp it, Anonymous, my choices—excluding the last one which is the "correct" answer—were intended as a dig at idiot leftists who rally around the jihadists who would like to kill them. As usual, the people I was aiming my irony at failed to respond (except maybe the "she's not the dupe" guy above), while my sarcasm appears to have gone over the heads of the decent but literal-minded readers such as yourself...
Drupal-enforced brevity
I was trying to make the point in the limited number of characters I was allowed. I changed "Tragically yes" to "She had tragic illusions" in the last option... Will you vote for it now?