Tuesday, May 18, 2004
Sexual sadism and the smog of war
Tribune column, 21 May 2004
The timing could hardly have been worse to try to launch a critical dialogue on the Koran, Islam and unbelievers. The plan had been that, following my Tribune column of a couple of weeks ago, I would co-author a piece on the subject with two friends: one, a gay Arab asylum-seeker, currently resident in London; the other, a one-time Zanzibari Muslim activist, now close to apostasy, living in Dar-es-Salaam. We had intended to publish simultaneously in Britain, Tanzania, several Arab countries and via the internet.
Last week, both of my co-authors and the principal Arab publisher pulled out of the project, at least for the time being. Their explanations varied, but stemmed from the same cause: the evidence of US, and to a different extent, British abuse of Muslim prisoners in Iraq.
Husam, my gay Arab friend, told me he was simply too scared to go public with anything that was critical of Islam in the current international climate. His homosexuality alone had already made him a target for the murderous Islamists in his country of origin; hence his (as yet unprocessed) asylum application in this country. Putting his name to a critique of Koranic illiberalism now would be like issuing his own death warrant, he said.
Ayuba, my Zanzibari friend, approached the subject from a different direction when we spoke. "I am still part of the umma [the Muslim community] even if I am no longer an active Muslim," he told me. "If I attacked Islam now it would feel like a betrayal. That is how people would see it, even those who agree with some of what we are saying."
Our Arab publisher was both fearful and angry. "You can't write about these things. Not now. It would not be tolerated by Muslims. What the Americans have done here is disgusting."
It is difficult to underestimate the effect of the Abu Gharaib prison revelations on Muslim sensibilities. It is not the fact that prisoners were mistreated; not the fact even that some have been beaten and killed. Heaven knows, enough innocent Iraqis have been beaten, blasted, shot or blown to bits in the course of their "liberation" from Saddam.
It is the humiliation that really bites. And it is the sexual element of that humiliation that cuts to the core of Muslim values, faith and pride. Torture would have been cause for condemnation, for anger and outrage. But this goes deeper: it invites disgust, and confirms, for those seeking guidance from such a source, every Koranic imperative about the perversities of the unbelievers. "To us," as our Arab publisher said, "this is worse than torture."
Husam had wanted us to write about sexual intolerance in the Koran; about the legitimation of murder of homosexuals and other sexual deviants; about the treatment of women; about the fear and oppression of human sexuality; about the fact that Muslim men could have as many "slave girls" as they liked but that the punishment laid down for adultery by a Muslim woman is stoning to death. He had even talked about whether it might be possible, in an Arab publication, to raise the issue of the Prophet having married a girl aged six and consummated that marriage when she was nine.
And then came the pictures of naked Iraqi men being piled up in obscene human pyramids, forced to masturbate or simulate sex for the camera. There was the smiling Lyndie England, cigarette in hand, pointing at a man's genitals as he was made to touch himself. And, worst of all, the image that will now surely come to characterise George Bush's Iraqi adventure like no other: the naked Iraqi on a leash.
How do you initiate a serious dialogue about sexuality, freedom and Islam in the face of this sort of behaviour and this sort of imagery? At worst, the sexual humiliation of Muslim prisoners is an act of deliberate policy that comes from the top of the US command. At best, it reflects a debasement of human values among ordinary GIs, who can then try to justify themselves, as one did, by saying, "We just thought they looked funny."
Perhaps it's no wonder that the Boston Globe couldn't tell the difference between real pictures of US troops raping Iraqi women and the ones they published last week, which came from a Hungarian porn site. Perhaps America can't tell the difference.
Perhaps, in the blur of sexual sadism and the smog of this most ill-planned war, it has lost all sight of what liberty is really supposed to be about. It is certainly doing a better job of setting set back the cause of liberty than even the most optimistic Al Qaeda strategists could have dreamt of when they set out to provoke the Great Satan on 11 September 2001 and got it to respond every bit as stupidly as they might have hoped for.
Join the discussion at the Heirs of Hell message board
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Tribune column, 21 May 2004
The timing could hardly have been worse to try to launch a critical dialogue on the Koran, Islam and unbelievers. The plan had been that, following my Tribune column of a couple of weeks ago, I would co-author a piece on the subject with two friends: one, a gay Arab asylum-seeker, currently resident in London; the other, a one-time Zanzibari Muslim activist, now close to apostasy, living in Dar-es-Salaam. We had intended to publish simultaneously in Britain, Tanzania, several Arab countries and via the internet.
Last week, both of my co-authors and the principal Arab publisher pulled out of the project, at least for the time being. Their explanations varied, but stemmed from the same cause: the evidence of US, and to a different extent, British abuse of Muslim prisoners in Iraq.
Husam, my gay Arab friend, told me he was simply too scared to go public with anything that was critical of Islam in the current international climate. His homosexuality alone had already made him a target for the murderous Islamists in his country of origin; hence his (as yet unprocessed) asylum application in this country. Putting his name to a critique of Koranic illiberalism now would be like issuing his own death warrant, he said.
Ayuba, my Zanzibari friend, approached the subject from a different direction when we spoke. "I am still part of the umma [the Muslim community] even if I am no longer an active Muslim," he told me. "If I attacked Islam now it would feel like a betrayal. That is how people would see it, even those who agree with some of what we are saying."
Our Arab publisher was both fearful and angry. "You can't write about these things. Not now. It would not be tolerated by Muslims. What the Americans have done here is disgusting."
It is difficult to underestimate the effect of the Abu Gharaib prison revelations on Muslim sensibilities. It is not the fact that prisoners were mistreated; not the fact even that some have been beaten and killed. Heaven knows, enough innocent Iraqis have been beaten, blasted, shot or blown to bits in the course of their "liberation" from Saddam.
It is the humiliation that really bites. And it is the sexual element of that humiliation that cuts to the core of Muslim values, faith and pride. Torture would have been cause for condemnation, for anger and outrage. But this goes deeper: it invites disgust, and confirms, for those seeking guidance from such a source, every Koranic imperative about the perversities of the unbelievers. "To us," as our Arab publisher said, "this is worse than torture."
Husam had wanted us to write about sexual intolerance in the Koran; about the legitimation of murder of homosexuals and other sexual deviants; about the treatment of women; about the fear and oppression of human sexuality; about the fact that Muslim men could have as many "slave girls" as they liked but that the punishment laid down for adultery by a Muslim woman is stoning to death. He had even talked about whether it might be possible, in an Arab publication, to raise the issue of the Prophet having married a girl aged six and consummated that marriage when she was nine.
And then came the pictures of naked Iraqi men being piled up in obscene human pyramids, forced to masturbate or simulate sex for the camera. There was the smiling Lyndie England, cigarette in hand, pointing at a man's genitals as he was made to touch himself. And, worst of all, the image that will now surely come to characterise George Bush's Iraqi adventure like no other: the naked Iraqi on a leash.
How do you initiate a serious dialogue about sexuality, freedom and Islam in the face of this sort of behaviour and this sort of imagery? At worst, the sexual humiliation of Muslim prisoners is an act of deliberate policy that comes from the top of the US command. At best, it reflects a debasement of human values among ordinary GIs, who can then try to justify themselves, as one did, by saying, "We just thought they looked funny."
Perhaps it's no wonder that the Boston Globe couldn't tell the difference between real pictures of US troops raping Iraqi women and the ones they published last week, which came from a Hungarian porn site. Perhaps America can't tell the difference.
Perhaps, in the blur of sexual sadism and the smog of this most ill-planned war, it has lost all sight of what liberty is really supposed to be about. It is certainly doing a better job of setting set back the cause of liberty than even the most optimistic Al Qaeda strategists could have dreamt of when they set out to provoke the Great Satan on 11 September 2001 and got it to respond every bit as stupidly as they might have hoped for.
Join the discussion at the Heirs of Hell message board
Monday, May 03, 2004
The heirs of Hell
Tribune column, 7 May 2004
I have been re-reading the Koran recently. It's a dispiriting experience for an unbeliever, especially one who comes to it with an open mind. No matter what good works I may do in this life, my disbelief is sufficient for the "curse of God" to be upon me. An "evil fate", a "lasting torment" awaits. Regardless of my actions, I am condemned as one of the "heirs of Hell", fuel for Allah's everlasting fire.
It's dispiriting because I'd hoped that by going back to the source I'd find something different, more inclusive. I'd hoped to find something closer to the philosophy espoused by my Muslim friends – one that judges people more on what they do than on what name they give to God in their prayers. I'd wanted to be able to blame the flaws in fundamentalist Islamism on the followers, not on Allah.
In fact, the more I read of the Koran, the more it seems clear that it is Allah's followers (or the non-fundamentalist ones amongst them, at any rate) who put a beneficent spin on his revelations – and it is Allah himself whose words are deeply flawed. If every letter in the Koran is Allah's infallible own, as believers insist, there's no room for argument, no scope for interpretation. It's not someone else but Allah in person who must take the rap.
So, for example, it's not the Islamist extremists distorting a message of peace when they say that "Al-Fitnah [disbelief, idolatry] is worse than killing." It's the Koran, the perfect expression of Allah's will. And it says so more than once, just to make sure there's no misunderstanding. Disbelief is worse than killing: truly words to chill you to the bone.
Sadly, the mere act of making these statements means that I am cutting myself off from dialogue with the more rigid "true believers" of Islam. The Koran does not permit dialogue with those who do not believe. It enjoins Muslims, at best, not to waste their breath on the likes of me or, at worst, to fight and kill me.
Not even friendship with non-believers is permitted for Muslims if they're going to abide strictly by Allah's injunctions:
"Believers, take not as bitanah [advisors, consultants, friends, helpers] any but your own people." (3:118)
Or, more explicitly: "Believers, take neither Jews nor Christians for your friends." (5:51)
Some British Islamists have been telling people arrested under anti-terrorism legislation, or subjected to racist or anti-Islamic treatment, that injunctions such as these prohibit them from accepting help from non-Muslim supporters. It is forbidden, so this argument goes, for good Muslims to use non-Muslim solicitors or even to seek redress under a non-Muslim legal system. One sheikh is cited saying that, "One of the factors that turns a Muslim into an apostate [for which the penalty specified in the Koran is death] is seeking any judgement other than that of Allah and his Prophet."
Are these the arguments of a warped extremism or a literal reading of Koranic texts? The answer, unfortunately, is both. It is difficult, in any honest reading of the Koran, to avoid the conclusion that it contains within itself the fundamental rationale for such extremism.
The Koran is no different to the bible in this respect, and it would be wrong, even in a short column such as this, to pass over the fact that there is much that is wise and good and merciful in its contents. Again and again, it makes clear that belief is not enough: it must be accompanied by "good works" in order for the faithful to ascend to paradise. The giving of alms (crucially, for the glory of God and not to earn praise for oneself) is central to Islam in a way that would make the average western capitalist blanch. Not for nothing does Islam have such a powerful appeal to the poor and powerless.
But the Koran still carries what is, in essence, an exclusive and intolerant message. The rewards of paradise are reserved for those who believe in every last jot and tittle of that message; and who, literally, submit to the God who supplied it. As for the rest of us, "They are the heirs of the Fire, and there they shall remain for ever."
If that was all the Koran had to say on the subject, it might be possible to agree to differ and let those of us who are unbelievers take our chances with the rest of humanity on the Day of Judgement. It's not, though, and therein lies a terrible dilemma for every non-believer who wants to stand firm with Muslims against racism and discrimination and in support of religious freedom.
How do we square the circle of standing steadfast in defence of religious tolerance, when so many of the world's religions (Islam is far from being alone in this respect) would deny that tolerance to others?
Steve Platt has set up the "Heirs of Hell" message board for anyone interested in discussing these and other issues at http://www.splatts.net/cgi-bin/amb/view.pl?board=heirs
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Tribune column, 7 May 2004
I have been re-reading the Koran recently. It's a dispiriting experience for an unbeliever, especially one who comes to it with an open mind. No matter what good works I may do in this life, my disbelief is sufficient for the "curse of God" to be upon me. An "evil fate", a "lasting torment" awaits. Regardless of my actions, I am condemned as one of the "heirs of Hell", fuel for Allah's everlasting fire.
It's dispiriting because I'd hoped that by going back to the source I'd find something different, more inclusive. I'd hoped to find something closer to the philosophy espoused by my Muslim friends – one that judges people more on what they do than on what name they give to God in their prayers. I'd wanted to be able to blame the flaws in fundamentalist Islamism on the followers, not on Allah.
In fact, the more I read of the Koran, the more it seems clear that it is Allah's followers (or the non-fundamentalist ones amongst them, at any rate) who put a beneficent spin on his revelations – and it is Allah himself whose words are deeply flawed. If every letter in the Koran is Allah's infallible own, as believers insist, there's no room for argument, no scope for interpretation. It's not someone else but Allah in person who must take the rap.
So, for example, it's not the Islamist extremists distorting a message of peace when they say that "Al-Fitnah [disbelief, idolatry] is worse than killing." It's the Koran, the perfect expression of Allah's will. And it says so more than once, just to make sure there's no misunderstanding. Disbelief is worse than killing: truly words to chill you to the bone.
Sadly, the mere act of making these statements means that I am cutting myself off from dialogue with the more rigid "true believers" of Islam. The Koran does not permit dialogue with those who do not believe. It enjoins Muslims, at best, not to waste their breath on the likes of me or, at worst, to fight and kill me.
Not even friendship with non-believers is permitted for Muslims if they're going to abide strictly by Allah's injunctions:
"Believers, take not as bitanah [advisors, consultants, friends, helpers] any but your own people." (3:118)
Or, more explicitly: "Believers, take neither Jews nor Christians for your friends." (5:51)
Some British Islamists have been telling people arrested under anti-terrorism legislation, or subjected to racist or anti-Islamic treatment, that injunctions such as these prohibit them from accepting help from non-Muslim supporters. It is forbidden, so this argument goes, for good Muslims to use non-Muslim solicitors or even to seek redress under a non-Muslim legal system. One sheikh is cited saying that, "One of the factors that turns a Muslim into an apostate [for which the penalty specified in the Koran is death] is seeking any judgement other than that of Allah and his Prophet."
Are these the arguments of a warped extremism or a literal reading of Koranic texts? The answer, unfortunately, is both. It is difficult, in any honest reading of the Koran, to avoid the conclusion that it contains within itself the fundamental rationale for such extremism.
The Koran is no different to the bible in this respect, and it would be wrong, even in a short column such as this, to pass over the fact that there is much that is wise and good and merciful in its contents. Again and again, it makes clear that belief is not enough: it must be accompanied by "good works" in order for the faithful to ascend to paradise. The giving of alms (crucially, for the glory of God and not to earn praise for oneself) is central to Islam in a way that would make the average western capitalist blanch. Not for nothing does Islam have such a powerful appeal to the poor and powerless.
But the Koran still carries what is, in essence, an exclusive and intolerant message. The rewards of paradise are reserved for those who believe in every last jot and tittle of that message; and who, literally, submit to the God who supplied it. As for the rest of us, "They are the heirs of the Fire, and there they shall remain for ever."
If that was all the Koran had to say on the subject, it might be possible to agree to differ and let those of us who are unbelievers take our chances with the rest of humanity on the Day of Judgement. It's not, though, and therein lies a terrible dilemma for every non-believer who wants to stand firm with Muslims against racism and discrimination and in support of religious freedom.
How do we square the circle of standing steadfast in defence of religious tolerance, when so many of the world's religions (Islam is far from being alone in this respect) would deny that tolerance to others?
Steve Platt has set up the "Heirs of Hell" message board for anyone interested in discussing these and other issues at http://www.splatts.net/cgi-bin/amb/view.pl?board=heirs
