- Intolerance for anything except the specific variation of Islam that prevails; even other variations of Islam are not tolerated. This is very much as odds with the rather basic human right that is universally recognised – freedom of thought and wherever you find Islam holding the reigns of power then you also find this attribute prevails to one degree or another.
- Misogyney – women are believed to have a lower status than men and are generally separated out. It may manifest in the extreme, for example Saudi Arabia dictates that women cannot do anything without permission from a male guardian, but also manifests in so many other ways in all other variations of Islam. The counter claims from apologists that women are held in high regard are not factual.
- Homophobia – not a surprise, most religious beliefs have a strong anti-gay mandate and so for this, Islam has no monopoly, but will take the bias to an extreme and if permitted to do so will execute people for the crime of simply being born with a different sexuality.
- Violence and Murder – if you review the list of terrorism and violence that has prevailed in the world, especially in the last ten years, you would be hard pressed to find something that has not been inspired by some variation of Islam. There are of course billions of people on the planet who embrace some variation of Islam and they are clearly not all violent thugs. Most are Muslim for what can best be described as cultural reasons, and rather sadly there are more that just a few individuals who do respond violently, and they also have many others who support them vocally and financially.
It is not all bleak.
Many born into an Islamic culture, and who identify as Muslim also find all of the above abhorrent and yet for the sake of a quiet life and a desire to not be a target, they quite understandably choose to play along and remain silent, isolated and alone, with such thoughts.
But now things are different, no longer are people trapped and isolated inside the Islamic bubble, the internet has granted them access to a vast flow of information that they were previously denied access to, and as a result this flow of new information is disrupting things. What we now discover is that there is a rising tide of open defiance as the previously isolated individuals discover they are not alone, and that there are many other out there just like them. For example, about 25% of people in Saudi Arabia are prepared to admit privately that they are not religious at all, that is essentially 1 in 4, and is quite an astonishing revelation for many, so much so that there is a rising degree of openness about non-belief that is proving to be quite alarming to the powers that prevail there. One utterly absurd response has been to declare non-belief to be on par with Terrorism, but more or less everything in Saudi is utterly absurd.
Stealthy Freedoms of Iranian Women
Another great example of the rising tide of defiance is the Facebook group called Stealthy Freedoms of Iranian Women, and already has over 721,000 followers. The group describes itself as follows …
This page does not belong to any political group and the initiative reflects the concerns of Iranian women, who face legal and social restrictions.
All of the photos and captions posted have been sent by women from all over Iran and this is a site dedicated to Iranian women inside the country who want to share their “stealthily” taken photos without the veil
There is also a great story about it all here in the UK’s Independent. The news there is that a women dared to dance on the subway without her hijab. The fact that this is news should highlight that what I am telling you is true, Islam is so oppressive that the very concept of simply dancing or not wearing a hijab is deemed to be a crime.
They explain …
An Iranian woman has filmed herself defying Iran’s restrictive laws against women by dancing to a song by British pop group Little Mix with her hijab around her shoulders.
The unidentified young woman can be seen energetically dancing on a train in Tehran while other passengers hold the camera.
Her dancing may seem innocuous enough, but the young woman is actually breaking two laws in the ultra-conservative country, where dancing in public is prohibited.
Could there really be consequences for this?
Very much so …
Her dancing is all the more brave in light of the punishments meted out to a group of young Iranian men and women who were filmed dancing to the song ‘Happy’. All seven were given suspended sentences of prison time and 91 lashes after posting their home made ‘Happy in Tehran’ music video on YouTube.
The article itself avoids the elephant in the room by making the observation that … “This is the cultural war between the Iranian government and young people.” … and avoids the ‘I’ word, the actual root cause here, which is of course the variation of Islam that dominates.
The Shape of Things to come
Faced with things that are not simply repellant, but are in fact immoral and evil, namely the intolerance, misogyney, homophobia, violence and murder, there is an inevitable consequence, a rising generation is now starting to stand together in the face of this irrational onslaught and is starting to send a strong clear decisive NO.
This younger generation will no longer be silenced, the prevailing darkness is starting to see a new dawn breaking, and so it is indeed now a time to throw off the shackles of religious oppression to dance and sing in the light of this new dawn.
Here is the YouTube clip of that dance in the subway …