A Pakistani Shithole ‘I looked from school to shithole and from shithole to school and I’m buggered if I could tell the difference’
Imagine if your educational experience at school involved a large amount of the following: being taught to disparage members of other religions, being taught that no member of these other religons had achieved anything and being lied to about the number of members of other religions present when your country was created.
Sounds hellish doesn’t it, now where could that be, could it be Britain, nope, could it be France, nope or could it be the leftwingers favourite target hate target, Israel, no not there either.
Oh well it’s Pakistan, you might have guessed. Even if this wasn’t alluded to in the title, many people would guess that the educational shithole that is being referred to was Pakistan.
The Pakistan Tribune reports that a meeting of Pakistani intellectuals found appalling biases in the text books used in Pakistani schools and colleges, along with enforced Islamic religious education even for those of minority faiths. Pakistani Children were according to one participant, Karamat Ali, were being fed ‘horrifying myths about people of other faiths’
The curriculum appears to include outright lies by omission and commission such as not saying that Pakistans first Chief Justice was a Christian and that at the time of Indian sub-continental partition there were more Hindus living in the area that is now Pakistan than there actually were.
The Pakistan Tribune said that on top of the twisted curriculum materials there was also pressure put on students to convert to Islam:
“I have heard of cases where Muslim students ask non-Muslim high achievers: Why don’t you convert to our religion,” recalled Karamat Ali, the executive director of the Pakistan Institute of Labour Education and Research. “And it is not just Muslims and Hindus, but also Shias who are given this treatment. This is because of the horrifying myths about people of other faiths that we fill our children with.”
Ali criticised political parties for having a narrow vision. “Every party says that they’ll bring ‘roti, kapra and makaan’. What about the freedom to practice your religion?”
Hmm! Freedom of religion not really an Islamic concept is it?
The Tribune article continued:
Dr Bernadette Dean, the principal of St Joseph’s College for Women, spoke about the religious and gender biases found in text books in Pakistan. “In the curriculum, Islamiat was included in the ‘general knowledge’ taught to children and was made compulsory for students in classes one, two and three,” she pointed out.
“This goes against Article 22 of the Constitution, which states that no person will be forced to attain religious education.”
Dean found religious biases in textbooks written for English, Urdu, Pakistan studies and social studies. “Teachers have to teach these textbooks because students are tested on them in the examinations. They don’t have the choice of breaking out of the system,” she said, adding that the cherry on top is the system of rote learning.
“Imagine thousands of students all over Pakistan rote learning biases against people of other religions by heart and then regurgitating them.” “
That isn’t an education system it is indoctrination of hate. What is going on in Pakistan’s education system regarding the demonisation of Pakistanis who follow a minority faith is appalling, and if it was done to Muslims anywhere in a non Muslim country you can bet your life that something would be done about it. The Pakistani education system appears to be extremely Islamicly supremecist, and sounds like a pretty dangerous and unpleasant place for Pakistani Christians, Hindus, Sikhs, and Ismaili and Shia Muslims.
It also seems that Pakistani ‘education’ ignores women and when women are mentioned in the curriculum they are in traditional home making and child rearing roles. On top of that any question of Islamic or Pakistani blame for the appalling violence at the time of partition in 1947, is ignored or Pakistanis are made to seem as absolute victims. The Tribune added:
“The partition is a tricky topic. “When I asked my students to write about the problems faced by Pakistan during partition, they said: Hindus are bad because they didn’t want to give us the Rs200 million promised to us at partition,” she said.
She then spoke about how textbooks fail to represent gender in a fair manner. “Our text books are full of great men,” she explained.
“You hardly ever come across any great women and when they do turn up, you find them in stereotypical roles, as mothers and housewives.” Dean stressed that textbooks need to be rewritten to reflect the changing times.
The executive director of NCJP, Peter Jacob, also wondered that if the study of religion is so important as to be included at every stage in the curriculum, then why does it only focus on Islam. “Why not include other religions as well.”
Sharing her views with The Express Tribune, Dr Nuzhat, the former principal of Government College, Karachi, felt the discussion was particularly saddening if the history of education in Pakistan, and Sindh in particular, was kept in mind.
“Why do we forget that all great schools in Karachi, including Karachi Grammar School and Mama Parsi, were built by non-Muslims? Muslim parents have been dying to get their children admitted into these schools ever since they were built around 100 years ago.” “
What a complete an utter indictement of all Pakistani governments, by not resisting Islam and creating a modern dyamic state (like one of the neighbours) Pakistani education has regressed to the state where the best schools were started or are run by non Muslims. Such is the damage that Islam does to a countries educational system, since 1947 Islamic influence in Government has impoverished Pakistans educational system. There is so much Islamic indoctrination that it must firstly affect how Muslim students think about non-Muslims and secondly that the indoctrination pushes out the useful learning.
What Islamic influence has done to Pakistans educational standards should be brought up every time an Islamic apologist trumpets rubbish about Islamic educational ‘achievement’.
Links
Original story on biases in Pakistani education system
Info on the top schools in Pakistan (run or started by non-Muslims)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karachi_Grammar_School
This is so sad. What kind of future can these children (especially the girls) hope for? They will not have minds opened by wonder and education, but closed by an oppressive belief.
It is not even an ‘education’ it is the sort of indoctrination that we saw in the 20th century dictatorships. I can well imagine that the position for women and girls is far far worse, especially in some of the ‘tribal’ areas of Pakistan. Howver this lack of respect for education may well be something connected to the ideology and culture of Islam. When Britain ruled India the Indian Civil Service employed more Hindus than Muslims because there was more of an educational culture in other faiths than in Islam and such people were more suited to civil administration than those brought up in a Muslim culture.
The great tragedy of the partition of the sub continent was the fact that a) the British PM Clement Atlee was pushing for Britain to be rid of a colony that was looking like it was going to erupt into communal violence and b) we in Britain (or rather our security services) did not know that the father of Pakistan, Mohammed Ali Jinnah was dying of cancer. If Britain had known that Jinnah was on his way out then maybe a better more ordered split could have been made or even, as Mahatma Ghandi wanted, not split at all. Pakistan has been a failing state since creation.