Let's not whitewash Islamic homophobia....
Almost a verbotten topic in the UK....
Over the past week there’s been a scrap going on between the political parties as to who is the gay-friendlier. Interesting to gays probably, very boring for everyone else. But there is one aspect to all of this which still goes largely ignored - for reasons, no doubt, of “cultural sensitivity” - and that is the effect that the long march of multiculturalism has had on this whole issue. Basically it comes down to this question: how do you celebrate and respect cultures and religions which think you are an abomination?
It’s a tricky one for the bien pensants and their political spokesman. I had the chance to find out quite how tricky when I went to a political event last week organised by the gay networking group Jake at the National Portrait Gallery, held to mark the opening of its Gay Icons exhibition (an odd collection, this. Madonna sure. But Nelson Mandela?). Nicholas Boles and Nick Herbert for the Tories and Ben Bradshaw and Chris Bryant for Labour (plus some anonymous bloke from the Lib Dems) vied with each other for the votes of an audience of 150 or so gay men.
When question time came around, I made the point to the panel that a recent survey by Policy Exchange had showed that 72 per cent of young Muslim men thought that homosexuality should be recriminalised. As the Channel 4 Dispatches programme on Mosques showed last year, there are some pretty disturbing things being said by some Imans about what is best for gays, ie death. Given the rapidly increasing proportion of the population which is Muslim, did they not think that there might be some possible problem in the future?
Needless to say this was neatly side-stepped. Or should I say, not really answered at all. Nick Herbert made the point that we should be careful not to generalise about the whole Muslim population (72 per cent seems pretty general to me). Immediately the issue was turned into something else, in a way we’re all too familiar with, which is how important it is not to demonise Islam.
There are major double standards going on here. I’m not remotely religious, but I can see how it’s considered perfectly legitimate to demonise the whole of the Catholic Church, say, or even Christianity in general. But when it comes to Islam, everybody gets very tongue-tied.
The reason is clear: the old liberal narrative insisted that all minorities had things in common. They were all united in a rainbow coalition in opposition to what the Americans call “The Man”. They were all victims. Multiculturalism has exposed this as a bit of a lie. But it will take a long time for the liberal elites to admit to it. Hence the disgraceful silence of Western feminists on the treatment of women in Islamic countries. And hence the depressing mealy-mouthedness at the Portrait Gallery last week.
posted by GayandRight @ 7:10 PM
6 Comments:
C'mon Fred!! No more of this pointing out that Islam is a 7th Century Death Cult that is sick beyond belief and violence is it's middle name.
Don'cha'no that it's the Religion of Peace..No, no. Not submission, peace.
@Fred: "when it comes to Islam, everybody gets very tongue-tied.
The reason is clear: the old liberal narrative insisted that all minorities had things in common."
Well, there's that, and then there's the very real fear of reprisal.
This really takes the cace
Canadian homosexual activist Jim Corcoran, posts Swastica on his Blog (see: http://steannes.blogspot.com/2009/05/to-pray-to-wish-to-do.html )
and than goes on attack against Catholic Church (files human right complaint against bishop and 12 parishioners).
See;
http://generalbrock.wordpress.com/2009/07/10/homosexual-man-files-human-rights-complaint-against-peterborough-bishop-and-parishioners/#comment-84
Quote from Jim Corcoran’s Blog,
“At some point in our history, the ideas espoused by Adolf Hitler must have seemed to make sense to some segment of the population. A man doesn’t rise to control an entire continent from a position of power in a vacuum.”
Wise words indeed, especially in view of the following,
http://www.abidingtruth.com/pfrc/books/pinkswastika/html/the_pinkswastika_4th_edition_-_final.htm
THE PINK SWASTIKA
THE HOMOSEXUAL ROOTS
OF THE NAZI PARTY
.....But Roehm was accustomed to being different. A homosexual with a taste for boys, Roehm was part of a growing subculture in Germany which fancied itself a superior form of German manhood. A large, heavy man, Roehm had been a professional soldier since 1906, and, after the war, had temporarily lent his talents to a socialist terror organization called the Iron Fist. On this night Roehm was on his way to meet some associates who had formed a much more powerful socialist organization.
At the door of the Bratwurstgloeckl, a tavern frequented by homosexual roughnecks and bully-boys, Roehm turned in and joined the handful of sexual deviants and occultists who were celebrating the success of a new campaign of terror. Their organization, once known as the German Worker’s Party, was now called the Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei, The National Socialist German Worker’s Party — the Nazis.
Yes, the Nazis met in a “gay” bar.
It was no coincidence that homosexuals were among those who founded the Nazi Party. In fact, the party grew out of a number of groups in Germany which were centers of homosexual activity and activism. Many of the characteristic rituals, symbols, activities and philosophies we associate with Nazism came from these organizations or from contemporary homosexuals. The extended-arm “Sieg Heil” salute, for example, was a ritual of the Wandervoegel (“Wandering Birds” or “Rovers”), a male youth society which became the German equivalent of the Boy Scouts. The Wandervoegel was started in the late 1800s by a group of homosexual teenagers. Its first adult leader, Karl Fischer, called himself “der Fuehrer” (“the Leader”) (Koch:25f). Hans Blueher, a homosexual Nazi philosopher and important early member of the Wandervoegel, incited a sensation in 1912 with publication of The German Wandervoegel Movement as an Erotic Phenomenon, which told how the movement had become one in which young boys could be introduced into the homosexual lifestyle (Rector:39f). The Wandervoegel and other youth organizations were later merged into the Hitler Youth (which itself became known among the populace as the “Homo Youth” because of rampant homosexuality....
It's fine to condemn Islamic homophobia such as you are doing Fred, but I don't believe that you should demonise Islam per se, no more than you can condemn Christianity for the beliefs of some. Islamic republics are one thing, but there are secular societies such as Turkey in which Islam is the majority faith, in the same sense as Quebec may be deemed a Catholic society, nominally Catholic in any event, but clerics do not rule.
You have societies nominally Islamic such as the Tartar republic in Russia, in which Islam is the majority faith, but where women pursue university degrees, pursue professions such as doctor, lawyer, engineer and even wear bathing suits at the beach.
I don't believe you would have difficulty interacting with such people and fearing for your life.
The Islamic Republik of Britain - will not tolerate homosexuality, you really gotta be kidding yourself if you believe otherwise, because just like a few catholics are more catholic than the pope - a huge portion of british muslims are more muslim than the mullahs.
There are millions of them and their intolerance is completely acceptable to aboriginal british people.
Dear Dupmar: I will continue to demonize Islam - because Islam calls for the murder of homosexuals - and we now have Islamic regimes who are actually killing gay people.
I'll show a bit more respect for Islam when it reforms itself.
As for Turkey - It's becoming more and more Islamicized....it appears to be moving away from it so-called secularism. I've been to Istanbul - and I really didn't to advertise that I was gay.
fred
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