I am pleased to announce the launch of the Talk Islam FAQ project. In a nutshell, TalkIslam is a Frequently Asked Questions database about Islam and muslims, loosely inspired after the TalkOrigins FAQ which is such an invaluable resource against Creationist arguments. The idea is that we address common questions (and tropes) about Islam preemptively and do so in an organized fashion so that anyone involved in a debate about Islam may simply refer to TalkIslam FAQ rather than reinvent the wheel.
The site is organized as follows. I've integrated BBpress (a bulletin board system) and Wordpress so that talkislam.info main page shows you the latest forum topics on top and the blog posts below. The forum is the FAQ; if you go to talkislam.info/faq you will see the forum immediately. User accounts on the blog also work on the forum and vice versa. The forum format allows us to define and nest topics of interest and then devote a thread to a given question for ongoing editing and refinement over time.
This project is analogous to a wiki in that it invites colloboration between all of us to a greater good. The advantage of the forum format is that we can refine and strengthen the answers over time, evolving the site to become more and more useful. I believe that the depth of talent in the Islamsphere is such that this project can attain a very high informational value in a very short time, even if all we do is recycle old posts from our blogs at the outset.
Please do visit talkislam.info, and register for a user acct! Let's make this happen.
Monday, July 23, 2007
Saturday, July 21, 2007
JetBlue acts red
The liberal sphere is outraged that JetBlue airlines has cowed to Bill O'Reilly's charaterization of DailyKos as a "hateful website" and withdrawn it's sponsorship of theYearlyKos conference. There are no less than three recommended diaries at DailyKos alone right now expressing anger, shock, and betrayal. However, this is not the first time that JetBlue has behaved badly. JetBlue has a history of reactionary prejudice against muslims and pakistanis.
Almost everyone in the blogsphere should remember Raed Jarrar - the Iraqi blogger of Raed in the Middle fame, whose dispatches from Baghdad in the runup to war kept millions of people on the edge of their seats in anxiety for his safety. Raed became an activist after the war, moved to the US, and has made many trips to Iraq and Jordan meeting with Iraqi ministers and secular, liberal human rights NGOs. On a return trip from aroad, he had an encounter with JetBlue personnel at JFK because he was wearing a t-shirt that said in Arabic script on the front, "we will not be silent". In his own words,
Incidentally, after the incident, other members of Raed's activist organization made a point of wearing the same shirts and flying on ActBlue. None were harassed in any way. Look at the pictures in the PDF report of their experiment and see if you can guess why.
It doesn't end there. JetBlue has been accused of religious discrimination, firing a Jewish man for his inability to work on Saturdays. And a Pakistani-born American citizen and trained commercial pilot, Faisal Baug, applied for and received a job at JetBlue. owever, JetBlue then rescinded the job offer, because his birth country of origin represented a "security risk" :
Just for kicks, Sepia Mutiny blog decided to see what Free Republic thought of the Faisal Baig affair, Oh, Iago, try not to keel over dead from not-surprise! As far as I am aware the Baug case is still pending litigation.
JetBlue seems to have a systematic profiling policy, which relies on crude stereotypical appearances rather than intelligent analysis of the sort successfully used by El Al, the national airline of Israel. Even this right winger, who self-describes himself as having "Mediterranean" appearance, got caught in the web; though he was happy about it. But anecdotal reports from throughout the south asian community lend credence to the assertion that JetBlue doesn't want you flying while brown.
So, I don't feel betrayed by JetBlue and frankly am glad that the incident with YearlyKos and O'Reilly served to finally wake the progressive community to the truth about this company. I empathize with Kos's praise of the service and convenience that JetBlue provides him on his travels, but flying JetBlue only serves to reward the company for its prejudgement of muslims and asians as terrorist threats.
Perhaps we should call it JetRed. At any rate, I won't ever fly JetBlue and I hope others come to the same conclusion.
FYI, Raed's shirt can be ordered in Arabic, Farsi, Spanish, English, German, or Hebrew with Arabic script, see some more photos here. Their antiwar group A Critical Voice will send you the shirt for free but they request a donation via paypal or check of whatever amount you think is best.
Almost everyone in the blogsphere should remember Raed Jarrar - the Iraqi blogger of Raed in the Middle fame, whose dispatches from Baghdad in the runup to war kept millions of people on the edge of their seats in anxiety for his safety. Raed became an activist after the war, moved to the US, and has made many trips to Iraq and Jordan meeting with Iraqi ministers and secular, liberal human rights NGOs. On a return trip from aroad, he had an encounter with JetBlue personnel at JFK because he was wearing a t-shirt that said in Arabic script on the front, "we will not be silent". In his own words,At around 8:30, two men approached me while I was checking my phone. One of them asked me if I had a minute and he showed me his badge, I said: "sure". We walked some few steps and stood in front of the boarding counter where I found out that they were accompanied by another person, a woman from Jet Blue.
One of the two men who approached me first, Inspector Harris, asked for my id card and boarding pass. I gave him my boarding pass and driver's license. He said "people are feeling offended because of your t-shirt". I looked at my t-shirt: I was wearing my shirt which states in both Arabic and English "we will not be silent". You can take a look at it in this picture taken during our Jordan meetings with Iraqi MPs. I said "I am very sorry if I offended anyone, I didnt know that this t-shirt will be offensive". He asked me if I had any other T-shirts to put on, and I told him that I had checked in all of my bags and I asked him "why do you want me to take off my t-shirt? Isn't it my constitutional right to express myself in this way?" The second man in a greenish suit interfered and said "people here in the US don't understand these things about constitutional rights". So I answered him "I live in the US, and I understand it is my right to wear this t-shirt".
Then I once again asked the three of them : "How come you are asking me to change my t-shirt? Isn't this my constitutional right to wear it? I am ready to change it if you tell me why I should. Do you have an order against Arabic t-shirts? Is there such a law against Arabic script?" so inspector Harris answered "you can't wear a t-shirt with Arabic script and come to an airport. It is like wearing a t-shirt that reads "I am a robber" and going to a bank". I said "but the message on my t-shirt is not offensive, it just says "we will not be silent". I got this t-shirt from Washington DC. There are more than a 1000 t-shirts printed with the same slogan, you can google them or email them at wewillnotbesilent@gmail.com . It is printed in many other languages: Arabic, Farsi, Spanish, English, etc." Inspector Harris said: "We cant make sure that your t-shirt means we will not be silent, we don't have a translator. Maybe it means something else". I said: "But as you can see, the statement is in both Arabic and English". He said "maybe it is not the same message". So based on the fact that Jet Blue doesn't have a translator, anything in Arabic is suspicious because maybe it'll mean something bad!
Meanwhile, a third man walked in our direction. He stood with us without introducing himself, and he looked at inspector Harris's notes and asks him: "is that his information?", inspector Harris answered "yes". The third man, Mr. Harmon, asks inspector Harris : "can I copy this information?", and inspector Harris says "yes, sure".
inspector Harris said: "You don't have to take of your t-shirt, just put it on inside-out". I refused to put on my shirt inside-out. So the woman interfered and said "let's reach a compromise. I will buy you a new t-shirt and you can put it on on top of this one". I said "I want to keep this t-shirt on". Both inspector Harris and Mr. Harmon said "No, we can't let you get on that airplane with your t-shirt". I said "I am ready to put on another t-shirt if you tell me what is the law that requires such a thing. I want to talk to your supervisor". Inspector Harris said "You don't have to talk to anyone. Many people called and complained about your t-shirt. Jetblue customers were calling before you reached the checkpoint, and costumers called when you were waiting here in the boarding area".
it was then that I realized that my t-shirt was the reason why I had been taken to the secondary checking.
I asked the four people again to let me talk to any supervisor, and they refused.
The Jet Blue woman was asking me again to end this problem by just putting on a new t-shirt, and I felt threatened by Mr. Harmon's remarks as in "Let's end this the nice way". Taking in consideration what happens to other Arabs and Muslims in US airports, and realizing that I will miss my flight unless I covered the Arabic script on my t-shirt as I was told by the four agents, I asked the Jet Blue woman to buy me a t-shirt and I said "I don't want to miss my flight."
She asked, what kind of t-shirts do you like. Should I get you an "I heart new york t-shirt?". So Mr. Harmon said "No, we shouldn't ask him to go from one extreme to another". I asked mr. harmon why does he assume I hate new york if I had some Arabic script on my t-shirt, but he didn't answer.
Incidentally, after the incident, other members of Raed's activist organization made a point of wearing the same shirts and flying on ActBlue. None were harassed in any way. Look at the pictures in the PDF report of their experiment and see if you can guess why.
It doesn't end there. JetBlue has been accused of religious discrimination, firing a Jewish man for his inability to work on Saturdays. And a Pakistani-born American citizen and trained commercial pilot, Faisal Baug, applied for and received a job at JetBlue. owever, JetBlue then rescinded the job offer, because his birth country of origin represented a "security risk" :
Faisal Baig, a U.S. citizen who was raised in Yonkers, N.Y., claims in the suit that an airline manager told him in March that he was a "security risk."
According to the suit, filed in Manhattan Supreme Court, Baig asked, "Are you saying that you are not hiring me because of my name or my religion? ... Are you saying you are not hiring me because of where I'm from?"
The manager answered, "Yes, and JetBlue considers you a security risk," according to the suit.
Baig claims he was offered the job in February and had already received a ticket to attend the airline's training school in Orlando, Fla. The 40-year-old, a Muslim, had previously flown for Independence Air for nearly six years.
"I was devastated," he said. "I've been living in this country since I was 7, and now somebody's telling me I'm not a good American."
Just for kicks, Sepia Mutiny blog decided to see what Free Republic thought of the Faisal Baig affair, Oh, Iago, try not to keel over dead from not-surprise! As far as I am aware the Baug case is still pending litigation.
JetBlue seems to have a systematic profiling policy, which relies on crude stereotypical appearances rather than intelligent analysis of the sort successfully used by El Al, the national airline of Israel. Even this right winger, who self-describes himself as having "Mediterranean" appearance, got caught in the web; though he was happy about it. But anecdotal reports from throughout the south asian community lend credence to the assertion that JetBlue doesn't want you flying while brown.
So, I don't feel betrayed by JetBlue and frankly am glad that the incident with YearlyKos and O'Reilly served to finally wake the progressive community to the truth about this company. I empathize with Kos's praise of the service and convenience that JetBlue provides him on his travels, but flying JetBlue only serves to reward the company for its prejudgement of muslims and asians as terrorist threats.
Perhaps we should call it JetRed. At any rate, I won't ever fly JetBlue and I hope others come to the same conclusion.
FYI, Raed's shirt can be ordered in Arabic, Farsi, Spanish, English, German, or Hebrew with Arabic script, see some more photos here. Their antiwar group A Critical Voice will send you the shirt for free but they request a donation via paypal or check of whatever amount you think is best.
Sunday, July 8, 2007
Islamicate
I don't read it as often as I should, but it's worth noting that Islamicate is an excellent blog. The author, Islamoyankee, is a Nizari Ismaili muslim which makes him as sort of blood cousin in faith to me. It's a great blog and I recommend it highly.
Friday, July 6, 2007
weak, transparent, shameful
On Fox News.
as Steve Benen at the Wsshington Monthly notes, this is a developing conservative talking point. Recently at National Review Online, Ian Murray argued that your foreign-trained doctor might be an Al-Qaeda mole:
...on Fox News's Your World With Neil Cavuto, National Review Online columnist Jerry Bowyer attacked Michael Moore's movie SiCKO and its positive portrayal of the health care in countries such as Britain and France. He argued that national health care systems are breeding grounds for terrorists because they are "bureaucratic." "I think the terrorists have shown over and over again ... they're very good at gaming the system with bureaucracies," said Bowyer.
as Steve Benen at the Wsshington Monthly notes, this is a developing conservative talking point. Recently at National Review Online, Ian Murray argued that your foreign-trained doctor might be an Al-Qaeda mole:
The socialization of medicine in the UK is responsible for a lot of problems. The importation of terrorists is just one of them.
Friday, June 29, 2007
atomic principles
on the origin of the word, atomic, from the Greek atomos:
the problem with discourse is that we tend to load up our ideas with detail. This results in people who might actually share the same underlying principles to disagree vociferously on an issue because they perceive the other side to be opposed to the common aim. A good example is the "not anti-war but on the other side" trope that gets bandied about against lefties on the topic of Iraq.
the way it should work instead is that we articulate the basic - "atomic" - principles, and then evaluate policy against them. That evaluation can take many forms, though I personally ascribe to the methodology that demands that the means by which the desired end is achieved match in full the principles and values that defined said end. In other words, as I have argued before, the ends do not justify the means - and the means actually influence the ends. But absolutism on principle is also detrimental to success; perfection is the enemy of the good.
The process of defining principle first, defining end goals in accordance with those principles, and then devising means that both stay within the boundaries of those means AND (critically) actually achieve the desired end, is what I call "principled pragmatism". Part of the pragmatism comes from acknowledging that there is tension in the criteria for means, between principle and success; finding the right policy therefore requires human judgment, and intelligence, and knowledge. Only thus can the degree to which the two criteria are compromised be minimized. And compromised they inevitably are to some extent.
The above might be more succinctly summarized as,
Here is where the need for atomic principles comes in. Principles that are too detailed ("Bush is Hitler"; "abortion is murder"; "The US is a rogue state"; "liberals are objectively pro-terrorist"; "not anti-war, but on the other side", etc) result in making it impossible to articulate effective policy. In other words, overly specific (and dogmatic) principles violate PP(b). Further, policy derived from such principles ultimately end up violating PP(a). For the requisite degrees of freedom needed to navigate the space of policy and principle without violating PP, we must have principles that are broader in scope, leaving human judgement and reason in control at the implementation level rather than blind obedience to dogma.
Of course, principle can't be so broad as to be devoid of meaning. "evil is bad" comes to mind. There needs to be a targeting of the idea towards a specific issue. This is far easier said than done, but the guiding light here can again be the "atomic" characteristic. Atomic principles literally must serve as building blocks, which can be rapidly assembled into more complex structures.
On Plato's theory of atomism:
What atomic principles might we articulate, then? Remember, these are principles, not axioms; disagreement is inevitable, and even beneficial! In the context of recent events, here are some I start with:
- Direct military intervention, including ground troops, are a moral obligation upon nations with the capability thereof, with regards to ongoing genocide and massacres.
- "With great power comes great responsibility" applies to nations as well as men; lack of direct self-interest in either case is not sufficient to excuse inaction.
- Lasting regime change for the purposes of liberalization/democratization can not succeed if driven primarily by foreign military intervention.
- Democracy is an end-product of liberalization, not an initial condition.
Upon these principles, rest pretty much my entire opposition to the specific implementation of the Iraq War by the present Administration, my support for almost all the Democratic presidential candidates over any GOP counterpart, and my increasingly weakening stance on maintaining a sizable troop contingent in Iraq for any length of time (though on the latter point, I still am against "withdrawal" as preferentially defined by the mainstream left). But disagreement on these issues of policy is far less fruitful than disagreement on the atomic principles above.
Incidentally, this essay more rightly belonged at Nation-Building blog, but Google robots have declared it to be a spamblog and thus it has been suspended pending review. I don't know how long that will take or even whether it will turn out in my favor but I do hope that 4 years of blogging there aren't consigned to /dev/null. My fate is in Google's hands. This was the final straw; I will be moving City of Brass off Blogger and cease using blogger entirely in the near future.
Related essay: the means influence the ends at City of Brass
In Greek, the prefix "a" means "not" and the word "tomos" means cut. Our word atom therefore comes from atomos, a Greek word meaning uncuttable.
the problem with discourse is that we tend to load up our ideas with detail. This results in people who might actually share the same underlying principles to disagree vociferously on an issue because they perceive the other side to be opposed to the common aim. A good example is the "not anti-war but on the other side" trope that gets bandied about against lefties on the topic of Iraq.
the way it should work instead is that we articulate the basic - "atomic" - principles, and then evaluate policy against them. That evaluation can take many forms, though I personally ascribe to the methodology that demands that the means by which the desired end is achieved match in full the principles and values that defined said end. In other words, as I have argued before, the ends do not justify the means - and the means actually influence the ends. But absolutism on principle is also detrimental to success; perfection is the enemy of the good.
The process of defining principle first, defining end goals in accordance with those principles, and then devising means that both stay within the boundaries of those means AND (critically) actually achieve the desired end, is what I call "principled pragmatism". Part of the pragmatism comes from acknowledging that there is tension in the criteria for means, between principle and success; finding the right policy therefore requires human judgment, and intelligence, and knowledge. Only thus can the degree to which the two criteria are compromised be minimized. And compromised they inevitably are to some extent.
The above might be more succinctly summarized as,
principled pragmatism (PP): (a) the means influence the ends, but (b) perfection is the enemy of the good.
Here is where the need for atomic principles comes in. Principles that are too detailed ("Bush is Hitler"; "abortion is murder"; "The US is a rogue state"; "liberals are objectively pro-terrorist"; "not anti-war, but on the other side", etc) result in making it impossible to articulate effective policy. In other words, overly specific (and dogmatic) principles violate PP(b). Further, policy derived from such principles ultimately end up violating PP(a). For the requisite degrees of freedom needed to navigate the space of policy and principle without violating PP, we must have principles that are broader in scope, leaving human judgement and reason in control at the implementation level rather than blind obedience to dogma.
Of course, principle can't be so broad as to be devoid of meaning. "evil is bad" comes to mind. There needs to be a targeting of the idea towards a specific issue. This is far easier said than done, but the guiding light here can again be the "atomic" characteristic. Atomic principles literally must serve as building blocks, which can be rapidly assembled into more complex structures.
On Plato's theory of atomism:
Plato's Timaeus ... elaborates an account of the world wherein the four different basic kinds of matter—earth, air, fire, and water — are regular solids composed from plane figures: isoceles and scalene right-angled triangles.
What atomic principles might we articulate, then? Remember, these are principles, not axioms; disagreement is inevitable, and even beneficial! In the context of recent events, here are some I start with:
- Direct military intervention, including ground troops, are a moral obligation upon nations with the capability thereof, with regards to ongoing genocide and massacres.
- "With great power comes great responsibility" applies to nations as well as men; lack of direct self-interest in either case is not sufficient to excuse inaction.
- Lasting regime change for the purposes of liberalization/democratization can not succeed if driven primarily by foreign military intervention.
- Democracy is an end-product of liberalization, not an initial condition.
Upon these principles, rest pretty much my entire opposition to the specific implementation of the Iraq War by the present Administration, my support for almost all the Democratic presidential candidates over any GOP counterpart, and my increasingly weakening stance on maintaining a sizable troop contingent in Iraq for any length of time (though on the latter point, I still am against "withdrawal" as preferentially defined by the mainstream left). But disagreement on these issues of policy is far less fruitful than disagreement on the atomic principles above.
Incidentally, this essay more rightly belonged at Nation-Building blog, but Google robots have declared it to be a spamblog and thus it has been suspended pending review. I don't know how long that will take or even whether it will turn out in my favor but I do hope that 4 years of blogging there aren't consigned to /dev/null. My fate is in Google's hands. This was the final straw; I will be moving City of Brass off Blogger and cease using blogger entirely in the near future.
Related essay: the means influence the ends at City of Brass
Friday, June 8, 2007
Why I wear the ridah
This essay was written by an 18-year old Bohra woman in Toronto, Tasneem bhen Yahya. It was originally published in the Young People's Press and the Halifax Chronicle Herald in 2003.
I'm skirting the edge of copyright by excerpting so much; the piece is worth reading in full.
Also related: my old essay, the Burka and the Bikini (altMuslim.com)
Contrary to popular misconceptions, the ridah or veil is liberating. It forces people to focus on the person, rather than the clothes they are wearing.
Designer jeans and tube tops don't have to be what defines a person. Success shouldn't be determined by how much skin is revealed, but by intelligence and personality. The ridah helps emphasize these attributes by covering a woman's body.
The ridah is also beautiful.
It comes in colours ranging from pretty pastels to rich shades of indigo, emerald, and crimson. The materials used vary from simple cottons to rich satins and chikan (embroidered cloth).
Usually ridahs are adorned with lace, embroidery and flowery appliques. Pre-designed ridah material is readily available in Pakistani and Indian street markets, but you still have to get them stitched by a tailor.
I look forward to trips to Pakistan where I can purchase my own material and accessories to fit my taste. I pick vividly printed cloth and intricately crocheted laces that are unusual.
I figured wearing a ridah to school would alienate me from my friends. Instead, all my friends from various backgrounds - Irish, Italian, British, Guyanese, Pakistani - encouraged me to wear it.
One of my friends asked questions about wearing it. She asked me where it came from, and whether it was mandatory for women to be veiled.
I explained to her it's my choice to wear it. It's a true reflection of my faith.
The ridah is an expression of faith similar to crosses for Christians and yarmulkes for Jewish men. For me, the ridah is a way to tell others I'm a practicing Muslim. I follow Islam and everything it teaches me about how to live my life and be a better person.
My friend then asked, "Aren't veiled women a product of fundamentalist Islamic regimes run by men?"
I was shocked she was so misinformed. But I couldn't blame her.
The only images I've seen of veiled women on television were from CNN's coverage of the "War on Terrorism." I saw women who were starving, uneducated and oppressed. Everything I'm not.
I'm skirting the edge of copyright by excerpting so much; the piece is worth reading in full.
Also related: my old essay, the Burka and the Bikini (altMuslim.com)
Wednesday, June 6, 2007
comments disabled
a minor admin note; since I blog so infrequently, I think it best to disable comments on the blog. I would prefer to keep conversations at a blog-to-blog level via Technorati links. I've just had too many spam comments on ancient posts recently to make it worth my while to keep comments open here. Maybe if Blogger supports comment expiration later I'll restore commenting in the future.
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