and then our exile

an allegro by dvorak, garden in the rain. formatting a paper by agha parsania on islamic cosmogenies. hands stained with tractor-grease.

am increasingly worried by public reactions to the ontario arrests. this is the first time this's happened in canada - comparisons to the US are little use, that is a different level altogether, but the media here is suddenly filled with vitriol, and harper's government will of course capitalize off this as best it can. (double entendre, ha.) if i'd had time in the cbc interview i wanted to say something about assumptions of guilt by association, how this country is heading onto a slippery slope, the experience south of the border. a single crisis and the jabber of multiculturalism and pluralism and inclusiveness is suddenly replaced (well, partially) by talking heads savaging the muslim community.

which segues into the next wincing sore: because it is a largely immigrant community it has an instinctive reflex to apologetics, which i cannot stand. they are now in the sermons we hear on fridays and the press conferences mosques feel they are obliged to give, and the name is Fear. bleakly put, everyone is getting afraid (muslims and nonmuslims) and so resorts to simplistic exhortations and explanations. on the one hand misunderstood and misconstrued discussions (ie. in wider society) about the muslim community, and on the other over-simplified understandings (on the part of muslims) about how western society works. this makes our imams and community leaders do things like praise harper for emphasizing that islam is a religion of peace, etc.

islam isn't a religion "of" peace - nor "of" war, or "of" pink polka dots: that is like saying judaism is "about" lions' dens or "about" following the kosher. these are huge reductions, and the media promoting these do no one good service - and st*phen harper made these statements because it was in his political interests to do so, gw.bush makes the same statements, they make no difference to actual policies. for someone to say "islam is about peace" - what does this mean? it is a worldview and way of life, and peace and war and life and death and everything has its own place within the framework, but to sacrifice accuracy to simplicity is a step with horrible implications.

even the reassurances that "these are fringe elements" have a cringing aspect i strongly resent. instead one should say these are human beings who have come to understand the world in a certain way because of certain real issues we would do well to address.

too much ir*s young, hm. i once had a longish argudiscussion with a TA about the role of personal responsibility in young - i fully appreciate her thought, but at the same time feel "wa la yukallifu'Llahu nafsan illa wus'aha" sweeps across everything: institutions, individuals, societies, the world.. all it requires is Will. (and, well, yeah, i guess the "totalitarian mentality" quote below plays into this)

but no, seriously - it is to the extent that my very own beloved cbc is implying RIS is a hotbed of extremism. = what? at the end of the radio clip the reporter finished by "not all islamic conferences are about spirituality" (or some-such) - which itself is fraught with pitholes, universalizing a specific and secularized historical construction of christianity (as private religion). this has its own issues, naive ethnocentricism, but...i'll stop raving now.

what bothers me, essentially, is this: go through some of the opinion pieces being churned out of the canadian media these days and replace "muslim" with any other minority group ("black", "gay", "native", "baha'i", "jew", etc). and watch the readership erupt with accusations of bigotry. but they aren't doing it now. which means that the culture itself has legitimized this kind of mutual fear. which bodes ill.


ok, long post.
other news, this morning j*stin trudeau called his father "a pretty rockin' prime minister".

peaceful as a hurricane eye