Exploring Islam: Apparently it's Really a Force for Fairness, Equality and Women's Liberation

I note with a mixture of interest, amusement and horror that a new charity has been set up in London to 'tackle people's negative views of Islam.'

The Exploring Islam Foundation commissioned a YouGov poll to assess public opinion of a few very weighted questions about Islam. Apparently 58% of respondents equated Islam with extremism, 50% with terrorism, only 13% agreed that Islam was a religion of peace, and 19% thought that Islam had a positive impact on British society.

Really? 19%? That's a bit high isn't it?

It's OK though - as one report reveals, more than 57% of these respondents admitted to only getting their information about Islam through media outlets such as newspapers and television, which are obviously hostile to the religion of peace. Doubtless had they learned about Islam from their local Imam, they would have formed a much more positive opinion of it.

The Charity has commissioned what amounts to a PR campaign, to promote a better understanding of the positive side of Islam, and have produced a series of posters including prominent British Muslims pictured with heart-warming slogans.

OK, so I know I'm a total cynic, but a comic could not have asked for a better set of slogans to rip the piss out of. In fact a good comic probably wrote them. The slogans read:

“I believe in social justice. So did Muhammad.”

“I believe in women’s rights. So did Muhammad.”

“I believe in protecting the environment. So did Muhammad.”

Ideas about what constitutes social justice have (thankfully) changed a little in the last 1400 years - at least outside the middle east - and no longer include eye-for-an-eye style punishments. On a more positive note, they may be referring to the charitable provisions enshrined in Islamic law, whereby men must give up a percentage of their income as charity, to be distributed amongst the poor. Why proponents of Islam can't see the difference between wanting to help the poor (voluntarily giving up your earnings) and being forced to do so on pain of eternal damnation is beyond me.

So too have Women's rights - again outside the middle east. It is no longer acceptable to beat the shit out of any of your wives, buy a wife, marry a nine year old girl, sell your daughter off to your cousin for a few goats, or have your daughter's external genitalia cut off with a sharpened stone, in order to preserve her purity and dignity. Of course, I'm being a little unfair - none of these things happen in Britain today, right? Any thug of any religion or none is capable of beating his wife, it just happens that in the Koran and Hadith you have instructions telling you when and how it is acceptable to beat your wife. Little girls get sent abroad to have their labia cut off, we wouldn't dream of allowing that kind of thing here. And goats are no longer in fashion.

What Muhammad knew about the environment could be written down on the back of a postage stamp. Any suggestion that an illiterate merchant who died 1400 years ago had ideas to save our planet in today's world are beyond laughable.

If I had enough funds, a large security force and could be guaranteed immunity from prosecution under the laws pertaining to causing religious offence, I might be tempted to run a counter-campaign thusly:

"I believe in murderous conquest and forced conversion of the infidels. So did Muhammad (peace be upon him)."

"I believe in marrying nine year old girls and raping them whenever I choose. So did Muhammad (peace be upon him)."

"I believe my wives and daughters are my property. So did Muhammad (peace be upon him)."

Offensive? Probably. True? Read your Koran. Read the Hadith, then tell me I'm wrong.

The point of the Exploring Islam Foundation campaign is to prevent hostility toward British Muslims. What they either don't see, or prefer to fudge for political advantage, is that it is not people that are disliked - generally speaking - but the ideas and beliefs they stand for, uphold, and insist are the only acceptable ideas around.

How could anyone not brought up from his/her mothers knee to believe that Islam is true possibly look at Islam and say 'hmm, now there's a system of peace, justice and respect for humanity and the environment I could really buy into'?

Viewed even half-way objectively, Islam is a truly horrifying prospect.

We often hear and read the phrase 'Islamophobic' used pejoratively against the mindless cretins who deface mosques, assualt Muslims or otherwise make total dicks of themselves in the name of ignorance. This word is generally bandied about by people who have some advantage in drawing genuine criticism away from themselves by branding all potential critics - reasonable or otherwise - as basically motivated by the same prejudice. The use of this word and others like it bear a striking similarity to such words as 'anti-semitic' so beloved of that small minority of messianic bulldozer-friendly Jews. 

The argument is a simple one, which is probably why it is so popular in religious circles, and goes a bit like this:

"I cannot be doing anything wrong, because you are prejudiced and just hate me. Therefore anything I do must be right, because you are a nasty bigot. Anyone who agrees with you in any particular is therefore also a nasty bigot, so their opinion must be discounted too. Ergo, I'm right, anyone who disagrees is an evil hate-filled bigot."

The original meaning of the suffix -phobe is fear, not hatred. By all means call me an Islamophobe if you mean it in the sense 'scared of Islam' - I am terrified of it. But don't just write off anybody who can't see Islam's divine truth as an Islamophobe, for the word becomes meaningless.

Blair: - The Key to World Harmony is for Christianity and Islam to 'Get On'

Tony Blair and his fine grin, here pictured in Bethlehem. I do like to use the most flattering pictures I can find on my blog, naturally.

Not content with galavanting around the holy land as Middle East Peace Envoy, or looking forward to his forthcoming likely role as 'President of Europe', Elder Statesman the one and only Tony Blair addressed a Common World conference of Muslim and Christian scholars at the Georgetown University, Washington DC, on Tuesday.

He apparently said, with great insight, that the key to World harmony in the 21st century is for these two faiths to 'get on' with each other.

Well there's a shocker - you mean if they fight one another, and can't agree about who's book is best, we won't have World peace? Damn.

Unfortunately this was about the high-point of his lucidity and hold upon the realities facing our World, as he then went on to say that many of the challenges facing the world today were similar to those that confronted Jesus and Mohammed. Yeah, like not knowing how rainfall works, thinking the desert is full of djinns, thinking that the World beyond the horizon is populated by Giants and mythical creatures, that sort of thing. Oh and of course mistaking 'voices' for the creator of the Universe - all problems we are dealing with today.

“Each was made to feel an outsider. Each stood out against the conventional teaching of the time. Each believed in the universal appeal of God to humanity. Each was a change-maker.” He said.

Where to start?

Jesus, if he even existed, was made to feel an outsider because he went around claiming to be the Messiah. Not the first, and by no means (still) the last person to do so of course, but if there's one thing gauranteed to piss off a Jew, it's claiming to be the Messiah. Seriously, go to Golders Green and find an Orthodox gentleman, minding his own business, and tell him your the Messiah. If he doesn't get really pissed off, I'll eat my hat.

And of course, not content with annoying Jews he had to go around bothering the Romans too, which is never a plan.

Mohammed, on the other hand, was just a merchant, and by all accounts not a very good one. He was treated as an outsider for disappearing into a cave and coming back with a load of stories - sorry I mean the final and immutable word of God - that bore an uncanny resemblance to local and nearby legends, plus a few bits about how he could treat his wives, of course. Were it not for his large family, and their penchant for murderous conquest, the World could have been spared this particular 'change maker'.

Such is history.

Mr Blair's talk pretty much went downhill from there. He then went on to say that faith was 'abused to do wrong'. Once again, an incredible insight (I'm beginning to understand why he became a Catholic) that ignores the fairly obvious point that faith is not only abused, but lends itself very freely to any idiot going who cares to interpet it in any way they choose. Faith is a whore - she'll do anything you want, just depends how you say whats written. Reminds me of the iphone advert - "You want peace and justice for all? - There's an ap for that." You want World domination and stoning for the infidels? There's an ap for that." And so on.

“We face an aggressive secular attack from without. We face the threat of extremism from within.”

Arguing that there was “no hope” from atheists who scorn God, he said the best way to confront the 'secularist agenda' was for all faiths to unite against it.

At least he recognizes that those who 'scorn' God are unlikely to willingly submit (or resubmit) their brains to the intellectual torpor required to believe in the big man in the sky. And if the best way for faiths to defeat the 'secularist agenda' is for them to unite, then I don't think we nasty 'secularist agenda-ists' (if you'll forgive that appalling grammatical construct) are in any particular danger, at least for the forsee-able future. Less chance, I feel, of the Pope standing shoulder to shoulder with an Ayatollah than of the bikini becoming all the rage in Riyadh.

He said: “Those who scorn God and those who do violence in God’s name, both represent views of religion. But both offer no hope for faith in the twenty first century.”

Sadly, there's plenty of hope for faith in the 21st century. Between them, followers of Islam and Christianity comprise about half of the World's population. I don't have a decent estimate of the numbers of atheists, agnostics and other non-believers, but I don't suppose its much more than one or two percent of the Earth's population. So I suppose we should feel at least slightly happy that such a minority is seen as a threat to religion. Only a threat, of course, because the evil 'secularist agenda' of the last couple of hundred years has made it very difficult to burn us.

I can't wait for born-again Blair to become unelected 'president' of an unelected European Government, I really can't. It's a prospect that fills my soul with boundless joy. Sarcasm? As if I would...

Link to this story: Times Online

Blasphemy Day

I've just found out (suppose I should have checked before) that today is International Blasphemy Day. The title of this post links to the site Blasphemy Day , which was set up to "open up all religious beliefs to the same level of free inquiry, discussion and criticism to which all other areas of academic interest are subjected." which is not only a noble cause but also gives us an extra excuse, as if one were needed, to ridicule beliefs held and proselytised without foundation in reality. Excellent.

The site makes no attempt to debate the existence or non-existence of Gods of any flavour, and makes it quite clear that such topics are well outside it's remit.


The reason that September 30th has been chosen for this day of blasphemy, is that it was on this day in 2005 that those infamous cartoons of Mohammed were published in the Danish Newspaper Jyllands-Posten. As a result of this, we found out just how fragile our values of 'free speech' and 'free expression' are here in Britain, as every single one of our newspapers declined to print any of the images, ostensibly for fear of causing offence, in reality for fear of having their windows broken by ramapaging mobs of hate-filled bigots, sorry, I mean peaceful and devout Muslims whose feelings were hurt by nasty cartoonists. I don't know about you, but if somebody hurts my feelings or criticizes something I hold dear, I don't feel the need to charge through the streets shouting, throwing stones and waving placards that say 'behead those who insult x' and 'butcher those who mock x'. Maybe I just don't have a highly enough developed sense of outrage.

So as mobs of  'offended' young men threatening obscene acts of violence paraded through the streets of Europe, waving their disgusting banners, shouting insults, throwing stones, spitting bile and showing us just how much Islam truly is 'the religion of peace', our political and religious leaders lined up in condemnation - of the cartoonists and the newspapers that dared to print them. I know it's a couple of years ago now but this case is so indicative of how our culture and our freedoms are being steadily eroded as we are forced to bend over backwards by our spineless political leaders, to accommodate a tiny minority of - lets not beat around the bush - infantile, ignorant, disgusting, hate-obsessed, violent, bigoted, misogynistic pricks, whose only way of coping with 'hurt feelings' are to get truly mouth-foamingly angry and take to the streets shouting insults and waving banners of such eye-watering evil and cruelty that we simply have no choice but to wring our hands and apologise profusely for upsetting them so much. Well, I would say, grow up you sad bastards and take a peak at the real World. Are you offended by this? Good. You don't just deserve to have your feelings hurt, you poor deluded little lambs, you deserve to have that disgusting, anti-human, uncivilized excrement you call the immutable word of God shoved so far down your throat that is makes you at least as half as sick as it makes me.

Now you  may feel I've stepped way over the line, I've insulted you, your holy book, the very tenets by which you claim to live your life, and of course that it is me who is being bigoted and hate-filled. I strongly suspect that the word 'Islamaphobe' has flashed across your consciousness several times, closely followed perhaps, if not preceded by, 'infidel', 'fatwa' and 'death threat'. You may even now be chalking up your banner and sharpening your scimitar in preperation for a march to show just how offended you are. Well, I'll be honest with you, I do hate you. I hate what you beleieve, and I hate what you stand for, but crucially, I don't want to kill you for it, and however much I dislike it, I have to accept that you have a right to believe it - can you say the same about me? I hope you'll change your mind, you'll grow up and see the real world, you'll see that beliefs founded in reality do not need violence to succeed, unless they are threatened by it, but I suspect it is too late for you, that you are so corrupted by hate and medieval bullshit that any chance of you using the mind that (you say) God gave you to actually think about this is lost. For this reason, I feel deeply sorry for you.
But of course Blasphemy day isn't just about the Muslims, it's about everyone who thinks their 'beliefs' should be above criticism (its' just that the Muslims are the only ones insecure enough to feel the need to threaten doubters with death) so without being gratuitously offensive, well not too much, here is my attempt at a little light-hearted blasphemy for each of the major faiths.

Judaism: Do you have any idea how ridiculous you look headbutting that silly wall? Do you really think God would make you his 'chosen people'? Why on Earth does God want you to have such ridiculously curly hair? Just what is God planning to do with that mountain of foreskins? Seems a bit daft that he would make you so perfectly in his image, then order you to cut off a bit of your knob.

Catholicism: Ah, a monotheism. With three Gods. Who are also one God. Mmm, you drink the blood of your God - if it really was blood and not just cheap plonk, do you have any idea how disgusting that would make you? Yes, a monotheism whose followers worship a pantheon of saints. Bit odd, eh? So hows that mile-high true cross coming along, have you collected all the splinters yet?

Greek and Russian Orthodox: - as above, just can't agree on the dates. Oh, and much nicer priestly outfits, those hats are great.

Protestantism - mainstream denominations: Catholics are wrong, of course, you got it right. So right that ther're literally thousands of different churches, all interpreting the 'word of God' differently. You'd think God would be a bit more careful when writing his truths, not to make them so ambiguous eh? Well who am I to judge, you're the experts...

Protestantism - evangelical denominations: Yes, thats right, the Bible is true, all true, ALL OF IT! Especially those bits that contradict each other, they're especially true. So, are you rapture ready? Its coming, you know, any day now. Any day. Any day now... Well, OK we're still waiting, but seriously, it is coming... any day...

Islam: I hardly need say anything, you're just a complete joke. A lethal joke, but funny none the less. Take a look at the images I've included to see just how incredibly funny you really are. So fucking funny that you make me puke.

Mormonism:  Oh no thats offensive isn't it? I mean Church of Jesus Christ of The Latter Day Saints: Well, the mind boggles, just reading the history of your 'religion' had me rolling in the aisles. A holy book dictated to an illiterate con-man (keep up people, I've done Islam already) telling the story of the lost tribe of Israel who somehow made it to the Americas. Gold-tabletted commandments that could only be seen by a convicted fraudster and magically disappeared into heaven afterwards... truly beyond satire. Thanks for helping me out with my genealogy research, by the way, but you need to go back through it again as you put one of my Carsberg relatives in the wrong family. I'd hate it if, come judgement day, God got all confused when reading your records and left my great great great grandfather in limbo.

Hinduism: Well take your pick, we've got a God for all occasions, and one of our holiest Gods is the one we drink from, bathe in, wash our clothes in, drain our sewerage in and of course scatter our dead in. Yummy.

Buddhism: Ah the ultimate path to enlightenment, the only way by which our essences may leave this mundane plane and escape the endless cycle of reincarnation. All you need to do is sit very still and think about it until you stop thinking about anything. And shave your head, of course, one cannot achieve spiritual enlightment with the weight of hair pressing down on you.

Sikhism: - The only path to God is to never cut your hair. What??

I think thats enough for now, as tempting as it is to rain down insults on the faithful, I'd hate to sink to their level of peurility, so I will close now by simply quoting from the Blasphemy Day website:

"Blasphemy Day, because your god is a joke."

Fatwa Phone - World's First Islamic Helpline

You really couldn't make this stuff up.

Muslims from around the world can now phone a helpline in Abu Dhabi to ask that a fatwa - a religious edict - be issued on their behalf, and for general queries relating to their faith.

I recommend checking out this article from The Times , where I first encountered this heartwarming little story.

Apparently this helpline, set up 3 months ago and staffed by 48 Muftis, takes up to 3,700 calls a day, and is open from 8am to 8pm on working days. They even have a 'skeleton staff' at night-time to deal with 'religious emergencies'.

The Times interviewed one of the Muftis, 48 year old Abdulrahman Ammoura, who said "I'm tired, so tired, I hear ringing in my ears." He was upset by his last caller, a woman whose husband was an alcoholic who became violent, beating her and forcing her to have sex (IE rape, if you're not a Muslim). The woman asked if she should try to divorce him. Mr Ammoura, one of the most learned and respected Muftis in the UAE, replied "No - it is better for him to find help. A woman living alone with children could face too many problems."

Perhaps the wife-beating rapist should 'find help' by calling the helpline to find out if God can forgive him - for drinking alcohol. Treating your woman like property is of course quite OK. I'm beginning to wonder how many Muslim women wear a full burkha or hijab just to cover up the bruises.

As for this poor woman, what on Earth would she do even if she did divorce? After all, there's no point in being property if you don't have an owner.

For all that this disgusts and amuses us, I do feel that the UAE government deserve some tiny amount of credit for setting up this helpline. Any fatwas issued by the staff are done so according to guidelines laid down by the government's General Authority for Islamic Affairs and Endowments; any fatwas issued by unregulated clerics - which are more likely to be extremist in nature - are declared null by the government.

It's still completely bonkers though, don't you think?

If you're in need of some light entertainment and would like to get in touch with the helpcentre, you can call (+971) 8002244 begin_of_the_skype_highlighting              (+971) 8002244      end_of_the_skype_highlighting.

If you can read Arabic, go to their website www.awqaf.ae

Enjoy.

Pat Condell reinstated on YouTube - Hooray!

Pat Condell's video about the creeping influence of sharia law in the UK has been reinstated. It was removed after certain people complained that it might be offensive.

One of the most important things about the right to free speech is that somebody will always be offended. They have the right to be offended, and also the right not to listen, but nobody should have the right to ban opinion.

Pat does not incite anyone to violence or hatred - all he really does is take the piss. Keep up the good work Pat, and thanks to all those who petitioned YouTube about the importance of freedom of speech.