Sunday, March 30, 2008

Fitna

The controversial anti-Islamist movie by far-right wing Dutch politician Geert Wilders. I downloaded (the torrent is widely available) and watched it today.

Wilder's views are somewhat extremist in nature. He pieces together specific (potentially inflammatory) Sura'as from the Quran and speeches by Imams from around the world to raise the alarm about the growing Islamisation (and radical Islamisation, at that) of the world in general and the Netherlands in particular.

I don't agree with his extremist views at all. In fact, I very strongly disagree with them. They're quite one- sided and xenophobic in nature. The tag of being a 'radical' can just as easily be applied to people from other religions (like the VHP in Hinduism). The holy books of all religions are potential sources of controversy (creationism in the Bible versus Darwin). So this movie clearly presents only one side of the story, and very strongly. Michael Moore would be proud.

I have several Muslim friends and am strongly against the branding of Islam as a violent and terrorist religion. A few misguided radicals are giving the religion a bad name around the world... every religion and ideology has its nutcases (relatively speaking). I guess the world probably needs a little more reassurance (such as this) that the actions of these people are clearly viewed as unacceptable by the larger Muslim community...

Do watch the movie, though. It's worth a watch, if only to provide one context on the issue in Northern and Western Europe.

Details: Wikipedia: Fitna (the film)
The movie: Youtube: Geert Wilders - Fitna the movie (Official English)

8 comments:

Unknown said...

It was a crappily made, poor quality short film.

Nothing in it was new or "inflammatory". It just showed a face of Islam that we all see too often. Now why was it Live Leak removed the movie at first? Oh would that be because Islamic nutters sent death threats to their staff? Yup!

Daniel said...

I don't think we should equate Islam with terrorism... this is very unfair to all those Islam friends, colleagues, neighbors, relatives, brothers and sisters who are sincerely making a decent living

Srividya Jayaraman said...

Too controversial a post..you'll have a lot of incensed muslims , venting their anger out here.

AC said...

@ Jenn: I agree there was nothing new in it... they were images that have been in the public domain for a long time. And there is nothing sacreligious except the cartoon at the beginning. But I believe it is inflammatory simply because it stokes the issue and provides a platform for anti-Islamists who do not necessarily have the maturity or knowledge to get a reasoned grasp of the connection between Islam and terrorism.

And LiveLeak, though they removed it, did share it long enough for everyone and his uncle to make a copy, so maybe it's alright!

@ Daniel: My thoughts exactly. Painting all Muslims with this broad brush is being highly unfair to them.

@ Srividya: Well, I did try to sanitize the post a bit before putting it up... hopefully no one will take offence!

Shan-ul-Hai said...

Thanks for the positive message. I always assumed that people already know this kind of stuff, but I think I tend to overestimate people... I should probably write a similar entry about distortion of Islam on , since I come from a Muslim background and it would fit my theme pretty well.

Anyway... I like your worldview...would you mind if I linked to you on my blog?


-Shan
optimistworld.blogspot.com

Unknown said...

Geert Wilders wants to make the world aware that too many muslims will lead to the disappearance of the western culture.

He doesn't make a difference between muslims and radical terroristic people who use the Quran/Koran as an excuse to threaten and murder.

Here in The Netherlands he's not highly regarded, because all he does is create a lot of irritation and controversy.
Only a few people have been influenced by this movie.

I wouldn't call him "somewhat extremist".
He is extremist and it's a shame that people in some other countries think all Dutch have the same opinion. Forget it!
It's a pity that people like him reach the international media so easily.
Most Dutch muslims and non-muslims live peacefully together. Why not.

AC said...

@ Shan-ul-hai: Interesting blog... and sure, I'd be honoured :)


@ Laane: Thankfully, such extremist views are accepted only by a minority in any country or society... rational thought still prevails (more or less). But it's precisely because of the extremist views (and subsequent controversy) that the world media falls over itself to cover him.

Anonymous said...

Finally, a level headed post on this furore.

I'm a muslim, and i haven't watched it - and i don't plan to. Why waste my tim eon something that is so trivial, childish and unnecessary? It will only make me angry and think ill of the Dutch for a while. even though i know they are not all like that - the huge majority (i'm only human).

Anti-Islamic, or Anti-West, why is one party necessarily better than the other?