Monday, 4 February 2013

Innocence of the Muslims: Politically Incorrect or Freedom of Speech?

I couldn’t believe what I was seeing – the ‘movie’ is a series of insults to the Muslim population! Everything that is politically incorrect is contained in the 13-minute trailer: blasphemy, pornography, and sexism.

My culture, my faith, my traditions, all degraded. Who would have imagined that the moviemakers could express themselves in such a horrific way, building up one lying stereotype after another? Political correctness has gone mad; no one respects it any longer. Why? What do people gain from being politically incorrect? The purpose of political correctness is to think before you speak and act, because you should be sensitive about certain things, as you never know if they might emotionally hurt another individual. But this movie has left no respect at all; it has condemned the Muslim population to something they are not.


It’s absurd how Muslims are categorised by the western world in the movie. The first scene of the trailer consists of a doctor writing on his whiteboard: “Man + X = Islamic Terrorist”. We are all marked as terrorists, no distinction is made between Muslims, we are all violent and false. They should look at themselves, before judging other people.

According to the trailer Muslims are a ferocious people who exert neanderthal violence against everyone who is not Muslim: “every non-Muslim is an infidel,” is repeated over and over in the short clip. Men are butchered, women are raped and children are molested. We are shown to be a race of faithless thugs and sexual perverts.

However, the greatest tragedy is the incessant mockery towards our prophet: Muhammad. He is shown pigging out on pork, placing his face between his mother’s legs, calling the Koran false, sleeping with married women, encouraging his followers to sexually abuse children. Then there are all the scenes of sabre wielding Muslims slaughtering innocent Christians. I could not watch the whole trailer, I felt sick in my stomach and in my heart for what they had done to my beautiful faith.


I used to think all that emphasis on politically correct language was ridiculous, a dumbing down, the nanny state and all that but now I think it is the only way to go. No one can or should be able to argue that this trailer is freedom of speech. If ignorant people like Bacile are allowed to tread on others’ sensibilities, if they can’t be trusted to do the right thing then someone has to make sure they do. Things have changed now – the Internet has access to thousands of millions of people! Even moderates can lose their calm when something dear to them is attacked. Free speech may be right in most cases but it should not be used to attack others’ culture, otherwise it loses the true meaning of the concept. Like all rights, freedom of speech has it limits and should not be abused as it has been in “Innocence of the Muslims”.

Saturday, 2 February 2013

Violence hits Sydney after Innocence of the Muslims Trailer


The explosion of violence last week was shocking and unexpected. I have grown up in a country known for its multiculturalism and tolerance, for being one of the few places that welcomes every nationality and every religion. I would never have expected these protests and violence to echo the radical ideologies of the Middle East.

What is the whole point behind this ferocity? Why are ordinary Muslims, like me, shouting death threats against the West because of a stupid movie trailer on YouTube? Nothing can justify such madness sweeping around the globe. It’s just a movie and as Muslims we need to accept this, we need to face the truth that not everyone is a believer and move on. Just because a single American created a movie against Muhammad, Muslims should not start a Crusade and attack people who have nothing to do with the trailer and the ideas behind it. This is 2012, not the Middle Ages.


The violence that we are seeing these days is counterproductive, undermining our legitimate pain in the eyes of billions across the world. The protests have not achieved anything except reinforce ideas Muslims as crazy extremists and Islam as an inherently intolerant, violent faith. They have already portrayed our culture negatively through the movie, why would we want to confirm their beliefs about us? We should demonstrate that we are not as they think we are.
 
Muslims should adopt a peaceful response towards ‘Innocence of the Muslims’. We must realise that we cannot continue to go through this kind of turmoil every time an ill-meaning action decides to mock our faith. The idiocy of the people behind the trailer (Nakoula Basseley Nakoula and Sam Bacile) is without question, but those who continue to protest violently against it are acting just as stupidly.

Freedom of speech means that you can say what you think; even someone doesn’t like what you are saying. It is a basic right, our parents fought for it when they moved to Australia. Others have the right to express their views about Muslims but we should be superior and ignore the provocations.

Let’s follow our prophet, Muhammad, and the teachings that we received from him. Whenever we see hatred and prejudice, we must show the best of our character, personify Muhammad and respond to the way he responded to insults. We need to let the hateful, ignorant opinion of one person against our culture flow over our heads.