The Righteous Fury of Veena Malik

Just a little background: Pakistani actress Veena Malik recently appeared on 'Big Boss,' the Pakistani (or Indian?) version of the TV reality show 'Big Brother.'

In this interview, a news host and a Mullah attempt to brand her as a shame to her country and her religion.

Watch what happens next:

Yeah, I know what you're thinking: All that AND brains!

The saddest thing about this is that there really isn't any way to guarantee this woman's safety, at least not while she remains in her native country.

The most we can do is say a prayer for her safety, and that more women in the region will stand up and support her.

The Middle East needs more women like Veena Malik.

Egyptian Muslims to act as "human shields" at Coptic Christmas Eve Mass

Signs of hope?

As reported by Ahram Online (emphasis added):

"Although 2011 started tragically, I feel it will be a year of eagerly anticipated change, where Egyptians will stand against sectarianism and unite as one,” Father Rafaeil Sarwat of the Mar-Mina church told Ahram Online. The Coptic priest was commenting on the now widespread call by Muslim intellectuals and activists upon Egyptian Muslims at large to flock to Coptic churches across the country to attend Coptic Christmas Eve mass, to show solidarity with the nation's Coptic minority, but also to serve as "human shields" against possible attacks by Islamist militants.

"Mohamed Abdel Moniem El-Sawy, founder of El-Sawy Culture Wheel was among the promiment Muslim cultural figures who first floated the bold initiative.

"“This is it. It is time to change and unite,” asserted journalist Ekram Youssef, another notable sponsor of the intiative, in a telephone interview with Ahram Online. She added that although it is the government’s responsibility to act and find solutions to bring an end to such violations, "it is time for Egyptian citizens to act to revive the true meaning of national unity."

"Following last year's Coptic Christmas Eve attack on congregants as they left their church in the Upper Egyptian city of Naga Hamady, Youssef created the crescent and cross logo with the slogan “A nation for all” - that was adopted during the past couple of days by many of Egypt’s 4 million Facebook users as their profile picture...

..."“I know it might not be safe, yet it’s either we live together, or we die together, we are all Egyptians,” Cherine Mohamed, a 50 year old house wife said.

"For Youssef, Egyptians should attend regardless of their faith as “we all have Christians as part of our family. I am a Muslim but I’m sure my great grandfather was a Christian"...

..."Some fear the initiative will be thwarted, however. “I’m filled with happiness, I feel it will become a national celebration, yet I fear that police won’t allow Muslims to attend the mass,” Ashraf Rasmy, a Coptic volunteer worker said.

"Nevertheless, Muslims and Copts are looking forward to tomorrow evening with all that it might bring. Amani Ramsis, a volunteer worker, remains defiant: “It is an anticipated celebration for all Egyptians, whether we live or die, we will never stop celebrating the birth of Jesus, and no one can bury our joy and unity.”"

If Christians Were Treated Like Muslims

This article I've posted below was published in Human Events on December 28, 2010.

Read it in its original context here.

"Few Americans would deny that Judeo-Christian beliefs and values informed the Founding of this country and that they continue to shape much of American life today. Nor would many of us deny that Americans who embrace Islamic values are a distinct minority here.

"I raise these two facts because of an emerging reality: that, in a variety of contexts, American Muslims are treated better than American Christians. That might seem like a bizarre assertion, so think about it in another way: What if the Christians were treated like Muslims in America, and Muslims like Christians?

"If Muslims were treated like Christians in America, Muslims would have to tolerate the defamation of their holiest images in our national museums, acts which would be called "artwork" -- and, if particularly provocative, even given taxpayer-funded grants from the National Endowment for the Arts. They would also have to accept Korans being burned and thrown into toilets, which instead of inciting worldwide outrage and retribution would provoke a collective shrug of the shoulders.

"If Muslims were treated like Christians, Muslims would be mocked by late night TV talk show hosts and lampooned in crude cartoon parodies. If Christians were treated like Muslims, conspicuous Christianity would be celebrated by our elites as a sign of our diversity and open-mindedness, not disparaged as an embarrassment, a nuisance and a breach of the law.

"If Christianity were treated like Islam, our students would be taught a white-washed version of Christian history, with the troubling bits miscast or omitted from textbooks and lesson plans.

"If Christianity were treated like Islam, if an evangelical Christian committed an evil act in the name of his faith, he would be portrayed in the media as a deviation from, not a personification of, the Gospel message. Meanwhile, our political and media elites would hasten to assure the public that evangelical Christianity is a religion of peace and that the vast majority of evangelical Christians do not support terrorism.

"If Christianity were treated like Islam in America, our president, a professed Christian, would proudly attend Christian-themed dinners and events while skipping Ramadan dinners, not vice versa. And Muslim politicians would go out of their way to assure people that their faith would not affect their policy-making.

"If Christianity were treated like Islam, Christmas and Easter would be publicly celebrated for what they are — the signature events of Christianity, marking the birth and the death and Resurrection of Christ — not stripped of all their theological meaning and transformed into secular holidays devoted to crass consumerism.

"If Christians were treated like Muslims, NASA would be tasked with reaching out to Christians and recognizing their faith's profound achievements and contributions to science, math and engineering, instead of being told to make Muslims feel good about their rather meager scientific accomplishments.

"If Christians were treated like Muslims, the Catholic Church's stances on sex, contraception and human life would be revered as welcome departures from our over-sexed, self-obsessed culture, not condemned as a cause of disease and death in the less-developed world. And if Muslims were treated like Christians, the application of Sharia law around the world would be met not with stony silence but with the outrage it deserves.

"If Christians were treated like Muslims in America, amusement parks would celebrate "Christian Family Day," (Six Flags recently celebrated "Muslim Family Day"), and Christians would be asked to embrace, not set aside, their religious convictions at the door when they entered the public square. Meanwhile, Muslim imams, not Christian pastors, would fear hate crimes lawsuits for preaching orthodox views of sexuality and sin.

"The notion that American Muslims face discrimination, even to the point of violence, is often posited by America's elites. But that idea evaporates under scrutiny. Remarkably few hate crimes are reported against Muslims (fewer than one-eighth those against Jews). What's more, Muslim immigration to America has risen sharply since September 11, 2001, and Muslims thrive, economically and educationally, once they arrive.

"In fact, it is Christians, not Muslims, who increasingly encounter cultural elites who are hostile to their beliefs and values.

"Sadly, Christians will never be treated like Muslims by America's elites. Why? Because Christianity can be attacked without fear of retribution. The Christian response to insult and attack -- "to turn the other cheek" -- contradicts the knee-jerk call to violence of many Islamists.

"It's also because left-wing elites and radical Islamists are united in the common cause of upending the Judeo-Christian culture and roots of American society.

"I’m not in favor of burning the Koran, and I don’t think insulting or defaming symbols of any religion constitutes art. At a time of the year when intolerance for public displays of Christianity is most acute, it is my Christmas wish that Muslims and Christians would be treated equally."

- Gary Bauer, Human Events, Dec. 28, 2010

The War Against Free Speech

What do comedian Vince Vaughn, Dutch Parliamentarian Geert Wilders, and journalist Juan Williams (pictured above) all have in common?

In the past few weeks, each of these men has become a participant in the ongoing struggle against the symptom of cultural decay that has until recently held Western society in an unshakable stranglehold. I say “recently” for the obvious reason that the recent experiences of each of these men- Juan Williams in particular- have had a mildly deleterious effect on this not-so-silent killer of free speech, a morally relativistic sentiment more commonly referred to as “Political Correctness”- which Dictionary.com defines as “adhering to a typically progressive orthodoxy on issues involving esp. race, gender, sexual affinity, or ecology,” and which the Urban Dictionary defines as “people who try so hard to say the right thing they end up just looking like twats.” I’m partial to the second definition, myself.

In case you don’t spend much free time watching the news, skimming political blogs, or listening to Whoopi Goldberg politely converse with Bill O’Reilly (NOT!) on ‘The View’ (the who?), here are a few headlines you might have missed, in no particular order:

1. Dutch politician Geert Wilders faces trial in his home country for expressing his negative feelings concerning Islam

2. (Former) Seattle cartoonist Molly Norris- whose brain-child “Everyone Draw Mohammed Day” caused her to receive numerous death threats- goes into hiding without so much as a murmur from most major news outlets

3. Gay rights organization GLAAD causes an uproar over a movie trailer in which Vince Vaughn makes a supposedly offensive joke concerning the masculinity (or lack thereof) of electric cars, but remains silent when Islamists demand that gay performer Adam Lambert cancel his Malaysian performance (which he did not, while agreeing to tone down certain aspects)

4. NPR fires reporter Juan Williams for making a statement about Muslims that the network found bigoted (but that clearly wasn't)

5. The Obama administration joins the OIC (Organization of the Islamic Conference) in attempting to pass a resolution in the U.N. barring the “negative stereotyping of religions.”

If you can decipher the true intentions behind news item #5, you can see a clear pattern here. Despite the protections of the First Amendment, we are observing a trend in government and media to suppress speech linking terrorism to Islam. Which makes sense, because clearly there isn’t any link between Islamic fundamentalism and Jihadist violence. What, you mean you don’t think Islam is the “religion of peace?” Well, aren’t you just the stereotypical right-wing loony bird!

That the movement to criminalize any individual in a Western nation raising valid complaints against the basic tenets of the Islamic faith has gained so much traction is cause for concern, to say the least. Thanks to his legal team, Geert Wilders managed to evade his charges, but would he have had the same good fortune in any other European court? This is altogether unclear, and that fact alone should frighten us all- including truly moderate Muslims who still see the West as a beacon of hope.

Ask yourself this: What could be a more Western value than freedom of expression? Is this capacity for free discussion and debate not the cornerstone of our entire societal history? Is it not the source of reason with which good ideas flourish and bad ideas are banished to the ash heap of history? With what other underlying value in mind could we have possibly turned back the tides of the numerous communisms and fascisms of the twentieth century?

And yet, as the news items above have shown, our quaint little Freedom of Speech is not a liberty we ought take for granted.

Since I don’t have the resources with which to properly inform anybody adequately about these cases, here are a few links to follow for the best summaries (which all just happen to be from the National Review):

· What Wilder’s Trial Means: A column by the editors of National Review Online

· Context of the Wilders Case: Just as the title indicates

· Obstructed View: Concerning the effect of some of these recent events on free speech

· The Closing of NPR’s Mind: The plight of Juan Williams (pictured at top) and modern political discourse

· Islam And Totalitarianism: By Andrew C. McCarthy

Now, I wouldn’t want anyone to think that my source material is cut from singularly conservative cloth, so here’s my version of a curveball: A speech by the vocal British atheist Christopher Hitchens, concerning free speech in general. I’ve found myself watching snippets of this talk on Youtube quite often as of late, and I encourage everyone to take a look. Sadly, there are few public figures capable of arguing so passionately in defense of free speech, thought, and writing. Were it not for his positions regarding Biblical scripture, he’d make a great NRO columnist as well.

But since Mr. Hitchens tends to (sloppily) link his critique of extremist Islam to other Abrahamic faith systems, be sure to take a look at Word On Fire’s counterargument concerning organized religion here. Gotta love that Father Barron.

Stand up for Molly Norris, Freedom of Speech

When Molly Norris announced the first annual celebration of ‘Everybody Draw Muhammad Day’, she knew that her activism wouldn’t come risk-free. Following the self-censorship by Comedy Central of a now-famous South Park episode detailing the controversy surrounding the representation of the “prophet” in question, everyone from the entertaiment blogosphere to Fox's Bill O'Reilly took notice. Of course, the fact that a mainstream television station had censored itself following threats from radical Muslim factions was, regrettably, not all that surprising.

But the station whose creative teams have made a fortune lampooning religions and ideologies of all shapes, sizes, colors, creeds? The same Comedy Central whose next project is an irreverent cartoon concerning the life of Christ and his relationship with his "oppressive father"? The plot thickens…

In any case, Norris and other artists disgusted by this self-censorship took their outrage and channeled it creatively, hence the birth of ‘Everybody Draw Mohammed Day’, which Wikipedia describes as “an annual protest in support of free speech, specifically in opposition to those who threaten violence against artists who draw representations of the prophet Muhammad.” Those interested in participating should mark May 20 on their 2011 calendar, but keep in mind the phrase “No guts, no glory,” because if the followers of American-born radical Islamic terrorist (yes, it DOES happen) Anwar al-Awlaki has his way, it’ll be the last doodle you ever… doodled?

Thanks to al-Awlaki- who is said to have had a hand in the near-miss attack on Times Square, as well as the shooting at Ft. Hood, Texas (read more HERE: http://www.nydailynews.com/news/world/2010/07/11/2010-07-11_cleric_anwar_alawlaki_puts_everybody_draw_mohammed_cartoonist_molly_norris_on_ex.html) - Molly Norris has good reason to fear for her life. At this point, Norris has publicly apologized for her project, stating in an interview that “I regret that I made my cartoon the way I did.” In an ideal United States, no artist- activist or otherwise- would ever have to make such an apology.

The point here is this: Artists ought not to be commended for mocking any religion, but nor should they be prohibited from doing so. Comedy Central has become synonymous over the years with irreverence, mostly to followers of the Christian faith. But last I checked, Christian factions aren't gathering in angry mobs demanding punishment for misguided entertainers. For whatever reason, practitioners of the Muslim faith today are much more likely than their Judeo-Christian brothers and sisters to take serious offense at whatever rhetoric they view as blasphemous .

Returning to the case of Molly Norris, al-Awlaki had this to say about her in a recent web document: "A soul that is so debased, as to enjoy the ridicule of the Messenger of Allah, the mercy to mankind; a soul that is so ungrateful towards its lord that it defames the Prophet of the religion Allah has chosen for his creation does not deserve life, does not deserve to breathe the air." In other words, those who offend God ought to be killed by the faithful.

As Fr. Robert Barron of Word On Fire Catholic Ministries put it in a recent video commentary on blasphemy, God cannot be harmed by a verbal attack by a mere mortal. While we who worship and love God understand that blaspheming is harmful to the blasphemer, it helps NO ONE if the supposed “faithful” in the community respond with acts of violence, or even the threat of such action. If God is Love, and therefore we who live are created, sustained, and intended for that Love, then to respond to blasphemers with anything but compassionate and firm disagreement is utterly counterproductive.

Nothing is gained by cowering in the presence of bigots, especially when said bigot is out to eliminate our freedom of speech.

PS For more information on the Catholic view of blasphemy, look no further than Fr. Robert Barron.