reduced and recycled

Looks like I might be right on some accounts. That notorious shield-generator person ⁽¹⁾ had made a dramatic declaration, ‘divorcing’ himself from Project Petaling Street. That doesn’t stop him from pinging PPS from his proxies, though, so I’m not sure what he’s divorcing himself from. Does he miss Malaysian visitors? I suppose not, since he claims to have quite a bit of support from British and American visitors. Well, that’s just nice, isn’t it?

I’ve asked him several questions, and since he’s blocked Malaysian IPs from visiting, I couldn’t be arsed to check if he’s replied. But that’s ok; he’s not stopped posting anti-Christian and, in my view, possibly incriminating content in violation of the MCMC. But I’m no lawyer, so I wouldn’t know how far he’s liable for what he’s written. I suppose we’ll only find out if someone hates his brand of hate-speech enough to cross the line: by reporting him. And that’s almost as anal as some of his postings, I suppose.

MENJ deserves this award, I think.

I was discussing this with some friends, and one of them said something I’d concluded some time back: there appears to be a direct relationship between an increase in fundamentalism and the siege mentality of some Muslims - not just in Malaysia, but the world over. But I must admit that this conclusion was drawn based on sketchy bits of information; I’m no Mid-East analyst, much less a global political commentator. But nevertheless, I present my views as follows:-

xpyre’s completely facetious, utterly believable history of fundamentalism in the mid-east

1. Ze Germans screw the Ottomans over and ravage much of the middle east in one of those world wars.
2. The brits and such free the Arabs from ze German scourge, also in one of those world wars.
3. The brits engage in one of those devious and ultimately harmful divisions of the Arab world. The Arab world is, generally, pissed - more so with ze Jew interloper in former ‘Palestine’.
4. Western involvement amongst the fractious Arabs begins a history of an invasive, covert, American ‘policy initiatives’.
5. Along comes the Cold War and Americans tussle over bits of parched land and tumbleweed with the Ruskies. America finds fast friends amongst the mujahideen, who already have a very fatalist kinda interpretation of Islam, or so I hear.
6. America typically abandons their ‘allies’ in the middle east; the mujahideen are generally pissed, and begin to take an active hand in the formulation of a ‘greater Arabia’, or some such in a middle east already disillusioned with the American backing of a Jewish state in the ‘heart of Arabia’.
7. Terrorist attacks inspired by these fundamentalists captures the imagination, and it’s spun several ways. No clear line is drawn between nationalism and Islam, and one is taken for the other.
8. The ‘cultural onslaught’ picks up speed; Islam is viewed as recidivist, backward and anti-modern. Christian fundies lead the charge, and atheists don’t help; critics who scorn Christians for sola scriptura come face to face with a far more rigid religion.
9. Iraq war, USS Cole and then, suddenly, the 9/11 bombings. The focus on Islam is intensified, including debates about the religion. Scrutiny and general distrust of Muslims forces some to defend or explain their faith.

And this means reconstituting what Islam means for public consumption, with everything from explaining the ‘hijab’ or rejecting ‘liberal’ thinking, to pouring scorn on the results of the Enlightenment. The unfortunate conflation between terrorism and Islam only feeds the public, non-Muslim distrust, and that has, it appears, engendered a sort of siege mentality expressed in two ways: public declarations of one’s adherence to Islam; and the rejection of ‘modernist’ views.

The latter, of course, means a ‘return’ to the principle roots of Islam no matter the socio-cultural developments over time that shaped the religion. That’s what I think, anyway, but I could be talking cock.

Anyway, back to the ’spectre of MENJ’. I suppose it’s easy to dismiss him as a product of the times. His views, however, are clearly chauvanist, and clearly anti-Christian; it would’ve been so much easier if his views were simply pro-Islam. As it is, I don’t think any non-Muslims are convinced of the ‘beauty of Islam’, and I do actually think Islam is a beautiful religion - but that is in spite of what MENJ has been saying all this while. All I want to know is, why does such a beautiful religion breed fundies like BADAI and MENJ.

1. Shield generators, friends; and he even includes some made up quotes from ‘Star Wars’… (↩)