Die heutige FAZ:

“… veröffentlichte die Zeitung ‘El País’ Auszüge aus den Tagebüchern Mussolinis, die seine Geliebte Claretta Petacci verwahrt hatte und die jetzt in Buchform auf den Markt kommen. Darin wird der Duce mit diesen wenig schmeichelhaften Worten über die Spanier und ihren Caudillo zitiert: ‘Franco ist ein Idiot. Die Spanier sind apathisch, gleichgültig und haben viel von den Arabern. Sie haben Spanien bis 1480 beherrscht. Acht Jahrhunderte islamischer Dominanz. Hier ist der Grund, warum sie so viel essen und schlafen.’”

Diese Bemerkung hebt sich doch sehr wohltuend von der blinden Mohammedanisten-Begeisterung monarchistischer und nationalsozialistischer Kreise seinerzeit in Deutschland ab (1) – wiewohl der “Duce” (Führer, 2) im Gegensatz zu “El Caudillo” (Führer) Franco (3), der sein Land 36 Jahre lang diktatorisch im Würgegriff halten konnte, schon 1945 erschossen wurde. Vor ihm erschossen wurde Claretta Petacci (4), die nur eine von mehreren Geliebten des Scheusals war, und über die Wiki Anrührendes zu berichten weiß: “Als Mussolini gefangen genommen wurde, gab man Clara Petacci die Möglichkeit zur Flucht, aber sie lehnte ab und versuchte hingegen, ihn mit ihrem Körper vor den Kugeln zu schützen. Mussolini wurde kurz nach ihr erschossen.”

Nicht nur Faschisten werden hin und wieder geliebt, diese edelste aller Emotionen soll bisweilen sogar bei Mohammedanisten zu beobachten sein. Ayaan Hirsi Ali (5) suchte Familienmitglieder in einem Flüchtlingslager und erlebte folgende Szene:

“Mahamed sagte, Mahamuuds Frau sei ganz in der Nähe, und den Kindern gehe es gut. Er nahm seinen Bruder beim Arm, und wir gingen weiter. Mahamuuds Frau sah ihn schon von weitem und lief uns entgegen, um uns zu begrüßen. Als sie sich ihm in die Arme warf, brach sie in Tränen aus. Es war erste Mal, daß ich ein somalisches Ehepaar seine Liebe so offen zeigen sah. Sie umarmten sich, streichelten einander das Gesicht, weinten und ließen nicht los. Die Kinder kamen herbeigerannt und klammerten sich an die beiden. Es war ein sehr anrührender Moment der Freude und der Tränen, und Mahamed und ich wandten uns taktvoll ab.”

Ich möchte behaupten, daß der Counterjihad nicht in erster Linie ein Kampf gegen Menschen ist, sondern vor allem einer gegen eine bösartige Ideologie, die Menschen dazu bringt, Böses zu tun und dies für Gutes zu halten. Aber Menschen sind wir natürlich alle miteinander, und am Ende wartet auf uns alle der Sarg (Dem “Caudillo” ließ die Familie übrigens 1975 nach einem Herzinfarkt gemäß dem Motto “genug ist genug” die lebenserhaltenden Maschinen abstellen).

Auch wenn manche Mohammedanisten wissen, was Liebe ist, ist der Mohammedanismus gleichwohl eine Ideologie des Hasses, des Hasses auf sich selbst und des Hasses auf alle anderen, auf alles, was lebt, auf alles was ist – die stärkste und eindeutigste Manifestation aller Zeiten des Nihilismus und der Angst. Ali Sina (6): “But how can you move an inch if you are paralyzed by the fear of hell? That psychopath did a pretty good job on his followers. They are reduced into zombies unable to think on their own. It is fear that paralyzes you.”

Ex-Mohammedanist Ali Sina hat Religion von ihrer schaurigsten Seite kennengelernt, ich die christliche hingegen von ihrer freundlichsten durch meine liebevollen Eltern. Ich habe keine Angst, weder vor den läppischen Killer-Orks, noch vor Gott, der mich liebt, der meine Mühe sieht, und der mir meine Fehler vergibt. GOTT führt uns in die FREIHEIT!

Time am 22. November 2009

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(1) http://madrasaoftime.wordpress.com/2009/10/18/wir-brauchen-die-turkei/

—  http://madrasaoftime.wordpress.com/2009/05/02/nazislamisten/

(2) http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mussolini

(3) http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Franco

(4) http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clara_Petacci

(5) Ayaan Hirsi Ali, “Mein Leben, meine Freiheit”, Piper 2006, S. 221

(6) http://www.faithfreedom.org/islam/protecting-feelings-muslims

When I started this blog, my main intention was to have a place to put all my short stories that were rejected by various publications. After a few weeks of blogging, a term I still sort of detest, I have gotten obsessed with the goddamned stats page. I can’t figure it out. What the fnuk does people really want to read about? It seems completely random. One day a post gets a fair amount of traffic, but then no one reads it ever again. I started to write about my boring life, I wrote about movies and I wrote about dogs. The posts were all successful and apparently reached all the 7 people that were interested in those subjects. I check my stats page around 36 times a day. I google how to get hits, but haven’t found anything worth while. The stupid thing is that there isn’t really any payoff for me if my blog suddenly became slightly more popular. I have received some comments on some of my posts, and I do appreciate them. It’s nice to know that I’m not just shouting at the moon, that there is in fact someone out there who’s read and enjoyed something I’ve put some time in. Some time on? Some time in? –This is what I hate about blogging, and there’s that word again. You get hung up on a few words, say them over and over again until neither version sounds right and you end up tossing the fucker. Then you re-write the sentence, only this time avoiding at all costs that phrase or series of words that made you tongue-tied in the first place.

I guess I should be topical or at least politically inclined and have some opinions about stuff. That’s what other people blog about. Believe me I’ve tried. I follow the news quite closely, have a few newspapers delivered to me daily and browse cnn.com’s headlines. The problem is that I don’t really care. No, let me rephrase. The problem is that you don’t really care. I mean you can get the real story, so why waste your time with my watered down version. It’ll be basically the same. Sure I’ll add the occasional shit, fuck, piss and cunt to any news story, but other than that, I really wouldn’t be giving you anything new. I work around 90% of the time from home. This gives me plenty of time to write in-depth stories about Islam, but I wont… Why? –Because we´re not fucking allowed!!! I had to think twice about writing that previous sentence. If this isn’t a reason NOT to get out of Afghanistan, I don’t know what is. We are being bullied by these… I don’t know. I don’t know what to say. I’m serious, what am I going to call them? You know who I’m talking about. That big group of religious folks. –Did you know that the director of that new movie 2012 wanted a car or something to land on a praying muslim, but the screenwriter refused. Why? –Because he didn’t want a fatwa on his head. A fatwa is basically a ruling from a religious leader, calling all arms to kill this guy. It has happened many times before and it will happen again.

Theo Van Gogh was a Dutch film director, who worked with writer Ayaan Hirsi Ali to produce the film Submission, which analyzed the treatment of women in Islam. Some claimed the film was critical of Islam, and On November 2nd, 2004 he was assassinated by Mohammed Bouyeri, a Dutch Muslim.

How is this picture relevant you ask? –It is not a pretty picture, and I think I mentioned the war in Afghanistan...

Let me paint a picture here for you. Imagine riding your bicycle to work. You’re probably thinking about your twelve year old daughter and how nice the weather is. It is November and with Christmas around the corner, you start to think about your family. The in-laws are probably coming over on Christmas Eve. You’re not too thrilled, but your daughter likes it and it is important for your wife, so you oblige them. Silly feuds over the in-laws. Deep inside you actually love them. The slightly dimwitted mother and the father that speaks too much. Whatever flaws they have, they produced a daughter that wanted to marry you and together you have this beautiful child. It’s going to be a nice day at the office today. You have on that special shirt. The one that makes you look a little thinner.

November 2nd, 2004.

Boom! You have never heard a real gunshot before, but you know this was the real thing. It all happens so fast. Before you can feel the first bullet that ripped through you, seven more gunshots are heard and seven more bullets enter your body. You think that the last five might’ve only been echoes. They weren’t. It doesn’t hurt. There wasn’t time. The bike vanishes from underneath you. You feel like you’re floating down on the hard pavement. When you hit the pavement, it feels like landing on a giant marshmallow. A voice inside you tells you that everything is alright, that there isn’t any need to be worried. Finally, what was blurry faded out softly, and you are no more. You have died, but you are still hanging around. It all seems so perfectly clear to you that you don’t even question what is going on. You might be waiting for someone to come and claim you from above or you might be hanging around in case the paramedics bring the defibrillator. Either way, you hear footsteps coming closer. There’s nothing you can do at this point. Here comes the knife and it’s sawing your head off. If that wasn’t enough. If the eight bullets and decapitation wasn’t enough, you get stabbed in the chest. Then another knife appears and stabs you again, this time through a five age letter the madman has written. You are left on the streets with two knives implanted in your torso, one attaching the five page letter covered in blood,  and it starts to rain…  You think about the movie you made. Was it really that good? You can’t reason with these people, and I might have to down a bottle of gin before I have the balls to post this thing on my blog. I don’t know. If my father knew that I’d even mentioned Theo van Gogh, he’d panic and beg me to delete everything. Theo was the great grandson of another Theo van Gogh, who was the brother of a certain Vincent van Gogh. Imagine that. Yes the picture I painted was a true story, if you didn’t understand. Jesus… I mean Muhammad… I mean… –I don’t know what to say…

Now I’m just depressed again. Dammit. For those of you who don’t know, I’m bi-polar… Yesterday I had to eat an entire Ben&Jerry’s chocolate fudge something or other.

Ser inte så stor skillnad på dessa religioner båda tillhör de abrahamitiska religionerna , bokens folk som de kallas inom Islam. Religionerna har samma rötter och delar många gemensamma värderingar, föreställningar och berättelser.

En viktig pelare inom Islam är att hjälpa de fattiga, så att de gör sjukhusbesök i religionens namn kan knappast vara anmärkningsvärt som tycks framstå av artikeln, skulle dock vara intressant och se om de bedriver verksamhet bland andra än sina egna trosfränder.

Inom kristendomen så är ett bekant fenomen att “hjälpa fattiga” som egentligen är förtäckt evangelisation.

ÖP skriver “– De visar också att muslimska församlingar samarbetar med omgivningen och främjar integrationen., förstår inte hur det skulle gå till. Islam är vetenskapsfientlig och strävar inte efter ett sekulariserat samhälle, så ser inte hur de skulle kunna främja integration i ett sekulariserat samhälle. Det enda som främjar integration är ett förbud mot konfessionella skollor och tankestyrning av barn.

Media: Dagen, ÖP

Ayaan Hirsi Ali:

Als ich dort ankam, waren Theos bester Freund Theodore Holman und sein Produzent Gijs van Westerlaken bei Theos Leichnam. Es waren keine Anzeichen für Gewalt zu sehen. Theo war gekleidet wie immer, hatte Rollkragenpullover und weite Hosen an. Ich suchte nach Hinweisen auf die Tortur, der er ausgesetzt gewesen war, doch sein Gesicht war friedlich; es gab nicht einmal einen blauen Fleck oder einen Kratzer. Seine Lippen umspielte ein kleines, sardonisches Lächeln. Er schien mir friedlicher und ruhiger, als ich ihn je erlebt hatte. Ich berührte seine Schulter und küßte ihn auf die Stirn. »Was ich getan habe tut mir leid«, sagte ich.

»Nicht doch, Ayaan«, sagte Theodore. »Wenn Theo noch am Leben wäre, würden ihn deine Worte verletzen. Er wollte nicht im Bett sterben. Nach ‘Submission’ kam er sich vor wie ein Ritter auf seinem Schlachtroß. Er ist in einem Kampf um die Meinungsfreiheit gestorben, und dafür hat er auch gelebt. Es wäre viel schlimmer gewesen, wenn ihn der Krebs zerfressen hätte oder wenn er von einem Auto überfahren worden wäre. Sein Tod hatte einen Sinn. Er war auch mein Freund, und ich möchte nicht, daß du traurig bist, weil Theo auf diese Art gestorben ist.«

Time am 2. November 2009

_____

http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theo_van_Gogh

Ayaan Hirsi Ali, “Mein Leben, meine Freiheit”, Piper 2007

Today is the 5th anniversary of the death of Theo van Gogh. He was a Dutch film director who worked with Ayaan Hirsi Ali on the film Submission.

The short film investigates violence against women in some Muslim societies. The script was written by Ayaan Hirsi Ali who was involved in social work amongst abused Muslim women in Europe.

After the film’s screening van Gogh and Hirsi Ali received death threats. On November 2, 2004, Van Gogh was murdered by Mohammed Bouyeri. Bouyeri shot him eight times, cut his throat, nearly decapitating him, and stabbed him in the chest. A five-page note threatening Western governments, Jews and Ayaan Hirsi Ali was attached to Van Gogh’s chest with a knife.

Since that time Ayaan Hirsi Ali has been under constant guard, and moved to the USA for some time. Bouyeri is currently serving a life sentence.

Ayaan Hirsi Ali wrote the book Infidel – I can highly recommend it. Brought up a Muslim she is now an atheist. Currently she is writing a fictional book where Mohamed is confronted by some well known Western enlightenment intellectuals. Should be good.

See also: Submission video

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Islam again has to silence the truth,ruling by fear and threats because if it doesn’t,muslims will begin to think for themselves.

In 2004 the dutch film maker Theo Van Gogh was murdered by a muslim, the reason?. . . . this film made from a ten minute script. On a paper attached to the knife buried in Vangoghs chest was the name of the next victim Ayaan Hirsi Ali- the script writer.We owe them our gratitude.

The body of Theo VanGogh  RIP

Book Review: The New Atheism: Taking a Stand for Science and Reason by Victor Stenger

Price: US$12.92
Paperback: 282 pages
Publisher: Prometheus Books (September 22, 2009)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1591027519
ISBN-13: 978-1591027515

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This book is timely. The “New Atheism” hit our awareness in the mid-part of the decade when Sam Harris’s book “The End of Faith” became a best-seller. This was quickly followed by more best-sellers from the authors Daniel Dennett, Richard Dawkins, Christopher Hitchens and Victor Stenger (the author of this book). And then there was the response. Many books have been written, mostly be theists, attacking the “New Atheists.” Although none of the later was a best-seller they did suggest that a new stage in the religion-atheism debate was underway.

Stenger’s new book is also useful because it helps put this whole debate in context. He summarises that nature of the “New Atheism movement” (although it is hardly a movement as there was no coordination in publishing these books). He briefly summarises the arguments of the “New Atheism” and the arguments employed by those attacking “New Atheism.” Then he shows the fallacies in the arguments employed by the “New Christians.” In some cases he reveals the way many of the “New Atheist” positions have been distorted and misrepresented. In others he deals with the substance of these arguments – particularly those dealing with scientific issues.

As an Emeritus Professor of Physics and Astronomy at the University of Hawaii and Adjunct Professor of Philosophy at the University of Colorado Stenger is an ideal person to write on this subject

The nature of New Atheism

Most of the New Atheists recognise the 2001 religiously motivated terrorist attacks in New York helped spur them to action. I suspect they were also reacting against the religious bullying characteristic of the time. Islamic threats to authors like Salman Rushdie and Ayaan Hirsi Ali. Christian Right attacks on abortion rights, gender rights, stem cell research and teaching evolutionary science.

I am somewhat cynical about the term “New Atheism” – as if we had suddenly discovered the subject. And the label has probably come from the critics, anyway. But there are some specific characteristics to the current wave of atheist revival worthy mentioning.

Stenger points out the well-known New Atheists are mostly science based. Sam Harris (The End of Faith – 2004 and Letter to a Christian Nation – 2006) has a degree in philosophy and is working on a Ph D in neuroscience. Richard Dawkins (The God Delusion – 2006) is a well-known biologist with years of research and science popularisation behind him. Victor J. Stenger (God: The Failed Hypothesis – 2007) has a long research career in physics and astronomy and has written several books popularising and defending science. Daniel Dennett (Breaking the Spell: Religion as a Natural Phenomenon – 2006) is a philosopher of science who has written extensively on scientific subjects. And while Christopher Hitchens (God Is Not Great – 2007) is not a scientist he does defend and use science in his debates.

Ayaan Hirsi Ali (Infidel – 2006) is sometimes included as a New Atheist. While her professional qualifications are in humanities rather than science she identifies strongly with many of the positions taken by the others.

New Atheist issues

These include:

God is a scientific question: After all science studies reality, statements of fact. This is implicitly conceded by many religious apologists who use science-based reasoning such as the “fine-tuning” and “big bang” arguments for the existence of their gods. Most theologians, however, strongly oppose this, preferring to keep their god safe from scientific investigation.

Religious claims should not be protected by false respect: They call for such claims to be discussed, debated and submitted to rational inquiry in the same way we do with scientific, political and sporting claims. Religion should not be allowed to make claims about reality but deny rational investigation of such claims. Faith should not be given a free pass.

This assertiveness is a characteristic feature of the “New Atheists” – one which has annoyed some other atheists as well as believers. Even some atheists accept the argument that religion has a special place and its claims should be protected against rational inquiry and normal human discussion.

Faith itself is a problem: Even when held by moderates. Promotion, even glorification, of faith is dangerous as it provides a base for extremists to justify antihuman actions. To some extent even the moderate believers must bear responsibility for supporting extremism if they promote faith against reason.

Proud defence of science and reason: They will assert these principles and oppose any attempt to make a place for those who wish to undermine science or claim territory for religion that it doesn’t deserve. This has helped disperse the idea that science and religion should be placed in separate compartments, “non-overlapping magisterial (NOMA)” (see Morals, values and the limits of science).

Stenger describes the position of many scientists and their organisations that science has nothing to say about gods and the supernatural as disingenuous. This is important today when religious apologists try to distort and misrepresent science to provide “evidence” for their gods.

Consciousness-raising: They have all been active in the consciousness-raising of people for atheism and reason. Their books, appearances, videos, lectures, etc., attract huge attention and have helped atheists to “come out” and publicly acknowledge their beliefs.

Human and democratic rights: The “New Atheists” have all spoken in defence of human and democratic rights. They have been assertive on these issues when many liberals have preferred to acquiesce against Islamic and other religious threats and customs in the belief they were advancing multiculturalism

The hostile response

The richarddawkins.net web site estimates publication of about 40 books attacking the “New Atheists,” mainly in response to Dawkins “The God Delusion.” Study of “New Atheism” and “The God Delusion” have even been incorporated into some theological education programmes.

Stenger discusses some of the reaction by authors like John Haught (God and the New Atheism: A Critical Response to Dawkins, Harris, and Hitchens – 2008), Dinesh D’Souza (What’s So Great about Christianity – 2007) and Alister McGrath (The Dawkins Delusion?: Atheist Fundamentalism and the Denial of the Divine – 2007). Many of their arguments and claims are of course straw men and easily disposed of. However, Stenger does devote several chapters to subjects like the problem of evil, supernatural claims, the nature of science, faith and evidence, compatibility of religious and scientific views, human consciousness, morality and “being good without a god.”

This makes the book useful as a summary of the whole subject providing the arguments of both sides on all the important areas.

Some scientific issues

I was personally pleased that Stenger provides authoritative and informed rejection of some of the religious apologetics attacks on, and misrepresentation of, science used by these “New Christians.” He demolishes the arguments for a god based on formation of the universe (the “big bang” and “the singularity”) and “fine-tuning” of physical constants. I discussed the first issue (the cosmological argument) in Godless cosmology.

Stenger argues far more believers accept the cosmological design agenda behind the “fine-tuning” argument than biological intelligent design (ID). Theologians who won’t have a bar of ID will use “fine-tunign” arguments. However, he shows that is wishful thinking, that many of the claimed examples of “fine-tuning” just are not true (see Fiddling with “fine-tuning”) and the argument usually assumes that physical constants can be varied independently.

I also like the way he rejects the claim made by apologists, and some defenders of science, that science cannot study the “supernatural.” That the scientific paradigm restricts itself to only natural phenomena.  “Is this supposed to mean that scientists would ignore a miracle if they saw one?” I would add of course not! They would rush to investigate it with thoughts of Nobel Prizes in mind. After all – what are miracles but phenomena that appear to defy natural logic because we don’t yet understand them? And investigation and understanding are what scientists specialise in.

Critics of the New Atheists often accuse them of “scientism” – the idea “that science is the only means that can be used to learn about the world and humanity”. I have been accused of that myself. So am pleased Stenger disposes of this charge with the assertion these critics “cannot quote a single new atheist who has said that. We fully recognise the value of and participate in other realm of thought and activity such as art, music, literature, poetry, and moral philosophy. At the same time, where observed phenomena are at issue, we insist that scientific method has a proper role. This includes questions of the supernatural and the existence of any god who actively engages in the affairs of the universe.”

Another chauvinistic Christian assertion Stenger denies is that Christianity was somehow responsible for the rise of modern science. “Maybe, as many Christian apologists claim, Western religions helped science develop by their own looking outward for God. However, I am not ready to give religion too much credit since science goes back centuries before Jesus to the axial age in Greece.”

Eastern religion

Stenger supports suggestions from Sam Harris and Susan Blackmore that atheists should appreciate some of the insights of Buddhism and others spiritualists and mystics of the east. They believe these can help us in understanding of our own minds and in developing a calm attitude towards life. Practises such as meditation can be stripped of their dogma and supernatural explanations and help encourag mental health.

There is little to fault with this book. Stenger writes in his usual style. A style that is readable, economical and clear. One rather parochial criticism – he is wrong in his claim that atheists form a majority in New Zealand. The 2006 census showed 32% of the population claiming no religion. Statistics on belief are always difficult to obtain and interpret and unfortunately he does not provide a reference for his assertion.

So, take that with a grain of salt. But if the subject interests you, whatever, your personal religious belief, this is a book you should read.

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See also: Quantum Gods my review of Quantum Gods: Creation, Chaos, and the Search for Cosmic Consciousness.

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Il m’arrive souvent de chambrer le Canada sur Twitter, en raison de ses nombreuses atteintes aux droits des personnes en matière notamment de terrorisme (songez à Maher Arar) et de son alignement aveugle sur l’interventionnisme étatsunien. C’est surtout parce que le Canada, tout comme les Pays-Bas (Pim Fortuyn, Geert Wilders, Ayaan Hirsi Ali) et le Danemark (Dansk Folkeparti), voire même le Royaume-Uni, symbolise parfaitement cette étonnante dérive d’un certain libéralisme vers un autoritarisme fondé sur l’atlantisme, la lutte anti-terroriste et la xénophobie (et plus particulièrement l’islamophobie). Ce qui caractérise ce libéralisme autoritaire c’est qu’il est éclectique: il pourra ainsi être en pointe en matière de parité hommes/femmes ou des droits des homosexuels, tout en votant avec enthousiasme des lois liberticides, des invasions ou bombardements de pays étrangers (de préférence musulmans) et comporter un discours et une pratique de plus en plus xénophobe ou islamophobe.

Mais dans certains cas, le libéralisme initial a encore de beaux restes: c’est malgré tout le cas du Canada, célèbre pour sa tolérance qui va jusqu’à défendre le droit pour un élève sikh de porter son poignard rituel, le kirpan, en classe (décision du 2 mars 2006 de la Cour suprême du Canada dans l’affaire Multani c. Commission scolaire), mais dont la principale contribution au multi-culturalisme est sans conteste la notion d’accomodement raisonnable.

Voici une définition officielle de ce concept:

Accommodement raisonnable
Arrangement qui relève de la sphère juridique, plus précisément de la jurisprudence; il vise à assouplir l’application d’une norme en faveur d’une personne menacée de discrimination en raison de particularités individuelles protégées par la loi.

Une commission canadienne, présidée par le célébrissime philosophe québecois Charles Taylor ainsi que par son collègue francophone Gérard Bouchard à l’instigation du premier ministre du Québec Jean Charest, s’est ainsi penchée sur la question après des réunions publiques généralement assez déprimantes pour les tenants du multi-culturalisme. Appelée officiellement la Commission de consultation sur les pratiques d’accommodement reliées aux différences culturelles (CCPARDC) et officieusement la commission Taylor-Bouchard, cette commission était chargée d’apporter une réponse à la conciliation des identités religieuses, ethniques et linguistiques différentes au Québec. Un volumineux rapport final ainsi qu’une série d’études spécifiques ont couronné ses travaux, y compris 37 recommandations concrètes. Pour leur mise en oeuvre, par contre, on repassera.

Cette notion est bien sûr d’actualité non seulement au Québec ou au Canada, mais aussi en Belgique – le militant des droits de l’homme Henri Goldman appelle sur son blog  la Belgique - où une vague de mesures inspirées par la laïcité à la française, très différente du principe de neutralité reconnu par la Constitution belge – à s’inspirer des accommodements (ou aménagements) raisonnables à la québecoise plutôt que de la loi scélérate d’interdiction du voile adoptée en France:

de toute façon, nous n’échapperons pas à un débat serein sur ce qu’on préfère appeler, dans la tradition juridique européenne, des « aménagements raisonnables » |2|. Ce concept appartient désormais pleinement au droit communautaire de la non-discrimination, tel qu’il a été transposé en droit belge par la loi « anti-discrimination » du 10 mai 2007. Ces nouvelles dispositions étendent dans une large mesure les dispositifs de lutte contre les discriminations raciales à d’autres motifs : l’âge, l’orientation sexuelle, l’état civil, la naissance, la fortune, les convictions religieuses, philosophiques ou politiques, la langue, l’état de santé actuel ou futur, un handicap, une caractéristique physique ou génétique, le sexe, la grossesse, l’accouchement, la maternité, le changement de sexe, en plus des critères « classiques » de la nationalité, de la prétendue race, de la couleur de peau, de l’ascendance et de l’origine nationale, ethnique ou sociale |3|.

Ce droit distingue classiquement deux formes de discriminations, selon qu’elles sont directes (c’est-à-dire qu’elles visent directement une ou plusieurs catégories de personnes) ou indirectes. Dans ce cas, la discrimination n’apparaît pas parmi les buts visés d’une disposition apparemment neutre poursuivant un but légitime, mais il en résulte pourtant un désavantage particulier pour certaines personnes relevant d’une catégorie reprise par la loi. Dans certains cas, il est possible de changer la disposition pour supprimer la discrimination sans nuire au but poursuivi. Dans d’autres, c’est impossible.

C’est ici qu’intervient la notion d’aménagement raisonnable : on examine s’il est possible de supprimer cette discrimination par des dispositions particulières s’appliquant aux personnes victimes des discriminations indirectes. Et c’est ici que les discussions commencent, car certains aménagements proposés peuvent relever de ce qu’on appelle une « contrainte excessive ». Par exemple, des personnes handicapées en chaise roulante ne peuvent accéder par leurs propres moyens au sommet du beffroi de Bruges, ce qui constitue incontestablement une discrimination indirecte à leur égard. Mais l’aménagement qui pourrait faire disparaître cette discrimination – la construction d’un ascenseur parallèle à la tour – est à l’évidence une contrainte excessive à cause de son coût exorbitant et parce qu’elle défigurerait un monument historique. Mais tous les aménagements n’ont pas cette évidence, d’où un large champ de débats.

Et les accomodements raisonnables au Maroc, ça donnerait quoi? Sans doute une abrogation de l’article 222 du Code pénal réprimant la rupture publique du jeûne par une personne notoirement connue pour son appartenance à la religion musulmane, une dépénalisation des relations sexuelles entre personnes du même sexe ou personnes non mariées (article 490 du Code pénal) et la suppression de l’interdiction pour les Marocaines musulmanes d’épouser un non-musulman (article 39 du Code de la famille), sans parler de la question des prénoms berbères. Mais de l’autre côté, l’interdiction de mesures discriminatoires contre les femmes voilées, les hommes barbus ou les chiites.

Je vous l’avais bien dit, cette notion d’accommodement raisonnable est intéressante…

A funny thing happened on the way to the internet today. First I ran across Time Magazine’s special report on the “State of the American Women”. And then I read an LA Times interview with Ayaan Hirsi Ali, the controversial author of Infidel: My Life.

Ali was born into a Somali Muslim family and sought asylum in the Netherlands, where she wrote the screenplay for a film about women’s treatment under Islam. There’s much more to her story, but to cut to the chase: Theo van Gogh, the filmmaker, was killed shortly after the film aired, and Ali has been under threat of death by Islamic fundamentalists ever since. She now lives under guard in the U.S., and works for the conservative American Enterprise Institute.

Two different views of the women’s movement: the first, how far we’ve come. The second, what we’ve ignored. Another wake up call? Put the two together and it helps you put your own private angst in perspective.

But let’s start with TIME. In the lead essay, Nancy Gibbs provides an overview of a survey on gender issues conducted by TIME and the Rockefeller Foundation. Gibbs tracked our progress — and the work ahead:

In 1972 only 7% of students playing high school sports were girls; now the number is six times as high. The female dropout rate has fallen in half. College campuses used to be almost 60-40 male; now the ratio has reversed, and close to half of law and medical degrees go to women, up from fewer than 10% in 1970. Half the Ivy League presidents are women, and two of the three network anchors soon will be; three of the four most recent Secretaries of State have been women. There are more than 145 foundations designed to empower women around the world, in the belief that this is the greatest possible weapon against poverty and disease; there was only one major foundation (the Ms. Foundation) for women in 1972. For the first time, five women have won Nobel Prizes in the same year (for Medicine, Chemistry, Economics and Literature). We just came through an election year in which Hillary Clinton, Sarah Palin, Tina Fey and Katie Couric were lead players, not the supporting cast. And the President of the United States was raised by a single mother and married a lawyer who outranked and outearned him.

It is still true that boardrooms and faculty clubs and legislatures and whole swaths of professions like, say, hedge-fund management remain predominantly male; women are about 10% of civil engineers and a third of physicians and surgeons but 98% of kindergarten teachers and dental assistants, and they still earn 77 cents on the dollar compared with men. They are charged higher premiums for health insurance yet still have greater out-of-pocket expenses for things as basic as contraception and maternity care. At times it seems as if the only women effortlessly balancing their jobs, kids, husbands and homes are the ones on TV.

Still, Gibbs ends by implying that those gender wars? So over. At least if you are American and middle class.

All the shapes in the puzzle are shifting. If there is anything like consensus on an issue as basic as how we live our lives as men and women, as lovers, parents, partners, it’s that getting the pieces of modern life to fit together is hard enough; something has to bend. Equal numbers of men and women report frequent stress in daily life, and most agree that government and businesses have failed to adjust to the changes in the family. As the Old Economy dissolves before our eyes, men and women express remarkably similar life goals when asked about the importance of money, health, jobs and family. If male jobs keep vanishing, if physical strength loses its workplace value, if the premium shifts ever more to education, in which achievement is increasingly female, then we will soon be having parallel conversations: What needs to be done to free American men to realize their full potential? You can imagine the whole conversation flipping in a single generation.

It’s no longer a man’s world. Nor is it a woman’s nation. It’s a cooperative, with bylaws under constant negotiation and expectations that profits be equally shared.

Our work here is done? Well, not quite. But we’re getting there, according to another TIME essay by Maria Shriver. In “The Unfinished Revolution,” she first reflects on what she learned from her mother, Eunice Kennedy Shriver, a road warrior for the role of smart and independent women in American society. Stepping back into her role as journalist, Shriver talked to women across the country and found them incredibly stressed about their families, their finances and work-life balance.

While there’s much to cheer about these days on the equality front, we still have a long way to go. Women still don’t make as much as men do for the same jobs. The U.S. still is the only industrialized nation without a child-care policy. Women are still being punished by a tax code designed when men were the sole breadwinners and women the sole caregivers. Sexual violence against women still is a huge issue. Women still are disproportionately affected by a lack of health-care services. And lesbian couples and older women are among the poorest segments of our society.

Which brings me back to my mother. I know for sure that if she were alive today, she’d say of this report, “It’s about time!” In articles published after her death, so many people were quoted as saying, “If only Eunice had been a man, she could have been President!” “If only.” My mother learned from that. Her message to women was “Don’t let society tame you or contain you.” Today she could run for President. And I believe she would win.

Well, then. Kinda makes you want to slap yourself on the back and hum the iconic advertising jingle — “You’ve come a long way, Baby” — that once linked feminism to skinny cigarettes. Until, that is, you juxtapose TIME’s assessment of women’s progress with Ali’s view — the LA Times piece was entitled “Feminism’s Freedom Fighter”. From the interview:

Will any country ever go to war for rights and women’s safety?

It looks like it will not happen. But I am very, very optimistic — not about going to war but about human beings changing their minds. You’ll remember how communism was stigmatized. The big problem is [how] to define the protection of women’s rights as the problem of the 21st century. If the world does that, [women's inequality] will become like the eradication of apartheid — people will insist that it’s wrong, it’s wrong, it’s wrong, and that’s when change happens.

What changes people?

I’ll give you an example. The Sudanese woman who decided to wear trousers, and when the world rallied to her support, she doesn’t get the lashes. It is this kind of unbending persistence. Human trafficking — girls kidnapped and then forced into prostitution — that is economic exploitation. That can be eradicated by going after the traffickers, by providing education and eradicating poverty. Where women are put in veils, where their genitals are cut, where there’s “honor killing,” where half the population may not go outside without a male guardian — that cannot be dealt with only by talking about poverty. You have to tackle those principles.

We fight for flex-time. She fights against honor killings. Made me think. You?

Há livros dos quais não consigo fazer uma resenha logo após sua leitura porque seu impacto é tão grande que não me sinto com a distância necessária para escrever de maneira mais ou menos lúcida, sem muita rapsódia, sobre o texto em questão.  Esta foi a minha experiência com o livro Infiel: a história de uma mulher que desafiou o Islã, de Ayaan Hirsi Ali [São Paulo, Cia das Letras: 2007, 496 páginas].  Há seis meses li esta biografia.  Fiquei muitíssimo impressionada e emocionada com sua leitura.  Passei o livro adiante para algumas amigas, cujas reações apesar de positivas não se igualaram às minhas.  O volume retornou à minha casa na semana passada e agora, neste fim de semana prolongado, tive a oportunidade de reler dezenas de passagens destas quase 500 páginas só para voltar a considerá-lo uma das grandes leituras que fiz nos últimos cinco anos.

Talvez seu impacto venha também influenciado por 3 fatores de grande importância:  1) Não é ficção.  É uma auto-biografia.  Memórias autobiográficas.  2) Morei num país islâmico e reconheço neste livro muitos dos atos bárbaros contra mulheres que presenciei por lá.  3) Este livro, como outros que surgiram nas últimas décadas, mostra uma mulher corajosa, que tomou as rédeas de sua própria vida e liderou um movimento, uma revolta.  Faltaram tais exemplos nos meus anos formativos. 

Ayaan Hirsi Ali nasceu numa família islâmica, na Somália, em 1969.  Teria sido simplesmente mais uma mulher a sofrer  a exclusão, a violência com que mulheres são tratadas pelos rituais islâmicos e tribais, incluindo a raspagem de seu clitóris, mais comumente conhecido como circuncisão feminina, não fosse também filha de um opositor da ditadura de Siad Barré, na Somália.  Seu pai, um antropólogo que havia estudado na Universidade de Columbia, nos EUA, foi preso em 1972.  Por causa disso, Ayaan  tem uma vida de exilada e nômade mesmo dentro de seu próprio país.  Apesar de abastada, a família, por causa das atividades políticas, estava em perpétua fuga e permanecia, portanto, excluída da norma nacional, vivendo sempre amedrontada por possíveis denúncias ou perseguições.  Aqui está um exemplo das preocupações familiares assim que a família deixa Mogadíscio para Matabaan.  Mahad é um ano mais velho que Ayaan nascido em 1968 e Haweya é dois anos mais nova, nascida em 1971.  Estes eventos acontecem antes de Mahad entrar para a escola primária.

         As mulheres lavavam roupa no lago, e os meninos nadavam lá.  Mamãe tinha muito medo de que os garotos hawiye afogassem Mahad, que não sabia nadar.  Livre para ir aonde quisesse por ser menino, o nosso irmão não parava em casa.  Haweya e eu éramos proibidas de andar à solta.  Além do mais Mahad não nos levaria com ele; não queria que os amigos soubessem que ele brincava com as irmãs.

          Mahad estava cada vez mais consciente de sua honra de macho.  Vovó o estimulava: tinha o hábito de dizer que ele era o homem da casa.  Mahad nunca pedia autorização para sair; às vezes voltava muito depois do anoitecer e mamãe se zangava tanto que fechava a cerca.  Ele se sentava lá perto, chorando, e ela gritava com frieza: “Pense na sua honra.  Homem não chora.”  [p.50]

Mapa da Somália

Mais tarde, aos dez anos de idade, Ayaan acompanha a família no exílio.  A Arábia Saudita foi o primeiro pouso.  Lá ela descobre um mundo ainda mais rígido contra as mulheres.   E mesmo em Meca a vida muda bastante, entre outras mudanças estava a de mulheres não poderem sair às ruas sem a companhia de um homem…

           As coisas não iam bem em casa. O vínculo outrora forte entre meus pais estava se rompendo.  Cada qual tinha expectativas diferentes na vida.  Mamãe sentia que papai não dava atenção à família.   Geralmente cabia a ela nos levar `a escola e buscar – escolas diferentes porque Mahad era menino – e voltar sozinha.  Minha mãe detestava sair sem homem, detestava ser insultada na rua, encarada com insolência.  Todas as somalis contavam casos de mulheres que haviam sido agredidas na rua, levadas sabe-se lá para onde, e então, horas depois, apareciam jogadas no acostamento de uma estrada, ou simplesmente nunca mais voltavam. Ser uma mulher sozinha já era horrível.  Ser estrangeira, e além disso, negra, significava quase não ser humana, estar totalmente desamparada: um bode expiatório.

           Quando mamãe ia fazer compras sem motorista ou marido que bancasse o guarda-costas, os comerciantes se recusavam a atendê-la.  Mesmo na companhia de Mahad, alguns balconistas não lhe dirigiam a palavra.  Restava-lhe pegar os tomates, as frutas e os temperos e perguntar em voz alta: “Quanto é?”  Quando recebia resposta , jogava o dinheiro no balcão e dizia: “ É pegar ou largar”, e ia embora.  No dia seguinte era obrigada a voltar à mesma mercearia .  Mahad assistia a tudo sem poder auxiliá-la, tinha apenas dez anos [pp. 80-81].

Crianças na Arábia Saudita, foto: Bob Riley.

A Etiópia, o país seguinte de refúgio da família, mostra à Ayaan, pela primeira vez, o cristianismo.  Um cristianismo monofisista, diferente do que conhecemos que foi considerada também uma heresia para os segmentos majoritários do cristianismo.  Conhecido no ocidente como a Igreja copta,  esse ramo do cristianismo,  formulado no século V, se ancorou principalmente na  Palestina, Síria, Egito e Etiópia.

          Abeh nos matriculou numa escola; as aulas eram dadas em amárico.  Como só sabíamos falar somali e árabe, tudo voltou a ser estrangeiro durante algum tempo. Só quando aprendi a me comunicar foi que descobri uma coisa assombrosa: minhas colegas não eram muçulmanas.  Diziam-se kiristaan, cristãs, coisa que na Arábia Saudita, seria um feio insulto: significava impuras.  Confusa, consultei mamãe, que o confirmou.  Os etíopes eram kufr, palavra quase obscena. Bebiam álcool e não se lavavam direito. Uma gente desprezível.

          A diferença era visível na rua.  As etíopes usavam saia na altura dos joelhos e até mesmo calça comprida.  Fumavam e riam em público, encaravam os homens sem o menor pudor.  As crianças podiam ir aonde quisessem. [pp: 90-91]

Peregrinos cristãos etíopes em Jerusalém esperando a abertura da Igreja do Santo Sepulcro para a missa de Páscoa.  Foto: AP

Mais tarde vão todos parar no Quênia, onde religiões, línguas e culturas diversas se misturam.  Com estas experiências Ayaan se expõe a muitas maneiras diferentes de encarar a vida e o mundo.  

          Embora o meu novo colégio se chamasse Meninas Muçulmanas, muitas alunas professavam outras religiões.  Quase a metade da turma era queniana, a maioria cristã, embora os quicuios também tivessem outro deus pagão.  Os quenianos se dividiam em tribos que nada tinham a ver com os clãs da Somália.  As tribos eram diferentes entre si no aspecto físico, falavam línguas distintas, tinham crenças próprias, ao passo que todos os clãs somalis falavam o mesmo idioma e acreditavam no islã. [p.106]

Alunas de uma escola em Nairobi.

Logo depois, influenciada por uma irmã maometana e com a necessidade adolescente de se descobrir, de descobrir sua própria identidade e talvez também por uma necessidade de direção, de limites para se sentir segura, para ter algo consistente em sua vida Ayaan se dedica ao fundamentalismo islâmico. Mais tarde, já como jovem mulher, irá rejeitá-lo. 

          Pedi dinheiro à minha mãe para que a costureira da irmã Aziza me fizesse um enorme manto preto com apenas três faixas apertadas nos pulsos e no pescoço e um zíper comprido.  Chagava até os pés.  Comecei a ir ao colégio com aquela roupa por cima do uniforme, que me cobria o corpo magro, um véu preto na cabeça e nos ombros.

          Eu vibrava com aquilo: um sentimento voluptuoso.  Sentia-me poderosa: por baixo daquele tecido se ocultava uma feminilidade até então insuspeitada, mas potencialmente letal.  Eu era única: pouquíssima gente andava assim na Nairóbi daquele tempo.  Curiosamente, a roupa fazia com que eu me sentisse um indivíduo.  Transmitia uma mensagem de superioridade; eu era a única muçulmana verdadeira.  Todas as demais garotas, de pequeninos véus brancos na cabeça, não passavam de crianças, de hipócritas. Eu era uma estrela de Deus.  Quando abria os braços sentia-me capaz de voar. [pp:131-2] 

NOTA:   A título de curiosidade, vale lembrar neste momento, que esconder atributos femininos tais como cabelo, boca, pescoço, pernas, braços e demais partes do corpo consideradas por demais atraentes para poderem ser vistas por olhos masculinos sem que um estupro seja eminente não é uma característica única do maometismo – os judeus ortodoxos, por exemplo, tampouco permitem suas mulheres de mostrarem seus cabelos, assim como têm também outras restrições a vestimentas.  As restrições muçulmanas  seguem diferentes regras através do mundo islâmico, um exemplo que vem à mente é a cobertura da boca das mulheres com um véu, nos países do norte da África enquanto que o rosto aparece todo descoberto em outros países assim como no Irã.  Coloco aqui um vídeo egípcio de como se cobrir o cabelo de uma maneira fashion para ilustração.

Descobrir que um dos requerimentos da muçulmana ortodoxa seria aceitar o casamento com qualquer que seja o homem escolhido por seu pai, é finalmente a gota d’água que leva Ayaan a deixar o islamismo ortodoxo.  Ela era filha de um casal muçulmano em que pai e mãe se escolheram.  Não poderia, portanto, imaginar a vida sem que essa escolha lhe fosse permitida.  Acaba emigrando para o ocidente e se encontra, finalmente, como ser humano político e membro de uma sociedade liberal, na Holanda.

 Lá, depois de aprender a língua e os costumes, torna-se quase por casualidade, mais engajada politicamente do que previa.  E eventualmente, através de sua luta pela proteção dos direitos femininos de milhares de imigrantes de religião islâmica na Holanda Ayaan é eleita deputada naquele país, em 2003.   

Mais um ponto de virada nesta vida cheia de migrações vem quando ela se torna uma persona non grata entre os muçulmanos e tem sua vida ameaçada de morte, depois de fazer um documentário sobre as restrições à mulher no islamismo.  Seu parceiro nesta experiência cinematográfica acaba assassinado.  Com sua vida correndo perigo, Ayaan não tem outra opção senão encontrar exílio nos Estados Unidos, onde mora até hoje.  Assim, hoje, com 40 anos de idade, conhecemos esta mulher que viveu muitas vidas e mostrou como ainda se pode revolucionar o mundo com conhecimento, cultura e inteligência. 

A autora: Ayaan Hirsi Ali.

 Sua auto biografia é de muito poder emocional, e recomendo a todos, homens e mulheres, adolescentes e idosos, porque Ayaan é um exemplo de vida, de coragem.  Leva uma vida de grande coerência e sua luta pessoal só pode ser vista como um excelente exemplo para todos os outros seres humanos.

Para os curiosos:  Aqui está a primeira parte do documentário que Ayaan Hirsi Ali e seu sócio o cineasta Theo Van Gogh produziram que levou ao assassinato de Theo e à perseguição de Ayaan.  [Aqui em tradução para o inglês].

„The Fjordman Files“ erkläret, warum Osama Bin Laden keinen Friedennobelpreis dieses Jahr bekommen hat:

I must admit that the news that US President Obama has been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize was surprising, but only mildly so given what I know about the people who are members of the Nobel Committee in Oslo.

By Norwegian standards, Hillary Clinton is a conservative politician. That was not a joke, it was a factual statement. The New York Times would be one the most right-wing newspapers in Norway. This is the only way I can explain local politics to outsiders. However, even many Norwegians apparently find it puzzling that Barack Hussein Obama got the Peace Prize.

I have spent much of the day trying to figure out why he got it, and I finally came up with this answer:Because he has done so much to advance the cause of Islam.

Two years ago I suggested that Ayaan Hirsi Ali or other ex-Muslims such as Ibn Warraq, Ali Sina or Wafa Sultan should be awarded the Peace Prize. My thinking was that they should get it because Islamic Jihad now constitutes the greatest threat to world peace, and former Muslims who defy the traditional death penalty for leaving Islam are standing up to this.

I am, of course, perfectly aware of the fact that they will probably never receive it, but even if somebody nominated them that would constitute a small victory. The Nobel Committee has now taken the exact opposite approach and concluded that to promote Islam is to promote peace. We all know that Islam is peace, and since Obama is advancing the cause of Islam worldwide he’s spreading peace.

During his Cairo speech as US President in June 2009, Obama announced that “I consider it part of my responsibility as president of the United States to fight against negative stereotypes of Islam wherever they appear.” In effect, he pledged himself to spreading Islam and censorship of those who criticize Islam around the world. Whatever else he might be, Obama is a man of his word. The Obama Administration has now co-sponsored an anti-free speech resolution at the United Nations along with Islamic countries.

If the Norwegian Nobel Committee has indeed decided that to promote Islam is to promote peace, I think they have unfairly bypassed another name: Osama bin Laden. Obama has been very eager during his first months as US President to promote Islam, but in all fairness, bin Laden has devoted his entire life to the same cause. Due to his many years of devotion to the spread of Islamic peace and justice, you could consequently argue that Osama deserves the Peace Prize more than Obama.

I suspect that the only reason why Osama bin Laden hasn’t received the Nobel Peace Prize yet is because as far as I know he hasn’t been nominated. I hope somebody can correct this mistake as soon as possible so that he can receive his well-deserved Prize in 2010.

Not: The noted blogger Fjordman is filing this report via Gates of Vienna.

For a complete Fjordman blogography, see The Fjordman Files. There is also a multi-index listing here...

Imagine directing a movie you felt would help the world by opening up its eyes. The feeling of accomplishment that you may actually make a difference in the world must be a great feeling. But instead of seeing how your film does over a span of time, you are brutally murdered in public for making it. This happened to Theo Van Gogh after making the film, Submission — intended to present ethical injustices going on with the muslim religion against women.

60 Minutes aired an episode also entitled Submission where they talk about the film’s impact and interview the writer of the film, Ayaan Hirsi Ali. As usual, 60 minutes does a superb job of brining the situation to light for Americans and telling the story with gripping interviews and video footage.

60 minutes always seems to do a good job of explaining the segment to viewers as to why it is on the show and what the situation is, because most of the time the viewer has no idea about the content of the segment. This was no different for Submission. I had no clue about the film, nonetheless the aftermath of the film, but producer John Marks made sure to make that clear before delving into the interviews and meat of the story.

60 Minutes is one of the best at asking the right questions in interviews that allow for breathtaking and unique responses. When interviewing Ali, they get her to say she will not back down from making a sequel to the movie because it would only prove to the radicals that their violence did the job. this is about as good of a “quote” as you can get on television and the interviewer deserves credit for getting that out of her.

The CBS documentary show also does a good job of getting video footage from the streets of Holland in the aftermath of the murder of Van Gogh. In a community that is usually known for peace and harmony, it is very interesting to witness the streets looking like the aftermath of a gang fight in downtown Chicago.

60 Minutes was obviously given a gripping story in the first place with Submission, but it is what they did with it — the interviews, video footage, explanation of the murder — that make this show one of the best.

really?  this is the book that caused such a fuss in parts of the Muslim world when it was published?  this warranted a fatwa, a miscarried assassination attempt, secret service protection?  book burnings, effigies?  for realzies?

I already knew that in any “cultural wars” debate regarding reactions to this book, I sided with Rushdie.  in fact, I put down Karen Armstrong’s book on Islam (and then traded it in) because she starts it off by posturing rather negatively towards the literary giant.  (and also because there was a gargantuan typo on the very first page: goal was used instead of gaol.  how embarrassing.)  I’m not saying I believe nothing is sacred — not saying I don’t believe that, though — but I do think an essential criterion for living in the modern world (esp. the modern West, with our unique history of free thought on skepticism with regard to religion, not to mention varying degrees of emphasizing tolerance) is that you cannot expect or even ask others to treat what you hold sacred in the same manner as you.  you don’t get to lay that on everyone else.

that’s not to say we shouldn’t discourage outright incendiary behavior, since we should — and anything approaching intolerance would completely defeat the point of our current setup — but shouldn’t someone whose cultural heritage includes Islam, and who doesn’t himself hold (rightly so) the Qur’an to be of divine origin, be allowed to engage with it creatively and thoughtfully in literature?  of course!  not to mention the fact that as we continue to look our shared global, cultural history, everything is up for grabs in terms of creative reflection and consideration.

but the craziest part about it all is how unoffensive the book really is.  Nikos Kazantzakis’s Last Temptation of Christ should have caused way more of an uproar (though a shorter-lived, milder uproar was certainly caused by the film version; in fact, apparently the movie holds the top spot in England in terms of most complaints about a broadcast … and I read something about someone throwing molotov cocktails into a Paris theater when it premiered — for shame).  there’s no possible way that most of the people who were up in arms had any clue what was actually in the book — which means that the reaction was even worse, and more dangerous for the modern world, as it was a heated and often violent claim that certain subjects — regardless of how benign they were treated — were off limits to others.  or were out of bounds in terms of interpretation, historical or otherwise.  I have a serious problem with that.  how much better could our historical (and critical) understanding of Islam be if there weren’t this “off limits” aura surrounding the subject?  compared to historical criticism and analysis of Christianity — which for the most part far exceeds the “flogging a dead horse” idiom — this area of inquiry hasn’t even got off the ground.  or so it seems.

Christopher Hitchens — also known to ruffle a few feathers now and then — has a good article in Vanity Fair in which he retells part of the story in relating it to more recent event such as the Islamic reaction to those infamous Dutch cartoons that you probably never saw (me neither) and the murder of Theo van Gogh for his film Submission about the treatment of women in Islam — following which the Dutch-Somali feminist writer and politician Ayaan Hirsi Ali, who co-wrote the script, had to go into hiding (and more recently had to seek international help again to raise money for her around-the-clock protection).  his point is that many countries and publishers and media outlets have now resorted to self-censorship out of fear of offending any Islamic radicals, who just might come knocking (and detonating).

I feel I’m in danger of getting unnecessarily irreverent here, so I should end by saying that the ongoing hostility in parts of the world to this great piece of writing is much to their chagrin (and to that of anyone else who, for whatever reason, continues to be cowed into opposing an imaginative, thought-provoking, and ultimately harmless book).  it’s a skid mark on a garment that’s already got enough shit on it, thank you very much.

This blog had its 2nd birthday last month.  I started this blog because I missed San Francisco but I couldn’t find a way to return there.  Now, after 2 years, I have a ticket to Toronto, Canada, where I plan to stay for a few years.  I will leave Japan next month.

I was thinking of multiculturalism throughout the first year of this blog.  My interest in multiculturalism made me look closer at different cultures and I feel that cultures are not equal.

http://ayaanhirsiali.web-log.nl/ayaanhirsiali/2007/01/ladies_first.html
“Human beings are equal; cultures are not.”

http://earideas.com/earideas/explore/show/75643/Ayaan+Hirsi+Ali+on+Muslim+women
“Culture, not poverty, is to blame for violence” (The Economist)

This is simply because one culture respects almost all of its members while another culture discriminates against disadvantaged members.  When I finished my overview of multiculturalism, I became interested in French culture which I had never been fascinated by before.  Then, I started learning French and French culture.  Now the more I learn about France, the more I like it.

I often hear that Americans and French people do not like each other’s culture but I like both the best simply because I believe in freedom and equality.  Japanese culture does not admire freedom and many Japanese prefer support to freedom but I prefer freedom to support.  On the other hand, I share many things with other Japanese.  Therefore, I think that individual differences are important to consider as well as generalizations

Multiculturalism made me think about immigrants too.  I have encountered both people in ethnic minorities who criticize western people and Europeans who look down on immigrants.  I disagree with both of them.  I think that because world trade systems and wars caused by developed countries prevent some countries from developing, developed countries have some responsibility for the poverty.  But can all responsibility for the poverty and lack of developments in poor countries be placed on developed countries?

And why do some ethnic minorities in western countries insist on their human rights when they do not believe in human rights?  Why do some less developed countries not attempt to learn good aspects of other countries, not only technologies but also other things, to better themselves?

I still have many questions about cultures.  I am hoping to find the answers in Toronto and that I won’t miss San Francisco so much.

Ayaan Hirsi Ali
è dovuta scappare dal Europa per salvarsi la vita in America per questo , Theo van Gogh /Theo_van_Gogh

non ha fatto in tempo a scappare, Sanaa non ha fatto in tempo a Pordenone, Santachè difende la legge italiana e viene aggredita.
Geert
Wilders
insiste con coraggio con questo

I valori dell’individualità, il rispetto per la donna, il rispetto per il bambino non sono più derogabili. Voglio vedere tutte le donne costituirsi parte civile nel processo al padre di Sanaa, al processo alla cultura che permette di ammazzare la donna per la sua scelta emotiva, per l’infibulazione delle bambine di dieci anni, per l’abbandono della donna quando partorisce.
Non si deve accettare la cultura dell’altro quando permette di uccidere, violentare, costringe all’aborto o vieta l’aborto. Sono violenze in eguale misura. La donna deve essere libera di decidere del suo corpo, deve avere diritto alla salvaguardia del suo corpo, delle sue emozioni. Il maschio non conosce né le emozioni della fecondazione né della gravidanza né del parto, né dell’allattamento, va ricacciato dove è il suo posto.

Autobiographies often suffer from late-life authorship–a time when the fires are damped and the events foreshortened by time. This one–by a woman still in her thirties–is an exception to nearly every rule of the genre.Not least for its electrifying readability: it consumed every free moment of the two days it took to finish it.Putting it down was simply not an option.

This book will grab your imagination like no other, transplant you into a world you have probably never known, and introduce you to the intimate world of a muslim family swept by circumstance all over Africa, Arabia, and Europe.The complex interaction of tribes, clans, cultures, extended families and nations (and their consequences) isn’t dryly analyzed, it is woven into a personal drama with the momentum of a locomotive.The love of family rides perilously over the jarring railbed of refugee life, of ancient and modern Islamic conflicts, all of it recounted with real compassion in beautifully clear English.This multilingual immigrant needs no ghostwriter.

Unlike the collection of editorial essays which comprised “The Caged Virgin”, “Infidel” is a consistently focused narrative of a spectacularly eventful life launched almost inadvertantly into an unparalleled adventure in moral courage.But there’s far more here than a clash-of-cultures story well told.There is no targeted rush toward a predestined liberation.The revelatory discovery of western freedoms comes late in the book and gathers like a slow-motion sunrise.Only in the final chapters does she defect from Muslim culture, graduate from the University of Leiden, become a Dutch legislator, a target of Islamic terrorists, and an incendiary revolutionary for Muslim womens’ rights.

More than simply discovering western libertarian values, she shows a deep and critical understanding of their history, how they’ve shaped the modern world, and shows their prognosis for dealing with the festering problem of Europe’s Islamic subculture.Her extraordinary life seems more an ongoing work in progress than a settled iconographic career.She has recently moved to America–the adopted home of another famously eloquent and consequential revolutionary: Tom Paine.

Click Here to see more reviews about: Infidel (Paperback)

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Weak males need imaginary penis extension

Ophelia Benson and Jeremy Stangroom have a book out called Does God Hate Women? Nick Cohen quotes it thusly,

Well, what can one say. Religious authorities and conservative clerics worship a wretchedly cruel unjust vindictive executioner of a God. They worship a God of 10-year-old boys, a God of playground bullies, a God of rapists, of gangs, of pimps. They worship — despite rhetoric about justice and compassion — a God who sides with the strong against the weak, a God who cheers for privilege and punishes egalitarianism. They worship a God who is  a male and who gangs up with other males against women. They worship a thug. They worship a God who thinks little girls should be married to grown men. They worship a God who looks on in approval when a grown man rapes a child because he is “married” to her. They worship a God who thinks a woman should receive 80 lashes with a whip because her hair wasn’t completely covered. They worship a God who is pleased when three brothers hack their sisters to death with axes because one of them married without their father’s permission.

And Cohen argues that this picture is not unfair:

If this sounds harsh, consider that Sharia adultery laws state that a raped woman must face the next-to-impossible task of providing four male witnesses to substantiate her allegation or be convicted of adultery. When rapists leave Pakistani women pregnant, the court takes the bulge in their bellies as evidence against them. In Nigeria, Sharia courts not only punish raped women for adultery, but order an extra punishment of a whipping for making false accusations against “innocent” men. In Israel, ultra-Orthodox gangs in Jerusalem beat up women seen in the company of married men. In the United States, the Fundamentalist Latter Day Saints give teenagers to old men in arranged marriages and tell them they must completely submit to their wishes.  In Saudi Arabia, women live in a theocratic state that stops them walking unaccompanied in the street, driving a car and speaking to men outside the family.

Cohen then argues that media response to Benson and Stangroom’s book reflected a greater concern for hypothetical Muslim sensibilities than for the plight of oppressed women:

The response of the Sunday Times to Does God Hate Women?was truly sinister. “An academic book about religious attitudes to women is to be published this week,” the paper reported, “despite concerns it could cause a backlash among Muslims because it criticises the prophet Muhammad for taking a nine-year-old girl as his third wife. Such assertions could invoke the ire of some Muslims.”

No irate Muslim had contacted the reporter to warn of a “backlash”. She had not seen threats against Benson and Stangroom in online chatrooms. The Sunday Times invented a scandal where none existed and was unconcerned that it might provoke attacks on the authors. In a dismal sign of our nervous times, their panicked publisher responded by calling in an “ecumenical adviser”, to assess whether the book’s launch should go ahead.

Cohen concedes not all religion is all bad, but then points out the disturbing trend of international capitulation to the primacy of religion over human rights in documents meant to affirm the latter:

But look on the bright side for too long, and you will be blinded by the sun. For all the qualifications, the stubborn fact remains that mainstream opinion does not consider the oppression of women a pressing concern when it is done in the name of culture or religion, particularly in the name of once-subordinate cultures and religions. The misogyny they generate does not move hearts or stir passions. Governments that stifle half their populations do not face boycotts or demonstrations outside their embassies, motions of condemnation at international conferences or opprobrium in everyday political discourse.

The comparison with the international anger directed at Apartheid is instructive. The oppression of blacks was once an affront to the conscience of the world. When we turn to the oppression of women, however, we find that the United Nations loses its conscience and encourages the ideologies of their oppressors. In 1990, Muslim foreign ministers challenged the first line of the UN’s Declaration of Human Rights by replacing the ringing statement that “all human beings are born free in dignity and in rights” with the Cairo Declaration of Human Rights which announces that “all human beings are God’s subjects”. The UN’s declaration says that everyone is entitled to its stipulated rights and freedoms “without distinction of any kind”. The Cairo declaration says that rights can be restricted for a “Sharia prescribed reason”. Nothing in it prevents forced marriages of pre-pubescent girls, or the death punishments for apostasy, homosexuality and the betrayal of a family’s “honour”.

Far from fighting off this direct assault on women’s rights, the UN went along with it and entertained the idea that those who criticise Sharia are guilty of the crime of “defaming religion”.

And then there is the left’s infuriating treatment of Ayaan Hirsi Ali:

When Ayaan Hirsi Ali published Infidel, her account of escape from forced marriage and genital mutilation to Europe, her defence of the liberal values they once believed in appalled “liberal” Europeans. Although Ali needed bodyguards to protect her from Islamist assassins, Timothy Garton Ash sneered that she was an “Enlightenment fundamentalist” while Ian Buruma denounced her as an absolutist. Maryam Namazie, a Marxist Iranian exile who set up the “One Law for all Campaign” to oppose the Archbishop and the Lord Chief Justice, tells me that she experiences every variety of Western duplicity. When she argues in favour of the demonstrators in Tehran, the hard Left tell her she is serving the interests of US imperialism — “It’s now reactionary to have a revolution,” she sighs. When she last appeared on the BBC, to argue that the burka was a straightjacket designed to mark off a woman as a man’s private property, the presenter told her she was an “extremist”. With dreary inevitability, Does God Hate Women’s critics say that Benson and Stangroom’s atheist liberalism is as fundamentalist as the religion of the hardliners they condemn.

Read his whole disturbing case here.

Your Thoughts?

So…here we are.  I just forced myself to go back and read my last entry so I could really feel at the height of my foolishness whilst writing this one.  After all the gusto and enthusiasm (and in my defence also a few glasses of wine) of my last post I’ve managed to not write another thing at all.  Brilliant.  I also managed to totally confuse the posting date and timing by editing the default post wordpress put in when I started this website in January so nothing really makes sense at all.  I suppose it’s neither here nor there as no one is reading this yet but really, it’s not starting out all that well.  I’ve finally figured out why…and also what the hell this blog is supposed to be about…So first: WHY? Why haven’t I written?  Basically I knew I wanted to be a Social Commentator more than I really wanted to be a writer.  I’m not the creative writing type, I don’t have ideas in this field. Nor do I really have an interest in it.  I love reading stories and literature and I’m happy to continue to do this and never be a world famous fiction author.  I want to write well enough to make my commentary interesting and accessible but that is really secondary to the subject matter. The problem is that when you say you want to be a writer people expect you to have a desire to write the next great Australian novel and well, quite frankly, I felt a bit blocked because that wasn’t what I wanted at all.  I’m over that. My recent visit to the Byron Bay Writers Festival sorted that out good and proper.  There I saw a bunch of Social Commentators; truly inspiring people in their fields. At one of the talks early in the festival someone referred to one of these speakers as “a leading public mind” and I thought WOW I want to be one of those.  So I wrote it in my notebook: I want to be a leading public mind. Good.  We got that out of the way.

So that’s all well and good really but I continued to procrastinate about starting.  I started to get a bit panicked about it all to be honest.  (As an aside, anyone not amused by the way we spell panicked?). I thought back to last year and how easy it was to write the travel blog and finally I had the lightbulb moment.  Of course it was easy to write last year.  I was writing a travel blog while traveling.  There is inspiration at every turn.  And given it was all in third world countries, plenty of fodder for a bit of social commentary.  So in the end I just decided to wait.  Figured something would float my boat sooner or later. That happened this week and we are even in the same month as the Writers Festival so really, not bad going.

What got me going? The memoir Infidel by Ayaan Hirsi Ali. I’ve always had a bit of an interest in Islam and it’s role in modern society since I did a subject on it during my uni studies.  I won’t go into it too much here as I’m going to do a number of posts on the topic but suffice to say Ayaan’s memoir lit a fire in my belly like I haven’t felt for quite some time.  I would highly recommend reading her story.

This is long now and perhaps highly uninteresting to anyone except me so I will wrap up. I will just point out one final thing… The title of this blog is Random Musings so it stands to reason that it will also include me musing randomly about whatever takes my attention at the time. It won’t all be social commentary.  A lot of it will be crap.  It is a blog after all and with a title like that I hardly feel I am constrained to stick to a topic. So now I’m going to toddle off and do a few more random posts to get this show on the road.

Isn’t it great that France is so enlightened, and such a champion of women’s rights, that its government has begun to specifically target Muslim women for state harassment?

Isn’t that neat? Maybe, if we’re all lucky, they’ll have a “democratic” vote so that the white majority can decide which pieces of clothing to ban from the Muslim minority.

We have French Urban Regeneration Minister Fadela Amara, herself Muslim, saying that she is “in favour of the burka not existing in my country”. Perhaps she will soon take the path of Ayaan Hirsi Ali, a Muslim-turned-atheist, who’s popularity in European and American conservative circles seems more fueled by Islamophobia than by anything else.

Ali once said, “The whole idea is for 1.2-1.5 billion [Muslim] people living in the world to start thinking, at least, I mean exercising some sort of intellectual activity, which we haven’t been doing…”

But Amara’s statements about burka-banning are not all.

Now it appears that the burkini, a swimsuit that is loose-fitting and covers everything but the face, hands and feet, is also a threat to enlightened France.

Major public health threat.

Here’s a bit from an LA Times article about a woman banned from a swimming pool in Emerainville that is really, well, astounding:

Emerainville’s mayor and the pool management contend that the burkini ban was invoked strictly because of hygiene concerns, just as shorts, rather than Speedos, are not allowed, because they can be worn outside the pool area.

“This has nothing to do with Islam,” Mayor Alain Kelyor told Le Parisien, “because the pool rules prohibit swimming while dressed.

“Besides, Islamic bathing suits don’t exist in the Koran,” he concluded.

Nice one Mayor Kelyor! But if that isn’t islamophobic enough for you….

“This is the tip of the fundamentalist iceberg,” National Assembly member Andre Gerin said of the burkini issue, which he claims is part of a “larger national problem” of growing Islamic extremism in France. Wearing the garment in public is a “clear provocation” and “ridiculous,” while helping “undo years of progress toward equal rights for women.”

Can’t we just burn them as witches already? ARRRG.

Here’s what the offending woman, identified only as Carole, has to say: “My only battle is simply to be able to swim with my children in a pool.” Oh, the evils of Islam! The witch Muslim woman has spawned! THEY ARE TRYING TO OUTBREED WHITES!

I’ve already written a careful explanation of why I hold these opinions on burkas, in a previous post where I outline 10 Reasons a French Burka Ban Is Wrong.

Via Womanist Musings.

Please add to this discussion. However, please do not assume that I know nothing about Islam, women’s oppression in the name of Islam, or what a burka is. Read my 10 Reasons post to get a better idea of my stance.