By that what I meant was that all those 'intellectuals' who talk about the great 'ideals' of liberalism,open mindedness, freedom & secularism etc. without debating on whether their ideas are absolutely right or absolutely wrong, whether their vision is vague or there is absolute clarity in them; when it gets down to making real sacrifices for the ideals they are professing ; the past history & the present trend within this segment of the society strongly suggests they do not possess the strength of character to do so.
The religious extremists on the other hand irrespective of the fact that they are evil , inhuman & pursuing practices that can be rightly typecast as a form of religious perversion do have the conviction to go all the way here, I mean the foot soldiers of this movement & not necessarily their bosses. Therefore they cant be defeated by the secularist or the enlightened moderates.Its only the poor masses, which at the moment are the least influential in shaping the ideological character of our society but the choices they make will determine the future of Pakistan in the next 10 or so years.
What the secularists dont realize why they are at a great disadvantage to religion in inspiring this segment , is that the 'mazdoor' , rickshay/taxiwalas, the massis that work in their homes while they may have little knowledge about religion to follow it in any meaningful capacity, but when the 'rashan' in their homes finishes on the 20th of every month its only 'Allah Ka Assra' that lets them survive the next 10 days, when their child is severely sick & they dont have any money for providing medical care to their child its only 'Allah Ka Wasila' that provides them hope, when they are harassed by people with authority be it their local 'bhais','chaudharies' or thaneydars they can only look towards Allah for being their savior in this situation. Their circumstances , coupled with lack of concern & conviction of the 'enlightened' makes them more amenable to being motivated by religion if it reaches them in the right form.
Great! I see your point. Thanks. :-)
In the end silent masses get to pay the price for two opposite groups fighting each other.
Each group blames poor masses for lack of so called outcry!
A really funny word outcry indeed! :-)