Closing Pandora's Box

The phone had been ringing for a long time. Where was everyone? They’ve all gone out you twillop said a voice inside my head. We have a phone in the sitting room, dining room and two of the bedrooms. It so happened I was in one of the rooms where there was no phone. I pressed pause on my laptop, took out the earphone from my right ear and got up to run and answer it. Oh that’s another thing about me, I only wear one earphone so that if someone is calling me, the phone rings or someone knocks at the door I can attend to them or it. One of the worst ever feelings is needing to use the loo but you don’t have the key to get into your house. And when you knock, the person inside takes what seems like forever to open because they can’t hear you. I only ever use both when going to bed, or sleeping on the bus. Anyway back to the ringing phone. I ran downstairs to the sitting room, out of breath and picked up the phone.

“Hello?”

After a few seconds an automated recording started playing, “Are you suffering from death? If you would like…”

I put the phone down after it finally registered what the recording had said.

*****

There’s been a lot of snow here in the UK. This story was in the news recently and the sheer stupidity of it made me smile. The woman didn’t even realise she was wasting valuable police time. (Click on the picture below to read the full story).

Even though the world is advancing rapidly in all sorts of ways, whether it be healthcare, learning more about the universe, creating smaller yet faster machines etc. etc, there’s still a lot of stupidity and ignorance. People still do and say things which make you open your mouth so wide flies are tempted to go inside and have babies. What’s the most stupidest thing you’ve heard or seen?

…Continued (Click here to read part 1)

Click here to watch episode (available in the UK ONLY)

Last week’s Panorama (Monday 22^nd November 2010), shown on BBC focused on faith schools and in particular Islamic schools. For those of you that are not in the UK, let me give you a brief summary of what some of the points raised:

• Of the many thousands of  schools in the UK, 160 are Muslim schools.
• The vast majority of which are “good Muslim schools, but there are also some that have an ideology that is a cause for concern”
• Some schools are directly funded by a mosque and mosque policy is usually reflected in the rules of the school.
• Students are exposed to radical anti-west speakers and thinkers who openly incite hatred against the west.
• Many part-time (after school / weekend) classes use the Saudi national curriculum which caters for 6-18 year olds. Even from an early age children are taught that Jews and Christians are like monkeys and pigs. The curriculum also contains information on how to carry out “medieval Islamic practices” such as amputations of the hands and feet.
• Students are often told to refrain from “evil western practices” such as listening to music and that one should not have any contact or dealing with the “kuffar”.

*****

“In time we hate that which we often fear” – William Shakespeare

A young mind absorbs knowledge just like the way a dry sponge sucks up any moisture around it. A child growing up in a household full of love and laughter will develop into an individual who is loving himself / herself. A child whose environment is saturated with hate by those around them will surely be affected by it. The first primary school I went to was predominantly white. There were only 3 non-whites there; me, my sister and another Asian boy. In year 5 a black French boy joined my class. One day we had a supply teacher to cover the afternoon lessons. She was a lovely Jamaican lady (I can still remember what we did in that lesson). While she was teaching a boy kept repeatedly talking and as any teacher would, she told him to be quiet and concentrate on his work. He put his pen down, got up and looked at the teacher with eyes like a snake’s full of venom, and shouted, “Go swim back to your country, you’re not wanted here.” Everyone gasped. Later that day I saw the child’s father walking into school. On his arm was a tattoo of a symbol that I did not recognise at that young age. I was 9 or 10 at that time. It was only a few years later while studying World War II did I understand the horrors the swastika had come to represent. We never saw the teacher again.

I don’t think hate is a feeling as such. Feelings are like happiness, anger and nostalgia for example; they’re temporary to an extent. Also we have no control over our feelings, they just happen. It would be more appropriate to describe hate as a verb rather than an adjective. You can feel hated and if you were to say I am feeling hate, that still insinuates the hate is being directed at you as apposed to emanating from within you. It is an extreme form of dislike. The superlative form of dislike which is the product of ignorance and is taught, learned or acquired and exhibited through anger, lack of trust and suffering to mention a few.

In the episode of Panorama we are made aware of the hate that is being spread in some faith schools. The programme quotes Orthodox Jewish, Evangelical Christian and Muslim school to be involved in saying things that may be deemed offensive. Despite that, it specifically chooses to elaborate on the radical nature of the teaching at some Islamic Schools. Education in imperative for the development of an individual and thus the roles of schools can never been underestimated. I think faith schools are a good thing as they allow for increasing one's spiritual knowledge as well as catering for their worldly knowledge. Having a mosque or church close to the school is like having a hospital in close vicinity to a medical school.

Knowledge is a double bladed sword if it is not obtained properly or used in a productive manner. A lack of it can drown one into the depths of ignorance from which it is hard to recover. On the other hand, those with knowledge can spread it in such a manner that instead of bringing enlightenment to the lives of others, it brings darkness. A darkness in the form of fear. As Yoda says in Star Wars, "fear leads to anger. Anger leads to hate. And hate leads to suffering." What disappointed me the most was the fact that so called 'scholars', whose words many people take for granted without any questioning, were selectively picking and choosing those things to teach that are representative of a specific narrow minded type mentality.

In the translation of the first Chapter of the Qur'an the scholar says, "Guide us not on the path of those who have earned thy displeasure, namely the Jews, nor those that have gone astray, namely the Christians." The mention of the Jews and the Christians is not in the actual Arabic text of the Qur'an. I do not by any means claim to be a scholar and feel free to correct me if I am wrong, but many nations incurred the wrath of God over time; the 10 plaques of Egypt come to mind. Was the Pharaoh and his people Jews? One of the many reasons so many prophets were raised was because mankind had forgotten the teachings sent down from heaven. If only the Christians had strayed from the right path then technically does that mean all those before them were following the true teachings? The university at which I study is no more than 15 minutes walk from Tooting Islamic Centre (mentioned in the programme). Once a special guest from there was invited to give a talk about the status of Jesus (a.s.) in Islam. Judging by the contents of the talk it should actually have been named, ‘Why Christians are wrong in their beliefs about Christ.’ I felt thoroughly ashamed for having wasted my time and was even more sympathetic towards all those Christians who had gone to learn something new about another faith.   

Many people are guilty of misquoting verses from religious texts and presenting a small portion of it completely out of context. One of the speakers in the programme quotes verse 14 of chapter 60 which reads, 'Oh ye who believe! make not friends of a people with whom Allah is wroth.' This verse on it's own seems to be telling Muslims to abstain from having any dealings with those that do not believe. What the people who use this verse to advocate exclusivity fail to mention is the context in which this verse was revealed or what the Qur’an says a little earlier. When this verse was revealed, the Muslims were at war with the Meccans and some Muslims out of their friendship would pass on sensitive information to the enemy. In light of this, the above verse (Chapter 60 : Verse 14) was revealed. This is not just a message for Muslims, but a message that all countries and nations strictly follow. During the second world war posters were made to remind the public that careless talk costs lives. Regarding one’s attitude towards non-Muslims, the Qur’an says, ‘Allah forbids you not, respecting those who have not fought against you on account of your religion, and who have not driven you forth from your homes, that you be kind to them and act equitably towards them; surely Allah loves those that are equitable. (Chapter 60 : Verse 9).

Even more surprising was the fact that children from the ages of 6 – 18 in Saudi Arabia are being taught the Jews and Christians look like pigs and dogs. They are being led to believe the world is divided into two groups of people; the Muslims and the non-Muslims. The seed of hate and intolerance is being planted in their hearts and is being cultivated every day they go to school. For that minority of Muslims who do believe in the heinous and absurd claims made against the Jews and Christians, I would like to remind you of a hadith of the Prophet of Islam (s.a.w.). He is reported to have said, “A time will come when nothing will remain of Islam except its name and nothing will remain of the Qur’an except its script. Mosques will be full of worshippers, but as far as righteousness is concerned they will be empty and deserted. Their ‘ulama’ (religious scholars) will be the worst creatures under the canopy of the heavens. Evil plots will originate from them and to them will they return” (Mishkat). Many people argue about the authenticity of this saying, but I think casting a quick glance over the world is enough to understand.

This reminds me of an excellent quote from the book To Kill A Mockingbird by Harper Lee in which the father Atticus is defending a black man in court who is accused for having raped a white girl. The book is set in Alabama, in the 1930’s when segregation of whites and blacks was common. He says while addressing the jury “confident that you gentlemen would go along with them on the assumption – the evil assumption – that all Negroes lie, that all Negroes are basically immoral beings, that all Negro men are not to be trusted around our women, an assumption one associates with minds of their calibre. Which, gentlemen, we know is in itself a lie as black as Tom Robinson’s skin, a lie I do not have to point out to you. You know the truth, and that truth is: some Negroes lie, some Negroes are immoral, some Negro men are not to be trusted around our women – black or white. But this is a truth that applied to the human race and to no particular race of men. There is not a person in this courtroom who has never told a lie, who has never done an immoral thing, and there is no living man who has never looked upon a woman without desire.’ Stereotypes are wrong, we all know it. I personally know Jews who have protested for the rights of Muslims in Palestine and Christians too. We would be walking in the footsteps of the Nazi’s if we were to say that all Jews and Christians were bad people.  

Though the Panorama programme raised some very important points about the regulation of faith schools in England, it was also very biased. Apart from mentioning one good Muslim school at the beginning no attempt was made to highlight the more pleasant and true teachings of Islam. Those individuals who already have misguided and or prejudiced views about Islam due to a lack of knowledge or bad experience will be further strengthened in their beliefs. Islamic law for the punishment of theft (the amputation of a hand) is referred to as a medieval practice. That’s an unfair comment I think. There are two means of execution used in the USA; the electric chair and the lethal injection. Imagine this scenario. The condemned is initially given sodium thiopental which acts an anaesthetic. Next, an injection of pancuronium bromide is given which causes total paralysis. This gives the person a calm look, so that when the 3^rd and final injection of potassium chloride is given to induce death, the death is as calm as possible for the onlookers. Due to the lack of research regarding the use of anaesthesia in execution, what if actually not enough of it is being administered? What if the condemned person experiences ‘asphyxiation, serve burning sensation, massive muscle cramping and finally cardiac arrest’? Is that really humane? This is a debate that has been going on for a very long time. You can  download and read an article about it here.

*****

We all have a choice. Just like we can choose to love (refer to the love described in the quote in this post) a person, we can also choose to hate. This is a choice made depending on our experience of that person, group of people or thing. I remember walking towards the hospital to get into university a few weeks ago. It was raining; not heavily and not lightly either. Everyone had their shoulders hunched up, trying to stop the rain from hitting their faces. Seeing all those annoyed people, I dropped my shoulders, lifted up my face and felt the rain against my skin. It was a beautiful feeling. Sometimes a thing may look bad due to our lack of knowledge or due to what we see other people doing and so we may follow them in avoiding that thing. Try lifting up your face to the rain next time and feel it’s refreshing touch on your skin.

I’d like to end this post with something that my dad has said to me many times:

If you believe you are right, then give the other person the same right to believe they are also right. 

…Continued (Click here to read part 3)

This picture I stole off the loveeeeely Bubblegum (thank you!). She is truly amazing.

I’ve never really been much of an X Factor fan, but I think this song is really rather good and quite inspirational. Joe McElderry was the winner of 2009’s X Factor.

Footballers are known for their lavish lifestyles, fast cars and HOT babes. But here’s some down to earth advice from Javier Hernandez, Manchester United’s first Mexican player (click to enlarge and read what is in the red box):

This is for you Marshmellow, Furree Katt & The General :)

*****

You should all recommend me a blog or two to read. It can be anything which you think I’ll enjoy. I want some more reading to do!

I’ve nearly finished writing part 2 of the post about racism, hate and discrimination. That’ll be up soon, sorry to have kept you waiting.

Last week I watched 3 excellent films; all of which I had seen multiple times before but thought I’d relive their awesomeness. On Tuesday I watched Mississippi Burning, on Wednesday it was American History X and on Thursday I watched Schindler's list with a friend.

(Click on the thumbnails to see the trailer for the movie)

On Tuesday last week I also turned on the radio after months. I was bored of waiting for the boiler man to come (they have such flexible appointment times). It wasn’t music I was after as I had already blasted my ears enough that day. I tuned into London’s Biggest Conversation (LBC) which is a discussion station regarding everything and nothing, ranging from why insects go round in circles around light bulbs to whether getting shat on by a bird is actually good luck. That particular day the topic of discussion was how to stop terrorism in the light of the admission by the Home Sectary, Theresa May, that the prevent program aimed at curbing radicalisation among young persons is not working as well as it could be. The presenter asked a member of the anti-terror think tank whether all types of extremism had a religious founding. The reply was:

No, I don’t think so. We all need justification for our actions and beliefs. Some people find it in religion, some people in anti-Islamism and some people find it in racism. Take for example the EDL, BNP, IRA, organisations that base their extremist ideas on politics.

Earlier this year, the following article appeared in the news:

On my first day of university (6^th October 2008 – yeah I remember it very well) I was feeling the standard emotions that one feels in such a big place surrounded by hundreds of new faces; the anxiety with a tinge of fear, but most of all the excitement. I remember sitting on the floor in the large lecture theatre listening to the various introductory welcome speeches because all the seats were full. I remember the first place we went after that was down into the depths of the medical school into the Dissection Room (DR). There was no rancid smell of decomposing dead bodies but instead the strong potent odour of formaldehyde (used to preserve the cadavers) penetrated one’s nostrils and caused itching of some people’s eyes. The room was brightly lit and one would not have assumed this was a room full of death. There were 18 metal tables arranged in 2 rows, each containing something covered by a green plastic. A skinless hand was hanging down out of the green plastic on one of the tables and I guessed then what we were just about to witness. As we entered the room, we were assigned a table by which to wait until everyone was assembled. After a short wait, a voice rang out from the speakers. “Hello and welcome to the Dissection Room. You should all have a demonstrator who will give you an introduction to the work done down here, safety precautions and the rules of the DR.” The green plastic was lifted up, the soaking towels were removed and there it was lying before us. A few people gasped, another person fainted and fell. A skinless dead face with an eye ball missing stared up at us.

At the end of the DR session I was washing my hands, trying to get rid of all the dead body juice when someone walked into me. After the apologies, and introductions, it transpired he was from Pakistan, having come to the UK only a few years ago. We got talking, went for lunch together (it was chicken at Amal’s) and that’s when we started talking about the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. This initiated a heated discussion on terrorism during which I made a side comment about the idiots who go round blowing themselves up and taking the lives of countless innocent civilians. It was then that I realised the guy I was talking to was ‘pro’ all the things I was anti; suicide bombing, indiscriminate killings and sacrificing one’s life and dragging down a dozen other people with you. Oh and he was a right pervert, with a mind that rotated around sex. Not just natural sex either (don’t even bother asking).

Having watched American History X, and looking back on the events of that day I’ve come to realise a few things. Extremist ‘recruiters’ play with your emotions. They make you feel angry, hurt, cheated on, uncared for and then exploit those feelings. In the film, Derek’s (played by Edward Norton) mentality transforms into that of a racist after his father tells him how ‘affirmative black action’ means that jobs are being given to black people not because they are the best at something, but to fill numbers. He quotes an example from his work where a black man was given a job for which a white man had better qualifications. He put forward his point in a subtle manner but it had a lasting effect on young Derek’s mind. When the father, a fireman, was killed, Derek blamed all the country’s problems on immigrants; ‘blacks, browns, yellow whatever.’ In response to the reporter asking what this has to do with anything, Derek replies, ‘Because my father was murdered doing his job!Putting out a fire in a fucking nigger neighbourhood he shouldn’t be giving a shit about. He got shot by a fucking drug dealer who probably collects a welfare check!’ In the same way, that guy I met on the first day of university tried to rouse my anger at America and Britain by twisting his words so that the killing of Muslims looked as if it was the killing of my own family. Organisations such as the BNP use issues like immigration and spread false information about certain peoples to rouse the emotions of the native population, who, as a result of which feel under threat. Once the seed of hate is sown, the tree flourishes and grows strong very quickly.

*****

But if you only have love for your own race
Then you only leave space to discriminate
And to discriminate only generates hate
And if you hatin’ you’re bound to get irate
Yeah madness is what you demonstrate
And that’s exactly how anger works and operates
You gotta have love to set it straight
Take control of your mind and meditate
Let your soul gravitate to the love y’all.
(Where is the love – Black Eyed Peas)

- END OF PART 1 -

To be continued (Click here to read part 2)…

I was YouTubing and came across this video. Do you ever feel like your mother treats you like this? It’s sicccccck bladddd! Man tells of his relationship wid his mum.

Something to make you laugh if you’re having a boring day. :)

If you enjoyed that, watch the next one!

Wagwan taliban!…dere’s still that connection init, I feel the tingling in ma bum init.

Life’s a gift, so appreciate it and thank Allah.

Have a lovely day, for you wont get another chance. Smile, and make others smile.

Before the rising of the golden sun,

Let me decorate each of its rays with happiness, prosperity, laughter and fun.

This is more than just an Eid wish; more than a message too,

For it comes with warm and loving thoughts meant for your loved ones and you.

Eid Mubarak to all the readers.

=] x

In year 9 we went on a history trip to Belgium where we visited museums, war memorials and cemeteries of many different countries. Just before getting on the coach to come back to London we stopped at the Menin Gate, a memorial dedicated to the British and Commonwealth soldiers that were killed in the Ypres Salient of World War I. The citizens of the town wanted to express their gratitude for those that had given their lives for the sake of Belgium’s Freedom and so each night, starting in 1927 when it was opened, buglers from the local fire brigade close the road that passes under the Gate and sound ‘The Last Post’. Even today this solemn ceremony takes place.

On Thursday I re-watched the film Schindler’s List which reminded me of the horrors of the Second World War and the grave injustices committed against humanity. Today’s world would have been so much different if it were not for those countless men and women who sacrificed their lives for the sake of world peace. Can you even begin to imagine the suffering? It is for that reason we remember, lest we should forget. How do you show your gratitude?

(There was a second half to this, but I’ve decided to post that later otherwise this would have become too long).