Dress in Educational Establishments
All around us, in our courts, in the oppressive liberty-destroying Bills being rushed through Parliament, we see the disasters of multiculturalism, the system by which too many Muslims have been allowed to grow up in this country with no sense of loyalty to its institutions, and with a sense of complete apartness.
The Shabina Begum case never had anything to do with modesty
I don’t know whether you caught young Shabina Begum talking on the television yesterday, but, as I studied the pictures of this exceedingly good-looking and confident young woman, I was suddenly conscious of a paradox.
Here she is, at the centre of a national media storm, and one that has been very largely whipped up by her own supporters. There goes our Shabina, batting her (rather beautiful) eyes through her visor, and thereby exciting the interest of millions of otherwise apathetic viewers, who are not only infidels but very possibly male infidels at that.
This is the 17-year-old from Luton whose dress sense and physical form are now the number one subject for conversation in every household in the country; and yet for years we have been asked to believe that the reason she wanted to vindicate her right to break school rules, and wear a tent instead of shalwar kameez, was to protect – in the word of her lawyer, Cherie Blair – her “modesty”.
What total tripe. This ludicrous and lamentable case had nothing to do with “modesty”. I don’t believe she wore the jilbab to “regain control of her body” any more than I could hope to wear a smarter suit and thereby regain control of my own.
This case wasn’t even about religion, or conscience, or the dictates of faith. At least it wasn’t primarily about those things. It was about power. It was about who really runs the schools in this country, and about how far militant Islam could go in bullying the poor, cowed, gelatinous and mentally spongiform apparatus of the British state.
Until yesterday, it seemed that there was nothing to stand in the Islamists’ way, from the moment on September 3, 2002, when Shabina’s brother and another man turned up at her school, and told a harassed maths teacher called Mr Moore that their Shabina was going to wear the full jilbab in the name of her “modesty”, and that, if they didn’t jump to it, the school would be sued.
And since the school refused to knuckle under, the extremist Islamic organisation Hizb-ut-Tahrir backed a case for breach of her human rights, and soon Shabina had a starring role in the great Rocky Horror Show of British self-flagellation, featuring Cherie Blair, Matrix Chambers, assorted terrified judges and a chorus of cretinous articles by retired feminists, famous for living colourful lives in the 1970s, in which they declared that the jilbab was really rather lovely and “empowering”, and that they wished they had worn one themselves.
Of course I don’t really blame the Prime Minister’s wife for the rubbish she spouted on Shabina’s behalf. We all understand the cab rank principle for barristers. We know the size of her mortgage, and, if her firm had not trousered the £50,000 in legal aid, then someone else would have picked it up. But I do blame the Court of Appeal for its invertebrate performance, and to judge by the tremendous ruling yesterday from Lord Bingham and other Law Lords, I am not alone.
As Lord Bingham points out in his ruling, the Court of Appeal was quite wrong in its assessment of Shabina’s human rights. Yes, she has the right to freedom of religion, but she could not manifest that freedom in such a way as to prejudice the school’s ability to ensure discipline and order, and to run things in the way it wanted.
Even in Strasbourg, home of the European Court of Human Rights, there is a long-standing tradition of upholding the discretion of educational establishments in matters of dress – not least in several important cases defending the right of Turkish universities to ban headscarves.
How could the Court of Appeal have missed this? Is it really possible that British appeal court judges have less robust common sense than the judges of Strasbourg?
Or is it also that our judges suffer, like other parts of the British Establishment, from a certain leeriness and timorousness about Islam? I detect in the Appeal Court ruling in favour of Shabina, that was so ignominiously crushed yesterday, the same hand-wringing wetness that inspired some poor Welsh bishop to resign the editorship of his local church news after he was found to have printed a Danish-type cartoon of positively ovine inoffensiveness.
I am by no means a maximalist in all this. I would certainly not ban all Muslim attire, such as headscarves, from all state schools, not least because that would be discriminatory, unless we simultaneously banned Sikh turbans, Jewish yarmulkes, and so on.
I might add (before I am lynched by Hizb-ut-Tahrir) that my own Muslim great-grandfather was a passionate wearer of the fez, and much resented that his elegant red pillbox-and-tassel was deemed to be backward-looking and Islamicist, and banned by Kemal Ataturk, father of the modern secular Turkey.
But the demands of these men – the brother of Shabina and his friend – were outrageous. As the Law Lords have shown, Shabina’s rights to freedom of religion were not infringed, because she could have taken herself to neighbouring schools that did allow the full jilbab, itself a sobering thought.
More importantly, by proposing to force the jilbabbed Shabina on the school, the men were deliberately setting out to undermine the careful compromise uniform that the school had worked out, which was approved by the Muslim Council of Great Britain.
They no doubt wanted to push the girls into a terrible game of holier-than-thou in which they competed, whether under pressure from their male relatives or not, to conceal ever greater stretches of their anatomy.
They weren’t doing it for Shabina; they weren’t doing it for the other female pupils; they were doing it to show that they could, and to take another yard of territory in the kulturkampf of modern Britain.
All around us, in our courts, in the oppressive liberty-destroying Bills being rushed through Parliament, we see the disasters of multiculturalism, the system by which too many Muslims have been allowed to grow up in this country with no sense of loyalty to its institutions, and with a sense of complete apartness.
In rejecting Shabina’s case, the Law Lords have provided a small but important victory for good sense, for British cohesion, and for the right of teachers to run their own schools.
166 Comments
Joe,
As I regard this blog as my playground (play can be a serious thing too!), I think I will have to invoke playground law on your colleague(?).
No sneaking! Sneaks are even worse than the people they sneak on.
One-way ticket to Coventry has been despatched!
;o)
Psi
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Joe :
Obesity is not a crime,
It’s snitching that deserves gaol time.
A handbag now , if unattended ,
Gives chances to the one offended ,
To wreak revenge for this great wrong,
And make stool pigeons sing swan song.
I don’t know what you’ve done; why earned,
The poisoned chalice , was she spurned?
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To consolidate this debate, the fundamental question we must pose is whether it is reasonable to force someone to wear clothes which conform to society’s sensibilities, or not? (Evil Twin)
And the answer must be that it is unreasonable and irrational, because anyone’s sensibility is necessarily of an emotional rather than rational character. It cannot ever be reasonable to require people to wear something just because other people want, or desire, or prefer them to so do, or not do so. The same applies to anything else they may or may not do. That I don’t like something is no reason, and can never be a reason, to ban it.
Sensibility aside, we might instead ask if it can ever be reasonable to require people to wear some garment or other. And the answer to this is that there are many circumstances where this so. It is reasonable to require surgeons wear masks and gloves and sterilised clothing (to minimise infection). It is reasonable to require miners and building workers to wear hard hats (to minimise injury). It is reasonable to require soldiers to wear recognisable uniforms (if only to distinguish them from their enemies, and prevent them mistakenly killing each other). There may be all sorts of perfectly good reasons why, in particular circumstances, it is reasonable to require people to wear something. If no good reason can be found for requiring people to wear something, then it is unreasonable to require them to do so.
Is it, then, reasonable that schoolchildren should be made to wear uniforms? I cannot myself think of any good reason. The argument that uniforms iron out differences, minimise jealousies, is, I submit, merely irrational and emotional sensibility trying to pretend to rationality.
And what applies to school uniforms also applies to muslim uniforms. If there is no good reason for them, nobody should be required to wear them.
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Well, that went better than expected. I don’t think we’ll be hearing any more from Mz. X with regard to my secret identity. However, having sunk the thick end of a bottle of scotch, I apologise, in advance, if my comments are less measured and civil than you have all come to expect. Firstly, thank you all for your support during this distressing time. I have chastised the young lady in question to within an inch of alcoholic poisoning and I will be surprised if she remembers her own name tomorrow morning let alone where this blog is. Before I receive utterly unwarranted accusations of irresponsible behaviour, I placed the young lady in a pre-paid cab with strict instructions to take her immediately home.
Meanwhile, back on Earth…
Yes idlex, I concur that many (if not all) of the issues discussed here with respect to uniforms, Muslims etc. derive from irrational, emotional responses. Unfortunately I would say that’s also the diagnosis for probably 90% of the socio-political problems in all terrestrial civilisations. Humans are emotional and irrational, period. I’m not sure I’d change such a thing even if I could although, that being said, the world would almost certainly be a more peaceful place. Unfortunately, it would also be called Vulcan.
Your query with regard to whether it’s reasonable to require school children to conform to some dress code is a less abstract question in that I am confident that teachers who have seen both sides of this particular coin would be able to comment on the matter with the benefit of experience rather than (our) conjecture. Hypothetically, I can see some justification for not allowing children to turn up to school in expensive ‘designer’ (horrid term) clothes because those pupils less fortunate in the fashion stakes will (inevitably?) be stigmatised by their lack of such trappings of wealth and this may additionally lead to instances of vexation motivated by petty envy and consequently cause unnecessary disruption. Similarly, Shamina could turn the playground at her school into a sort of ‘devotional’ cold war. Her insistence on wearing clothing rigidly defined by her particular sect/denomination could be seen, by other pupils, as being a statement that she is more devoutly orthodox than they are and by inference, a more ‘worthy’ Muslim. Again, I can’t see this as being good for school morale or discipline.
Again, you are correct in that these statements are based on an irrational, emotional paradigm but, let’s face it, we’re talking about adolescents here. The only thing which would stop them from being emotional and irrational is probably a pre-frontal lobotomy(?) or lithium. So my vote on this matter would be pretty much what I’ve already said. i.e. the current (uniform) system seems to work with the existing regulations on uniforms and reasonable compromises on religiously motivated attire. Shamina seems to be a lone individual with her sights set on either becoming a martyr for the cause or exploiting the contemporary and endemic lack of resolve in British schools when addressing such matters. I concede that this isn’t really a good reason, in your terminology, and would be insufficient to justify a change to such a uniform oriented rationale, but I do think it is a good reason to maintain the status quo.
And Shug, Loosen up dude, it’s only a blog, not Hansard.
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fiddlesticks
You’ve got the grumps old boy. Of course a comaprison between Sinn Fein and the BNP is at present slightly silly. The BNP do not run numbers of housing estates by terror yet nor can their members kill people in pubs with impunity knowing that none dare come forward to speak to the police.
Unlike Irish fascism, which probably learnt a lot during the second world war when it supported the Nazis, British fascism is a pretty amateur affair. As P. G. Wodehouse noted our rather silly sense of humour means we tend to giggle at people who parade out in black shirts and jodpurs, unless they are playing polo of course.
My unreserved apologies. The knuckle grazing grunts of the BNP have a long way to go before they can rise to the sophistication of Irish fascism. Many thanks for helping me keep things in perspective.
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I once drank 16 pints of a rather nice Liverpool brew at lunchtime and went back to work. It was the day I left (as planned previously).
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Schools and workplaces are not places devoted to the development of the individual, and they impose uniforms to reinforce in all directions the sense of belonging or conformity, the temporary subjugation of the individual. Just try wearing a really different outfit to work at a bank and see what happens. Institutions like schools and corporations can’t possibly deal with thousands of individuals, so they try to de-individuate them just enough that they can be predicted and managed. (raincoaster)
I have always understood the role of education to be one assisting individuals to develop and broaden their minds.
And in the workplace, I don’t see that individuals need to be ‘de-individuated’ in order to be managed. It strikes me as extremely bad management practice to set out to crush individuals into subservience. Indeed, it sounds more like the sort of thing that happens in army training. And, if nothing else, individuals generally remain individuals at all times.
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Well let it not be said I can’t take criticism: Evil Twin’s edit is indeed better than the original.
One small point that needs to be cleared up is that I view government as a service delivery organization, and taxes are the fee paid. The service rendered is that government does the thinking about all kinds of things the public just really doesn’t want to deal with. This is essential in any society as complex as ours, as there are just too many decisions to be made. As well, it allows the people to scapegoat disposable people (ie vote them out and replace them with, often, virtually identical people) without making anyone shoulder the burden of making their own decisions in the meantime.
It is annoying though: they usually have to pay me before they get to edit me. But then, sometimes I even do a second draft for them if they ask nicely.
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Bleah! What I meant to say was that government is the highest of the organizations to which we delegate decision-making power, not that goverment’s role was to intermediate between the individual and the institutions. It is not apart from those institutions; it is the meta-institution.
Great, now I’m second-guessing ever post. Thanks ET, you truly are evil.
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everY*
Swell.
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For example, if we take idlex’s, slightly sarcastic, proposal, whereby some fixed dress code were to be genuinely applied to the whole of British society, I am utterly certain that every person who has (ever) posted on this site would be on their way to set fire to Westminster Palace even as we speak. (Joe M)
I was indeed being slightly sarcastic, and I’d like to be as certain as you are, but I’m not.
In the first place, it wouldn’t happen overnight: it would happen in stages. First undesirable forms of clothing would be subject to prolonged vilification. Then these forms of clothing would be declared to endanger health. Over-tight clothes would be shown to impede blood circulation. Studies would show that women who wore high heel shoes were admitted to hospital for concussion 2.3 times more frequently than others. Further studies would show that wearing green wellies had a strong correlation with angina. Trousers would be shown to constrict the naughty bits. TV documentaries would spring up about Clothing Safety, a bit like they do about cookery these days. The Department of Health would issue clothing safety guidelines, and devise a National Safety Costume – a khaki jacket and skirt, plus wooden clogs. Celebrities would be shown wearing it, and ministers would expound on its benefits. Then, in some national emergency – an unnecessary war or something – the NSC would become mandatory dress, with swingeing fines for anyone found not wearing it.
You don’t lose your freedom all at once. You lose it little by little. And when it’s finally all gone, it’s too late to revolt.
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All the above, of course, is loosely based on the anti-smoking crusade. (Incidentally, not content with banning smoking in public places, they now want to ban smoking being shown on TV.)
But there is another way in which a uniform dress code might be imposed. Everybody here, except me, thinks that schoolchildren should wear uniforms. All that needs to be done is to extend school age, and the dress code that accompanies it, indefinitely. And bob’s your uncle.
I’d be around about a forty-fifth former by now, I reckon.
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Make that a lower forty-fifth-former.
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The great thing about posting stuff at this time of night is that nobody interrupts you. They’re all fast asleep, the dear sweeties.
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I’m sure you look adorable in short pants, idlex!
I never actually said that I favoured uniforms; in Indonesia, they’re a form of extortion. The government has a committment to provide free education, but jams up the price of the uniforms; kids with no uniforms don’t get to go to school. Nasssssssssssty.
I think that people should just get TF over how other people look, but until the day that glorious and enlightened anarchy arrives on our doorstep, it’s just a pipe dream. I can see that where people get hung up on appearances, blindfolding them all might work. I’ve done it with horses, and it’s quite useful for getting them over sticky places.
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I just want to say a few things.
If people want to hunt foxes, let them hunt foxes, if people want to wear headscarves, let them wear headscarves.
I think policing in London has gone bananas when it comes to religion/religious hatred. Did you see the Met walking quietly down the street with those religious nutcases who were protesting about the Mohammed cartoons?
Next thing you know they want to prosecute one of them for inciting murder. This will surely never be successful; you can’t give someone a life sentence for waiving a placard, can you? They’ll be hoping he pleads guilty on the inciting racial hatred so they can drop the charge (but I doubt it) expect it to be quietly forgotten about or get ready for another long and expensive legal battle about whether the use of the word ‘Europe’ means ‘European’ and whether ‘European’ is a race.
Surely they should have just confiscated their placards under the Public Order Act 1986 (as amended) and told them to go home or get nicked for breach of the peace! Surely if someone is inciting murder or racial hatred it is in the public interest to arrest them immediately?
Oh, and aren’t the Danish government spineless. They effectively apologised for having free speech! Shouldn’t they have just said that they though the newspaper were idiots for publishing it and that angry Muslims were free to send them bags / gigabytes of hate mail if they wanted to?
One good thing about this is I have been broadening my knowledge and reading a translation of the Holy Koran for the first time.
http://www.hti.umich.edu/k/koran/browse.html
It doesn’t strike me as a very riveting read to be honest. From the way these fundamentalists go on you’d think it was all death and destruction. I couldn’t find anything that incites one man to kill another. I’ve no idea about how good a translation it is but I found this bit quite amusing:
‘The Believers
In the name of Allah, the Beneficent, the Merciful.
[23.1] Successful indeed are the believers,
[23.2] Who are humble in their prayers,
[23.3] And who keep aloof from what is vain,
[23.4] And who are givers of poor-rate,
[23.5] And who guard their private parts,
[23.6] Except before their mates or those whom their right hands possess, for they surely are not blameable,’
Maybe this Begum girl, if she is such a devout Muslim, should devote her spare time to helping the poor, not help a few greedy human rights barristers to pay their mortgages?
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I’m sure you look adorable in short pants, idlex!
Well, I’ve been wearing them for the last 50 years or so, so I’m pretty expert.
But Joe Mental and the Ancient Submariner would totally knock spots off me in this division.
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I suspect, were I to use some sort of hydraulic press to get into my old squash kit, I’d bear a startling resemblence to Tweedledum.
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Thanks Steve L, I had a quick squiz at it. Has anyone written something like “The Good News Koran” though? I find all the stuff about “orphans” and “eating property” typically opaque.
Look guys, all this stuff: the Torah, the Gospels, and the Koran, was just a load of junk a bunch of power grabbing nutters knocked up for the purposes of control and intimidation.
I don’t know if any of you have read anything about Charles Taze Russell (Founder of the Jehovah’s Witnesses)? This guy spent more time in the court (fighting libel actions against the Brooklyn Eagle – which he instituted I hasten to add) than he did in the pulpit. All this was in the early part of the 20th century (+/- 1920)
Russell’s claim to fame was that he retranslated the bible (from Greek) and that (according to Charlie) there were some errors in the original translation and consequently Christians were “following the wrong path”. The Brooklyn Eagle, somewhat wryly, observed that it was odd that a man who only made fifth grade at school could translate from Greek which sparked off yet another libel action. In court, whilst being asked to identify some Greek letters on a bit of paper, Russell admitted he hadn’t got the faintest clue about Greek. Presumably it’s just another case of divine inspiration.
All the aforementioned religious texts have in common and to distinguish them, is the veneer of credibility attributed to them as a result of extreme antiquity. In the absurd, from my perspective, event that a God (whose likeness we enjoy) exists and his/her/its motivations are those ascribed to him in these specious texts, I have absolutely no doubt whatsoever, that this being is currently screwed up in a stomach hugging position in fits of laughter at human credibility!
Gospel according to Joe Mental
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I wish it were so.
Long ago, I was on a task force examining whether or not secondary schools met the needs they were supposed to. We designed a questionnaire for the graduating students to fill out. It all went well enough until the final draft, when questions relating to individuality and self-determination were deleted en masse. This was an arbitrary decision by the school board, and the rationale they gave us was that the questions were “irrelevant.”
Here, from The Memory Hole is an interesting explanation for the school district’s thinking: it was DESIGNED that way from the beginning. And I do have to agree, given my individual experience, both listed above and things I haven’t posted.
Some snippets:
And so on, and so on. Plenty more to read on that site.
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Idlex:
The kilt precludes pants of any dimension: I must however admit to my breath being in short pants.
And Steve L:
You found nothing in the Q’uran about the unbeliever and how one should deal with him? Read on MacDuff; read on!
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Why, this debate reminds of me of the intrigue surrounding Ayatollah Arkwright, the Rochdale Mullah who wanted to wear his flowing robes in the machine room at Cobble & Petard’s Mill on the Bacup road. Terrible controversy at the time.
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Jehovah’s Witnesses? I had a couple of them come around once when I was a student in Huddersfield. I found them strangely amusing, but felt a bit sorry for them at the same time.
I was bored so I confessed that I had read the Bible before and proceeded to chat with him about it. It turned out he believed that his religion was the only religion still controlled by God. He believed that at the moment in time when (supposedly) the Serpent tricked Adam and Eve into eating from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil that Satan took over the world. He went on to explain to me that not only could we only be saved by Jesus, but that his religion was the only religion that could do this for me, and that everything else in the world was still controlled by Satan.
Yes, that’s right, every other religion, every other organisation, every government, even me (although I didn’t realise it of course). Poor man!
Someone once told me that when they are working they donate a percentage of their salary to their church (a big skyscraper in downtown New York). So basically, if this is true, they are out doing door-to-door sales for whoever is behind it, commission free and actually paying for the privilege.
The bit that gets me though is that (if they follow their teachings) they would sooner let their own children die than have a blood transfusion, and they go around, big smile, nice as pie, trying to persuade you to get your priorities in order and do the same!
Having ‘googled’ them following Joe Mentals suggestion I found (amongst many thousands of pages of American drivel) some jokes:
While travelling near Tampa, Florida I passed the “Jehovah’s Witness Assembly Hall” and was struck by the fact that that must be where they make them.
I learned something the other day. I learned the Jehovah’s Witnesses do not celebrate Halloween. I guess they don’t like strangers going up to their door and annoying them.
Pages and pages (some good, some poor) of JW jokes at:
http://www.virushead.net/jwhumor.html
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There is a history of semi illiterate religious nuts doing impossible translations, for example , the young American Joseph Smith, unable to find what he sought in any of the non-conformist Church in his native land, suddenly being able to translate the hieroglyphs on some gold plates he claimed to have divined as a dowser, into the Book of Mormon.
Why is America the birthplace of so many new , so-called religions?
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More to the point Macarnie, why can’t we do something to stop them exporting their ‘so called religions’ over here?
Surely the commies at the EU Commission can do something useful for once?
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Steve’s religion:
’19th over: An effortless golf-style drive from Flintoff sends Sreesanth’s next ball soaring over long-off for the first six of the innings and brings up England’s 100. He then produces a deft chip to collect four more in the same region and bring up the fifty partnership. The last ball of the over is dispatched way over mid-wicket for another maximum and the Indians look beaten already.’
(BBC, 28th March 2006)
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Some (wise) comedian once said that religious wars were nothing more than two groups fighting about who had the better imaginary friend.
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Have given up on the Koran for the time being, too long, boring and repetitive. Here’s a thought for the day from the Bible though:
Exodus 20:14 (New International Version)
‘You shall not commit adultery.’
Matthew 5:28 (New International Version)
‘But I tell you that anyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart.’
Matthew 18:9 (New International Version)
‘And if your eye causes you to sin, gouge it out and throw it away. It is better for you to enter life with one eye than to have two eyes and be thrown into the fire of hell.’
If they read it in this order (and they do seem to hop and skip around to suit them, rather than start at the beginning like common sense would dictate) there would be a lot of one eyed people over the pond!
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It is interesting to observe that there is not a single blog or thread that references the source that requires the dress code advocated by Shamina Begum. In Islam the absolute reference point is the Quran; all other books and sources are interpretations. Anyone can access the section of dress code written in the Quran; you need not be a muslim to access this information, but not a single thread has bothered to read the source. It would be a very interesting exercise for them to do so; they may be surprised by their reading; the Quran is authentically translated into Englash with many transliterations, to name just a few transalators with their nationalities in brackets there is Marmaduke Picthall ( English); Yusaf Ali (Indian); Muhammad Ali (Indian), Muhammad Asad (Iraqi converted from Judaism) ; all of whom did their translations in the early part of the 20th century their transliteration of the Quran about dress code for both men and women is almost identical and their interprtations are also very close to each other. I suspect the judges accessed this material before they made their ruling. Anyone with an open mind can get an idea of the dress code that is portrayed by Islam by reading the relevant passages from the Quran. Incidently there is no reference; where a woman is required to have her head totally covered, should anyone find a passage or reference which says otherwise please post it for viewing.
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The reason nobody’s cited Koranic law is that it is irrelevant to the discussion. The point is not what the Koran dictates; the point is what is allowable under British law. Whether or not her beliefs are in accordance with the teachings of the Koran is not ours to decide, thankfully. Nor the judges.
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Why is America the birthplace of so many new , so-called religions? (Mac)
I suspect it may be because Protestantism – protesting against established beliefs – is inherently fissile. No sooner have they got one Protestant church going than another bunch of people protest, and split off to form yet another church. The process repeats itself indefinitely.
But that’s just a guess.
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Raincoaster, re:
Some (wise) comedian once said that religious wars were nothing more than two groups fighting about who had the better imaginary friend.
We agree at last! (if you support the latter statement anyway) I never thought it would happen….. so it must be a miracle!?!?!?!
Praise the Lord!
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Oh Mullah Raincoaster; you indeed have a great deal in common with the Mullahs who prefer to burn books rather than read them. Your ‘mother of all Judges’ pronouncement on the niceties of the British Judiciary would be better served if your read around the subject.
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raincoaster, you can do some research here:
You’ve GOT to be kidding!!!
It should be enough to put you off this particular exponent of the Abrahamic religions for life.
I don’t know if it’s sponsored by the BNP or what, but if, as someone observed earlier in this blog, this bunch don’t have their ‘enlightenment’ (whatever the hell that is) soon it’s a poor lookout for the future in the Middle East.
If one percent of this is true (and not out of context) it’s still enough to make my stomach turn.
(You’ve got to see the video about “How Muslim women eat” though)
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Oh, and before I pick up a load of death threats from the God squad and demands to “shoot the messenger”, the guy who put the site up has specifically requested confrontation and refutation.
You can read his (somewhat pugnacious and offensive) challenge at:
Sew a button on that!
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Joe, it depends on WHICH imaginary friends we’re talking about. After all, mine is for real.
Bashir Ahmad, you are simply incorrect. Whether or not she was in obedience to Koranic doctrine is not the question that was being asked. Sometimes, Bashir, it just isn’t the question, and this was one of those times. Whether or not she’s obeying God’s true will is between her and God. As we say over here in North America: Like, so not my problem.
I don’t think I need a refresher course in some of the more constraining interpretations of the Koran. my mother lived in Saudi Arabia and during that time the entire family gained an appreciation for the diversity of Islam, as well as some of its less attractive manifestations. It must be said that we also picked up a great deal of respect for it, and a certain degree of knowledge we hadn’t had before. It’s almost as diverse as Protestantism, although thankfully the Lutherans et al haven’t really gotten into Jihad. There were those Crusades, but of course that was Catholics. Nothing to do with us!
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However the current crusade (and Bush used that word one time) has everything to do with American Christian Fundamentalism, which definitely isn’t Catholic. I don’t think the Pope supports the Iraq war. But then I don’t think the Archbishop of Canterbury does either.
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And I really hope there is a Rapture, and that I get Left Behind.
It would be just great if all these blithering Fundamentalist idiots suddenly vanished overnight.
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idlex, do you really think this has anything to do with Christianity? To me it seems obvious that the invasion of Iraq is simply oil-based. Until the Seventies, the US effectively owned all the oil in Saudi Arabia; ever since they lost control of that, they’ve been looking for a substitute. They invaded Afghanistan to use it as a staging platform. I really do not think the motivation was anything other than control of the world’s oil resources.
Dubya is the shining example of the way a certain kind of jabbering superficial Christian thinks: the more you talk about Jesus, the less you have to listen to him.
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Raincoaster; you have strong preconceived views of what I should be saying instead of reading what I am actually saying. It would be a shock to both muslims, christians and others as to what is actually written on the dress code in the Koran. People love to hang on to preconceptions rather than read the actuals; this fear of the truth often leads to disputes and misunderstandings. Islam has as much to do with Saudi Arabia or the Middle East as Christianity has to do with Europe, which is none ! Jesus Christ is often portrayed as a tall blonde blue eyed scandinavian born coincidently on 25th December, the same as the ancient date of celebrating the ancient Pagan religon of Europe. The reality is that he was born sometime in June or July and certainly wasn’t a tall Scandivian, but so much commercialism and folklore has been developed that any reference to the original source is haw-hawed. The interpretation of Islam by the Saudi Government is not absolute but the petrodollar is used or abused to give favour to their interpretation; without the petrodollar, Saudi Arabia would have no voice; just as America would have no voice; we all know money talks. There are no other muslim countries that insist on women fully covering themselves; it is left to the women to decide on how she dresses. Since you are familiar with Saudi Arabia; you must also know that during Haj no men or women are permitted to cover their heads during pilgrimage. There is no injunction in the Koran that insists that a woman must have her head covered; however it may be too much to ask you read the source, as you prefer to read websites with their concocted versions. The power of misinformation is beneficial for both sides an argument who have their own agendas.
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Bashir, in this you are correct:
Facts Bashir. It’s important to look at the facts. And the fact is, the dress code of the devout was never in question in this case.
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Ah, and perhaps you forget that two of the three holiest sites in Islam are in Saudi Arabia. It is from that, rather than from riches, that Saudi Arabia’s true influence on Islam comes. Do I have to remind you of everything?
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idlex, do you really think this has anything to do with Christianity? To me it seems obvious that the invasion of Iraq is simply oil-based. (raincoaster)
I agree it’s essentially all about oil. But I think that as part of selling it to the US right, they’ve chosen to tap into apocalyptic Christian fundamentalist ‘End Time’ thinking (if ‘thinking’ be the right term for it) to shore up support for the war of Good against Evil Turrists. And it’s quite clear that it works.
Incidentally, in this respect, Bush was recently asked if he thought we were living in these ‘End Times’, to which he replied that he hadn’t thought about it.
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Well the list of things Dubya hasn’t thought about is a long one indeed. Perhaps I’m prejudiced (moi?) but it seemed to me that on 9/11 he was struggling with reading My Pet Goat.
And yes, it’s all just spin. Bush is a social Christian; he likes the connections church gives him, and he likes the Calvinist doctrine of course, since it implies he’s so virtuous. But a man who has a hard time with My Pet Goat is not going to succeed at reaching an enlightened interpretation of Revelations, for instance.
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Well i am at last impressed with some sensible commentry on this issue. I really dispair of modern “britain” that this case got as far as it did in the first place.
well done boris for saying what needs to be said on this.
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Raincoaster; Is it really that difficult to believe that there are many muslims, in fact most muslims; who do not fall into the defination of a muslim as given by “Fox TV”. Presumably; during your time in Saudi Arabia you must have learned a great deal about Islam in the isolated expatriate ghettto colonies where reinforcing prejudices and preconceptions over several martinis and beers has been a popular pastime; not dissimiliar to the ghettos in Europe or America where migrant workers seek refuge in a alien environment. The only difference being one of magnitude in monetary gain; otherwise the level of ignorance about each others cultures remains the same. “A great deal ” is gained by many parties by encouraging distrust and divisions. The Saudi version of Islam is understandably followed in Saudi Arabia but not elsewhere unless there is some coersion with some petrodollars. Hollywood’s popular self-mocking portrayal of infidels has a great deal to answer in this game of misinformation.
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Bashir, it’s obvious you aren’t reading my posts. Read all of the words in them, not just the ones that annoy you.
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Raincoaster; none of your comments annoy me; entertain perhaps but not annoy. There is a great deal of common ground. Have a nice day.
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I’m glad my posts entertain you. I hope that they may perhaps educate as well. For the record:
I have never been to Saudi Arabia
I have been to Indonesia, the US, Mindanao in the Phillippines, France, and Canada, so I don’t have quite the constrained view of Islam of which you accuse me. One of my dear friends spent quite some time as a political prisoner in Pakistan over this and other, related issues.
I know we all look alike, but do try to treat us like individuals.
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‘It is interesting to observe that there is not a single blog or thread that references the source that requires the dress code advocated by Shamina Begum.’
(Bashir Ahmed)
Ahem! I put a link up for the Koran last week!
I apologise for not reading it from cover to cover and finding all the correct references for everyone, but you guys all seem to have too much time on your hands anyway judging at the amount of time you all spend on here.
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