No offence Moe Aung (#130) that I do not take Aye Chan’s word literally since he is partial
on the subject. For example, in the youtube video where he talked about Burmese King annexing Arakan in 1784, he did not mention about how tens of thousands of Muslims (earlier, I mistakenly said hundreds of thousands) had to feel to Chittagong but he mentioned about the Muslims form Chittagong entering Burma as if they’re new comers instead of telling the truth that they were coming back to their homes in Arakan when it was safe to do so.
Soory, Moe Aung that Aye Chan is not a credible historian.
Jon: not sure where you get your stats from, for I have seen no official stats on convictions. If you have some, let us know the source.
ALRC says this: “Statistics provided by the Office of the Judiciary indicate a sharp rise in lese-majesty charges filed since the 19 September 2006 coup, with 33 charges filed in 2005, 30 filed in 2006, 126 filed in 2007, 77 filed in 2008, 164 filed in 2009, and an extraordinary 478 charges filed in 2010. While statistics released for the first five months of 2011 indicate a reduction in the number of charges filed, information for the second half of 2011 and 2012 to date has not been made available publicly.” Given that the conviction rate has been about 95%, then we’d expect more convictions than your figures suggest. Data for the last years seems a blank.
Don’t pigeonhole Violet Cho asking whether she supports this or that. She has already asked to see things under historical, political, cultural, social light ratrher than race since the issue in arakan is a very complex issue. She is fully aware that those Rohingyas are not recent immigrants of 20th century from Bengal.
I feel strongly that it is reasonable to blame the British colonial administration for arming the Chittagonians in the Mayu Frontier as the Volunteer Force. The V Force, as it is called by the British Army, was formed in 1942 soon after the Japanese operations threatened the British position in India. Its principal role was to undertake guerrilla operations against Japanese, to collect information of the enemy’s movements and to act as interpreters. But the British Army Liaison Officer, Anthony Irwin wrote that the participation of the local V Forces in the skirmishes with the Japanese in Arakan was discredited by the British commanders (Irwin 1946: 7-8, 16).
The volunteers, instead of fighting the Japanese, destroyed Buddhist monasteries and Pagodas and burnt down the houses in the Arakanese villages. They first killed U Kyaw Khine, the deputy commissioner of Akyab District, left behind by the British government to maintain law and order in the frontier area; they then massacred thousands of Arakanese civilians in the towns and villages. A record of the Secretary of British governor of Burma in exile dated 4 February 1943 reads:
I have been told harrowing tales of cruelty and suffering inflicted on the Arakanese villages in the Ratheedaung area. Most of the villages on the West bank of the Mayu River have been burnt and destroyed by the Chittagonian V forces…. The enemy never came to these villages. They had the misfortune of being in the way of our advancing patrols. Hundreds of villagers are said to be hiding in the hills… It will be the Arakanese who will be ousted from their ancestral land and if they cannot be won over in time, then there can be no hope of their salvation (British Library, London, India Office Records R/8/9GS. 4243).
If you accuse Edward Said ( a diseased Palestinian and hence the real descendant of origian Jews of Judea than the converted jews from Europe – see a book by Israeli historian from Tel Aviv university on who the Palestinians are) who was a University Professor of English and Comparative Literature at Columbia University, shouldn’t you also say something about the whitewashing of Israeli atrocities by the world’s media?
if anyone is curious why I, a non Rohingya, is spending time writing this, it’s because after learning their sufferings, my conscience won’t allow me to keep quiet about what I know about the orchestrated victimization of the Rohingyas.
The academics got it right. The initial reaction revealed it all. Later moderate voice form the Buddhist sides are “damange control” as they realzed that their true feelings about the Rohingyas has been revealed to the world. The world, assuming that “Buddhist equals peaceful people ” is no longer fooled.
The lady doth protest too much. Excellent citation BTW from a wiki article almost entirely contributed by none other than Dr Abdul Rahman Zafrudin, champion of a one man crusade, should I say jihad, and the proud winner of the Tireless Contributor Barnstar.
More or less a translation issue…
Why “Unspeakable things” when the Thai, р╕кр╕┤р╣Ир╕Зр╕Чр╕╡р╣Ир╣Бр╕Хр╕░р╕Хр╣Йр╕нр╕Зр╣Др╕бр╣Ир╣Др╕Фр╣Й, means untouchable, or sometimes intangible? If something is unspeakable, then р╣Др╕бр╣Ир╕кр╕▓р╕бр╕▓р╕гр╕Цр╕Ър╕гр╕гр╕вр╕▓р╕вр╣Др╕Фр╣Й [mai samart barnyai dai].
In a less direct sense, unspeakable could imply untouchable. Hopefully I am not nitpicking here…if off the mark I would appreciate being put in my place. Thanks.
One more thing I noticed about Hla Oo’s blog is that though he posted a news piece from nytimes, the rest of his news (with pictures, orchestrated pictures at that, showing Rohingyas rioting and attacking Rakhines, are from propaganda sources.
I do not hear Bangladeshis talking about human rights for Burmese too. Why should Burmese talking about human rights for Bengalis especially when they are burning our homes, killing our local people, pretending as a victim while invading our country.
We are treating those animal minded people as humans, our soldiers are taking the bullets from those invaders to protect the fire fighters who are being shot by Bengali invaders who set fire to their make-shift hut to burn down mansions of centuries old Arakanese homes. If we do not respect human rights, those invaders would have been died now. But if you look at the casuality, Bumese are more on the receiving side than those Bengali invaders.
Ivan said that “Hla Oo seems to be geographically located near the actual situation and quite informed and knowledgable and also provides copies of local newspapers, photos, texts, etc. ” as if local news paper controlled by the Burmese government and Buddhist majority are unbiased.
Ivan continued ” He does not seem to be encouraging more violence, in fact, he seems to be horrified by what’s going on, and appears to merely want people to be better informed as to the actual facts.” and so I would like to ask Ivan, who obviously is a Buddhist from Burma this:
If Hla OO is so knwoledgeable, why doesn’t he also report the followings which I ljust learned upon catching up with a true Rohingya that I have known since I was 4 years old as neighnors in Yangon where I grew up, in his blog?
(1) The government orchestrating taking pictures of people painting their faces and body to be darker and wearing of Muslim’s caps and burning houses as if the terrorized Rohingyas who have been too powerless and only have been fleeing to Bangladesh – this time only to be blocked by Bangladesh authorities – really committed those crimes.
(2) The government throwing acids on the corpse of Muslims and shaving heads to make them look like they were non-Muslims victims.
Hla Oo’s blog is as bias as they (the Buddhists majority and the government) come. Nothing new. I even saw a youtube video in which a Rakhine girl wearing hijab as if she’s a muslim and bashing the Rohingyas. The poster of the video moderates the comments, obviously to screen posts like mine, challenging their claims calling the Rohingyas terrorists.
Logic would dictate that Muslims in Burma, especially the Rohingyas, terrorized under the military regime, are in no position to be capable of burning houses and what not as they have been accused of committing.
My personal comments based on what a real Rohungya told me: The so called Rohingya leaders are active with their own agenda (to get financial support from other muslims sources), not in the best interest of the Ordinary Rohiungya Muslims.
The poor Rohingya villagers, with no one representing in their interest, are being used by so the called Rohingya leaders as if those leaders represent the poor refugees, At the same time, the poor villagers are targetd by the Burmese government and the Buddhists majority.
Such is the mess in Arakan that escalated to what it is since the British left.
And of course we are also limited in what we can say indirectly. Because LM judgements have often been based on interpretation of metaphor and presumed intention. ThoughtCrime.
If this had not been the case I might have quoted directly from the use of T-shirts celebrating the King of Rock and Roll (Elvis) and the great British Rock Band Queen. Difficult to parse of course.
“It’s hard to parse any useful meaning from this sentence. Of course the number is growing. How high is ‘high’? What sort of number would not be ‘high’?”
Jon Wright, it is hard to parse these things. But it’s not a grammar exercise. I think the answer to your question is “unspeakably” high. If you can find more precise figures, please let us know.
Great idea, Ben and Tyrell. And you are quite right that in Thailand at the moment we “are limited in what we can say directly”. I hope this can get us nearer to that ideal.
Fair enough that the author slips his imagination into the story and creates something far off the reality, but the pictures and these asserted stories are hokum. These kind of stories just reinforce romanticized clichés of Southeast Asian countries. I am deeply dissatisfied with this and the bulk of uncritical comments on that.
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Launch of “Unspeakable Things”
“Off-limit” should be a possible rendition in English of the Thai expression р╣Бр╕Хр╕░р╕Хр╣Йр╕нр╕Зр╣Др╕бр╣Ир╣Др╕Фр╣Й
Intolerance, Islam and the Internet in Burma
No offence Moe Aung (#130) that I do not take Aye Chan’s word literally since he is partial
on the subject. For example, in the youtube video where he talked about Burmese King annexing Arakan in 1784, he did not mention about how tens of thousands of Muslims (earlier, I mistakenly said hundreds of thousands) had to feel to Chittagong but he mentioned about the Muslims form Chittagong entering Burma as if they’re new comers instead of telling the truth that they were coming back to their homes in Arakan when it was safe to do so.
Soory, Moe Aung that Aye Chan is not a credible historian.
BTW, my name is spelled “Mandy”, not “Mehndi”.
Launch of “Unspeakable Things”
Jon: not sure where you get your stats from, for I have seen no official stats on convictions. If you have some, let us know the source.
ALRC says this: “Statistics provided by the Office of the Judiciary indicate a sharp rise in lese-majesty charges filed since the 19 September 2006 coup, with 33 charges filed in 2005, 30 filed in 2006, 126 filed in 2007, 77 filed in 2008, 164 filed in 2009, and an extraordinary 478 charges filed in 2010. While statistics released for the first five months of 2011 indicate a reduction in the number of charges filed, information for the second half of 2011 and 2012 to date has not been made available publicly.” Given that the conviction rate has been about 95%, then we’d expect more convictions than your figures suggest. Data for the last years seems a blank.
Voices of moderation on Burmese Facebook
Kyaw Naing Win (#10)
Don’t pigeonhole Violet Cho asking whether she supports this or that. She has already asked to see things under historical, political, cultural, social light ratrher than race since the issue in arakan is a very complex issue. She is fully aware that those Rohingyas are not recent immigrants of 20th century from Bengal.
See post #117 at http://www.newmandala.org/2012/06/10/intolerance-islam-and-the-internet-in-burma-today/comment-page-3/#comment-1094489
Voices of moderation on Burmese Facebook
To post #9,
These pieces are appearing after the perpetrators started damage controls. Sai Latt was well aware of the history of the victimization of Rohingyas.
Intolerance, Islam and the Internet in Burma
Mandy (a) Nyunt Oo Swe (a) Mehndi,
Ever heard of Godwin’s Law?
As to – Such is the mess in Arakan that escalated to what it is since the British left, this is what Dr Aye Chan had to say in his paper The Development of a Muslim Enclave in Arakan (Rakhine) State of Burma (Myanmar) published by the SOAS in the Bulletin of Burma Research, Autumn 2005 (p406-7):
Kristallnacht, huh?
Voices of moderation on Burmese Facebook
Response to #5,
If you accuse Edward Said ( a diseased Palestinian and hence the real descendant of origian Jews of Judea than the converted jews from Europe – see a book by Israeli historian from Tel Aviv university on who the Palestinians are) who was a University Professor of English and Comparative Literature at Columbia University, shouldn’t you also say something about the whitewashing of Israeli atrocities by the world’s media?
As for callinmg Rohingyas terrorist, it’s a cliche you know. I won’t even bother reapeating the facts. I will just refre you to my post #125 at http://www.newmandala.org/2012/06/10/intolerance-islam-and-the-internet-in-burma-today/comment-page-3/#comment-1094489
if anyone is curious why I, a non Rohingya, is spending time writing this, it’s because after learning their sufferings, my conscience won’t allow me to keep quiet about what I know about the orchestrated victimization of the Rohingyas.
Voices of moderation on Burmese Facebook
Response to the No. #1
The academics got it right. The initial reaction revealed it all. Later moderate voice form the Buddhist sides are “damange control” as they realzed that their true feelings about the Rohingyas has been revealed to the world. The world, assuming that “Buddhist equals peaceful people ” is no longer fooled.
Intolerance, Islam and the Internet in Burma
Mandy (a) Nyunt Oo Swe (a) Mehndi,
The lady doth protest too much. Excellent citation BTW from a wiki article almost entirely contributed by none other than Dr Abdul Rahman Zafrudin, champion of a one man crusade, should I say jihad, and the proud winner of the Tireless Contributor Barnstar.
Not noticed his ping back above in #2?
Launch of “Unspeakable Things”
More or less a translation issue…
Why “Unspeakable things” when the Thai, р╕кр╕┤р╣Ир╕Зр╕Чр╕╡р╣Ир╣Бр╕Хр╕░р╕Хр╣Йр╕нр╕Зр╣Др╕бр╣Ир╣Др╕Фр╣Й, means untouchable, or sometimes intangible? If something is unspeakable, then р╣Др╕бр╣Ир╕кр╕▓р╕бр╕▓р╕гр╕Цр╕Ър╕гр╕гр╕вр╕▓р╕вр╣Др╕Фр╣Й [mai samart barnyai dai].
In a less direct sense, unspeakable could imply untouchable. Hopefully I am not nitpicking here…if off the mark I would appreciate being put in my place. Thanks.
Intolerance, Islam and the Internet in Burma
One more thing I noticed about Hla Oo’s blog is that though he posted a news piece from nytimes, the rest of his news (with pictures, orchestrated pictures at that, showing Rohingyas rioting and attacking Rakhines, are from propaganda sources.
Intolerance, Islam and the Internet in Burma
I do not hear Bangladeshis talking about human rights for Burmese too. Why should Burmese talking about human rights for Bengalis especially when they are burning our homes, killing our local people, pretending as a victim while invading our country.
We are treating those animal minded people as humans, our soldiers are taking the bullets from those invaders to protect the fire fighters who are being shot by Bengali invaders who set fire to their make-shift hut to burn down mansions of centuries old Arakanese homes. If we do not respect human rights, those invaders would have been died now. But if you look at the casuality, Bumese are more on the receiving side than those Bengali invaders.
Intolerance, Islam and the Internet in Burma
Ivan said that “Hla Oo seems to be geographically located near the actual situation and quite informed and knowledgable and also provides copies of local newspapers, photos, texts, etc. ” as if local news paper controlled by the Burmese government and Buddhist majority are unbiased.
Ivan continued ” He does not seem to be encouraging more violence, in fact, he seems to be horrified by what’s going on, and appears to merely want people to be better informed as to the actual facts.” and so I would like to ask Ivan, who obviously is a Buddhist from Burma this:
If Hla OO is so knwoledgeable, why doesn’t he also report the followings which I ljust learned upon catching up with a true Rohingya that I have known since I was 4 years old as neighnors in Yangon where I grew up, in his blog?
(1) The government orchestrating taking pictures of people painting their faces and body to be darker and wearing of Muslim’s caps and burning houses as if the terrorized Rohingyas who have been too powerless and only have been fleeing to Bangladesh – this time only to be blocked by Bangladesh authorities – really committed those crimes.
(2) The government throwing acids on the corpse of Muslims and shaving heads to make them look like they were non-Muslims victims.
Hla Oo’s blog is as bias as they (the Buddhists majority and the government) come. Nothing new. I even saw a youtube video in which a Rakhine girl wearing hijab as if she’s a muslim and bashing the Rohingyas. The poster of the video moderates the comments, obviously to screen posts like mine, challenging their claims calling the Rohingyas terrorists.
Logic would dictate that Muslims in Burma, especially the Rohingyas, terrorized under the military regime, are in no position to be capable of burning houses and what not as they have been accused of committing.
Intolerance, Islam and the Internet in Burma
Nigella’s comment, “Recent events evoke the atmosphere for Jews in 1930s Germany, and specifically Kristallnacht” is right on.
Intolerance, Islam and the Internet in Burma
My personal comments based on what a real Rohungya told me: The so called Rohingya leaders are active with their own agenda (to get financial support from other muslims sources), not in the best interest of the Ordinary Rohiungya Muslims.
The poor Rohingya villagers, with no one representing in their interest, are being used by so the called Rohingya leaders as if those leaders represent the poor refugees, At the same time, the poor villagers are targetd by the Burmese government and the Buddhists majority.
Such is the mess in Arakan that escalated to what it is since the British left.
Launch of “Unspeakable Things”
And of course we are also limited in what we can say indirectly. Because LM judgements have often been based on interpretation of metaphor and presumed intention. ThoughtCrime.
If this had not been the case I might have quoted directly from the use of T-shirts celebrating the King of Rock and Roll (Elvis) and the great British Rock Band Queen. Difficult to parse of course.
Launch of “Unspeakable Things”
“It’s hard to parse any useful meaning from this sentence. Of course the number is growing. How high is ‘high’? What sort of number would not be ‘high’?”
Jon Wright, it is hard to parse these things. But it’s not a grammar exercise. I think the answer to your question is “unspeakably” high. If you can find more precise figures, please let us know.
Great idea, Ben and Tyrell. And you are quite right that in Thailand at the moment we “are limited in what we can say directly”. I hope this can get us nearer to that ideal.
Intolerance, Islam and the Internet in Burma
Aya Chan talking about Human Rights for (bamar, Rakhines, Karens, Shan, Kachins, etc. but not about Rohingyas.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PE1HhIpiIUE&feature=related
Coup talk in Thailand 2012
Something is rotten in Bangkok
Noir nights in Phnom Penh
Fair enough that the author slips his imagination into the story and creates something far off the reality, but the pictures and these asserted stories are hokum. These kind of stories just reinforce romanticized clichés of Southeast Asian countries. I am deeply dissatisfied with this and the bulk of uncritical comments on that.