Branding of the State: Labeling certain sectors of Islam as Extremists is so passe

Seriously though it is. No really it is, I'm just as surprised as you are really. So for this week's little project I decided to look into modern day issues surrounding Sufism and I managed to dig up some rather interesting tid bits. Most primarily the interplay between Sufism, Colonialism, and the State. How exactly, well a you hopefully well know at one point in time Europe ruled a majority of the world

notice how everything is in the process of being ruined 

and if it wasn't outright controlled it was in someway being used as a playground for a few great powers. Such as Britain and Russia in the form of the Great Game, which depending on who you talk to may or may not have existed. The game was a form of geostrategy and politics revolving around increasing tensions between the two powers in the middle east. Notice on the map how the only thing between Russia and India (which was the crown jewel of the British Empire) was Afghanistan and Persia (and they still barely touch).

Lions and Afghans and Bears...wait that isn't right

So as the two major powers played their games real people on the ground dealt with the fallout as always. One of the responses to the game and to Colonialism throughout the middle east was resistance by the Sufism surprising right? Well actually if you think about it, not all that much. The Sufism were made up of large spread esoteric networks of Teacher and Students which in many ways the making of an underground network for resistance. However, because these groups were made up of a single teacher with many followers adhering to their principles the European Empires (which was rife with Orientalism and had (and to a good degree still does) very little understanding of how non-Christian religions worked) very quickly essentially Sufism to one thing: fanaticism.

Sound familiar? Cause it really should. In fact this trend of essentializing Islam to fantaicism, extremism, or blind faith lead by ideological or personal charisma is pretty old (Marco Polo accused the Hashashin of such).  

Hashashin = Win

And it is interesting that it is almost an essential part of the Western Christian World's discussion of Islam. Never discussed are issues such as Islam contributions to medicine, science, or mathematics. Never discussed are issues such as Islam's overwhelming message of non-violence and peace. And, of course, never discussed is the fact that more often then not violence by Muslims towards the West has been a direct response to the Crusades, Colonialism, or Neo-Liberalism. All of which are parasitic systems of exploitation and domination. 

So next time when you hear the media talk of Islamic Extremists, remember the Sufis (who many Westerners speak of as not being truly Islamic and therefore acceptable in modern worship) were once considered to be that too.

Till next time 

Jacob 

Sources: 

Ernst, Carl W. The Shambhala Guide to Sufism. Boston, Mass: Shambhala, 1997.

Renard, John. Knowledge of God in Classical Sufism: Foundations of Islamic Mystical Theology. New York: Paulist Press, 2004.

The Ides of March

Welcome to March! The most beautiful and terrible of all months for a whole host of reasons which can sometimes (as our tyrannical friend Caesar found) be political. To be more direct on Tuesday twenty people were killed in a riot in north-western city of Kashgar in Xinjiang province in China.

Courtesy of the BBC

Wait what? Well for those of you who don't know Tibet is not the only region which China has colonized. The Xinjiang autonomous region of China was reconquered in 1949 and half of its population are Uighurs. China has always been a large ethnically diverse country (there are over nine different versions of spoken Chinese after all) and its various governments have used various policies to deal with this issue. The current policy under the PRC has been to create a large overwhelming ethnic majority of Han Chinese (which has recently absorbed groups like the Cantonese) and spread that group throughout China (and while I support the building of China's high speed rail network on environmental grounds, this policy is one of the reasons its being built in the first place) in order to create a false (or perhaps real) sense of cultural, ethnic, and national hegemony allowing for easier governance. 

However, in many cases the exact opposite is happening. Groups like the Uighurs, Tibetans, and Cantonese are beginning to question these policies claiming that they are active forms of discrimination that decrease likelihood of employment as well as a form of destructive cultural erosion. However, The CCP doesn't really take all that well to criticism so the complaints, through normal channels, go unheeded. Resulting in: 

2008 Lhasa unrest

2009 Xinjiang unrest 

Which forces the CCP to do the only thing it knows how to do:

Since the 2008/2009 urrest in both Tibet and Xinjiang China has increasingly tightened security. And with China's parliament meeting frighteningly close to the anniversary of the Lhasa riots this coming week, certain members of the government are calling for even tighter control. With officials like the party's secretary to Tibet, Chen Quanguo, calling for tight monitoring of  "Mobile phones, the internet and other measures for the management of new media need to be fully implemented to maintain the public's interests and national security."

Which raises a rather interesting issue that I'll let Princess Leia voice:

Preach Friend, Preach!

It'll be interesting (and probably horrifying considering the PRC track record on these things) to see what unfolds in the next few weeks. Are the fears of the CCP unfounded? Or are things going to exploded and if so what will that explosion mean. 

I guess will just have to wait and see (but I'm beginning to think there more to that geomancer's story then ever before)

Till next time 

Jacob 

Articles: 

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-china-17195886 

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-17211909

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-china-17216650

The Bolsheviks of Korea

I do love a good conspiracy theory and it seems that this week on The Gods Talks we have something along those lines on are hands. As I mentioned two posts ago I've been looking into the 1919 March 1st Movement in Korea, ever heard of it?

oh ok

Don't worry neither had I until a week ago. Basically in 1910 the Empire of Japan annexed Korea ending the 500 years of stability under Joseon Dynasty and, to put it bluntly, the new Japanese Imperial policies were not kind to the Korean people. There was a vast reeducation campaign mounted by the Japanese and there was an attempt to erase much of Korea's history (particularly the bits about them repelling the previous unsuccessful Japanese invasions). So by the time 1919 rolled around the Koreans were getting a little annoyed with the Japanese and with advent of the 14 Points at the Paris Peace Conference the Koreans began to nonviolently demand their independence from the Empire of the Rising Sun ala a mass movements.The Empire did not take this very well and there was a harsh backlash against the campaign.

While all of this was going on a Canadian Presbyterian Missionary and veterinarian named Frank Schofield started writing about the atrocities going on Korea sending his articles to the Japan Advertiser as well as Canadian newspapers. His writing helped the growing crisis in Korea gain international press as he was spreading a story which was not being published by the main stream news. Eventually the Japanese, and to a slight degree English, aggression turned towards Schofield for his words and he was recalled to Canada by the Mission office. However he continued writing when from home and eventually managed to return to Korea permanently till he died in 1970 in Seoul. He was also declared to be one of the patriots of Korea and is an important part of the honoring of the March 1st Movement to Korea to this day.

He didn't think he was gonna be a badass either

And while all of this is interesting it is isn't really the tofu (ha see what I did there) of what I want to talk about today. You see my research question for this week was investigating the British Response to Frank Schofield’s involvement in the March 1^st Movement and the protests in Korea in general. Why you ask? Well the thing is while Schofield's writing started out as being critical of the abuses being perpetuated in Korea it increasing began to focus on problemetize the system of Imperialism that in many ways had been pioneered by his own country. And there are a few who say that this critique is part of what got Schofield pulled out of Korea by the mission.

So thinking like any good historian would the first place I checked was the vaults of the London Times and, to my surprise, the first article that pops up for this period is barely 100 words long and comes with perhaps the most fantastically typical title I have ever seen:

McCarthy would be proud

That's right they used the red scare tactic. And to be honest that's really as controversial as the Times gets on this issue. There are only 4 articles from 1919 on Korea at all and all of them have to do with the Japanese opinion on what the crisis is and how it is to be solved. Including the correct view that independence would not be gained but more civilian control of Korea would be granted to the Koreans (although almost all of this was withdrawn during WWII). And Schofield ? Well he doesn't come in the Times at all actually, which really isn't that surprising to me. While I currently do not have enough evidence or research to support this I personally feel that the British felt that the best way to deal with Schofield's criticism of imperialism ruining everything was the easiest, yank him from Korea, make it impossible for him to go back, and leave him Canada where his complaints could go on mostly unheard. 

honest truth 

Which leads us into my ever present question of where do we go from here? Well to be frank more research. My understanding and knowledge of Korea and events of 1919 is very limited and it needs to be broadened still. In terms of specifics if I, or anyone else, were to fall down the rabbit hole of this project I'd say an investigation of British Imperial policy towards the other major Empires of the day would be good, as well as finding away to go further back in the Japan Times archives than 1999 or see if there could be anyway to access the vaults of the now defunct Japan Advertiser (which was coincidentally eaten the Japan Times in the 1930s) so I could access more primary documents on the crisis as well as more of  Schofield's articles.

So that's all for now, 

Till next time (when well probably talk about Daoism) 

Jacob 

References:

Bolshevism in korea. 1919. The Time, Thursday, Apr 10, 1919.

Korea's rights. 1919. The Times, Thursday, Apr 17, 1919.

Reforms for Korea. 1919. The Times, Tuesday, Apr 22, 1919.

Reforms for korea: Ultimate equality with japanese, imperial rescript. 1919. The Times, The Times Friday, Aug 22, 1919.

Legault, Barbara and John F. Prescot. “The arch agitator:” Dr. Frank W. Schofield and the Korean Independence Movement. Veterinary History.

Oh, Wei Nam. 2008. The transformation of frank schofield (1889-1970): Opening korea, a hermit nation in east asia. Social Identities 14, no. 2: 233-251.