On Sat, Apr 03, 2004 at 12:02:24PM -0700, Trent Shipley wrote: > Thus, in this sort of conversation distinguishing between the word > "Allah" and "God" appears as a strategy to mark Muslims as the enemy > Other, sort of like calling German's "Huns" or Japanese "Yellow Japs" > in WWII. (Alternatively,
Don't be silly. What do I care what people call their imaginary supreme being? They can call it jim for all I care. (Thus, in this sort of conversation, saying that it is an enemy marking strategy to use the word allah to discuss the imaginary supreme being appears as a strategy to mark the person using the word as the enemy Other) > Second, most people, not even most Muslims, work that way. Most > people I know are sort of "passively" religious. For example, I think > most Americans belive in God and are in some sense Christian, but in > most contexts neither fact is of particular psycho-social relevance. .... > Almost no one I have met *really* follows God's law above all others, > especially if you ask their friends and acquainances (though rare > examples do). Most people follow God's law in combination with > (multiple) other "laws". In the case of Arabs almost everyone has to > balance personal interest, civil law, a version of the Mediterranian > honor code, and their personal understanding of Islamic piety. So, you are saying that religion was just not an important factor in what the killers in Fallujah did and thought? > Of course, in an interview any given Fallujis is likely to *say* he or > she follows God's law above all else. Some may even fervently believe > their own rhetoric. Most (but not all) who believe their own rhetoric > will be regarded as hypocritical by others. I think you are implying that although most Fallujis would say they follow god's law above all else, you don't think they really do, because almost no one you have met really does? > Before the fact they probably did not justify breaking Islamic > morality. They were almost certainly not thinking about the fact that > they were breaking with Islamic morality in the moments before during > and after the events we are discussing. A spur of the moment crime of rage and hate, but not premeditated, or at least not carefully considered and planned? > After the fact, I expect most would see no contradiction or only a > mild contradiction between their actions and Islamic morality. Were > I doing anthropological or journalistic interviews with participants > my initial expectation or hypothesis would be that a typical > interviewee would simply fail to address the implicit religious > contradiction. INSTEAD, they would reference another source of > values--the local system of honor. > They would say: > 1) They killed the Americans because they were Americans AND were armed > rent-a-soldiers thus enemies of Fallujis, Iraqis, and Muslims. (Acceptable in > both the honor code and Islam. The killings are arguably part of a just > war.) What war, specifically? What goal do they hope to achieve in their war? And what considerations make a war just or unjust to them? > 2a) They desecrated the dead to avenge their own tarnished honor. > 2b) They desecrated the dead to shame America (that is to damage American > honor). > 2c) They desecrated the dead because they were enraged (very akin to > temporary insanity). (Note: no part of #2 is acceptable under any > Islamic law, except for #2c and then only as an excuse.) > > 3) Note well, I have no expectation that my hypothetical interviewees would > address the contradiction between desecrating bodies and Islam of their own > accord. The interviewer must be impolite and point out the contradiction > before most interviewees will even think about it for the first time. > Whereupon interviewees will take positions justifying their actions. So again we come back to religion apparently playing little role in what they did. They did not think about allah beforehand, and they do not worry about allah afterwards. Do you think this would have occurred even if these people were not religious at all? > 3a) The desecration was a sin, but was forgivable because they were > extremely provoked by American evil and so should not be held overly > accountable for actions committed in the insanity of the sacred > passion of righteous anger. 3b) Islam accomodates the honor code; > therefore, the desecration was only a minor sin. > Very probably. Many Arabs think Americans are cowards. No doubt they > had in mind the fact that mutalating American dead was instrumental in > getting Americans to leave Somolia. Really? That is a rather complex line of thought to go through before taking action. It sounds carefully thought about and planned. In which case I wonder about what you said earlier about them not considering that it would defy Islamic law? It sounds like a better explanation would be that these people simply weren't very religious. -- Erik Reuter http://www.erikreuter.net/ _______________________________________________ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
