More burning flags?

Dutch Member of Parliament (MP) Geert Wilders, leader of the right-wing Freedom Party, is scheduled to release a film that is critical of the Quran in the coming weeks.The film was expected to be released on 25 January, but Wilders announced on 18 January that he required at least two weeks to complete the film, suggesting a release date of 31 January or later. He is in discussions with Dutch television channels NOVA, EenVandaag, Netwerk and Het Gesprek over rights to broadcast the film.

Wilders has indicated that the film intends to portray the alleged fascism of the Quran.

I guess we should expect massive overreaction from my brethren, and of course forgetting that there have been and will be many criticisms of faith, regardless of what flavour it is.

People will believe what they want to believe. Right or wrong is a matter of opinion. But a simple principle taught to most of us as kids was that if someone bullies you, you should just ignore it and walk away. And bullies come from all cultures/belief systems/races. (In fact my kid sister still bullies me, but then she does buy me wicked presents, so its a small price to pay.)

Marriage counsellors offer the same advice, if you see an argument brewing, walk away and discuss it with a calm head later.

And of those readers who will only believe something if it comes from Quran/Sunnah, I’ll paraphrase:

If you get angry, sit down. If are still angry, lie down. If you are angry still, go and perform the ablution.

Usually the second of those works for me….Have you ever tried to be angry while lying down…not only do you look and sound ridiculous, I end up going to sleep as I’m so knackered nowadays!

Digestion complete in 8 weeks

We went for our 32 week checkup for baby No. 2 last week. All fun and games as we walked through torrential rain and walked dripping into the Women’s Wellness unit at Barnet General. The sight must have been impressive as the looks we got clearly said ‘Do you not have umbrellas where you come from?’

Anyway…I then had to go straight out into the rain as we had forgotten our notes at home. One hour later we went through an examination which was farcical, but more on that later.

So why digestion? Well when we found out we were pregnant, we had to stop Ruqaiiya from jumping on her Mum-Mum’s tummy.

‘Why?’ came the reply.

<cue much umm-ing and aah-ing about whether to discuss birds and bees with a 3 year old>

‘Oh! Did Mum-Mum EAT the baby?!??!’

<we both issue a sigh of relief as the answer has presented itself miraculously!>

‘Yes! That’s right…Mum-Mum ate the baby!’ we both cried.

Thereafter follows 9 months of constant reprimands for Mum-mum along the lines of ‘You should not eat babies Mum-Mum. If you are hungry you should tell Papa and he can make you something to eat. Like chocolate.’

So, given the baby has been eaten, it will be fully digested in approximately 8 weeks meaning that the nesting instinct has kicked in…and I feel the next few weeks may involve a little DIY.

Characterless?

2 Euphemisms I came across in my life for prostitutes are:

“Woman of Ill Repute” and my favourite “A Characterless woman”

So when I read something about prostitutes in Bangladesh (who are not really discussed in polite circles, but I guess that is the case in every country), I wonder whether these euphemisms apply.

The first probably does because it is effectively a judgement on the reputation of a person and that is always external to the person and how they are perceived. And despite what corporate culture says in the West, perception is not always reality.

However as for being Characterless, I would say the only reason it is true is because the women’s characters are probably beaten out of them, either physically or psychologically, but basic manners still exist. These womenwill welcome people into their lives and offer them something to drink. But they themselves readily admit that life in a brothel is not all that its cut out to be, despite how some working girls portray themselves in the West today, i.e. the ‘fictional’ Belle de Jour.

Wow!

Its been a long time since I’ve been writing…but finally after a few months of constant busy-ness (surely that has to be a word!), I am getting a little time to put electronic pen to paper.

Got a pressie from darling sister over the Winterval holidays*….one of these.

This means that I have promised that I will upload at least one picture to Flickr every day this year. Will be adding a Flickr feed soon.

Oh and baby number 2 is due in about 8 weeks. Time to look at environmentally friendly nappies.
*As Christmas is so obviously not politically correct. As a Muslim I honestly couldn’t give a rodent’s bottom about what its called, but I might as well pander to the PC crowd and also any Right Wingnuts who think Muslims eat babies.

Back in the UK now…

And it seems that the rain that everyone was whining about has disappeared…Also I’m thinking of taking up golf after getting a taste for it in KSA. It seems that the issue now is convincing the Mrs that it’s a good idea…

The Holocaust didn’t happen?

Recently I received a forwarded email (oh how I love those) which claimed that teaching of the Holocaust has been banned in UK schools.

So most of this stuff gets put straight into the junk folder and the person who forwarded gets a virtual slap for believing everything they read on the internet.

But it seems that this email has been round the houses quite a bit according to the BBC.

The MCB has in the past and as far as I know currently still do refuse to attend Holocaust memorial days, not as a sign of denial, but of a desire to include all other acts of genocide within this one memorial day. Whether it should be renamed to Genocide Memorial day or something I’ll leave to the politicians.

But actual denial of the Holocaust is a bit of a silly thing to do. Even if people claim that it is a ‘Jewish/Zionist/Christian’ conspiracy, I find it hard to believe that it didn’t happen because of the huge amount of evidence. And by denying it we are simply saying that most of the world’s population have been duped and I give them a little more credit than that.

On top of this Shaykh Hamza Yusuf presents a more lucid viewpoint, which clarifies what I think should be the normal Muslim’s position on this (hat tip to Hahmed). Basically it translates as ‘if enough people say something happened, then it happened, why waste time coming up with conspiracy theories.’

Muxlim TV goes into Beta

Muxlim TV (part of Muxlim.com) looks like it is into Beta now. I guess the content is focused on the Islamic, but I’m not sure how this content will be monitored (if at all). I’d be interested to see how much content gets put up there which is not in breach of copyright laws and also whether the Right Wing (of any religion) begins to hijack/hack the site.

As we know the sort of popularity that sites like YouTube and Metacafe enjoy, we should keep an eye on this to see how it takes off.

Power to the Pupil(s)

I loved this article on the BBC website which just shows that in this day and age people power does still exist. 13 year old Habiba Sultana was about to be married off to a 23-year old neighbour. But thanks to her fellow students who protested together with their parents the marriage was stopped by local police.

The age difference is not the issue here (how many eyebrows would be raised if she was 23 and he was 33?) The problem here, which the Bangladeshi authorities may have missed was that she may be being forced into the marriage. The Police ordered a stop to the marriage on legal grounds i.e. she was underage. But I guess it is too early for people to understand that forced marriages at any age are the wrong thing.

Crystal Balls? Pah…give me a test

I just came back from a few days in Horsley Towers on a management development course. So apart from running around the countryside we also had a few tests to determine personality types, or more accurately, natural tendencies. One of them was what is called a Myers-Briggs test. This involves answering a set of simple questions resulting in 4 letters being assigned to you. E or I S or N T or F J or P I came up as a borderline ENTJ or ENTP. None of this means that I cannot be a different person, but it seemed to indicate my natural state. Of course different moods and circumstances can affect this behaviour and how we react, but under stress, our natural state is what we return to. This piqued my interest and one of my colleagues started talking about something called an Enneagram. So she explained what it was and she told me I was a 3. I had no idea what she meant, so back in my hotel room I decided to take an enneagram test (of the many that are on the Internet) and surprise surprise, I came up as a 3. Are Astrologists missing a trick here? These seem to be fairly accurate and may not pretend to predict the future, but it certainly does help understand my own behaviour on occasion.

Return to Jahiliyah

For my non muslim readers, Jahiliyah is an arabic word refering to the time before the advent of Islam in Arabia. Literally I believe it means ‘Ignorance’. So despite the name sounding exotic, I’m pretty sure its not a place worth visiting. This was a rough time for all, but especially women.

The second Caliph of Islam, Umar Ibn Al Khattab, often recalled a story where he buried his daughter alive as was a common practice amongst the Arabs in pre-Islamic Arabia. After becoming a Muslim, he would often cry while remembering this act of his. The Arabs used to be disheartened and annnoyed with the birth of girls. The perception was that girls are useless in defending the family short of just screaming and shouting and would not bring money into the home. These beliefs allows for this evil practice so even the fear of poverty or disgrace was enough to push people into performing these heinous acts. In some traditions, it was also permissible to sell a daughter into effectively slavehood. In that context, the Qur’an states in a derogatory manner of occurences during the day of judgment:

“When the female child buried alive is questioned: For what reason were you killed?” (81:8-9)

and

“When news is brought to one of them, of (the birth of) a female (child), his face darkens, and he is filled with inward grief! With shame does he hide himself from his people, because of the bad news he has had! Shall he retain it on (sufferance and) contempt, or bury it in the dust? Ah! what an evil (choice) they decide on?” (16: 58-59)

As a father of a girl, whom I love like crazy, I am sick to my stomach whenever I read accounts of what used to happen before. And this morning I find myself experiencing the same feeling as I read the story of Abdul Rahman (who I’m guessing is a muslim, the name is a bit of a giveaway. In fact the name is a shocking misnomer in this instance meaning “The Servant of the All Merciful”).

Abdul Rahman, the Grandfather of this child decided to take it upon himself to bury her.

I have nothing more to add other than I feel sick.