Some were confused by my post about the Kashmiri woman stone thrower & reproached me for mocking Kashmiri women. Let me simply say it would be unthinkable that I would ever mock the men, women, & children on the front lines of freedom struggles. My post refers back to this reposted one from last month about the role of small children in Intifada.

Satire, including sarcasm & mockery, is the genre of the oppressed to reverse power relationships & prevent anger at injustice from souring into misdirected hatred. It is a genre I employ often against the oppressor, never against the oppressed who are our own. For them, there is only respect & solidarity.
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“Kashmiri Intifada:
You see this same kind of image of Palestinian children against Israeli soldiers. In Belfast in 1983, I saw many small boys taking rocks after armored vehicles of the occupying British army.

Some living sheltered lives get on a high horse & shake the naughty finger: “where are the parents?” To stop children from resisting occupation you would have to keep them locked up. Something about a child that doesn’t like an occupation–especially when children are the targets of pellet guns (Kashmir) or bombers (Gaza).

The tragedy here is not that children resist oppression but that the Indian government makes it necessary for them to do so & takes away their childhood in the process.

End the occupation. Self-determination for Kashm