(no subject)

[morwen]

does the fact that Tavistock Square, the site of bus bombing, features a statue of Gandhi in it count as irony?

Comments

[drjane.livejournal.com]

i found it more ironic that they happened to set off the bomb in front of a building absoloutely packed with doctors, who set up a triage and got to work straight away (BMA building).

like, maybe there were some feelings of abivalence from the bomber or something...

[ex-froodtheh193.livejournal.com]

I'm not so sure. He was Hindu and pressured for a separate state for Muslims, I imagine he was the first internationally revered rascist

[abigailb.livejournal.com]

No, Gandhi was very much an all-India kind of chap.

But he was also a fan of non-violent protest.

[hairyears.livejournal.com]

Gandhi? I would imagine him to be a figure of hatred for Moslems, educated and uneducated: the uneducated, simply for being a prominent unbeliever; and among the educated, for being the founder of a nation in which Moslems are governed by a 'heathen' majority.

This is anathema - or at least difficult - for Moslems, being subject to un-Islamic law; many regard such legal systems as inherently discriminatory against the faithful, others see them as fundamentally unjust and illegitimate. Saudi agitators - Wahhabites - promote the view that the entire concept of 'secular' law is blasphemous, and it is all too common, in Leicester and London alike, for mullahs to be brought in from 'the old country' who think it would be perfectly reasonable to revive the idea of mediaeval 'church courts' of sharia judges for the faithful in England. The situation in India isn't helped by the perversion of Gandhi's legacy in India, with unpleasant overtones of 'Hindutva', the guiding philosophy of Hindu supremacists who exist overtly in the BJP and insidiously in the (currently) ruling Congress Party.

[clarisinda.livejournal.com]

I thought that too. The garden in the middle of Tavistock Square is often described as a "peace garden" as there are other memorials etc. there too - somewhat ironic.

We *still* haven't been allowed back into our offices on Tav Square - rumour has it we'll get back in in the next couple of days as the bus was removed on Saturday though.