what is the result? war, the horrors of full war, the horrors of absolute power, like assad, refusing to yield, even if every damn syrian must die in order for him to stay in power; and the rest of it, on all sides, seems to be determined to kill off anyone who is left.
we are living, as djibril diop mambety said, in the age of hyenas; and the hyenas, deluded about their power, imagine themselves to be lions, bears, monsters of power: the russian bear, the american eagle, the triumphant bombs of isis that dare to blow up their prisoners lashed to ancient columns.
we live in these times. we should stand against these positions, and yes, tolerance, seems the poor, slight sister who quivers in the corner while the elephants crush everything in sight.
k
To clarify what I mean by totalitarian position. You stated local people could be required to "accept a measure of behavior that they themselves don't observe." the key word here is "a measure." To insist on no measure of that behavior at all as a right would be a totalitarian position. To insist on a full measure of that behavior as a right would equally be a totalitarian position. Both together would create a totalitarian explosion.
--KenI agree completely that respect and tolerance must go together. Tolerance without respect is colonialism, respect without acceptance is chauvinism. I was reaching for that golden word tolerance when I previously referenced African hospitality. I am sure we can still count on the deep wells of tolerance of our polytheistic people! Thanks for introducing it explicitly into the debate. I have come to tolerate tailgating, it now amuses me more than anything else. A lady tells me she makes about $200 every weekend from recycling empty cans! I might in fact join in someday! In that mutual exchange of respect and tolerance, there should be no space for a totalitarian position.Bode
On Wed, Oct 28, 2015 at 12:35 PM kenneth harrow <harrow@msu.edu> wrote:
all rights, all customs, and even laws are hedged by other rights.
the right to wear a headscarf as a muslim woman, the right of a brother to have dignity in his family, the right of a father to have authority over his children, the right of a girl to decide what to wear, the right of a mother to dress as she wants, to protect her children.
we all have been children, and struggled with our parents about what to wear.
in france, the right of a girl to wear a long dress conflicted with school authorities to decide what constitutes muslim vs secular dress.
dress codes in school.
all must be in some balance. i mostly hate tailgating drunkenness, too. i also hate gun-toting nuts who insist that semi-automatic weapons be readily available, even as children are being shot in schools by gun nuts.
there is nothing unique about nigeria having local, state, and national laws, customs, beliefs, that need to be harmonized.
so toyin's example of respecting local customs when traveling to local areas demonstrates one side of this harmonization; the other side is tolerance, where local people might be asked, or required, to accept a measure of behavior that they themselves don't observe, like drinking alcohol.
should there really be no bars in muslim regions? or should they be only for non-muslims? should all restaurants be closed on sabbath? should women have to adjust their clothing depending on the neighborhoods they enter into, be they orthodox muslim or jewish or fundamentalist christian? or should people in those deeply religious regions be obliged to accommodate those who are different?
should women traveling to iran be obliged to cover their hair?
take french secularist rules and iranian fundamentalist rules, and put them together. another nuclear explosion. another charlie hebdo.
ken
On 10/28/15 9:37 AM, Bode wrote:
that last statement is not complete without the following caveat. all powers are contestable and should be contested: local and federal. and all rights are subject to verification. to contest and to question are part of the processes of establishing legitimacy both of power and rights. we love the power that gives rights, not one that sets their limits, understandably. but the function of power is both positive and negative. it gives and it sets the limits of rights. if we do away with the negative function of setting the limit of rights, even in the 21st century, we will descend into a state of nature. those limitations will fall away in the utopian society of tomorrow. i cannot wait for it to come. that will be the Kingdom of God.
for the time being, local and state powers can and do constitute undue burden for some. that is a historical and contemporary fact. federal power can also overreach. in both cases we are called upon to stand up for the rights of citizens and the powers of states and local authorities because those authorities represent people like us, who have rights like us and equal to ours. so, in upholding state power, we are also upholding the rights of the citizens of that state. it might be our state, it might be us, but it does not have to be us, to be our state or local authority before we uphold the powers of state and local governments.
most weekends i cannot go to the library because of games that i do not understand nor care about. i see people drinking bear far away from the stadium not even watching any game and after they hear the final scores and the game is over, every one leaves all the same. everyone has just been to the game. this is not my tradition, i do not care about it at all, it ruins my weekends most of the time. the police even impose high fees for parking. what can i do about this? is the problem that it is not my tradition and therefore i see no value in it whatsoever, or does it constitute an undue burden? can i petition for the abolition of this tailgating tradition because i could care less about it and it impinges on my omnitudinal right?
Bode
--On Wed, Oct 28, 2015 at 8:25 AM Bode <ominira@gmail.com> wrote:
The relative autonomy of the power of local authorities to make laws that do not contradict federal law include their power to legitimize and codify customs. If we take that power away from them we are no longer in a federal republic. that would constitute meddling with state and local affairs. remember it is this meddling of the federal government in the affairs at Ibadan that led to the collapse of the first republic. meddling with the constitutional powers of state and local authorities is as perilous as denying the rights of citizens. state and local authorities have constitutional powers to make laws and to incorporate customs and traditions if they want. the power of the states and the rights of citizens are not mutually exclusive.
On Tue, Oct 27, 2015 at 7:56 PM Bode <ominira@gmail.com> wrote:
"Both the national government and the smaller political subdivisions have the power to make laws and both have a certain level of autonomy from each other."
The relative autonomy of state and local authorities to make their own laws so long as those laws do not contradict any federal law, and so long as the area of jurisdiction is not listed expressly in the constitution as federal jurisdiction is the very core of a federal system.
I do not know that anyone supports the disrespect or subversion of any aspects of the custom and tradition of any part of Nigeria in which they choose to live. The issue for me is whether custom and tradition trumps the laws of the Republic of Nigeria, and also whether communities/groups can pick and choose which laws of the republic they would abide by based on any conflicts and contradictions that custom and tradition may pose. My considered view is that the constitution is the supreme law. All accommodation including custom and tradition must be within and not outside it if the constitution is to mean anything. That seems to me to be the choice that Nigeria have made. All Nigerians should be faithful to that choice.
If I understand it correctly, the Nigeria project is about building and growing an achieving, competitive country that works for all law abiding citizens at all times, in spite of Nigeria's diversity spectrum. A bloody war was fought over many years to keep the country together- uphold the constitution not custom and tradition. That this conversation is taking place in this forum is a wee bit uncomfortable for me. The primacy of the constitution in my opinion, and unalloyed respect of it in spite of different customs and traditions, is the best guarantee of fulfillment of Nigeria's purpose and promise
oa.
From: usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com [mailto:usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of Rex Marinus
Sent: Tuesday, October 27, 2015 12:39 PM
To: usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com
Subject: RE: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Moderator's Caution: Lives Matter--
Dear Professor Falola:
With due regard to the sentiments that you have reflected here, I'd like to ask you that very simple question that Soyinka asked some nearly two decades ago "when is a nation"? Humane scholarship, as I understand it, permits us to ask the hard and difficult questions, and to give real ambit to our most enlightened conscience. So, let me draw an analogy with some of our experiences here: because the Ku Klux Klan has history and is sacred to some people, must we therefore never question, or attempt to organize in areas where they hold sway, because it would offend those who find the KKK an important part of their "culture" and "heritage"? Better still, you realize that the foundation of the Nazi idea and of Mussolini's exactly asks us to do very exactly what you have proposed, almost inadvertently? And I'm certain you neither identify with Nazism or Fascism ideologically, although its local variety seems to escape your scrutiny, it seems to me, in the penumbra of the protective sheets which you now advocate we must wear around the critique of the modern nation in Nigeria.
Nations have never been built on these terms. Every right we enjoy today, in the comforts of our current location was gained by blood and sacrifice; by people who were insistent on breaking down the barriers you want us to protect/preserve in Nigeria. It did not come by easy acquiesence. If they had followed your thinking, sir, you would never mount the distinguished chair you sit upon quite easily and legitimately today in Austin, Texas. There will certainly be no interest in African history in those places. Our particular identities do not foreclose, and need not detain us to the past. Let me give a particularly recent example about why we must not be sucked into the defence of these strange institutions. I do not know if you agree with image of the just dead Ooni of Ife, with his foot resting on his court or ritual slave, who traveled with him t Harvard. As a sign of culture and indication of majesty, the slave knelt before Ooni Olubuse as he sat, while he was a guest of a conference on African Religions in Harvard about five years or so ago. It was a horrifying scene, but there are those who defend it as tradition.
If we are unwilling to defend the constitution that grants equality between the Ooni and his ritual slave, by placing limits which it does not place on the individual, simply on the premise that it questions the Ooni, at what point do we then stop talking about the travesty called Nigeria? Why should e worry that corruption exists? Because everytime the Nigerian intellectual talks about democracy, and still defends the rights of the monarchy, they defend a corrupt order. They are either unclear about the conceptual meaning and significance of the terms they use, or they are just being hypocritical. The trouble in Nigeria has remained the limits we are prepared to place on its development as a modern, progressive state; the extreme disregard of its laws by the self-interested elite, and the complicity of the intellectuals who have mostly been willing tools, because they tolerate, accommodate, and perpetuate the most conservative and tyrannical order on that society, sometimes of the lamest excuses: "it is too dangerous to shift the apple carts," we say.
My favorite Nigeria is also the Onigbongbo model. Anybody who likes to go and prostrate to Onigbongbo has the supreme rights. But whoever wants to drink beer in front of the mosque should be free to do so, for as long as it is not inside the mosque. It should neither the business of the imam or the Onigbongbo to decree on whether beer is to be sold or not. If they as much as attempt to disrupt the common life of those who choose to drink beer either in Onigbongo or in Sokoto, the Federal government has the duty and the obligation under our laws to protect the secular convictions of citizens, whether they have lived in Onigbongbo all their lives, or just came to town by bus, that night. It should not matter because that is the basis of our rule of law. When we become selective on which law to defend, or place abstract limits on the rights already guaranteed the citizen, we give leverage to disorder, and to tyranny. I salute you, professor.
Obi Nwakanma
From: toyinfalola@austin.utexas.edu
To: USAAfricaDialogue@googlegroups.com
Subject: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Moderator's Caution: Lives Matter
Date: Tue, 27 Oct 2015 13:09:01 +0000Scholars:
As you make your arguments, be aware that statements that can generate violence and loss of lives are outside the bounds of scholarly engagements and individual rights. Indeed, such statements are irresponsible. Citizenship has its limits. Freedom has its limits. Rights are not limitless.
We cannot be in the comfort of our relocated spaces and not know that we have our brothers and sisters in Enugu, Sokoto, Makurdi, Ibadan and other places whose lives deserve to be protected.
Localism, irrespective of one's "federalist" position, remains powerful in Africa. You cannot wish away overnight, Zulu identity, even if we make arguments that it was a 19th century creation. Igbo, Yoruba etc. as presently constituted as political identities have not always been with us. But you can no longer wish them away overnight. I cannot go to Benue State and be disrespectful to the Idoma because of modernist arguments.
I cannot walk to Sokoto and say that the Sultan is not important, and his right to the Sokoto throne qualifies me to set up what the Sultan will regard as a threat to his throne. There is a history to his throne, and there may be a history to mine as well, but wisdom means that I must be careful as I may not even have the number to fight the Sultan.
I am not from Ile-Ife, but I cannot walk to Ife to ask them not to accord respect and dignity to their Ooni. Who am I? Citizenship in most African countries remain connected to places of birth, and I am sure that it will not always be so in the years ahead. You and I do not know when.
Meanwhile, we must protect lives, and not be talking about death to people, in so casual a manner.
A mob can be generated within minutes in many places, and the police and army cannot do that much to protect lives, usually of the poor.
Onigbogbo is my favorite joint in Nigeria. I was there last week. Here is the model that works, Muslims and Christians, poor and not so poor, Tiv, Igbo and Yoruba living their lives without many of the arguments we make here. My joint is actually in front of the palace of the Onigbongbo. Indeed, after the Friday mosque, some Muslims joined us to drink beer. The Onigbongbo people see lives differently from the way some of the scholars see things.
Exercise caution.
Life is sacrosanct. One life should not be lost because of temporary political exigencies in a country that was cobbled together and where secular institutions remain either weak or not functioning well.
CAUTION
--
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---- kenneth w. harrow faculty excellence advocate professor of english michigan state university department of english 619 red cedar road room C-614 wells hall east lansing, mi 48824 ph. 517 803 8839 harrow@msu.edu
Listserv moderated by Toyin Falola, University of Texas at Austin
To post to this group, send an email to USAAfricaDialogue@googlegroups.com
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-- kenneth w. harrow faculty excellence advocate professor of english michigan state university department of english 619 red cedar road room C-614 wells hall east lansing, mi 48824 ph. 517 803 8839 harrow@msu.edu
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