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 Another Inconvenient Truth >> Aki Nawaz “Go Join Hezbollah!" >> Amina Nawaz So, You Wanna Change the World? >> Sarah Waseem 10 Books To Read Before Going To University >> Mujadad Zaman Still Learning to Tread on Hallowed Ground >> Omar Fraser A Prophet for All >> Abdul-Rehman Malik Emerging from the Rubble: A Letter from New York City >> Zeeshan Suhail and Muntasir Sattar Istanbul’s Illuminated Ramadan Nights >> Abdal Hakim Murad The Pain of Panjshir >> Chris Sands A People Coming Apart at the Seams >> David Lepeska A Cynical Plan to Rebuild Islam >> Louay Safi Suffer The Little Children >> Tasneem Osgood Dangerous Denial on Darfur >> Muhammed Abdelmoteleb Is the Glass Half Full of Hope or Despair? >> Fozia Bora The Mother of All Muslim Organisations >> Mullah Charles Bala Subramaniam Narasimha Rao A Pious Mole >> Mudasser Ali Living on the Edge >> Tauhid Pasha The Silly Season >> Dal Nun Strong Walk in the Old Paths >> Daoud Rosser-Owen A Modern-Day Ibn Battuta - A tribute to Thomas Omar Abercrombie (1930-2006) >> Shiraz Sheikh “How can you hear a million words from a million mouths at the same time?” >> Shan Khan A Triumph of Myth >> Abdul-Rehman Malik The Timbuktu Charter: “We will be like ferocious lions” >> Muammar al-Gaddafi Updike’s Terrorist: An(other) American Folly >> Raneem Azzam A Crooked Commission >> Sunny Hundal Aural Remembrance Whitewashing White Terror Veil-Gate - The End of Tolerance? Organic Iftars, Unholy Garbage iPod vs iMuslim Formula One Fatwas Vox Populi |
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Letters Page 8 The Pope Letter of the month I have an idea. It’s a whacky idea, somewhat novel and untested - but I think we should do it anyway: let’s all go out into the streets and shout stupid yobbo slogans and burn American flags and wave infantile placards and demonstrate to the entire world on live television what a bunch of humourless, graceless bunch of thuggish nitwits we Muslims all are. I’ll lead the beat and you all shout - the chant has a very simple lyrical refrain. Everytime I say - “KILL THE POPE” you say “Allah hu Akbar! Allah hu Akbar!" It’ll be one of those audience participation woodstock type thing... it’s going to be really heavy and fat... let’s do it. Meet me at Trafalgar Sq at 8. Tell all your readers to come wearing balaclavas, hoodies and keffiyas. In fact, you can sell tickets - £10 a piece: All profits donated to the Campaign for Halal Gelatine. Or you could just stay and home, ignore this nonsense and just act in a civilised and gracefully manner like the vast majority of Muslims the world over. Up to you. But I’m raisin’ hell. I have been wondering what exactly happened to cause the controversy with regards to what the Pope said. Having not had chance to read the newspaper or watch the news, I went online. As is with much reporting, it can be hard to get to the truth but what I read with interest was your editor’s quote on the Guardian’s website. It made things as clear and understandable to me as was necessary and reaffirmed my own views which I try to promote to others who insult Islam. I am not a Christian or Muslim but respect others’ religious beliefs. Reading the article lead me to the Q-News website and therefore, a positive thing has happened in light of this negative media coverage - there is much learning to be gained from your magazine. The comments by the pope is disastrous for Islam because of how people will feel about some Muslims’ reaction to it. My immediate reaction was, here we go again, you’ve got them at it, yet more Islam in the media. Your editor asked on the Heaven and Earth show how Muslims are going to get the world’s attention to their anger. But people don’t want Islam’s attention. Non-Muslims do not want to keep hearing about Islam and secular people certainly don’t. Britain is not a Muslim country and we never had all this Islam when I was growing up. I’ve rejected religion. The British don’t do God. Now it seems we can’t pick up a paper or turn on the news without hearing about Muslims and what they think and how we have to listen to them and do this and that to please them. The Pope’s comments have not helped Islam, because people will be angered by the reaction of many Muslims. Mosque Etiquette I went to a talk in our local masjid recently. The subject of the talk was excellent, the two speakers were very learned, and the setting, a beautiful new mosque opened during Ramadaan. All the makings of a perfect evening. So what went wrong? In a nutshell the selfishness of women who insist on bringing young children to such events - without a thought for all those other people who either don’t have young children or who have taken the time and effort to arrange for their children to be cared for at home by Grandma or big sister or some other responsible babysitter. Firstly, by ‘young’ I mean children under seven. It is totally unrealistic to expect young children to sit quietly for hours. They quickly get bored. What do our enterprising mums do? They feed them sweets, crisps and cola in an effort to bribe them into being quiet. And still, they wonder why, after being pumped full of sugar and additives, the children are even more hyper than before. Nobody benefits in these circumstances, not the kids who are rampaging round the place as if it’s a playground, or the mothers, who seem embarrassed to get up and tell their children off. Instead the mothers just tune out and let the children get on with it. Others come to listen but, due to the noise either give up on the talk and leave or add to the general cacophony by forming little gossip groups! This behaviour is bad enough when it’s in a hall but when it’s in a masjid then I think it’s disgraceful. Masjids are built and furbished with the generosity of the ummah. What right has anyone to allow their child to dribble “chewits” onto the carpet or to roll around on the floor spilling his or her milk everywhere? One child was even running around with his shoes on. These places are supposed to be kept clean for people to prostrate to their Creator. Who wants to go into sajadah and get a forehead sticky with sweets or the smell of sour milk in their nostrils? Good manners, cleanliness and respect are supposed to be basic qualities which every Muslim should have, so why is that we have this kind of behaviour in the mosque. If you attend a church, which I used to before I embraced Islam, you would never see this kind of behaviour. Why aren’t we teaching our children respect for the masjid? Why don’t we honour other people’s rights to listen to the talks they attend, rather than spoiling the event for everyone and robbing everyone of the chance to learn something beneficial? My request to all Muslim parents everywhere is that in the interest of your children and other people, do not bring young children to such events. Either find a babysitter or stay at home with them yourself and use the time to teach them ikhlas. Upside Down World Thank you to Ibrahim Hewitt for the feature - Our Upside Down World – in the last edition of Q News. I am one of those British-English-Geordie-Muslims he refers to in his article. I am an English revert (of some 19years Alhamdulillah) who did so out of true love of Islam (not married) and was born and lives some five miles from the centre of Newcastle (so you could say I’m close enough). I too am sick of having to apologise for ‘my ummah’. The idea of arguing back with ‘well all Christians must identify with the IRA/UDF, etc.’ is frankly getting a bit boring. I’ve been using it all my revert life. We are all united only by a simple belief system in the shahadah, the Qur’an, etc. and that is all. Like all human beings, we all have differing backgrounds, opinions, languages, experiences – history means that we are facing Islamophobia but all I ask is we don’t pander to stereotypes. I am not scared to argue with people over anything they ‘believe’ - I restrict my answers to Qur’an and Hadith. Anything else is always explained with ‘that is a matter of opinion/ that is a matter of politics/ that is disputed by but I believe…because...’ I am not involved in changing opinions in a large way, Allah will bring whomever he wants to the way but I know I have changed some people’s opinions towards Islam by being English first and Muslim second. Hijab is my positive identity but I hope my attitude and my individual actions soon overturn any preconceived notions that people may have. We need to start separating culture from the essence of Islam. If people do not engage fully with society, then society cannot engage fully with them. Every government needs to be engaging and not just responding as the situation hits them. It’s like gangs at school – you have certain friends who influence the way that you think. The more Muslims are out there, in wider society, getting about their daily lives and contributing to society as a whole, the sooner negative stereotypes can be broken down. We are all entitled to make mistakes but we should be learning by them. Nothing can change if all you do is stay closeted in your own ‘sphere’ and complain. You are all answerable to Allah Most High only. Be pro-active and you may find that you are rewarded. Nothing will change if we don’t work for it. To conclude, this is just a letter to say that Ibrahim Hewitt is not the only voice in the wilderness. Many of us have been saying this for many years but as there is no united forum, it’s difficult to let the people who have power know what their true electors are thinking. Thank you Q-News for having the courage to stand up for the ‘wider picture’. Unveiled My reason for writing is to say how much I appreciated Fareena Alam’s broadcast on Radio 4, ‘Unveiled’. So much so that I had to locate a portable radio so that I could continue listening outside as I hung up my washing. I am a British-born woman, of English background and therefore technically ‘white'. I was born into, and follow the Christian faith, and am training to become a priest. The point that you made, that I have been longing to hear in all this talk about integration, is that there are far more important things such as housing, education and employment that cause segregation, rather than a face covering. I have made Muslim women friends through work and circumstance, and whether they wear a hijab is not relevant to our friendship, although I have to say that I do not know anyone to speak to who covers her face. I also appreciated the point that you made that Jack Straw should try coming out of his comfort zone for a change. Even to a someone who is not Muslim, it seems the height of arrogance to ignore the fact that if a women has chosen to cover her face she has her own reasons for doing so, which include a desire not to reveal it to unrelated men. Thank you again for such an excellent programme. Thank you for your programme ‘Unveiled’ on BBC Radio 4. Over the past week I have felt the full gamut of negative emotions on hearing the comments of politicians, journalists and other public figures speak out in support of Jack Straw. It has saddened me to see so much media coverage given over to commentary ranging from the ignorant and ill-considered through to the deliberately deceptive and outright racist. Your broadcast has been one of the few beacons of enlightenment and tolerance. For me one of the most important points that came out of your programme was that most people are only separated by a lack of contact and familiarity and where that occurs and is given space to flourish any discomfort we may feel initially soon disappears. However, Jack Straw, in going to the media with his comments, has not fostered that contact and familiarity (or even any kind of genuine debate) but rather hindered it by initiating a further outpouring of anti-Muslim hysteria by the press and, following on their coat-tails, a whole string of gutless politicians. There are two reasons why I am so angry with Jack Straw. Firstly because I cannot believe that an experienced and ranking New Labour politician (up to his armpits in spin doctors and political advisers) did not know exactly what the reaction to his comments would be. And that had his concerns been genuine he would have more modestly expressed them privately to veiled female constituents visiting him and to Muslim community leaders. Secondly because, as a white working class atheist, he has attempted to co-opt me in his ‘debate’ by falsely invoking the issues of community relations and feelings of separateness. Perhaps I am being a little over-sensitive on this last point but as I have no means of expressing my disgust to Mr Straw personally I reserve the right to my private indignant outrage! Ian McNee, Wolverhampton
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