The Question: The producers of the movie "The Kite Runner" had to evacuate three boy actors from Afghanistan because they were involved in a scene portraying homosexual rape. Who's at fault here: the movie producers who exposed the boys to danger, or the Afghan culture that threatens them?

I am a Pathan from the tribal areas of Pakistan, so perhaps this question poses difficult issues. From a modern perspective there is no doubt that the lack of tolerance, especially on artistic expressions, has been a matter of concern for people like me. I question whether the Afghans who have threatened the actors are suggesting that homosexuality doesn't happen in Afghanistan, or whether they are suggesting that exposing its existence is a crime. The reality is that homosexuality has been prevalent in Afghan culture for centuries, and proliferated especially during the Taliban years when contact between women and men was very difficult. In The Kite Runner, the homosexual rape is the contentious issue especially because a Taliban official commits it. The portrayal highlights the fact that often in Afghan society during times of war, captured enemy men were sodomized. As British officers from the Afghan wars would say: ‘Better to put a bullet through your own head then be taken prisoner.’

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The Question: What was the biggest news story in your country last year [in 2007], and why?

There’s no doubt that the assassination of Benazir Bhutto, in the twilight of the year, has become Pakistan’s biggest story of 2007. It would take a huge story indeed to overshadow the Gaza situation, the Iraqi insurgency, the U.S.-Iran nuclear standoff and Sheikh Mohammed of Dubai’s bold $1 billion fund to educate children. Each is a huge news story in its own right. Yet the death of a woman like Benazir Bhutto raises enormous questions as to the future course of Pakistan, and indeed the region.

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The Current Discussion: For Valentine’s Day, this question: What is the future of love?

Although our moderators asked this question in the interest of lightening up the debate, it comes across somewhat like asking as to the future of global warming, or the future of the U.S. economy. Perhaps our approach to life, love and happiness is too stunted to consider the esoteric elements of life anymore; is it in earnestness that we have commercialized Valentine’s Day and Christmas?

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The Current Discussion: Egypt has detained a number of its citizens for using the social networking site Facebook to organize anti-government protests. What online sites are most effective in influencing politics -- and is the impact positive?

In the context of Egypt, the government’s reaction to the use of sites like Facebook to influence politics within the country forms a broader pattern of media control. In essence Facebook, Hi5, and other social networking communities do get the wrath of governments on the basis of alleged erosion of 'social values'. This is a delicate subject for most of the emerging world, but I am not entirely sure that Facebook, per se, is known for being a platform for political dissent. For instance, the entire protest against General Musharraf's handling of Pakistan’s Judiciary, while absolutely high-handed, has not been reflected in places like Facebook. Yet blogs, other internet sites and even email e-blogs have become more effective mainly because they remain more targeted.

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The Current Discussion: France has rejected a citizenship application from a burqa-wearing Moroccan woman on the grounds that she has "insufficiently assimilated" to French culture. Should cultural assimilation be a requirement for citizenship?

Is cultural xenophobia a good thing? Has the concept of nation-state reached a point where rigid lines of acceptance or rejection become the sole driving force for cultural preservation? I can understand the overwhelming desire for people to protect their 'culture.' But in an interdependent world, 'assimilation' should absolutely not be the only criteria for immigration. While I personally do not think the veil is an issue and think it is and should continue to be a matter of personal choice, to use it as the sole reason for rejecting an applicant is short-sighted and closed-minded. As much as I did not agree with the Taliban forcing their style and view of Islam, I equally do not agree with the French using people’s preferences as a means to discriminate.

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The Current Discussion: A London publishing house was firebombed for agreeing to publish 'The Jewel of Medina', a controversial novel about Muhammad's wife, which Random House dropped earlier this year because it feared terrorist threats. In hindsight, was Random House in the right? Does this justify censorship of this kind in the future?

I am totally for free speech and have always spoken for it, and yet there are times when I have to use my conscience as a humanist to question when free speech is deliberately aimed at offending the sensitivities of communities and religious people. I would agree that religious people should be calm and not be too offended, especially by attacks that are clearly inconsequential to the essence of their faith, there must still be a measure of responsibility when we deal with historical elements and facts and their subsequent treatment into literary fiction. To argue that only Muslims are offended by blasphemy would be wrong, considering that even Christian nations have banned so-called literary works that have offended their faith. The recent controversy over the book on Aisha the favorite wife of Prophet Muhammad is a case in point. I have not read the book, so I have to rely on what various commentators who have read it has said thus far. When Prof Denise Spellberg made the point that the book is distorting historical fact to the point of creating soft pornography, I am tempted then to argue that free speech has gone too far. In the first place such distortion does us no good in understanding someone's, and secondly one has to question the motives of the writer and the publisher.

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The Current Discussion: How can we reduce our vulnerability to risks posed by global interconnectedness - from swine flu to financial contagion to terrorist threats? What risks do you see on the horizon?

We are often reminded that we live in a fragile world. At any moment, any of the nuclear armed countries could simply destroy all that is known to exist for humankind and take us back into the Dark Ages. That remains the greatest threat to human progress and determines how nations, societies and people make decisions. The pressure on countries seeking nuclear weapons has increased, but the willingness of existing nuclear states to seek disarmament has decreased.

The moral argument that some states are mature to possess nuclear weapons and others are not is nothing but social snobbery and conceit. We should actively seek total disarmament from nuclear weapons for ALL states. As Utopian as that may sound, the presence of nuclear weapons has actually increased limited wars and conflicts since 1945. Armed conflict has engulfed societies in a more fundamentally damaging war of attrition between nations, societies and religions. This battle for the minds of the next generation is being fought not on the streets and in the trenches, but on the Internet through the quiet subtle manipulation of the minds of young people. This has brought more intolerance to the world, whether right-wing fanatics in the U.S. or Israel or Kalashnikov-toting fanatics in Afghanistan, Pakistan or many countries in Africa.

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