Islam Day: Are you Kidding Me?

Just this afternoon while I was pulling some hard strokes in the pool, I kicked myself for writing some lame blogs. No passion, no fire and not too much humor. Okay, you have been working on the book. Sure, but I wouldn’t brag about that progress either.

Back at the condo I downed a mocha banana smoothie and scanned through the West Hawaii Today. I hadn’t been sure I really wanted to buy it this morning. I had only two dollars in my pocket, $29 on my debt card and my tenants’ rent checks hadn’t hit the bottom line in my bank account. Two dollars can get three papaya and a bunch of bananas. I bought it anyway and settled for just the bananas.

On page five, the headline smacked me upside the head, sending a chill through me that I couldn't attribute to the smoothie. Lawmakers Back Creation of “Islam Day.” Muslim Religion Will Be Celebrated on September 24.

I believe that is thirteen days after September 11. What the hell is this about? The bill recognizes “the rich religious, scientific, cultural and artistic contributions” that Islam and the Islamic world have made.

Oh yeah? Let me count the ways.

World Contributions: The Humanities

• On page four, same paper, same day. Pakistan: ‘It’s an all-out war there’. Eight years after the September 11, 2001 attacks, the area remains a haven for al-Qaida and Taliban fighters blamed for spiraling violence in Pakistan and Afghanistan. (But I am sure we are going to blame this on George Bush, and “the not- founded-on-Christian-principles America.”)


• April 6th Pakistan: A young woman was brutally flogged 46 times in a street for walking with her father-in-law. The poor girl was laid flat on her back, held like an animal for slaughter by two men, and then flogged. That means she got this in the face. Like it makes a difference.


• A man who raped a Muslim woman because she showed an interest in Christianity was jailed for five years by a Sydney, Australia court. If she had shown interest in a Muslim country she would have been killed, along with the Christian. And their killings "would be halal" - meaning the killer would go to heaven. I believe in the real world he’d go to Hell, or at least be reincarnated as a pig.


• In Buffalo, NY a particularly gruesome killing, the beheading of a woman, after her husband — an influential member of the local Muslim community — reported her death to police. Her husband the founder and chief executive officer of Bridges TV, which he launched in 2004, amid hopes that it would help portray Muslims in a more positive light was charged with second-degree murder.

World Contributions: The Sciences

• No matter what the cultural or language differences, science is more or less guided by scientific principles—except in many Islamic countries, where it is guided by the Koran.


• Islam has this strange alliance within that shuns modern science. The modernist decided to neglect and overlook the consequences of Western science, either philosophical or religious and felt that Islam could handle the matter much better than Christianity. They felt that there was something wrong with Christianity which buckled under the pressures of modern science and rationalism in the nineteenth century. Yes nineteenth century – makes it tough to call them modernist, but that is what they are referred to. The other group, the religious scholars of Islam disdained science completely. This cuts across the Islamic world, all refuse to have anything to do with modern science.

World Contributions: The Arts

• Aiming to eliminate idolatry from Afghanistan, the Taliban religious militia destroyed two soaring statues of Buddha. The two Buddhas, 175 feet and 120 feet tall, were hewn from the side of a mountain in Bamiyan. The taller statue was thought to be the world's tallest standing Buddha. The pair were carved in the 3rd and 5th centuries. Officials said they had already eliminated two-thirds of the country's statues.


• Under strict Islamic Law children's toys, including dolls and kites; card and board games; cameras; photographs and paintings of people and animals; pet parakeets; cigarettes and alcohol; magazines and newspapers, and most books are banned. Applause is even forbidden -- a moot point, since there's nothing left to applaud!

In The United States of America, which includes Hawaii by the way, the country's founding principles of Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness are highly valued. It is tough to imagine celebrating a “religion” that bans music, movies and television, computers, picnics, wedding parties, New Year celebrations, any kind of mixed-sex gathering. Probably would even ban the very newspaper this article appeared in.

Just in case you decide to celebrate this day here are a few rules.

1. Women must stay home all day.
2. If you dare venture outside to wish someone a “Happy Islam Day” women best be covered from head to toe in a burqa.
3. You must be accompanied by a male family member (not an in-law family member).
4. Of course, there will not be a party to celebrate this event.
5. Allah forbid, no bell tolling, no fire crackers.
6. Men over there.
7. Women over here.
8. No toys, no music, no applauding. No parade.
9. Men should not shave their beards. You have from now until September 24 to make this happen.
   

Come to think of it? What's an Islamic celebration anyway? Shooting guns off in the street and yelling "Death to America"?

If you feel prone to recognize this day because of the great contributions to the world that this religion has made in the far and distant past, think twice. If America now finds fault with great American leaders like George Washington for owning slaves, why would we celebrate a religion for what it currently does?

Proponents of this Islam Day say we must be tolerant. Funny how Islamic Law isn’t too tolerant. Funny how the hi-jackers on 911 weren’t too tolerant.

Dare I say we have a day of celebration for Christians? Before you toss up that Christians have Christmas might I remind you that the civil liberty nuts are taking Christ out of Christmas, demanding equal time or at least equal square footage on the community lawn for Anti-Christian displays? Stores order employees to say “happy holidays.” Well, there you go – holidays: throw the Muslims into that pot and forget September 24.