Well, Abdol-Hamid should know that the headscarf, hijab, burqa - you name it - has been traditionally used to keep women in their place. The more power you give to the Abdol-Hamids the more difficult the world becomes for the Hassiba Boulmerkas.

Should the Danes outlaw headscarves? Definitely not!

But do I understand why they might be nervous? You bet!

BTW, did you find a quote that might shed some light on Abdol-Hamid's stance on free speech vis-s-vis the cartoon fiasco? Enquiring minds would love to know.

India often goes way overboard in creating laws, especially when it comes to defending the "fairer sex". But, ultimately, that means zilch to the lives of women because laws in India are rarely meant to be executed.

You can escape the scourge of dowry if you are lucky enough to grow up in one of the more liberal metros where dowry is indeed a thing of the past, especally among the middle and upper classes. In the rest of the country, there are few marriages without some sort of dowry. Dowry is the reason for female foeticide (and a fat lot of good has been done by legislation!) - if you are unlucky enough to have a girl child, you spend your life saving money for her marriage.

We were told that education was our ticket out. Bullshit! In one of the premier technological institutions in the country, I watched my fellow students from the north spend their time preparing for civil services - apparently, in the hierarchy of dowry, civil servants were one of the top earners. In the silicon valley of India's south, I realized with horror that many female software engineers saved money to pay for their dowry. I know of a few of these marriages which ended in divorce - and the guys family walked away with the loot, laws notwithstanding.

However, for those of you who would use India's dowry system to crow about the superior culture of the west - give me a break! I had to travel all the way from the third world to the US to learn that it was uncool for a girl to study and enjoy studying math and physics.

Well, capitalist_pig....if you would really want to compare, maybe we could start comparing domestic violence between the two countries, date rapes, deadbeat dads, abortion rights (who ever thought that could be an issue in India?)....

You're the one who put up the strawman by equating "uncoolness" with such things as infanticide.

Did I, now? All I did was to point out that people making broad generalizations about Indian cultures might want to look at issues within their borders, as well. It was not meant to be a comparison between evils - although, based on my experience, the "uncoolness" I wrote about speaks to me about broader issues about the state of women and their pursuit of happiness in a country that is supposed to shine a leading light in all matters of personal freedom.

I do not want to compare. I think that comparing two nations who are at different stages in their development and have totally different colonial, religious, and ancient histories is ridiculous.

Great... we can agree on something, then. But this should have been the response to some letters written before I wrote mine.... maybe, they didn't irk you because they were less flippant?

The one thing that I do know about the U.S. is that we are unique in the ways we air our grievances.

This intrigues me! Had we not digressed far enough from the topic of the article, I might have asked for some explanation of this... What unique ways? Grievances within your borders or outside? I have to agree that dropping bombs on hapless people is a rather unique way of airing grievances - but there I go being flippant again...

Well, you have to give it to the Indian population that there was never a significant clamor for a Hindu version of "creationism" to be taught in schools or for the evolution teory to be pulled off. The nuttiest of the Hindu right probably accepts the different stories of creation as fables.

The problems with the nutso Hindu right (and I am not talking about the criminal variety that butchers people and destroys architectural sites) are

a. A collective persecution complex and a complete lack of humor (the world is out to slander us, a Ganesha on a T-shirt is an irreparable harm to our Great Ancient Culture...) - nowhere is this more obvious than on desi blogs and other internet sites

b. An insistence on how every field of knowledge originated in our Great Ancient Culture and the folks who wrote the Vedas know everything that is worth knowing today. There is a whole lot of kooky nonsense that goes by the name "Vedic Mathematics"

c. Xenophobia that guises itself as patriotism - with crazy theories, e.g., Aryan invasion was a myth, the Aryans actually originated in the land that is called India and migrated west.