The Canvas

Sometimes it’s just cool to believe in things that you want to believe in, regardless of the fact that you know they might be untrue. Like a moment where one thinks as a child they would get their favorite gifts on Christmas, while the probability of which is already known and could start from zero. Regardless of the fact that those things are the truth you wish to seek.

Here is an attempt, a good one I believe, I found over at Crybaby’s blog at deconstructing how logic is sometimes mis-leading and mis-informing.

An excerpt from it,

In a state of utter frustration at the inability to comprehend the paradox of free-will and predestination, I asked a Malaysian islamic scholar to satisfy my intellect. We were sitting in a mosque and pointing his finger towards a wall he asked me “Can you see behind it?” I replied “No”. With a smile he said “You’re a human with such a small intellect that you don’t even know whats behind that wall, but you think you can understand all the workings of God with your mind”

While it might be is own personal path to enlightenment, it might or might not be true for others.

Update I
Just as I finished this piece, news came in that the woman has been sentenced for 15 days imprisonment, and deportation from Sudan.

Nowhere in the world would one see these three things discussed under one topic except for an Islamic and/or religious forum.

Just for the record, even if you are familiar with this case, there was a lady teacher in Sudan… Sudan! Who is British and was teaching a group of elementary schoolers. It so happened that she accidentally or unintentionally led a small school boy/student to name his teddy bear ‘Muhammad.’ The details of the event can be read in the news link and various other sources online. Her mistake was told on to the law enforcement agencies and she was taking into custody. In a nutshell, it has created a bigger riot outside of Sudan than inside of it. Let me explain how.

The Opinion Pools
All over the internet, Islamic apologists and pseudo reformers have started debating at how arcane a step it is for the Sudanese law enforcement to have arrested her in the first place and then made to stand trial to plea her case. “Free her immediately, for it was an honest mistake,” is what they say it’s all. Apparently they know more about her mistakes sitting outside Sudan with the limited information that is making out from that war stricken country.

Additionally, what is amazing to note is that these people, the so called reformists, have straight away declared this act as ‘insane’ or ‘idiotic’. Citations cannot be given since they are from closed discussion groups.

The British Foreign Secretary, David Miliband, has repeatedly called for ‘commonsense’ to prevail, while I believe he has no idea what ‘commonsense’ in an astute Khartoum religious terms means. Commonsense in Sudan would mean lashes and imprisonment for a few weeks and possible deportation. I would use my word carefully, Mr. Miliband.

Read a variety of opinions and thoughts here.

The Annoying Part
What is annoying to see in all this is that when a country like Sudan, where religious fervor is as common as dust in the Saharan deserts, is trying to follow their constitutional system, their ‘laws’, their understanding of human liberties and giving the woman a trial to plea her case, all these overnight intellectuals pop out of the woodwork brandishing their version of Islamic laws and fatwas, adamantly demanding other’s to follow them. All the while infringing the very morals of freedom of choice of a society, and popular vote they so vehemently vow to protect and uphold.

If Sudanese people feel they cannot live with persons and people somehow defiling or defaming the Holy Prophet (PBUH), I believe it is their justified right to make a law to restrict people from doing so. Because honestly, what would be a better situation, a place where people try to keep quite about a few things rather than demand freedom of XYZ things and get harassed at the hands of the greater community?

And on a state level, we the libertarians should ask ourselves if we want to hinder the course of a country trying to develop it’s democratic institutions. Would it be best to dictate it’s path towards what is right and what is wrong regardless of what the people on the ground level believe? I believe it would be hypocritical of us to deny countries like these to have a chance at running their own path towards a society that better understands the in’s and out’s of the laws they have, and why they have them in the first place. Mending them to perfection comes later.

A Few Concepts Worth Preaching
In times like these, when everyone is so edgy, it is indeed good for everyone of us to take a step back and take a deep breath. We need to act calmer, we need to act patiently, we need to show people some mercy regardless of their faith or religion. I know there are somethings in like that aren’t acceptable, but it might be an honest mistake from a person who might have little or no knowledge about certain cultures and taboos in more conservative societies. We could always be more tolerant of such mistakes.

But only if these are honest mistakes and not some juvenile acts of pissing people off and making fun of their beliefs. The only best way of finding that out is through a fair trial for the defendant, and that I think is being given to her. Moreover, not all of us are as clean as we think we are. We are all sinners, big or small, we could always find a little spot in our hearts that could be given to people who might have committed a petty crime, unintentionally. That goes same for the people on the other side, who preach the world about their universal morals, etc.

After all, from God we all came, and to God we’ll all go.