Afshan Azad - Padma Patil in the Harry Potter films - was assaulted by her brother who threatened to kill her (click on image for the news): "
Marry a Muslim or you die!". "
Sort your daughter out! She's a slag!". The father got involved: he said "
Just kill her!" (this was disputed in court). The mother and sister-in-law get involved: the family discussed what to do with her. Apparently her father suggested sending her back to Bangladesh for an arranged marriage and her mother called her a "prostitute". The brother then said: "
I'm going to kill you. I'm actually going to kill you".
Is he an obsessed or an ordinary Muslim? This is not a unique situation; a family row is 'normal' in any race or religion; a Muslim family row isn't odd; an honour killing or an arranged marriage isn't that rare an occurrence; [edited 5:50P.M.] however, what would
Sayeeda say?
3 comments:
Anybody who is different is often referred by their difference, so a tall person, Irish person etc gets called Lofty, Paddy etc. The problem arises when terms become shorthand for abuse whether that is racial, religious or sizest. I'm sure that there are people who see all Muslims as potential suicide bombers, perps of honour killings etc and so the default position is unhelpful.
One aspect of social integration that needs to be addressed is why is it that such a disproportionate number of Muslim men and women are unemployed.
I worked with somebdoy in the late 1980's who said she didn't care whether or not the Guildford Four and Birmingham Six were innocent or not because if they were you could be sure it meant some other Irish people were guilty. I think Muslims have replaced the Irish and whilst there's no doubt that some do not help their collective case it seems that there are extremes when it comes to the coverage of whatever wrongdoing they get up to.
I can't think of any other group during my lifetime who have been referred to as either extremists or moderates.
Most of what you say is pretty much what Warsi was trying to get across...and she got a right slagging from 99% of the news I've read about it. However it's not only unemployment, Muslim (boys at least, not sure about girls) are down the bottom of the pile in education too (compare to Chinese and Indian children who are both at the top) This IMHO is ENTIRELY down to non-integration of Muslims. The children want to but they aren't allowed, I agree with what Warsi said BUT the media aren't to blame, the Muslim community is. First they must put country before religion...but they won't: the moderate/extremist is a side issue that was born of the non-integration and the intransigent nature of Islam, the girls seem to get this much more than the boys and this just aggrevates the brainless machismo.
P.P.S. this is "breaking news" on the Gaurdian now. They been overdoing the orgasmfest over Coulson...so have the BBC.
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