The Drawings of Mohammad, Facebook, Pakistan, and Ignorance!

Okay, so I'm not really sure whether to laugh at or cry for (some) Muslims. We've all probably heard about the whole "Everybody Draw Mohammed Day" thingie that started on Facebook, and many of us can even imagine the response of some Muslims (death threats, etc.).

So, what had happened was that South Park recently had an episode in which it depicted Prophet Mohammad (pbuh) as a bear. Many Muslims were infuriated and created riots over it, some even refusing to watch the show anymore and others going so far as to threaten the creators/producers/cartoonists of the show. I'm going to quote Wikipedia here (well, yeah, Wiki al-Saheeh has been keeping up with much better than I have, you see): The South Park episode sparked statements from the extremist website Revolution Muslim posted a picture of the partially decapitated body of the Dutch filmmaker, Theo van Gogh, with a statement declaring that Parker and Stone could meet a similar fate.

So, it looks like some extremist Muslims were threatening the South Park show people, and in response, Jon Wellington created the Facebook page for "Everybody Draw Mohammed Day" to show support for South Park and to stand against the extremist response of the Muslims who issued death threats. The person who first drew a cartoon of Mohammed to inspire the creation of the Facebook group was Molly Norris, who is now said to have apologized for having drawn the caricature and suggested to others to do the same; she also claims that her intention was not to instigate hatred. (Well, clearly, someone doesn't how beastly some humans can be, eh.)

Then in response to all this, to show it's "love" for Islam and Muslims, Pakistan banned Facebook (it banned Youtube, too; go figure!).  Me, I bow my head at this decision because of its stupidity.

Now I also hear that the Facebook page of the DrawMohammedDay has been hacked by some Turkish Muslims. Okay, now that's even more ignorant and ridiculous than demanding that Facebook close the DrawMoahmmed Page. Could we GET any more pitiful than this?

To answer my own questions, YES! Yes, we can! Get this: About a month ago, an Iranian Muslim cleric named Kazim Sidigi stated publicly that the reason we have earthquakes is because of the immodesty of some women. Quoting him, "Many women who do not dress modestly lead young men astray and spread adultery in society which increases earthquakes." He later added, "Some ask why (more) earthquakes and storms don't occur in the Western world, which suffers from the slime of homosexuality, the slime of promiscuity and has plunged up to the neck" in immorality, he said.

"Who says they don't occur? Storms take place in the U.S. and other parts of the world. We don't say committing sin is the entire reason but it's one of the reasons," he said. He kinda clarifies himself in this last statement; otherwise, he's being utterly illogical and nonsensical in his first quote. He obviously has no knowledge of earthquakes or their formation, I see. 

Anyway, so guess how some people responded to this claim that earthquakes are caused by the immodesty of women: A female named Jen McCreight created a Facebook Event to invite women and girls on Monday, April 26th, 2010 to be as immodest as they wanted to be. It was actually called "Bookquake," which she defined to mean the showing of cleavage, but she also said, "You don't have to show your cleavage if you don't want to. Show your ankles, for there must be someone out there who thinks that for a girl to show her ankle is immodest!" She adds:
I was amused and annoyed, but not surprised. Blaming natural disasters on sinful activities isn't limited to Muslim clerics—just look at Pat Robertson's comments on Haiti , or Jerry Falwell's on Hurricane Katrina. But as a scientist and a feminist, I felt obligated to respond. I proposed on my blog that we try a bit of a science experiment to test Sedighi's hypothesis: On Monday, April 26, women would dress as immodestly as they desired, and we would see if we really did increase the number of earthquakes. In a brilliant display of my intellectual sense of humor, I dubbed the event "Boobquake." I hurriedly submitted the post and scampered off before I missed the beginning of House.  

(Like she says, blaming natural disasters on the activity of humans is nothing new or atypical. Me, I don't buy this argument/explanation whatsoever. I must admit, any time we can't explain something or don't have any answers to a difficult question, we bring God into it and leave it to Him.)

My point? I wish some Muslims would stop being so freaking ignorant.

My opinion on the draw Mohammad idea? This:

I don't approve of the idea of drawing Mohammad because I sense a bad intention (and I read some of the comments on the DrawMohammed page on Facebok, and they were extremely rude and intolerant), BUT I don't approve of Muslims' behavior towards South Park's decision either, just as I condemned Muslims' reaction to the Dutch cartoons. You see, we're absolutely ridiculous when it comes to making a point. We don't want people to make a picture of Prophet Mohammad, so we start killing each other and other people, and especially those who do what we don't want them to do! So I'm going to have to break some hearts here and say ... we Muslims brought this upon ourselves. We kill people who criticize Islam or say anything we don't like about Islam (EVEN THOUGH we say bad things about other religions ALL the time :S like it's our "right" to do so), and so this is what we get. When we protest, we have signs that say "KILL THOSE who insult Islam!" or "BEHEAD those who draw Prophet Mohammad (pbuh)!" Or "Go to hell, Free Speech!" (without realizing that what we're doing right there is itself free speech too, lol!) When these people protest, is there any violence at all? We kill people like Theo van Gogh with pride, and we think we've done an awesome job AND that now that we've killed him, all others should learn a lesson from our having killing him; we think that if we kill the bearer of an idea, we kill the idea itself. WHO exactly are we fooling with such ludicrous thinking? Well, guess what, folks with a feeble mind and extremely weak faith The idea is still there! You killed only one person who thought like that; what are you gonna do, kill the millions who believe that way, too? That's what this DrawMohammadDay group was trying to convey - "These extremist Muslims might threaten or even kill one or a few of us, but they can't kill all of us!" What we need to learn, folks, is to criticize an idea, a thought, NOT the individual bearing the idea. But, heck, try reasoning with folks who think you're anti-Islam/anti-Muslim just because you don't agree with their extremist ideologies. But, me, thank God I've finally officially learned to just observe without responding to people who don't make sense and think they're the most sensible people alive. I guess ignorance is bliss for them all right.

Someone please tell me something ... why are we imposing our views on non-Muslims? If hadiths tell us not to draw Prophet Mohammad, should this same ruling apply to non-Muslims too? And shouldn't we be questioning the idea of why we can't draw it in the first? Isn't the philosophy behind it that eventually we'll start to worship it? (Not that we don't already worship the prophet, of course. I think we worship him much more than we worship Allah... some of us, I mean, of course.) So, if that's the case, why are we killing ourselves and others over this whole matter? 

A friend of mine wrote on his Facebook page that "Let's create a FB page and call it "Stupid things that Muslims say and do." I'm totally for it. I could write at least three heavy books on the topic of "stupidity among Muslims."

I'm so fed up of the nonsense that Muslims feed each other and the nonsense that they allow themselves to accept. Why is there nothing about the killings of Muslims and non-Muslims worldwide? Over 2.5 million Pashtuns were displaced during the last couple of years; what have Muslims done about these people? What have Muslims done about the Sudanese who are still suffering in their genocide? Yes, we've done a lot for the Palestinians, can't deny that, but what about all other Muslims?


I guess what I mean is ... why don't Muslims ever unite for something more "constructive" than "let's hack the anti-Islam groups!"? THIS is what we are willing to unite for? Oh my God.

Ignorance makes me gag ... no, wait, it makes me sick.