Current Affairs

The Reel News

I was watching The Daily Show with Jon Stewart last night and he had the most succinct commentary about why a constitutional amendment banning gay-marriage is a flawed proposition. They only other time we’ve had an amendment dealing with individual morality was prohibition. We all know how well that one went. What would we do without independent news outlets?

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Religion

Yo Say José

One of the activities that some Shi’ah participate in during Muharram is to chant “Ya Hasan! Ya Husayn!” “Oh Hasan! Oh Husayn!” These were the Prophet’s (PBUH) grandsons, both of whom were assassinated. When the British came to South Asia they heard “Hobson-Jobson” and thus was born the Anglo-Indian Dictionary. Hobson-Jobson is the dictionary of all the words that have entered English from South Asia. The list is quite entertaining and exhaustive. There has been an attempt to supplement it with some of the words that have gained currency in the 20th century in a book called Sahibs, Nabobs and…

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Uncategorized

Moslemic America [updated]

Been going to this conference since its inception. Sometimes good, sometimes bad. This year looks good. Come out and represent. [Update] Much love to HijabMan for reminding me about the conference. Most of the islamicate group will be coming, as will he. If anyone else from the blogosphere is planning on attending, please drop me a line and I’ll try to get us all together. Email is: islamoyankee at yourmotheristhesourceofallspam.mac.com (just remove the “your mother” comment.)

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Weblogs

Don’t Pick Me Last [edit]

[edited for “i really should have proofread it one more time” mistakes.] So a few days ago I said I was working on a post on the state and inclusion. My hook was going to be about gay marriages and the hijab, but the article I linked to did a pretty good job of covering some of that ground. Then an article got picked up by Al-Muhajabah and Muslims Under Progress about the legality of Islam in Australia. I hadn’t seen it the article, and left the issue on the back-burner. Dervish Du’a gave me the details (and some good…

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Uncategorized

Marsiya

شەيد كربلا كي مومينوں جب ياد آتي هے تژپ جاتي هے دنيا خون آنسوں بەاتي هے يا حسين shahîd-e karbalâ kî momînoñ jab yâd âtî hai taRap jâtî hai duniyâ xûn ânsûñ bahâtî hai yâ husayn When believers remember the Martyr of Karbala The world becomes upset Blood flows as tears Oh Husayn! From a Marsiya performed by Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan.

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Uncategorized

So You Say You Want a Revolution…

So the hypocrites have spoken. The mullahs of Iran have said the people have spoken, with only 33% of the electorate voting. Explain to me how discouraging people from voting, eliminating people from the ballot as being poor Muslims after they have declared the shahada, declaring yourselves the true spokesmen of Islam is in keeping with Khomeini’s vision, let alone the vision of Islam as embodied by Prophet Muhammad (PBUH).

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Religion

An Orange Link

Another Boston Globe op-ed about a statement from Gov. Howard Dean. Any commentary I give on these would be stale, but I think they raise some valid points, so I’d like to put them out to our (limited) readership. As an aside, I use the Globe b/c, unlike the NY Times, they offer free persistent linking.

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Religion

Muslim minority [edit]

Now that Gov. Howard Dean is no longer actively seeking the presidential nomination, I feel freer to post about him. The Boston Globe ran an op-ed analyzing his thoughts about race. Please take a moment and read it; however, every time you see “black” or “African-American,” insert “Muslim” and every time you see “white,” insert “Christian.” It’s a great analysis, and very true applicable, including the Clinton section, to the situation of Muslims in US. My one thought on it is, if he did have a Muslim room mate, and this individual became head of a Muslim group, would the…

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