# Excellent reminder No politics in the masjid, akhi. I know its last ten nights, but if anything, this reality encourages me even more to make the following point: politics and islam are inextricably linked! I remember some time ago, I asked a bunch of brothers who are pretty dedicated to studying the deen, classical texts, fluent in arabic, memorising quran, etc about the Wests strategic interests in syria and her relationship with israel, and the response by one prominent and otherwise very intelligent brother was (to the effect of)... if we believe in Allah truly... the west cannot harm us. He then insisted on the futility of engaging in such a conversation until I just...sat back...flustered, and did this inhale-exhale exercise that a doc taught me for my asthma. To other asthmatics out there, its breathe in : hold : breathe out in a ratio of 1:4:2. Youre welcome :) My problem with such a woeful response is on so many levels and to such a magnitude that I often dont bother with a counter response. But heres to me stepping out of my comfort zone. As an ummah, we have never supported or shown confidence in mainstream media outlets, especially the large broadcasting corporations like BBC or its American, Canadian, Australian equivalents. No support, no confidence, no conviction. BBC prides and sells itself as an impartial public service. And as an ummah we not only ridicule or laugh at this, but are almost conspiratorially suspicious of anything we hear; Muslims are the first to suspect, the first to reject. Its extensive report on Gaza today (which lasted a record 5 minutes and reported nothing but the basics of war, where the shelling was happening and quoting some random spokesperson of an even more random American-Palestinian body), was testament to this. Weve repeated it so much we sound like broken records: western media is shamefully and hopelessly substandard. Yet miraculously... so many of us continue to rely on these very outlets! Partly because of the scope and depth (BBC being worlds oldest with tens of thousands of employees), but also...and this is my problem...because were forced to rely on them; we have failed to develop our own sources of news, our own yardsticks of judgement and our own mature analyses on major world events. Our khateebs and shuyukh have bashed a no politics attitude into us. Fantastic. Shaykh, what are the interests of each of the parties in the Ukraine/Russia/Crimea issue? Doesnt know, doesnt care. So why are we hating on BBC and why is there, like, ummah-wide ijma (consensus) on suspecting if not rejecting mainstream media when it reports on Muslim issues? Where do we go to for news and analysis now? How do we understand global politics from an Islamic perspective? How do we understand speech that is said or actions that is taken on part of the leaders of the world, the presidents, prime ministers, MPs, the representatives of transnational bodies, the reps of the major institutions, and how can we possibly express an opinion that can be considered as based on political awareness and not just triviality ? Sufyan Badar
Posted on: Mon, 21 Jul 2014 16:38:55 +0000
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