Out of curiosity, I watched the Fitna movie. And as a Muslim, I found it disgusting. It's the same old nonsense anti-Islamic propaganda. And it's nothing new. Islamophobia has existed almost for the entire life of Islam.
It began with brutal persecution of early believers by infidels in Mecca. Islam was a threat to their revenues from pilgrims who visited Kaaba to pay their tribute to the idols (and also to do some shopping on the side of their pilgrim). Furthermore, the egalitarian ideology of Islam, declaring all people (regardless of skin color, gender, tribe, wealth and social class) to be worthy only by their obedience to God, was enough reason for slaveholding tribalistic mysogenic infidels to fear the spread of this new religion.
During the Dark Ages, when Islamic world was the cradle of civilization and knowledge (well, if we ignore some dark pages when Shia Muslims were persecuted), Islamophobia manifested as the Crusades and horrible crimes in the name of Jesus and Christianity. The threat of the Islamic empire to European kingdoms who ruled people by keeping them in abysmal ignorance was something that necessitated immediate action. And those kings and monarches (in an unholy alliance with the Holy See) managed to fool their subjects that the Holy Land should be liberated from the yoke of infidel Muslims. Ironically, the accusation that Islam was the religion of sword, proved to suit better the promoters of Christianity over that period and the centuries that followed the Crusades.
And following that line and using a similar rhetoric in our modern times, it shows up as the media hype and anti-Islamic propaganda. At a lower level, such propaganda inspire like-minded idiots to discriminate against Muslims (have a look at this experiment video or this real video) or worse, commit hate-crimes against anybody who just looks like Muslims (even if they're not). And at a higher level, they prepare the western world mindset for new forms of Crusades against Islamic world. Fitna is the latest example of such garbage. And its name, Fitna, suits the content and intent.
The producer, Geert Wilders claims that he's concerned about extremist Islam. But looking at his movie, it appears that his problem is with Islam and Muslims in general. At one point, he gives alarming statistics about the rising population of Muslims in the Netherlands since 1909 (54) to 2004 (944,000). The population of the Netherlands is about 16 million. Then, he proceeds to declare the number of Muslims in Europe in 2007 as 54,000,000. And he makes no distinction about what percentage of these alarming numbers constitute extremists. He's just concerned about the numbers.
At another point, he juxtaposes images of mosques with the caption "Greetings from the Netherlands". Apparently, he's not happy about seeing mosques in general, regardless of the nature of the message preached in there. And this reminds me of the Minaret controversy in Switzerland (one of the most progressive democratic countries), where some bigots lobbied (and apparently, are still lobbying) for a constitutional amendment preventing construction of mosques with minarets. These democratic freedom-loving people are not happy about seeing their land being conquered by minarets.
The rest of the movie consists of recitations of some verses from Quran, followed by carnage scenes created by terrorists. So, you want to believe that Quran is the textbook for terrorism. At the end, he suggests Muslims to tear out those pages from Quran.
Well, those verses are taken out of context, both by Muslim extermeists and also by their bigot peers in the non-Muslim world. Such verses tell Musims what to do with enemies of Islam who actively and aggressively engage Muslims in war, not just anybody who simply is not a Muslim. And even when warmongers opt for peace, Quran advises Muslims to treat them peacefully. Anybody could pick and choose verses out of holy books and come up with conclusions they want. Have a look at this video-clip or this one just as examples to see how similar verses exist in the Bible. Should Christians tear out those pages from the Bible? Probably not.
And following those verses literally has not been a hypothetical situation or occasional occurrence. The Crusaders did follow those instructions very faithfully (much beyond the surface of the words) during the Crusades while they conquered Muslim territories. And even in our modern times, there are modern Crusaders who do the same thing, although not as wide-spread as the Dark Ages.
However, when wars are waged against Islamic countries and civilian Muslims are mass-murdered as collateral damage (God knows how much I hate this phrase), the result is the same. It just inflames new cycles of violence with popele in the Muslim world finding enough fuel to avenge their civilian casualty by killing some civilians on the other side. And then, anti-Muslims defend against violence and terrorism with killing even more civilian Muslims. And the vicious cycle goes on and on and on.
Thinking about anti-Islamic garbage, I remembered Salman Rushdie and our Department of English Language and Literature widely promoting him for their undergraduate conference on Identity in Language and Literature. For several weeks, you could see his picture in their Call for Papers (and the extension thereof) all over the University Hall floors, stairways and corridors.
Having read the Satanic Verses, I don't find any merit in the book apart from insulting the beliefs of over one billion Muslims and fueling the Clash of Civilizations. The book is a cheap effort in Magic Realism (not even distantly comparable to works of Marquez, the master of this genre). In the Satanic Verses, the author who has experienced humiliation as an immigrant Indian Muslim in the British society has let it out in his book through 2 fictional characters (one of them makes you think of our Prophet). What you read in the book is mostly comprised of fantasies based on historical lies. I've seen lots of these cheap works targeting religious beliefs.
Even when the controversy over the Danish cartoons broke out, it was not the first (or the only) of its kind. I've seen a comic book which is entirely comprised of cartoons of our Prophet (and in this case, the author/creator was an ex-Muslim Arab making fun of everything in Islam). And those pictures were much more abhorrible than the ones published by Danish newspapers.
And regrettably, I have to admit that some of the nonsense in this comic book (or similar anti-Islamic stuff in general) are originated in some unauthentic, yet widely recognized Islamic texts. For example, the central theme in Salman Rushdie's book (Satan leading the Prophet recite some bogus verses recognizing idols besides God) was not completely a product of his ingenuity; it has been present in some unauthentic Islamic texts read over and over for centuries. And ironically, those Muslims believing in those Islamic texts, never scratched their head that such lies in their texts contradict Quran. Well, until Salman Rushdie brought it up and embellished it by some other lies (again, present in those unauthentic Islamic texts).
Lots of such works are published around the world and nobody knows or even cares about them, except for some intellectually-challenged people who base their information and knowledge of history and religion on such sources.
What enrages the Muslim world is the publicity and support that such works and their creators receive by the western governments under the pretext of artistic creation and freedom of expression. As a recent example, Salman Rushdie was awarded knighthood last year for services to literature. It appears that certain instances of free speech immediately lead to prosecution and jail while insulting religious beliefs receives a blind eye or worse, support and praise. And when Muslims observe double standards on freedom of expression, even those not subscribing to conspiracy theories, come to believe there's a modern Crusade going on.
It began with brutal persecution of early believers by infidels in Mecca. Islam was a threat to their revenues from pilgrims who visited Kaaba to pay their tribute to the idols (and also to do some shopping on the side of their pilgrim). Furthermore, the egalitarian ideology of Islam, declaring all people (regardless of skin color, gender, tribe, wealth and social class) to be worthy only by their obedience to God, was enough reason for slaveholding tribalistic mysogenic infidels to fear the spread of this new religion.
During the Dark Ages, when Islamic world was the cradle of civilization and knowledge (well, if we ignore some dark pages when Shia Muslims were persecuted), Islamophobia manifested as the Crusades and horrible crimes in the name of Jesus and Christianity. The threat of the Islamic empire to European kingdoms who ruled people by keeping them in abysmal ignorance was something that necessitated immediate action. And those kings and monarches (in an unholy alliance with the Holy See) managed to fool their subjects that the Holy Land should be liberated from the yoke of infidel Muslims. Ironically, the accusation that Islam was the religion of sword, proved to suit better the promoters of Christianity over that period and the centuries that followed the Crusades.
And following that line and using a similar rhetoric in our modern times, it shows up as the media hype and anti-Islamic propaganda. At a lower level, such propaganda inspire like-minded idiots to discriminate against Muslims (have a look at this experiment video or this real video) or worse, commit hate-crimes against anybody who just looks like Muslims (even if they're not). And at a higher level, they prepare the western world mindset for new forms of Crusades against Islamic world. Fitna is the latest example of such garbage. And its name, Fitna, suits the content and intent.
The producer, Geert Wilders claims that he's concerned about extremist Islam. But looking at his movie, it appears that his problem is with Islam and Muslims in general. At one point, he gives alarming statistics about the rising population of Muslims in the Netherlands since 1909 (54) to 2004 (944,000). The population of the Netherlands is about 16 million. Then, he proceeds to declare the number of Muslims in Europe in 2007 as 54,000,000. And he makes no distinction about what percentage of these alarming numbers constitute extremists. He's just concerned about the numbers.
At another point, he juxtaposes images of mosques with the caption "Greetings from the Netherlands". Apparently, he's not happy about seeing mosques in general, regardless of the nature of the message preached in there. And this reminds me of the Minaret controversy in Switzerland (one of the most progressive democratic countries), where some bigots lobbied (and apparently, are still lobbying) for a constitutional amendment preventing construction of mosques with minarets. These democratic freedom-loving people are not happy about seeing their land being conquered by minarets.
The rest of the movie consists of recitations of some verses from Quran, followed by carnage scenes created by terrorists. So, you want to believe that Quran is the textbook for terrorism. At the end, he suggests Muslims to tear out those pages from Quran.
Well, those verses are taken out of context, both by Muslim extermeists and also by their bigot peers in the non-Muslim world. Such verses tell Musims what to do with enemies of Islam who actively and aggressively engage Muslims in war, not just anybody who simply is not a Muslim. And even when warmongers opt for peace, Quran advises Muslims to treat them peacefully. Anybody could pick and choose verses out of holy books and come up with conclusions they want. Have a look at this video-clip or this one just as examples to see how similar verses exist in the Bible. Should Christians tear out those pages from the Bible? Probably not.
And following those verses literally has not been a hypothetical situation or occasional occurrence. The Crusaders did follow those instructions very faithfully (much beyond the surface of the words) during the Crusades while they conquered Muslim territories. And even in our modern times, there are modern Crusaders who do the same thing, although not as wide-spread as the Dark Ages.
However, when wars are waged against Islamic countries and civilian Muslims are mass-murdered as collateral damage (God knows how much I hate this phrase), the result is the same. It just inflames new cycles of violence with popele in the Muslim world finding enough fuel to avenge their civilian casualty by killing some civilians on the other side. And then, anti-Muslims defend against violence and terrorism with killing even more civilian Muslims. And the vicious cycle goes on and on and on.
Thinking about anti-Islamic garbage, I remembered Salman Rushdie and our Department of English Language and Literature widely promoting him for their undergraduate conference on Identity in Language and Literature. For several weeks, you could see his picture in their Call for Papers (and the extension thereof) all over the University Hall floors, stairways and corridors.
Having read the Satanic Verses, I don't find any merit in the book apart from insulting the beliefs of over one billion Muslims and fueling the Clash of Civilizations. The book is a cheap effort in Magic Realism (not even distantly comparable to works of Marquez, the master of this genre). In the Satanic Verses, the author who has experienced humiliation as an immigrant Indian Muslim in the British society has let it out in his book through 2 fictional characters (one of them makes you think of our Prophet). What you read in the book is mostly comprised of fantasies based on historical lies. I've seen lots of these cheap works targeting religious beliefs.
Even when the controversy over the Danish cartoons broke out, it was not the first (or the only) of its kind. I've seen a comic book which is entirely comprised of cartoons of our Prophet (and in this case, the author/creator was an ex-Muslim Arab making fun of everything in Islam). And those pictures were much more abhorrible than the ones published by Danish newspapers.
And regrettably, I have to admit that some of the nonsense in this comic book (or similar anti-Islamic stuff in general) are originated in some unauthentic, yet widely recognized Islamic texts. For example, the central theme in Salman Rushdie's book (Satan leading the Prophet recite some bogus verses recognizing idols besides God) was not completely a product of his ingenuity; it has been present in some unauthentic Islamic texts read over and over for centuries. And ironically, those Muslims believing in those Islamic texts, never scratched their head that such lies in their texts contradict Quran. Well, until Salman Rushdie brought it up and embellished it by some other lies (again, present in those unauthentic Islamic texts).
Lots of such works are published around the world and nobody knows or even cares about them, except for some intellectually-challenged people who base their information and knowledge of history and religion on such sources.
What enrages the Muslim world is the publicity and support that such works and their creators receive by the western governments under the pretext of artistic creation and freedom of expression. As a recent example, Salman Rushdie was awarded knighthood last year for services to literature. It appears that certain instances of free speech immediately lead to prosecution and jail while insulting religious beliefs receives a blind eye or worse, support and praise. And when Muslims observe double standards on freedom of expression, even those not subscribing to conspiracy theories, come to believe there's a modern Crusade going on.
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