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rok_the-boat
Joined: 24 Jan 2004
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 Posted: Tue Jul 26, 2005 6:23 pm Post subject: Democracy - Hah! They've never had it so bad. -- Iraq |
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If Iraq adopts an Islamic constitution, and they seem to be headed in that direction, I think that the whole Iraqi war business will be determined to have been a tremendous mistake - from the point of view of the West, of course, not say, Iran. Democracy - Hah! They've never had it so bad.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20050726/ap_on_re_mi_ea/iraq_050726195037 |
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mithridates
Joined: 03 Mar 2003
Location: President's office, Korean Space Agency
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Joo Rip Gwa Rhhee
Joined: 25 May 2003
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| Posted: Wed Jul 27, 2005 12:06 am Post subject: Re: Democracy - Hah! They've never had it so bad. -- Iraq |
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| rok_the-boat wrote: |
If Iraq adopts an Islamic constitution, and they seem to be headed in that direction, I think that the whole Iraqi war business will be determined to have been a tremendous mistake - from the point of view of the West, of course, not say, Iran. Democracy - Hah! They've never had it so bad.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20050726/ap_on_re_mi_ea/iraq_050726195037 |
Why is that?
What is wrong with an Islamic constitution?
Iran is/ was the way it is because Khomeni was a fascist bigot, he just happened to be a muslim. |
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bigverne
Joined: 12 May 2004
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| Posted: Wed Jul 27, 2005 1:01 am Post subject: Re: Democracy - Hah! They've never had it so bad. -- Iraq |
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| Joo Rip Gwa Rhhee wrote: |
| rok_the-boat wrote: |
If Iraq adopts an Islamic constitution, and they seem to be headed in that direction, I think that the whole Iraqi war business will be determined to have been a tremendous mistake - from the point of view of the West, of course, not say, Iran. Democracy - Hah! They've never had it so bad.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20050726/ap_on_re_mi_ea/iraq_050726195037 |
Why is that?
What is wrong with an Islamic constitution?
Iran is/ was the way it is because Khomeni was a fascist bigot, he just happened to be a muslim. |
What's wrong with an Islamic constitution is that it is at odds with the rights of women, minorities and the concept of human dignity and freedom which Islam does not recognise.
Iran is the way it is because its government and laws are organised on the basis of Shariah. This is why you can be imprisoned merely for crimes of 'apostasy'. Not because of Khomeini, but because of Shariah. |
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Joo Rip Gwa Rhhee
Joined: 25 May 2003
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| Posted: Wed Jul 27, 2005 1:16 am Post subject: |
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depends on how it is interpreted. |
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bigverne
Joined: 12 May 2004
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| Posted: Wed Jul 27, 2005 1:33 am Post subject: |
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| Under Shariah, apostasy is punishable by death. There's not much interpretation needed there. |
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Joo Rip Gwa Rhhee
Joined: 25 May 2003
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| Posted: Wed Jul 27, 2005 4:30 am Post subject: |
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| Quote: |
By Stephen Schwartz
Weekly Standard | July 12, 2004
Much hope is presently vested, by friends of a free Iraq, in the 74-year-old grand ayatollah, Sayyid Ali al-Husseini Sistani. Ayatollah Sistani acts as a marja, or religious guide, for many if not most Iraqi Shia Muslims from his residence in the holy city of Najaf. Since the Shia make up about 60 percent of Iraq's population, it is a matter of some interest to know just where the grand ayatollah would lead his followers.
Sistani has thus far been an unwavering advocate of elected government in Iraq (far more steadfast than the Coalition itself). And now it is possible to ascertain his views on another important matter--relations between Muslims and non-Muslims--thanks to a volume of Sistani's pronouncements (fatwas) offering guidance to Muslims living abroad. A Code of Practice for Muslims in the West was dictated to Abdul Hadi al-Hakim and translated by Syed Muhammad Rizvi from an Arabic text approved by Sistani's office in the Iranian religious center of Qum. It can be downloaded at www.sistani.org/html/eng or bought from Islamic booksellers.
For the novice, any work of Islamic jurisprudence might prove difficult to navigate. Certainly, there is much here to disconcert the reader unfamiliar with the strict Shia sect. The book begins, for example, by warning that Muslims should not emigrate to non-Muslim countries unless they are certain that doing so will not undermine their faith or that of their relatives. Its pages mention numerous customs and notions alien to outsiders, like the prohibition on attendance at musical concerts intended purely for entertainment, rigorous habits of personal modesty, and acceptance of "temporary" as well as "permanent" marriage.
But more instructive than looking for exotic features of Shia teaching is a comparison of Sistani's views on key questions with those propounded by Wahhabi Islam, the official sect of Saudi Arabia. Wahhabi teaching is propagated via websites, newspapers, sermons, and lectures, in thousands of Sunni mosques and by Islamist organizations throughout the world. It is the contrast between Sistani's teaching and that of the Wahhabis that shows quite plainly who are our enemies and who are our friends.
A good place to start is the question whether Muslims living in the West may participate in electoral politics. Sistani answers yes, the Wahhabis answer no. And the difference between them in tone could hardly be greater.
The Ayatollah Sistani not only states that Muslim citizens of Western nations may vote, he goes on to counsel that they may, and sometimes should, run for office: "At times the higher interests of the Muslims in non-Muslim countries demand that Muslims seek membership of political parties, and enter parliaments, and representative assemblies." While he specifies that such decisions must be submitted to consultation with "trustworthy experts," his view is that Muslim citizens of countries like Britain should participate in the political process on an equal basis with non-Muslims.
The Wahhabis' attitude toward elections was on display during the recent vote for the European Parliament. In Britain, which has a Muslim population of at least 1.5 million, widely reproduced Wahhabi propaganda posters, flyers, and website commentaries bore the headline "The Messenger Muhammad (S.A.W.) Is Our Example--Did He Ever Vote?" (S.A.W. stands for Sallallahu Aleyhi wa-Sallam, or May the Peace of God Be Upon Him, and is usually abbreviated in English PBUH.) One might as well ask whether the Messenger Muhammad ever rode a bus, spoke on the telephone, or wore glasses, but that was not the point. Rather, the intent was to keep Muslims removed from the political process of a democracy.
A typical Wahhabi rant under this headline may be read at the pro-bin Laden website al-Muhajiroun. It declaims, "Muslims must not vote for anyone in the present election, even if they say that they are going to get you some schools or other benefits for the Muslim community." That "some people go to Parliament or local councils and legislate and others vote for them to go there and do so" is "clear-cut shirk," or idol-worship. "How can a Muslim say there is no legislator except Allah," asks the piece, ". . . and then vote for someone else to legislate [the unbelievers'] law and order?"
Such blandishments accurately represent the all-or-nothing mentality of Wahhabis living in Britain, according to whom no government is legitimate except an Islamic one--which is why they fully intend to establish an Islamic government in place of the country's present parliamentary system.
The contrast between the mentality of Sistani and that of the Wahhabis is even starker when one turns to the simplest level of participation in community life: Should Muslims extend Christmas and New Year's greetings to their Christian neighbors? Sistani says yes, the Wahhabis say no.
Sistani states very simply: "It is permissible to greet the Jews and Christians and also [other non-Muslims] on the occasions they celebrate like the New Year, Christmas, Easter, and the Passover."
If we turn to the Wahhabi website www.myiwc.com, representing the "Islamic web community," we find a diatribe by Jamal al-Din Zarabozo. He writes that "it is not allowed for Muslims to congratulate the non-Muslims on their holidays and festivals. . . . It is one of the greatest sins in Allah's sight . . . a greater sin than congratulating them for drinking wine."
Zarabozo, whose rhetoric is notorious among Muslims for its excesses, cites a reported opinion by Abdullah ibn Umar, a companion of the Prophet Muhammad, that "whoever stays in the lands of the foreigners and celebrates their New Year's Days . . . shall be resurrected with them on the Day of Resurrection," that is, excluded from the Muslim hereafter. Zarabozo also cites an opinion of Ibn al Qayyim, a fourteenth-century disciple of Ibn Taymiyyah, the forerunner of Wahhabism, holding that Muslims should not even "sell Christians anything they may use in their holidays of meat, blood, or clothing, nor should they loan an animal to ride on, nor help with anything concerning [their] festival because all of that would be a way of dignifying their idolatry and helping them in their [unbelief]."
Moving on to actual friendships between Muslims, Christians, and Jews, Sistani welcomes them, the Wahhabis forbid them.
Sistani writes, "A Muslim is allowed to take non-Muslims for acquaintances and friends, to be sincere towards them and they be sincere towards him, to help them and they help him in fulfilling the needs of this life." He notes that Imam Jafar as-Sadiq, the founder of Shia jurisprudence, said, "If a Jewish person comes to sit with you, make that a good meeting."
Wahhabis teach that such relationships should be avoided at all costs. (The Muslim Students Association is especially pernicious in spreading this view among Muslim college students in North America.) The authoritative Wahhabi website Islam Q&A declares that "a Muslim's relationship with Muslims is different from his relationship with others. . . . With regard to non-Muslims, the Muslim should disavow himself of them, and he should not feel any love in his heart towards them. . . . If [the] Muslim has to be with [non-Muslims] physically, he should not be with them in his heart, and he must avoid mixing with them unnecessarily. . . . The rights of Allah and His Book and His Prophet are more important than our personal rights. Remember this, for this is one of the things that will help you to hate them and regard them as enemies until they believe in Allah alone."
Some Wahhabis have adopted a viewpoint slightly less harsh. Abdullah Ibn Abd ur-Rahman Jibreen, a prominent Saudi cleric and state religious functionary whose fatwa against hijackings has been used to paint the Wahhabis as enemies of terrorism, concedes, "It is allowed to mix with the disbelievers, sit with them and be polite with them as means of calling them to Allah, explaining to them the teachings of Islam, encouraging them to enter this religion and to make it clear to them the good result of accepting the religion and the evil result of punishment for those who turn away. For this purpose, being a companion to them and showing love for them is overlooked in order to reach that good final goal."
It is true that Shia and Wahhabi leaders have one unfortunate point of agreement: Both call on Muslims in the West to boycott Israeli products. Wahhabis, however, are instructed to go the extra mile and boycott American products as well. The differences between the dour, rigid mentality that Saudi Arabia seeks to impose and the moderate views of Ayatollah Sistani, meanwhile, extend to matters as trivial as depictions of human beings (Wahhabis command that such paintings be destroyed; Sistani accepts them) and as grave as punishments for adultery (the Wahhabis kill an adulteress; Sistani writes that "it is not permissible for [a Muslim man] to kill [a Muslim woman who commits adultery], even if he sees her in the act").
Most important, perhaps, Sistani's book makes no mention of concepts, dear to Muslim radicals, such as the goal of establishing Islamic rule in Western countries and the duty to fight jihad in non-Muslim lands. Instead, Sistani exhorts the Muslim living in a non-Muslim nation that when he has made a commitment "to abide by the laws of that country"--as he implicitly has in signing immigration documents--he must keep his promise.
The lesson here is simple and essential: The Ayatollah Sistani does not seek to promote a clash of civilizations or a conflict between religions. He does not teach the necessity of aggressive dawa (Islamic evangelism) or jihad against non-Muslims. The Saudis and their Wahhabi servants insist on both.
And that, of course, is a major reason why extremist Saudi clerics incite Muslims to kidnap and murder Americans and other non-Muslims on Saudi soil. It is also why Saudi Arabia so fears a democratic, Shia-led Iraq on its northern border, and why Wahhabi preachers urge pious Muslims to kill and die fighting all who defend the new Iraq.
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Stephen Schwartz, an author and journalist, is author of The Two Faces of Islam: The House of Sa'ud from Tradition to Terror. A vociferous critic of Wahhabism, Schwartz is a frequent contributor to National Review, The Weekly Standard, and other publications. |
http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=14173 |
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bigverne
Joined: 12 May 2004
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| Posted: Wed Jul 27, 2005 4:39 am Post subject: |
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| Doesn't say anything in that article about punishments for apostasy, or indeed whether women who commit adultery should be sentenced to death in court. |
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rapier
Joined: 16 Feb 2003
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| Posted: Wed Jul 27, 2005 4:51 am Post subject: |
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Islam has always placed a high value on women's rights. they can have their own careers and independence, and a wide choice of fashionable clothes to wear. They also get to realise and express their sexuality, and individuality. I'm sure they're quite happy.
Believe it or not, there is a designer dress and expensive make up under all of that. |
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The Bobster
Joined: 15 Jan 2003
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| Posted: Wed Jul 27, 2005 9:39 am Post subject: |
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| Joo Rip Gwa Rhhee wrote: |
| http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=14173 |
This website is pretty extreme rightwing whackjob loony bin stuff. And yet Joo posts it like it was the NYT or theo Post or the LA Times. no hinto fo qulaification about how far out there they are ... par for the course with this guy.
Maybe it's just me, but fine to post a blog that has someone's opinion, especially if it links to some reputable news source ... but to just post an entire article with no inidcation of the provenance, not even a hint that the site might be less than "objective?"
Look around that site (it's a big one) and notice what it says about Israel (always favorable) and what it says about Arabs (not even close).
The guy who posted that wants us to believe he has no agenda of his own. He does, though. |
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Joo Rip Gwa Rhhee
Joined: 25 May 2003
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| Posted: Wed Jul 27, 2005 10:13 am Post subject: |
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| The Bobster wrote: |
| Joo Rip Gwa Rhhee wrote: |
| http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=14173 |
This website is pretty extreme rightwing whackjob loony bin stuff. And yet Joo posts it like it was the NYT or theo Post or the LA Times. no hinto fo qulaification about how far out there they are ... par for the course with this guy.
Maybe it's just me, but fine to post a blog that has someone's opinion, especially if it links to some reputable news source ... but to just post an entire article with no inidcation of the provenance, not even a hint that the site might be less than "objective?"
Look around that site (it's a big one) and notice what it says about Israel (always favorable) and what it says about Arabs (not even close).
The guy who posted that wants us to believe he has no agenda of his own. He does, though. |
| Quote: |
By Stephen Schwartz
Weekly Standard | July 12, 2004 |
It was originally in the weekly standard. And it was saying good things about Sistani.
and I don't think it is loony bin stuff. How is it? Pls show it?
Anyway my views are more or less those similar Bill Clinton while the Bobsters' views are to the left of the magazine the Nation.
this use to be Bobs' opinion of blogs
Bobster said:
Posted: Fri Jul 08, 2005 1:17 pm
http://www.eslcafe.com/forums/korea/viewtopic.php?t=41306&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=0
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Blogs are useful. They can call your attention to primary sources that give you information you didn't have before. I got a blog, too. I would never use it try to win an argument, and the fact that you use Powerline in this way means that you think most peple are not aware of the bias at that site.
You are aware of it, though, Joo. That makes you guilty, not once but twice, of posting a source as information when it is in fact as much a source of bias and lies as you are.
Those of us who have watched you can see how full of lies you are, Joo. Do you wonder why so few bother to reply to you any more? |
Bob's source for the post above:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/theblog/archive/jim-moore/why-karl-rove-will-never-_4367.html
Besides the article that Bob showed us didn't have any links to newstories , at least not that I can see.
Bob of course uses that left wing whacko Ted Rail
http://www.eslcafe.com/forums/korea/viewtopic.php?t=41306&start=0 |
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hypnotist
Joined: 04 Dec 2004
Location: I wish I were a sock
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| Posted: Wed Jul 27, 2005 4:24 pm Post subject: |
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| rapier wrote: |
| Islam has always placed a high value on women's rights. they can have their own careers and independence, and a wide choice of fashionable clothes to wear. They also get to realise and express their sexuality, and individuality. I'm sure they're quite happy. |
The female employment rate [in Turkey] is meanwhile the worst in Europe, exacerbated by female illiteracy and poor education. One in every eight girls is out of school, often pushed into arranged marriages at a young age.
"Some people say this is because of Islam," says secular women's campaigner Turkan Saylan. "It isn't - it is because of poverty. Once the country develops economically, I am absolutely certain that this will change - that fathers will stop using Islam as an excuse to take their daughters out of school.
| Quote: |
| Believe it or not, there is a designer dress and expensive make up under all of that. |
Believe it or not, some Muslim women are happier dressed like that in public than in designer dresses and make-up. Not all, but some. |
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gdimension
Joined: 05 Jul 2005
Location: Jeju
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| Posted: Wed Jul 27, 2005 4:48 pm Post subject: |
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| Believe it or not, some Muslim women are happier dressed like that in public than in designer dresses and make-up. Not all, but some. |
I'm far from an expert on Muslim dress-codes, but how would we know that some women are happier dressed like that? For the record, I agree with you - I think that some must prefer to be clothed in that way, but....
How can we really know what they want? I ask that hoping for an answer, not because I'm trying to make a point...I really don't know much about Islamic culture.
I understand wearing traditional clothing was the law under Taliban-controlled Afghanistan, but what about in other Islamic countries? What is the situation for Muslims living in the West? Is there more leeway?
And what about familial and societal pressure (as opposed to laws and rules from the government/mosques)? Could your average Muslim female in **country** wear what she wants and still be considered a true Muslim? I'm guessing the answer again depends on what country we are talking about...
Anybody who is in the know: enlighten, please. |
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rok_the-boat
Joined: 24 Jan 2004
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| Posted: Wed Jul 27, 2005 5:05 pm Post subject: |
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| View the initial post in the light of the fact that Bush is struggling to escape the WMD fake purpose of the war and now trying to lay down foundation for removing a bad guy and replacing him with DEMOCRACY. |
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bucheon bum
Joined: 16 Jan 2003
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| Posted: Wed Jul 27, 2005 5:19 pm Post subject: |
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| gdimension wrote: |
| Quote: |
| Believe it or not, some Muslim women are happier dressed like that in public than in designer dresses and make-up. Not all, but some. |
I'm far from an expert on Muslim dress-codes, but how would we know that some women are happier dressed like that? For the record, I agree with you - I think that some must prefer to be clothed in that way, but....
How can we really know what they want? I ask that hoping for an answer, not because I'm trying to make a point...I really don't know much about Islamic culture.
I understand wearing traditional clothing was the law under Taliban-controlled Afghanistan, but what about in other Islamic countries? What is the situation for Muslims living in the West? Is there more leeway?
And what about familial and societal pressure (as opposed to laws and rules from the government/mosques)? Could your average Muslim female in **country** wear what she wants and still be considered a true Muslim? I'm guessing the answer again depends on what country we are talking about...
Anybody who is in the know: enlighten, please. |
It depends. Saudi is at one extreme, while Turkey is at the other in the Muslim world. The widest variety of clothing I've seen is probably Jordan or Egypt. In some parts of Amman, some women wear really tight, revealing clothing, while in the old downtown, women are fairly conservative (although not that conservative compared to the Gulf). In Tunisia and Morocco, those who wear hijab are generally poor and less likely from the city. Syria was the hardest to put a finger on; I saw uncovered women everywhere, but I also saw plenty of women wearing the Iranian-style black cloak (blocking on the name).
Overall, I'd say it really is divided economically. Basically the more wealthy a family is, and nicer the neighborhood they live in, the less grief a woman is going to get for what she wears. Obviously I'm generalizing and there are plenty of exceptions, but that's the easiest way to sum it up.
What they really want? Well while plenty are comfortable with their choice of clothing, plenty are not. Unfortunately there is certainly a substantial minority (and majority I'm sure in some countries) who don't like it.
But honestly, I think Muslim women care about other things more: right to divorce, custody over children (men get custody every time according to Sharia), etc etc. Once they get those rights and those rights are enforced, I think the freedom of dress will naturally take place. |
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