Swiss Minaret Ban Advocate – Converted to Islam

Quite recently there was some furore being made in Switzerland and beyond regarding the banning of minarets on mosques across the country. Much was made and discussed of the decision made by the so-called neutral state, who has a small minority of Muslims residing in its land.

A while ago, there has been news of the main advocate for the minaret ban, Daniel Streich – member of the Swiss People’s Party has converted to Islam. Supposedly Daniel had converted 2 years ago but this news remained secret until recently. The only coverage of this has been in the Nation and Jewish blog.

Pondering on this, I wonder about the issues this throws up in the air. Whilst being Muslim he was campaigning for a ban on minarets. Perhaps he had introduced this campaign prior to becoming Muslim, and in its duration changed his views.  Or maybe he subscribed to the strict Salafi understanding and wanted the minarets banned in accordance of forbidding “evil innovation -bidah”

Maybe the whole story is a hoax! More to come….

C4′s Indian Winter: Slumming It (Part 1)

As part of Channel 4s Indian Winter, Slumming it which aired last night showed Grand Designs Kevin McCloud spend time in ….the Dharavi slums (which is now in the public knowledge as a result of it being catapulted to fame in Danny Boyle’s Slumdog Millionaire – the kind of expsoure no amount of news articles and research could’ve mustered up), which is viewed as an inspirational model of community cohesion and sustainable living.

Owing to the typical Western mindset, Kevin is appalled at the lack of sanitation and the banal living arrangements, with children playing amongst “toxic waste”, the waterpipe lines sitting in sewage and diseases such as cholera, typhoid and dyptheria being rife.

He talks alot about the squalor of the slums, and at one point he says to the family he is living with that “in my country cooking on the floor is considered unsanitary”. I am sure this taught Kevin a little about societal norms and ways of living…what he considered to be misery and squalor, inhabitants viewed it as “normal” because they had known only the living standards in which they were in – they had no choice.

Throughout the show, despite references to rats and lack of running water or a flushing loo – he seems genuinely enamoured with how Dharavi functions; they have their own businesses which make billions in revenue a year, unemployment is very low and so is crime.

On the other hand, poor working and living conditions and child labour were realities which were hard to escape from.

One thing which summed up the East/West civilisations dichotomy was when Kevin, in a moment of inspiration said: “We in the West measure beauty in terms of environment ” we have a nice car, a lovely garden” and here it is about human beings.  Beauty is in how they dress. Look at them, they are very smartly dressed and take pride in their appearance. They are the most beautiful people in the world”.  He noted that even amongst the “misery” of their dwellings they were happy, had a cohesive family unit and a sense of belonging. All of the things Western societies, and increasingly developing nations are beginning to lose as they ebb their way into the modern way of living.

Part 2 of Slumming It aired tonight, will pen thoughts on it tomorrow.

Book: Mother Of The Believers by Kamran Pasha

 

Not so long ago, I came across a review on the book Mother of the Believers by Kamran Pasha. Initially I thought it would be typical of a myriad of books available which do little but villify, degrade and mock Islam and the wives of the Prophet (saw), such as Jewel of Medina.

It was therefore a pleasant surprise to come across a book which not only read as a novel from a first person narrative, who’s protagonist is Aisha (ra) herself , but also through this medium attempts to bring life and a voice to the popular wife of Muhammed (saw)

An excerpt from the opening chapter:

PROLOGUE – THE BEGINNING OF THE END

In the Name of God, the Merciful, the Compassionate

What is faith?

It is a question I have asked myself over the years, dear nephew, and I am no closer to the answer now then I was when my hair was still crimson like the rising dawn, not the pale silver of moonlight as it is today.

I write this for you, because I know I am dying. I do not complain, for there are times I wished I had died many years ago, or better yet, never have been born. My heart looks at the trees, whose life consists of no more than dreams of the sun and memories of the rain, and I envy them. There are times when I wish I were one of the rocks that line the hills beyond Medina, ignored and forgotten by those who tread upon them.

You will protest, I am sure. How could I, Aisha the daughter of Abu Bakr, the most famed woman of her time, wish to trade in my glorious memories for the sleep of the deaf and the dumb of the earth? That is the tricky thing with memories, dear Abdallah, son of my sister. They are like the wind. They come when they wish, and carry with them both the hope of life and the danger of death. We cannot master them. Nay, they are our masters, and rejoice in their capriciousness, carrying our hearts with them wherever they wish.

And now they have taken me, against my will, to this moment, where I sit in my tiny bedroom made of mud brick, only a few feet away from the grave of my beloved, writing this tale. There is much I do not want to recall, but my memories cry out to be recorded, so that they can live in the memories of others when I am gone. …..(To read the rest: source)

Safiyyah writes an insightful and eloquent review of the book at Muslimah Media Watch, where Kamran Pasha himself kindly addressed some of the questions posed by commentators about the themes and concepts.

I ordered the book a few weeks ago and have begun thumbing through it. I shall also post my thoughts on it when I finish reading.

h/t to Achelois for making me aware of the book in the first place!

Mental Health & Jinn Possession Amongst Muslims

Tales of jinn posession are never far from where Muslims are concerned. We all know of at least a few people who have either had an encounter with a jinn themselves, or know of someone (a friend of a friends aunty) who has been overcome by a jinn. More people are readily more comfortable to propose jinn posession as opposed to having mental health problems, with many being masked as a result. We may never know the “true” number of cases where mental illness if the cause of their ill health -not pseudo jinn/spirit possession. This alternates readily between jinn possession and black magic – both of which frankly largely mirror one another anyway.

Often when the term “mental illness” is used a picture of a ravaged person, withwild eyes, laughing manicly with the tendency to become violent is conjured up. Much of this owes to stereotyping of the media of what a mentally ill individual looks like – give them an axe and let them wield it about a bit: the image is complete! Pandering to these images does nothing but further distort and villify those who have mental health problems which range from depression, anxiety to the other end of the spectrum of schizophrenia and psychosis.

A factor of interest with regards to this issue is that mental health problems may be seen as something which the individual is being “punished” with or that he/she is deserving of it in recompense for some ill doing. Jinn possession doesn’t carry this baggage – it is often seen as being outwith the control of the individual who falls circumspect to it. There is a plethora of research which points to “it being a test”, “I’m being punished for sinning” type attributions to their mental health problems which in turn leads to short bursts of religuous fervour. This can result in “burn out” due to the desperate state in which some individual being to absorb themselves into prayers and other faith based solutions in the hope of “becoming better” quicker.

Some faith healers are understood to provide a service though one wonders how shoddy some of these services truly are (one only needs to flip through any ethnic newspaper and faith healer advert’s hit you square in the face with their claims of resolving anything from sexual impotency to acquiring unrequited love).

On the other hand, some psychiatrists aren’t immune from making blunders due to their lack of “people skills”, unwilling to have a dialogue with the patient instead choosing to talk “at” them rather than discussing their care plan and the inherent imbalance of power which exists in the doctor/patient dyad.

Many studies over the years point to this phenomenon of ethnic groups to disregard mental illness as a factor of their poor health. They will resort to traditional healers to alleviate their ailments. That is not to say that religion is obsolete when it comes to recovery or dealing with mental illness – but there draws a fine line between dual treatment options (traditional healing such as recitation of Quran and other religious methods and the use of medication) and denial of the existence of mental ill health altogether.

This is partly due to disillusion with the Eurocentric model of psychiatry where little scope or acceptance of anything which falls beyond the comfortable niches of the Western notions of x symptoms = y diagnosis exists. Most of this directly related to the proponents of models – predominantely white middle class men from the West.This is readily being acknowledged and accepted as a contributory factor in the stoical stance some psychiatrists take towards other “models” of mental ill health – including those from an Eastern outlook.

Due to the expanding field of cross cultural psychiatry, slowly things are shifting. Recently a conference on the topic of Spirit Posession and Mental Health was held in London and much was discussed about various cultures and their understanding of mental health, their attributions to it and their approaches to treatment which ranged from indulging in religion/faith seeking behaviours (such as prayers) to seeking out a combination of medical treatment and faith based healing. There is a ready admittance of the Eurocentricity of psychiatry, and a more willing approach to engaging in dialogue with faith healers, religious leaders and even the patient him/herself as to their viewpoint on the mental health problem. However, this approach boils down largely  to the individual psychiatrist and team members rather than an overall approach by the MH sector.

What is the incidence of mental health problems (from depression right through to enduring MI such as schizophrenia) amongst Muslims in the UK? We’ll probably never know for sure, and hazarding a guess as to the numbers in the Muslim world is even more of a mystery – although it is often proposed that mental illness (the incidences) is largely an issue faced by people overwhelmingly in the West compared to the East (possibly due to myriad of reasons: detection of MI in the East compared to the West, the support network available to individuals in the East compared to the West etc)

We would do well to move away from the belief of jinn possession as a factor in someone’s poor health as the likelihood of their behaviour being as it is, their physical deterioration, withdrawal is more down to mental health issues rather than a jinn occupation and/or black magic. Rational thinking is needed here, not mere hysteria.

March for Shariah – Cancelled

This didnt happen after all. Heard it on the radio, it was supposedly either re-arranged to a “secret” location in a bid to increase safety or it was completely cancelled – which one was it, I have no idea.