On Jihad, Ignorance Stands Still

The Washington Post had an article the other day about an ad campaign in DC to inform the public on what ‘jihad’ actually means.

With a four-week ad buy in the Shaw, Waterfront, Rockville and Dunn Loring Metro stations, organizer Ahmed Rehab, who is also executive director of the Chicago branch of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, says that he is hoping to change the narrative around the word jihad.

“We kind of got tired sitting there watching people tell us what we believe or what we don’t believe.”

The posters feature photos of Muslims sharing their religious struggles, and uses lines like “my jihad is to build bridges through friendship” and “my jihad: modesty is not a weakness.”

Twelve years after 9/11 and the initial bout of screaming American ignorance, the country’s morons are still as ignorant and still as vocal as ever. Some comments from the WaPo:

You can try to give a newer softer meaning to the word “jihad” but it is too late.
For too many non muslims, the word jihad is associated with terrorism.

This is not a newer, softer meaning. This is the meaning.

Painting Jihad in any other way than getting rid of whoever believes differently is like sprinkling sugar on blood or painting lipstick on a pig’s snout.

“Lipstick on a pig” will always remind me of Sarah Palin.

Jihad means islamic holy war and it has no any other meaning.Jihad in german language is Mein Kampf.
Jihad does not mean to build bridge through friendship.
Jihad is war,jihad means killing infidels/non-muslims.
Jihad is an obligation in House of War/Infidel Country(America,Europe)
Jihad ads at metro stations are Lie Propaganda and Deception

Congratulations, you’re exactly wrong.

But I’m happy to say that the really awful comments I saw the other day have largely been addressed by thoughtful, patient people, and there’s real discussion going on in the comments today.

And people can still see the humor:

My jihad is to get laid this weekend

That’s not quite the meaning, but good luck to you, ma’am.

Funny Ad

This is a series of screen caps from an SNL parody ad. Found this on Pleated Jeans.

Man Talks to Turkeys: Video

This video is good for an infectious laugh. Saturday morning and I already guffawed, so you know it’s good stuff.

The meta humor is that the Arabic title is “Important: Leaked Speech of Bashar al-Assad at the Funeral of Assef Shawkat.”

Bashar is somewhat turkey-like. I’m sure you see it.

Don’t Know How to Explain this Song

It sounds like an Arabic-language cover of some American folk song.

I found it on the blog “and far away…” which already resides on my blogroll over there –>

One Line of Arabic On Modern Family

Relax, Mitchell. You’ll get your all-white-meat chicken.

Arabic Quilling

“Quilling” is an art form I just learned about within the last month, then in my browse around the internet today, I found this Arabic quilling project on The Creative Muslimah blog.

thecreativemuslimah.blogspot.com/

NYPD Shadowed Folks Whose Names Sounded Arab

http://news.yahoo.com/ap-impact-nypd-shadows-muslims-change-names-070530735.html

Wow, it’s been a long time since I posted. And this is a good thing, in the sense that Arab- and Islamophobia are being addressed on big blogs and in real news stories nowadays.

As for novels, it’s just been a while since I’ve read one that had silly stereotypes and misinformation about Arabs. But I’m still reading voraciously, so I’m bound to find something eventually.

But here’s something I didn’t see blogs picking up: the New York police department had a policy of following people who changed their names from Arab-sounding names to “normal” sounding names, and vice versa.

NEW YORK (AP) — Muslims who change their names to sound more traditionally American, as immigrants have done for generations, or who adopt Arabic names as a sign of their faith are often investigated and catalogued in secret New York Police Department intelligence files, according to documents obtained by The Associated Press.

Like other NYPD intelligence programs created in the past decade, this one involved monitoring behavior protected by the First Amendment.

Monitoring name changes illustrates how the threat of terrorism now casts suspicion over what historically has been part of America’s story. For centuries, immigrants have Americanized their names in New York. The Roosevelts were once the van Rosenvelts. Fashion designer Ralph Lauren was born Ralph Lifshitz. Donald Trump’s grandfather changed the family name from Drumpf.

NYPD spokesman Paul Browne did not respond to messages left over two days asking about the legal justification for the program and whether it had identified any terrorists.

Early on, police added people with American names to the list so that if details of the program ever leaked out, the department would not be accused of profiling, according to one person briefed on the program.

Whatever an “American name” is. Sheesh.

The NYPD’s rules also prohibit opening investigations based solely on activities protected by the First Amendment. Federal courts have held that people have a right to change their names and, in the case of religious conversion, that right is protected by the First Amendment.

In fact, of those who agreed to talk at all, many said they Americanized their names because they were being harassed or were having problems getting a job and thought a new name would help.

Sad.

It’s a long article. I recommend it. Surprised it hasn’t gotten more attention.

Media Fails to Follow Up on “Arabic Graffiti” Story

So it’s been five days since some media outlets first breathlessly reported Arabic writing on airplanes, and none of them have bothered to report that actually the marks in question are not Arabic at all and there was never good reason to think they were.
If anybody can find a story about this outside of Gawker, please let me know. Thanks.

Ignorant Xenophobe Americans Report “Arabic Writing” on Planes

Gawker story here

Fox News story here

It turns out the “Arabic writing” is neither Arabic nor writing, and scarcely resembles Arabic writing. Rather, it looks like a stylized drawing of a sword.

Gawker explains it here

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UPDATE: I forgot to mock the people who think there are mysterious Arabic symbols. Arabic is a language. It has writing. There are no Arabic symbols. So no job for a Tom-Hanks-style Dan Brown mystery Angels and Demons kind of *symbologist*, more’s the pity.

Arabic Grammar – The Forms or Measures

Is Arabic hard or easy, simple or complicated? You sometimes hear the argument that Arabic is easy because there are only two verb tenses and the verbs are formed according to patterns, from a three-letter root.
From what I’ve been told, native speakers of Arabic don’t learn the measures the way we do; some western linguist or grammarian or whatever invented it for our sake. Anyhow, my point is, if you’re trying to learn Arabic, it couldn’t hurt to read Keith Massey’s book, Intermediate Arabic for Dummies.
As an Arabic student acquaintance of mine said, “If Dr Massey wrote another book, I’d read it.”
You can find out more here at Keith’s site, Adventures in Language.