The Orlando Shooter

was apparently gay himself.

Mateen worked as a security guard for G4S and had hoped to become a law enforcement officer, and former classmates at a police academy said he was socially awkward and apparently gay himself. “We went to a few gay bars with him, and I was not out at the time, so I declined his offer,” said one former classmate at Indian River Community College. “He just wanted to fit in and no one liked him,” the classmate said. “He was always socially awkward.” His father, Seddique Mir Mateen, has apologized for his son’s actions but said “God will punish those involved in homosexuality,” Mateen married a woman he met online about eight years ago, and the couple had a son, but they divorced because he allegedly became abusive. “He was not a stable person,” his ex-wife said.

But he continued going to gay bars and setting up profiles on gay dating apps — and was apparently a regular at Pulse. At least four regular customers have identified Mateen as a regular at the LGBT club, saying he often drank alone there but sometimes became loud and belligerent. Another customer said he exchanged messages with Mateen for about a year through the gay dating app Jack’d but never met him in person until he spotted him about 1 a.m. Sunday going into the club.

A loser, a closeted gay Muslim, an abuser, a crazy person and also an ISIS follower.

What made him go on a shooting rampage? Family that refused to accept his gay-side? Religion that promises the most harsh and the severest form of punishment? Muslim society that tends to ex-communicate and alienate any members of their community that is a little bit different than them?

Reference

https://www.rawstory.com/2016/06/orlando-killer-had-help-and-law-enforcement-plans-to-arrest-accomplice/

Inciting violence against homosexuals

I've been monitoring social media feeds for the past 24 hours. How do Muslims feel about the Orlando gay bar shooting (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2016_Orlando_nightclub_shooting)? A supposedly devout radical lone wolf Muslim of Afghan descent was the perpetrator.

The perpetrator was described as aggressive and slightly crazy by those who knows him.

Religion could be more accommodating towards homosexuals or asexual or folks who are very different from the rest of us. Unfortunately, Islam, just like any other religions, demands a complete conformity from you.

Muslim crowds on the social media were very sympathetic. They condemned the senseless violence. They re-posted and re-tweeted calls for blood donations to help the victims/survivors. The slogans for peace and greater understanding were everywhere. Right at this moment, the Muslim feeling for Gays/Homosexuals seem to be at the top. How long will this love last?

Also, don't forget to read my other post on this topic.

Reference
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2016_Orlando_nightclub_shooting
http://researchintoothersects.blogspot.com/2013/12/ancient-religions-apparent-contempt-and.html

To be critical

To be critical, you must always need to have these 7 ideas in your head. While the note was more towards history/sociology/psychology areas, you can always extend it to everything else, including religion.

Ibn Khaldun starts the Muqaddimah with a thorough criticism of the mistakes regularly committed by his fellow historians and the difficulties which await the historian in his work. He notes seven critical issues:

"All records, by their very nature, are liable to error...
1. ...Partisanship towards a creed or opinion...

2. ...Over-confidence in one's sources...

3. ...The failure to understand what is intended...

4. ...A mistaken belief in the truth...

5. ...The inability to place an event in its real context

6. ...The common desire to gain favor of those of high ranks, by praising them, by spreading their fame...

7. ...The most important is the ignorance of the laws governing the transformation of human society."

He really had a lot of interesting ideas that are worth exploring.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muqaddimah

Wedding Night

You will not believe what they were doing ...

Read this [1]

Manama: A Saudi bride was divorced shortly after the marriage ceremony when she ignored her groom and kept chatting with her friends on her mobile.
“Following the marriage ceremony, the groom took his bride to the hotel where they had booked a room,” a relative said. “However, as soon as the bride was in the room, she kept using her mobile. Her groom tried to get closer with her and become more intimate, but he was shocked when she ignored him, not responding to his words and action. When he asked her about the reasons, she answered she was busy communicating with her friends who were congratulating her on her marriage on the mobile. The groom asked her to delay the messages, but she refused and became angry. When he asked her if her friends were more important than he was, the bride answered that they were,” the relative said, quoted by Saudi daily Al Watan on Tuesday.

As the argument between them became unexpectedly heated, the groom told his bride he was divorcing her and left the hotel. The relative said that a divorce case was filed and the court referred it to the reconciliation committee to assess if the newly-weds could be reconciled, the relative added. However, the groom, too hurt in his pride to forgive, refused to withdraw the case and insisted on the divorce.

Perhaps something more romantic than being married for a night? [2]

In what may rank as one of the least romantic wedding nights in history, a Chinese couple reportedly spent their first night of marital bliss transcribing the Communist party’s 17,000-word constitution as part of a campaign designed to shore up support for President Xi Jinping’s administration. Li Yunpeng and his bride, Chen Xuanchi, saw the task as a way of creating “beautiful memories” of their wedding night, their employer, the Nanchang railway bureau, wrote in an online message.
The state-run Global Times said last Sunday’s post-nuptial transcription session was part of a Beijing-backed campaign called Copy the Chinese Communist party constitution for 100 days.
Chinese internet users were quick to mock the Communist party for gatecrashing the couple’s honeymoon. “I have to say this must be the most ridiculous and hilarious thing the party has ever done,” one wrote on Weibo, China’s answer to Twitter

What's wrong with the kids today?

References
[1] http://gulfnews.com/news/gulf/saudi-arabia/saudi-bride-divorced-minutes-after-marriage-ceremony-1.1829174

[2] http://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/may/18/chinese-couple-wedding-night-copying-communist-party-constitution?CMP=fb_gu

Single men are root of all evil?

In some places in the world, single men can be very dangerous. They try stupid stunts

A popular stunt among young drivers is "sidewall skiing," which entails driving on the two side wheels of the car only. To make the experience even more extreme, the driver may high-five a spectator on the curb, passengers ride outside the vehicle, barely hanging on to the windows or the chassis, and other thrill-seekers lie on the road as the car passes over them. [1]

They join murderous cult like ISIS so they can purchase wives and slaves on black markets.

Via a translator, the man says he has been in contact with a broker—a middleman used as a go-between from ISIS to grieving Yazidi families—who for a high fee will return his children after they were taken and sold as slaves among the jihadis just over a year ago in the ISIS blitz of northern Iraq. [2]

Muslim girls and women have to guard themselves from constant abuse and harassment by covering themselves from top to bottom, left to right. Covering doesn't really help or guard women against those who have a very low opinion of the female gender.

One member of a gang of youngsters who harassed two young women as they took a stroll along the corniche in the Red Sea port city of Jeddah has been arrested. The arrested individual gave out the names of some members of the group of adolescents who followed the two girls, one of whom was fully veiled and the other with only the upper half of her face showing, Saudi news site Sabq reported on Monday. The two women pleaded with the raucous teenagers to leave them alone, but their pleas seemed to fall on deaf ears. [3]

Enough is enough! Women should not be punish for the weakness of men. Qatar is doing something about this.

"No bachelors," the guard said. The newly-renovated park - its boating lake, miniature golf course and neatly manicured lawns - was off-limits to men unaccompanied by women or children, the guard said. "It's for families only." So-called "bachelor bans" that bar lone men from entering malls and parks on certain days of the week and from living in residential neighborhoods are a common, often loosely-enforced, practice in the conservative Muslim Gulf. Local authorities say the measure, enforced by businesses and municipalities, allows families and women who live in crowded and male-dominated cities space to enjoy public facilities.

Qatar's population stands at 2.6 million, 75 percent of whom are male, according to the country's ministry of planning. No one knows exactly how many Qatari citizens there are as the government refuses to release a total but estimates say there are between 200,000 to 250,000. "Bachelor workers are eroding the privacy and comfort of families," Rashed Al Fadeh, a Qatari journalist, wrote in a column for local Arabic-language daily al-Sharq last year, saying workers overrunning neighborhoods was damaging Qatar’s social fabric.

"Going shopping without being stared at, enjoying a park not crowded with men who may look at women and not respect traditions. Qatari families have the right to do these simple things," said Mohannadi. "Today if you go to Al Khor on the weekend you may not see one person wearing traditional dress, no Qataris ... You can feel like a stranger there now." Authorities have in recent months taken steps to further separate workers from locals: ministry of interior maps which highlight in stark green and yellow Doha’s “no-go” housing zones for migrant workers were plastered last month on billboards across the capital. In December, construction workers were turned away from a parade event along Doha's corniche marking Qatar’s national day celebrations.

after reading this article in its entirety, I'm thinking that the banning of the single men is applicable only to non-Qatari migrant workers and not to their own first-class citizen.

References
[1] http://www.businessinsider.com/saudi-arabia-sidewall-skiing-2013-4
[2] http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2015/09/03/the-isis-slave-girl-buyback-schemes.html
[3] http://gulfnews.com/news/gulf/saudi-arabia/video-saudi-youth-held-for-harassing-women-1.1553231
[4] http://in.reuters.com/article/qatar-labour-bachelors-idINKCN0Y81JQ

Every day is mother's day?

Recently we celebrated mother's day. This is a fairly new and informal celebratory day, mostly good for businesses (restaurant, flowers, shopping, cards and other gifts, etc) and your ego but perhaps not very good for your purse/wallet.

On facebook, everyone had pictures of their mothers or some nice sweet messages. Some Muslim were heavily promoting and forwarding the slogan: “In Islam, everyday is mother's day” and some positive messages about women and Islam. It's all about trying to fit in with the modern life and sell your religion.

Realistic, in Islam, there's no mother's day. This is not really something you can find or trace anywhere in its teaching. Since I'm not a purist, I don't see any harm in celebrating mother's day but for consistency sake we also need to say that “In Islam, everyday could easily be Valentine day” since Islam is also not oppose to lovers.

Relevant link
1
2

I'm still alive

I have not been active on the blog for a while. I became busy and lost interest in writing. Because of not doing anything with the blog, google thinks I'm dead. So I had a little trouble getting in my account.

I setup this blog using email system A and as a recovery method I used email system B. And I remember all my passwords for system A and system B.

When I logged to the blog with the correct password after being inactive for a long time, google thinks there's something fishy going on with my account. It sent me a recovery code to system B. I login to my email account on system B and find out that system B thinks something fishy is going on. System B sent a recovery code to system A to verify that this is the same person since I haven't log in to my account for a long time. So, I was trapped between system A and B sending recovery email to each other, despite me knowing all the passwords to my account. Annoying!

Rent a husband for an hour

Check this out.

Moscow City Hall want to rent ‘husbands’ to perform ‘men’s jobs’ in local households. The hired “husbands” would be available to perform tasks traditionally viewed as a man’s job in a Russian household, such as replacing a leaky tap or putting up shelves,

“Husband For An Hour Moscow” is one of several dozen companies which promise “young and strong men with a huge set of technical skills,”

“You’ve just spent a long time in a store selecting a new light fixture for your hallway to perfectly match your new decor,” the company’s online statement reads. “But you’re a beautiful woman with a killer manicure, and you’re not ready to get intimate with a buzzing and horribly vibrating drill. Who can come to your aid?” “Assertive men, who’ll call themselves your husband for an hour, are on their way to your home,” the ad reads.

We generally call these men ..plumber, electrician, technician, carpenter, contractor, window guy..etc

Maybe something is lost in the translation…or way more is being advertised here..


Reference

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/mar/10/moscow-announces-plans-for-rent-a-husband-social-service

Join a jihadi group and get your throat slit by a friend

Yesterday, I mentioned briefly why it’s not a good idea to become friendly with fanatics or radical Muslim/Fundamentalists. Just because someone claims to be your brother/sister in Islam, it doesn’t mean you want to spend your time with the craziest. Don’t even acknowledge their stupidity by seriously considering anything they say. Just walk away.

Today, another video appear that shows a young kid from the ISIS/ISIL group shooting unarmed Palestinian guy –straight at his head.

A video released Tuesday showed Mohamed Musallam, 20, wearing the disturbingly familiar orange jumpsuit of an Islamic State captive. He was shown admitting under obvious duress that he was an informer for Israeli intelligence before he was shot in the head by a young boy. The Islamic State, also known as ISIS or ISIL, alleged that he had been sent to Syria “as an agent for the Israeli Mossad” to gather information on the group.

By now, you have probably realized that ISIS/ISIL doesn’t really conduct trial or call witnesses or have judges that look into the allegations. Even worse they don’t even have a proper executioner of law. As can be seen in this latest video, the executioner is a young kid, who’s very much on a fast track to become a sadistic animal when he grows-up.

Interestingly, Mohamed Musallam travelled to Syria to join this barbaric group.

Ahmed and his father suggested that Mohamed Musallam was most likely lured by Islamic State recruiters or brainwashed by other Palestinians in their East Jerusalem neighborhood who were loyal to the group’s philosophy.

“They promised him girls and money,” his father said.

References

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/03/12/world/middleeast/family-of-palestinian-man-killed-by-isis-say-he-wasnt-spying-for-israel.html

http://www.bostonherald.com/news_opinion/international/europe/2015/03/official_man_boy_in_is_killing_video_are_french_citizens

Radical Islam is not only bad for your health but also

The fanatics (radical Muslims/Islamic fundamentalists) are dangerous to your life, health and wellbeing because no matter how nice they appear to you initially, eventually they will turn vicious, if you still refuse to be convinced by their smart/stupid arguments/reasoning. Just like other human emotions, it’s very hard to control or curb it. When someone loses it, they tend to go overboard.

Recently, we have seen images of ISIS/ISIL destroying historical artifacts from ancient Iraqi cities.

On Friday, the group razed 3,000-year old Nimrud and on Saturday, they bulldozed 2,000-year old Hatra – both UNESCO world heritage sites. Isil currently controls about a third of Iraq and Syria. The Sunni extremist group has been campaigning to purge ancient relics they say promote idolatry that violates their fundamentalist interpretation of Islamic law.

I generally don’t buy into this idea that as soon as you see a sculpture or painting or a strange looking historical artifacts, you will immediately start worshiping it. That’s purely a dumb speculation. What's even dumber is to think that a 4000 year old monuments or artifacts are even being used for any religious purposes when the ancient civilization no longer exists.

We are not only facing problems with people who subscribe to very extreme interpretation of Islam but even regular folks can't get away from many of Islam's small contradictions about which gods can be worship and which gods/goddesses cannot be worship.

According to Islam, Jesus son of God, and also god incarnate and his mother, Mary wife of God and mother of God, can be worship. So you can build your churches and put their images/pictures/idols or sculptures on altars and do whatever you see fit. Christianity is not the only religion that is protected under Islamic theology. Judaism, Zoroastrians, Sabeans, Mandeans and a few other ancient religions (which have not been named or clearly defined in literatures) have also earned the status of being a protected faith. Again, the status confers on these faiths are extremely arbitrary. It’s not based on deep analyses of religious dogma or anything of that nature. I’ve read some of the reasons and found them to be utterly unconvincing. I have posts on this here.


Reference

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/islamic-state/11458343/Third-ancient-site-of-Khorsabad-attacked-by-Isil-as-coalition-strike-on-Syria-oil-refinery-kills-30.html

Jihadi John

Most of the news media based in the UK and also elsewhere are covering stories about Jihadi John, the Internet personality associated with the ISIS/ISIL terror group. Jihadi John wearing a face-covering appeared in a series of high quality videos (with audio) showing him beheading, burning alive and cutting the throats of his victims (mostly made up of hostages) for fun or for whatever imaginary reasons he thinks people across the globe should be punished for.

Recently, the real identity of this personality has been uncovered by Washington Post and then BBC. Those who knew him or have worked with him are interviewed. Based on some of the glowing responses from the people who describe him as gentle, hard worker, honest, someone who keeps to himself and away from trouble, Jihadi John has been very busy throughout the years, building a common man persona.

Most people are a very bad judge of human character. Even when a psychopath like Jihadi John are revealed to them, they still, in the state of complete denial, cling to their level of comfort – of what they know about someone/something as opposed to seeing the reality that is right in front of them.

Not getting a job because of hijab/headscarf

I'm following this news about a woman who was not offered a job at a big organization in US (Abercrombie & Fitch) because she was wearing a headscarf.

Of course the lawyer, to defend his client (the organization), said that their so-called look policy is religion-neutral policy and that the company didn't discriminate the woman because of her religion.

Why is this case so interesting?

The government believes that the burden should be on the employer, because the employer here — to take the first step in a job interview, because the employer has superior knowledge, knows the work rules. And if the employer senses, perceives, understands or knows that there could be a religious issue, the employer should just bring it up and start what Congress intended, a dialogue with the job applicant, to see if there was a religious issue, and is there a need for an accommodation? Otherwise, if you put the burden on the employee or job applicant, as the lower court here did, they’re reluctant to bring religion up in a job interview.

I also agree with the following opinion that the employers should be the first party to open the discussion over something that can be considered sensitive/private/very personal to the candidate

he really simplified this and said, look, why can’t an employer just say — for one of the hypotheticals, you have somebody wearing a beard in front of you, why can’t an employer just say during the interview, we have a work policy that excludes beards? Do you have a problem with that? It doesn’t draw religion into it right away. But it gives — then the onus shifts to the job applicant to say if he or she does have a problem with it.

What the following person describe is so very true at least in western countries. We have strong anti-discriminatory laws to give equal opportunity to folks in the matter of employment, but still so many good candidates don't get the same level of consideration for the job.

An employer’s responsibility is not to bury their head in the stand when they are on notice that a potential employee will need a reasonable accommodation from them to work for them. So, for example, in this case, there were supervisors, employees who recognized the young woman’s head scarf as a hijab, and that a hijab is a religious garment. Instead of engaging in a dialogue with her at all, or asking her, do you think you’re going to have any problems doing this job, here is our look policy, they basically decided to avoid the issue altogether and not to extend her a job offer, even though otherwise she seemed to be a good candidate.

Reference
http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/supreme-court-weighs-religious-freedom-affects-business-dress-codes

Yemen is Crumbling

Yemen has been a Zaydi strong hold for centuries. A lot of interesting Islamic ideas have been developed from here but unfortunately they didn't really become mainstream, mainly because most Muslims (in the past) seems to think and believe that Zaydis have been on the wrong side of the history. Zaydis were never able to achieve mass support from the people for a prolong period of time. Their ideology(Zaydism) was considered very militant at one time but of course that's very subjective now with the new wave of global jihad and terrorism of the 21st century using modern warfare techniques and propagation of extreme Sunni belief, even in Yemen.


I'm reading this news on why Yemen as a country was not able to progress much. Not surprising the main cause has to do with corrupt politicians.

UNITED NATIONS (AP) — Yemen's former president Ali Abdullah Saleh is alleged to have amassed assets worth between $32 billion and $60 billion, most believed to have been transferred abroad under other names, U.N. experts said in a report circulated Wednesday.

The experts, who monitor U.N. sanctions ordering all countries to freeze the assets of Saleh and two Houthi rebel leaders, said the ex-president's assets are believed to include property, cash, shares, gold and other valuable commodities in at least 20 countries.

"The origin of the funds used to generate Ali Abdullah Saleh's wealth is believed to be partly from his corrupt practices as president of Yemen, particularly relating to gas and oil contracts where he reportedly asked for money in exchange for granting companies exclusive rights to prospect for gas and oil in Yemen," the experts said.

The panel of experts said in the report to the U.N. Security Council that Saleh, his family and associates allegedly stole money from a fuel subsidy program which uses up to 10 percent of Yemen's gross domestic product, as well as other ventures involving extortion, embezzlement and abuse of power.

The report noted that Saleh had many years to hide his alleged assets — especially after the possibility of sanctions against him was raised nearly a year ago — using front companies or individuals acting on his behalf. The panel said five prominent Yemeni businessmen are believed to have helped him.

The experts said they are continuing their investigation into connections with these five people and other individuals believed to be assisting the Saleh family to remove funds from banks in Yemen and deposit them overseas. The panel said it is also conducting investigations into a number of private and publicly listed companies inside and outside Yemen where it is believed Saleh "may be the beneficial owner of investments."

Reference

http://www.utsandiego.com/news/2015/feb/25/un-experts-yemen-ex-president-amassed-up-to-60/

Three school girls joining the Islamic Radical group

I'm following the news of the three school girls (two of them are 15 and one is 16 years of age) from UK who has travelled to Turkey and then onward to Syria to join the Islamic Terror group called ISIS/ISIL. [1]

These girls are believed to be influenced by social media and Internet personalities who are very supportive of the core message of ISIL. Most of us, who are sane, recognize ISIS/ ISIL as a terror group who has committed unimaginable horror acts indiscriminately in Syria and Iraq. However, many Muslims from various part of the world support this group by claiming that ISIS/ISIL are waging a Jihad or Holy War in Syria/Iraq and their activities are completely legal under Islam.

I was watching and reading news about pleas from the members of the families [2] who want these girls found and brought home. The girls' family didn't divulge a lot of private information about the girls. They just want them back. I'm certain that there's more to this story than what we have been told so far, but we won’t know much because generally Muslim families have a tendency to hide a lot of secrets and not talk about anything that may potentially bring the family a bad name or shame. If everything was going so well at home or school then these girls are running away for no reason whatsover? That’s very hard to believe.

Dr Muhammad Abdul Bari, from the East London Mosque and a former teacher at Bethnal Green Academy, said all the parents "were shocked". "Children running away from home or disappearing is every parent's nightmare," he told BBC Breakfast. He said the girls were "talented and dynamic" but "impressionable" and that they could end up "with the most vile and dangerous group on earth" was "heartbreaking" for the parents.

Some folks are also pointing fingers at the authority for not doing enough to stop these girls from being contacted by those who are preying on young impressionable girls.

"Security services have been criticised after it emerged that - before leaving the UK - Shamima sent a Twitter message to Aqsa Mahmood, who left Glasgow for Syria in 2013 to marry an Islamic State fighter." "According to a lawyer for Ms Mahmood's family, her Twitter account has been "monitored" by police since she left Britain - and he said authorities should have seen Shamima's message and taken action before she and her two friends followed."

I'm generally supportive of authorities who are investigating extremists who are known to use violent means to achieve their objectives. Extremists can be from any religious background and from any segment of society. But it is completely unrealistic to demand and expect that the authority watch and monitor each and every twitter messages or Facebook posts so they can be analyzed in-depth. No one can babysit your children or teenagers for you, especially silly teenage girls who are looking for 'Islamic' husbands on Internet.

You would think that it would be very hard to enter a war-torn-area controlled by Islamic Extremists, but it’s actually ridiculously simple based on this news report[3].

intelligence sources in Turkey said Shamima Begum, 15, Kadiza Sultana, 16, and Amira Abase, 15, appeared to have travelled by car to the border on Friday, from where they crossed into the Isil-controlled town of Tal Abyad. They were travelling with a Syrian male in a private car. They were using Syrian identity cards. “We understand that after arriving in Istanbul the girls met an Isil member who is charged with helping foreigners who want to join the group.” The source said the girls stayed in Istanbul for two days before travelling to the border.There is someone co-ordinating with them. A smuggler. They can’t move by themselves.”

References

[1] http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-31575908

[2] http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-31589762

[3] http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/islamic-state/11427505/Schoolgirls-have-already-crossed-Syrian-border-say-sources.html

Debate: Islamic Terrorism or Extremism with no connection to Islam?

In the last couple of days, folks are having a conversation about radical groups professing their Islamic faith.
A large number of Muslim (let’s call them mainstream) believes that the terrorist group like ISIS/ISIL has nothing to do with Islam. These extremists may claim to be Muslims but their actions show otherwise.

"There's no such thing as radical Islam," Awad said. "There's no violent extremist ideology within Islam. Islam is one. Some people become extremists, but it's not because of the religion — it's because of themselves as individuals. I think people get entangled in terminology when, in fact, we are dealing with criminality. Criminals are criminals." [1]

Obviously the terrorist group ISIS/ISIL would disagree. According to ISIS/ISIL, most of the mainstreams Muslim are not really Islamic based to their own interpretation and legal judgment (theology). Only the ones who join their cause and accept their hardcore version of Islam can truly be considered a true believer of Islam.

The main dilemma is that both sides think they have the correct version of Islam worthy of representing all Muslim while the other sides are misguided.

Yesterday, I was watching this discussion on TV [2]. David Brooks get invited to a lot of these programs. You cannot always believe what he says because a lot of time his opinions are flatly wrong, but sometimes he makes an interesting point, like yesterday

DAVID BROOKS: Well, are we allowed to called the Islamic State Islamic?

They are. In some sense, it’s a stupid debate, because is it true Islam, is it perverted Islam? The fact is, religion is all interpretation. God doesn’t come down here and tell us exactly what he means. We have interpretations within Christianity, within Judaism and within Islam. If you call yourself a Muslim, you’re a Muslim.

They have different interpretations, but it’s all interpretations. So, one is a perverted or a sick form of Islam. A lot of people fortunately have a much more peaceful form of Islam, but it’s all an interpretation of a faith. What’s the real one? It’s all a matter of interpretation.

I think they should probably call it Islamic extremism. It is Islamic extremism. The second, I think, and more important issue is how we diagnose the problem. And there are three elements to this sort of terrorism, as we just saw in the segment about that Egyptian young man.

First, there’s economic and political dysfunction. So that young man wanted to be a personal trainer and he couldn’t. So he was alienated from that and marginalized from society.

But, second, there’s a spiritual ardor. A guy wants to be a hero. The guy wants to be seen as strong and a hero, like that young man.

And, third, there’s theological conviction. And Islamic State has theology to it, real, substantive theology. We’re comfortable talking about the economics and the politics because we live in a secular society and we’re comfortable talking about that stuff.
But if we don’t talk about the spiritual call that they feel and the theological content, then we’re missing the core of the thing. And if we’re going to fight it, you can’t just say we’re going to give you a higher standard of living. You don’t need to go to the Islamic State. That isn’t going to work. You have to have a spiritual, better alternative. [2]

References
[1] http://www.npr.org/2015/02/20/387611455/more-muslim-groups-voice-willingness-to-combat-extremism-in-their-faith
[2] http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/shields-brooks-fighting-islamic-extremism-giuliani-obama/

Yazidi girls taken into slavery

I was watching this news segment on TV yesterday about how a group of young Yazidi girls were taken into slavery by the radical Islamic group known currently as ISIS/ISIL. You can watch the video or read the transcript here. The interview is very grim and also graphic.

I'm reproducing a portion of the interview report entitled "Freed but not free: Yazidi girls who escaped Islamic State are trapped by trauma" which I think is noteworthy. You can also watch the video interview.

The Yazidis are a small community of less than a million people, found primarily in Northern Iraq. A private and conservative community, they practice an ancient religion. Last August, members of the Islamic State group, also known as ISIS or ISIL, attacked the Yazidis, whom they consider heretics.

These pictures of Yazidis trapped on Sinjar Mountain stunned the world. Hundreds of thousands fled for their lives after I.S. fighters executed many of the men and took thousands of women and girls as slaves.

GIRL (through interpreter): They brought everyone to a school and put the women upstairs and drove the men away. I didn’t want to let my mother go, but they were pulling us from our mothers and beating us. The children were all put in cars. They said, “We’re going to sell you to others and you will have sex with them.”


MARCIA BIGGS: This video, which went viral last fall, appears to show an I.S. fighter bragging about the selling of girls.

KRG envoy Dr. Nouri Othman told us about two girls who escaped their captors in Raqqa and ran to a nearby house, but were turned away by the owner, too scared to take the chance.

DR. NOURI OTHMAN, Envoy to Internationally Displaced Persons, Kurdish Regional Government: I called the person, said, listen to me. Please keep these two girls at your home for a couple of days. He said, no, I can’t. I said, I’m going to pay you. Nobody is going to make an adventure with his life without doing something for you. You have to pay them.

MARCIA BIGGS: As many as 400 Yazidi women and girls are now free and living in camps like this one, but their nightmare is not over. Most of them have been raped repeatedly. And in a culture where a woman’s virginity is her badge of honor, no one wants to talk about it.

But we found one brave girl who told us her whole story. Just 15 years old, she and her siblings were captured, separated, and, for four months, she was shuttled between towns and cities hundreds of miles apart, even being sent to Syria.

In that first month, she and another girl were handed over to a man she calls the sheik.

GIRL (through interpreter): He took us to his house, and for the night, he forced us to have sex with him.

MARCIA BIGGS: He raped you?

GIRL (through interpreter): Yes. He raped us together. We were together, the three of us, for the night. He told us: “You don’t have religion. I’m marrying you to make you the people of God.”

MARCIA BIGGS: What else did he say to you?


GIRL (through interpreter): He said: “We are married. You are mine. We will stay together and have children. If you try to escape or run away, you will get hurt and we might sell you.”

MARCIA BIGGS: They escaped through the help of a local mechanic, who was able to get them a taxi. They were discovered out at an Islam checkpoint and returned to the city of Mosul, where she was bought and sold again to a man who she says raped her over and over.

GIRL (through interpreter): He said bad words, ugly words. He told me: “If you don’t let me have sex with you, I’m going to sell you again. I will send you to Syria, where 10 men will be doing the same. And he beat us.”

MARCIA BIGGS: She says she attempted suicide twice, the first by drinking bleach, and the second by strangling herself with her scarf.

During those dark days, she used a razor and a pen to tattoo herself with the words which is Arabic for “Mommy and daddy, I love you.” She says that’s what kept her going.

You hadn’t seen them for four months and you didn’t know where your sisters were.

GIRL (through interpreter): No, I hadn’t heard anything about my sisters.

MARCIA BIGGS: She finally managed to escape once more, through a small kitchen window. A family took her in until a taxi driver, paid by the local government, drove her north towards the town of Dohuk. She says she walked the final hours on a road littered with bombs.

And she’s still missing. And she’s still missing as well.

Her four sisters and brother are still missing. Her mother can barely speak as we swipe through the pictures on her phone of her missing children. It’s too dangerous for us to show you their faces. She may be back with her family, but, like all the girls we met, she is suffering severe trauma, with very few resources.


MARCIA BIGGS: Dr. Derek Farrell is a British psychotherapist working with a foundation that aims to open a trauma center for Yazidi girls. He told us some of the horror stories he’s heard.

What has struck you the most?

DEREK FARRELL: Well, one is the level of sexual violence, which is horrific. These are the members of the Yazidi community, where their faith is very important to them. And it’s the fact that, within their trauma, their faith is in some way being used against them, in a way which is very dehumanizing.

A number of them felt that they wanted to kill themselves. And some of the women were given a gun by their ISIS captor and were offered that they could kill themselves, but, when they pushed the trigger, the gun was empty, you know. And it was the sheer, you know, humiliation and ridicule that went with that. These are girls who can’t sleep. They’re having bad nightmares. They are having flashbacks.

MARCIA BIGGS: So many of the girls are afraid to admit that they were raped. They use the words honor and virginity interchangeably. This woman told me she had gone to a doctor who performed a test to prove she was still a virgin.

MARCIA BIGGS: Some girls have had their hymens repaired, a sort of revirginization surgery provided by the government for those that want it.

Did you have any kind of a surgery?

GIRL (through interpreter): I had surgery to become a virgin.

MARCIA BIGGS: Did you feel like you had to have that surgery?

GIRL (through interpreter): Yes.

MARCIA BIGGS: Why?

GIRL (through interpreter): To return to that time when I was a virgin.

DR. NIZAR ESMAT: The priority is to provide good medical care, but some of them are hopeless, because, they say we lost our virginity, so we cannot marry again, for example. We cannot make a family. And we don’t want to disclose this to any one of our family.

They are really in a situation that is really a barrier for us to treat her or to overcome her traumas and depression.

MARCIA BIGGS: Dr. Nizar wouldn’t confirm reports of underground abortions, but said that he is working with the court to try to find a way to make abortion legal for girls returning from captivity.

Throughout the camp, we notice the older women and the little girls, but very few young women. They prefer to stay inside.

Do you think that you will some day marry and have a family?

GIRL (through interpreter): No. Because of what happened to me, I can’t. I don’t want to marry again. I can have a family, but I don’t want to

Reference
http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/freed-free-yazidi-girls-escaped-islamic-state-trapped-trauma/

A new kind of terrorist

I was watching the 60 minutes segment about the shooting at Charlie Hebdo office in France by the Jihadist. How did the French authority missed the shooters since all three were well known to the authority due to their criminal background?

All three assailants were raised in harsh environment in Ghettos. Mostly immigrants live a life of segregation and cannot integrate well so they are left to the side.

The terrorism expert said that these men were known criminals because they have served jail time. From hardened criminals they turned into terrorist. These are the new type of hybrid: petty criminals turned into Jihadist. Because of their criminal background and experience, they were able to outsmart the police and procure weapons to carry out their attack.

They brought up the story of one of the brother who lived the life of drinking beer, smoking pot, music/rap, chasing girls and the next day he was at the mosque. These are the typically characteristics of many like him who lived an utterly sinful life and then found religion. They are mad dogs and morons. They had no instruction from outside terror organization. It was their own initiatives.

The lawyer for cherif said his client was a bit of coward. He was happy to go to the prison rather than going to Iraq to support his Muslim brothers because he was a coward. In prison he met a teacher who feed him radical Islamic propaganda. They didn’t know anything about Islam. They just follow this leader like a kid following his mummy who is always asking his mummy “What if I do this..what if I do that”

The segment also showed a happy picture of Amedy Coulibaly and his girlfriend/partner Hayat Boumeddiene who was wearing the skimpiest bikini at the beach. In the next picture the partner (Hayat) was fully covered in a black cloak and a face covering. No surprise here, many of the women/girls joining the Jihadist movement are of very loose characters (just like their men) or extremely gullible and naive teenagers.

Valentine day police in India patrolling the streets

Valentine day is glorified in the West and elsewhere because it is very profitable for businesses (such as restaurants, cinemas, stores, florists, bakeries and others). The biggest harm is perhaps only to your wallet/purse and stress level if you are in a relationship with these sort of expectations.

I’m not really into things that are very superficial so I’m completely indifferent to the idea of having a day for your loved ones, not saying that only people who are superficial celebrate this day. Everyone may have their own thinking style and motive for whatever it is that they do for themselves. However, one thing we can all perhaps agree on is that if you don’t celebrate or treat Valentine day as something special then why would you care what others are doing on this day?

Blind faith and fanaticism is very dangerous. Religions unfortunately promote both by boxing you inside a belief system that is always against everything else without providing a good explanation and reasoning as to why approach A is better than approach B.

I’m reading this news article about a group of hardcore Hindu fanatics being obsessed about what others are doing of February 14.

Right-wing Hindus in India are offering white roses, free counselling and a chance to get married for couples caught kissing or hugging in public places on Valentine's Day.

Roving three-person teams of volunteers from the Akhil Bharat Hindu Mahasabha will fan out across India on Feb. 14, scanning parks and public spaces for couples exhibiting "inappropriate behaviour."

"We'll explain the meaning of love to them," said Chander Prakash Kaushik, the group's president. "We are against any vulgarity, not against love."

"Suhaag raat should be in the bedroom, not on roads," he said, using the Hindi term for the consummation of a marriage.

Wait a second. Isn’t this the country (India) that mass produce and release massive amount of cheesy movies, almost every single one centered or revolves around love and relationship with very silly plots?

Kaushik said the Hindu Mahasabha volunteers would distribute white roses to signify they come in peace, and then advise the couples to get married if they are really in love.

This guy doesn’t seem to get it. Love is free buddy, marriage is a very expensive business.

The Hindu Mahasabha, which is not affiliated to the ruling Hindu-nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party, is among groups seen as self-appointed moral guardians of younger Indians who increasingly seek the right to choose their own partner, independent of caste and other traditional rules.

Public displays of love and live-in relationships are viewed as a cultural threat in India, where conservative attitudes coexist with high rates of violence against women.

Reference
http://in.reuters.com/article/2015/02/13/india-valentine-idINKBN0LH1QK20150213

What's so scary about any plan to establish the caliphate or Islamic Government?

I'm reading this news over here about a radical Islamic group in a western country that wishes to establish a caliphate or Islamic government.

The court in Antwerp sentenced the Sharia4Belgium group's "charismatic leader," Fouad Belkacem, to 12 years' imprisonment and gave dozens of other members lower sentences. Belkacem, who was led into court in handcuffs by police in body armor, smiled as he listened to the judgment. Other senior leaders of the group were sentenced to 15 years because judges said that, unlike Belkacem, they were actively involved in terrorism in Syria. The verdicts came in one of Belgium's biggest ever terror trials — 46 Muslims were originally indicted, though only a handful appeared in court. Others are believed to be fighting with Sunni armed groups in Syria or to have died in its civil war.

Muslims and non-Muslims have every right to fear loud-mouthed idiots who think they can implement a Utopian styled-Islamic government forcefully anywhere on planet Earth. This short sentence below (from the news article) highlights everything that is wrong with a faith based government, namely Islamic government, but it can also be easily extended to Christian, Hindus or other belief systems.

The written judgment said that in the "totalitarian" Islamic state Sharia4Belgium wanted, "there is no freedom, no human rights, no place for personal development, science or culture. Their state is based on violence and fear.

Reference
http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/court-islamic-group-terror-organization-28882299

Muslim’s Ghettos?

I’m told that the Muslims who immigrate/move to western countries (especially Europe) have a tendency to turn their neighborhood (place of resident) into Ghettos

The Muslims are accused of bringing the ‘Ghetto’ from back home to their new place of residence.

I live in a nice neighborhood in a predominately white Christian area. There are some rundown areas mostly populated by the minorities (Hispanics and Blacks) who are mostly Christians. I know many Muslims who are very well off who live in nice neighborhoods.

Based on my observation, people who mostly live in rundown areas are of limited means and income. If they could afford better housing options then they wouldn’t be stuck in such places. Reasonable folks generally care about the quality of life and also other factors.

A lot of Muslim immigrants in Europe for the most part don’t come from affluent background. They kind of have to do with what they have. Even poor immigrants from Western Europe who are mostly Christians don’t live in nice houses/neighborhoods. They too have their own Ghettos.

The unfortunate part of living in less than stellar neighborhood is that no one will care much about their neighborhood. This has a ripple effect because everyone living there will have a lower quality of life. Secondly, I don't think this way of life is very health because it will promote folks who are only interested with others who are very much like them (being insular). They will cling to their race, religion, people from their own communities (people who share a common origin), language, way of life. The more insular they become, the more they cling to folks just like them, and eventually they will start to despise everyone who are not like them and hate everything that is not representative of them.

And this is the major cause of why the Muslims are accused of not being able to integrate well into western culture or unable to let go of their backward way of thinking even when something better comes along.