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When Freedom Of Speech Is Unknown

Posted September 18th, 2012 by Lesley Hazleton

I could just link to this post by Charles Mudede of Seattle’s Pulitzer-winning alt-weekly The Stranger, but I think it might be worth reposting here:

Why are Arab and African Muslims so upset about that dumb video?  I got this answer from a Coptic Eritrean who is a marine biologist by training but makes a living as a taxi driver:

“Before coming to America I lived in Saudi Arabia and other countries in North Africa. And what I can tell you is this: The people in these countries, and also countries in East Africa, cannot believe that people in America actually speak for themselves and not for the government. Why? Because what they have seen all their lives is only the government speaking. When something is on TV, it is the government speaking. When something is in the newspapers, it is the government speaking. You see what I mean? Something on the internet, it is the government speaking again. The government never allows anyone else to speak. So they think it is the same in America. That video about their prophet doing very bad, very evil things? That has to be the government speaking. So they go to the American embassy and try to burn it to the ground. They just can’t believe a person can actually speak for themselves and not be in trouble with the government. This is what is going on.”

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File under: Islam, Middle East, US politics | Tagged: Tags: East Africa, freedom of speech, North Africa, protests, Saudi Arabia, that video | 4 Comments
  1. Sohail says:
    September 19, 2012 at 12:03 am

    That is probably true in some places.However that is not the reason for the rioting and the anti USA demos. The main reason is that leaders, with their own ax to grind, fire up emotional people, to take such actions. In the third world countries such demonstrations can easily be manipulated to turn violent. Interestingly, such ‘firing up emotional people’ business is not conducted only in the Muslim countries. It happens in the USA too. The difference is that the usually people do not riot themselves but force the government to take action e.g. Mitt Romney fires up people, people force the govt. to go and bomb Libya.

  2. Mamun Elghusein says:
    September 19, 2012 at 1:57 am

    Very insightful remark , in many Islamic countries a great religion is being misunderstood and misinterpreted!

  3. ahmadataya says:
    September 19, 2012 at 11:06 am

    Maybe I was surprised of the reaction against the United States. I did not understand at first the reasone behind anger against the United States. Although I am an Arab Muslim. Although I do not follow the conspiracy theory, but we have to take advantage of some happenings in history to offend Islam. In 2006 I was living in Syria. In that year emerged Danish cartoons depicting the Prophet Muhammad, peace be upon him. The Syrian government at the time to facilitate the arrival of protesters into the European embassies.It’s also hired some mercenaries to burn european embassies.I had a question I ask myself always. Why Syrian government do this. When it sould be a secular government.i’ve Reached the answer after a while. The Syrian government wants to deliver a message to the world. This is an alternative for our government. Islamist extremists will rule this country.

  4. anon says:
    September 23, 2012 at 7:00 pm

    Even in the U.S.—there are exceptions to free-speech (under law) such as defamation, obscenity, incitement to crime…etc…..

    Some U.S. judge banned protests at soldiers funerals because it “hurts the feelings of the families”

    Some U.S. college students were jailed because they protested a speech by Israeli Ambassador…..

“I Am Proud To Be Egyptian Today”

Posted January 29th, 2011 by Lesley Hazleton

In admiration of the stunning courage of the uprisings in Tunisia and Egypt, and with my heart in my mouth for their success:

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7hBV0ApIh_4]

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File under: Middle East | Tagged: Tags: Egypt, Mubarak, protests | 1 Comment
  1. Amna Khalid says:
    January 29, 2011 at 5:18 pm

    It is so touching to see how the dreams of so many Egyptians are on the verge of coming true on seeing a better Egypt for the future as a result of this revolution. As someone who loves her own country (Pakistan), I can relate to how such changes for the positive would feel like. God bless the Egyptians.

Framing the Mosque

Posted August 17th, 2010 by Lesley Hazleton

I hate to say this, but whoever came up with the phrase “mosque at Ground Zero” was a political genius.  The phrase is not just an exaggeration;  it’s a lie. But in today’s America, it’s a very effective lie — a horribly brilliant piece of demagogery.

I could show you what’s actually planned, but that’s not the point (okay, the plan’s at the end of this post).  I could point out that the Park 51 Islamic center’s peace- and love-preaching imam is Sufi, part of the mystical branch of Islam (see the medieval Persian poems of Rumi, the best-selling poet in the US), as hated by hardline Saudi- and Taliban-type Islamic bigots as by fundamentalist American Christian and Jewish ones.   I could explain, as William Dalrymple does so eloquently on the Op-Ed page of today’s NYT, that

a 2007 study by the RAND Corporation found that Sufis’ open, intellectual interpretation of Islam makes them ideal “partners in the effort to combat Islamist extremism.”Sufism is an entirely indigenous, deeply rooted resistance movement against violent Islamic radicalism. Whether it can be harnessed to a political end is not clear. But the least we can do is to encourage the Sufis in our own societies. Men like Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf should be embraced as vital allies, and we should have only contempt for those who, through ignorance or political calculation, attempt to conflate them with the extremists.

I could explain and point out and be as rational as you like, but bigotry demands blind ignorance.   It demands the simplistic view, in which Islam is a destructive monolith.  And just as the patriotism of scoundrels wraps itself in the flag, so the bigotry of Islamophobia wraps itself in the deaths of others — those Americans who died on 9/11 (except, of course, for the American Muslims among them).

The idea of Ground Zero as “hallowed ground” is another ghastly piece of framing, veiling bigotry in the holy.   “Too close to hallowed ground,” say the bigots.  “Move it further away.”   But not to the suddenly hallowed ground of Staten Island, where they’ve organized in opposition to a proposed new mosque. Or that of Murfreeesboro TN, ditto.  Or  Wilson, WI, ditto.  Or Temecula CA, ditto. Three thousand miles from Ground Zero is clearly just too close for delicate bigoted sensibilities.

We need to re-frame this issue, and quick.  NYC Mayor Michael Bloomberg started the path toward re-framing (read his full speech here, an object lesson in integrity).  President Obama then set an all-too  tentative foot on the same path, only to immediately back-track — an object lesson, it saddens me to say, in the lack of integrity:

“I was not commenting and I will not comment on the wisdom of making the decision to put a mosque there. I was commenting very specifically on the right people have that dates back to our founding.

“No comment”?  Thanks, Mr President.

It’s time to stop pussy-footing around. Time to talk not just about the right to build the Park 51 Islamic center, but the need for it to be built.  Yes, right there, close to Ground Zero, as a magnificent stand of Islam — of all of us — against the crude distortions of murderous extremists, of those who love only their own bigotry, and of cynical political operators now determined to make the “mosque at Ground Zero” a central issue in the mid-term elections.

This is not solely a matter of constitutional rights, Obama, and you know it.   You need to speak out — clearly, forcefully, and eloquently — not just for the right to build Park 51, but for the necessity of it as a major step toward healing this ghastly rift in both the national and the international body politic.

Don’t you remember?  Yes, you can.

…
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File under: Christianity, fundamentalism, Islam, Judaism, US politics | Tagged: Tags: bigotry, framing, Ground Zero, Islamic centers, Islamophobia, Michael Bloomberg, mid-term elections, mosques, Obama, Park 51, protests, Rumi, Sufi | 5 Comments
  1. Pietra says:
    August 17, 2010 at 3:04 pm

    I’ve been finding out the truth piece by piece on 1090am, Seattle.

  2. Gustav Hellthaler says:
    August 17, 2010 at 8:25 pm

    Leslie,
    I have tried to sign up to your blog. Could you include me in?
    Gus

    • Lesley Hazleton says:
      August 18, 2010 at 12:46 pm

      Gus, you are hereby declared in! To get email notification of new posts, just click the “Sign Me Up” button under Email Subscription half-way down the left-hand side of the page. (I don’t know why they call it a subscription, since there’s no fee — it just sounds off-puttingly formal. Sigh…).

  3. Tea-mahm says:
    August 18, 2010 at 11:21 am

    The King of Morocco would agree with you. He uses Sufism as a “hedge against fundamentalism.” On behalf of many Sufis and other reasonable people, thank you for this, Lesley.

    • Lesley Hazleton says:
      August 18, 2010 at 12:48 pm

      Thanks T — and in case you missed it, check out William Dalrymple’s excellent Op-Ed piece yesterday in the NYT (I linked to it in the post).

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