Posts from — February 2008

A lot of people have already said what there is to say about Obama vehemently denying that he’s Muslim.

Fine, he’s not Muslim but the way he is going about it is leaving a bit of a bad taste to those of us who are Muslim.

Naomi Klein, of No Logo and Shock Doctrine fame, has an article up on The Nation with her two cents regarding this topic:

Obama, Being Called a Muslim Is Not a Smear

“Of course Obama must correct the record, but he doesn’t have to stop there. What is disturbing about the campaign’s response is that it leaves unchallenged the disgraceful and racist premise behind the entire “Muslim smear”: that being Muslim is de facto a source of shame. Obama’s supporters often say they are being “Swiftboated,” casually accepting the idea that being accused of Muslimhood is tantamount to being accused of treason.”

It’s a good article. Check it out.

Muslims prefer a democracy? They condemn the acts of 9/11?? Get out!

The Gallup polling agency released the results of a survey that began soon after the events of 9/11 to determine what the heck it is that those crazy Moslems think.

They surveyed about 50,000 Muslims from 35 countries and found that the religion of Islam did not actually fuel terrorism:

“Religion is an important part of life for the overwhelming majority of Muslims, and if it were indeed the driver for radicalisation, this would be a serious issue.”

But the study, which Gallup says surveyed a sample equivalent to 90 percent of the world’s Muslims, showed that widespread religiosity “does not translate into widespread support for terrorism,” said Mogahed, director of the Gallup Center for Muslim Studies.

Not only that, but Gallup found that the majority of Muslims favored a democracy. . . just as long as it wasn’t imposed on them by an outside force.

Article here – Major survey challenges Western perceptions of Islam

The Oscars finished not too long ago and, considering that I hadn’t seen most of the movies, the show wasn’t too bad. There were only two categories where I was really rooting for people/movies:

Persepolis for Best Animated Movie
and ‘Falling Slowly’ for Best Song from the movie Once.

Persepolis lost out to Ratatouille (figures) but Glen Hansard and Marketa Irglova won for Falling Slowly. Once was one of my favorite movies from last year (even though I can’t really explain why it was) so I was beyond happy when these two won for the song that they wrote and performed within the movie. Although I liked their performance at the Oscars, it didn’t beat the song within the context of the movie. That was something else.

As it happens with all acceptance speeches with more than one person, the orchestra played music over Marketa when it was her turn to talk. But, then something happened that I have never seen in the history of watching the Oscars:

John Stewart, the host, brought her back out again so she could finish what she wanted to say.

Not only did she get a second chance to address the audience, but she utilized that time to say something meaningful. Check it out -

I really wish Persepolis won though. I think it should have been in the best Foreign Language Oscar. I don’t remember the last time I went to the theater when the audience was as transfixed with a movie like they were with Persepolis – laughing one moment and then in somber silence the next. I couldn’t stop thinking about it for a while.

Anyways, not a bad Oscar broadcast.

So I’m sitting here watching the premier of Knight Rider (a completely unintentional act). KITT, God bless it, saved the daughter of its creator, who was killed (or was he?!) by mysterious henchmen who were after information about the even mysteriouser sounding ‘Promethus Project.’ I know, I know, gripping.

Anyways, the girl was sitting in the KITT’s car, tearing up about her father when KITT started asking about why she was sad, why do humans get like that, etc. The girl explains it to him and they talk stuff like that and ‘feelings.’

The thing is, I was just watching Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles on the DVR and the good terminator played by Summer Glau couldn’t understand why humans feel the way they do when someone dies. So John and Sarah, at various points of time, try to explain why humans are the way they are – why humans cry, feel sad, and how she will never understand.

I’m starting to notice a trend here. Robots don’t have feelings AND they are not programmed to understand a human’s feelings.

Our capacity to feel differentiates us from the robots.

And that is why they will win.

(I kid, I kid! Everyone knows that our feelings and emotions will give us the advantage. . . eventually.)

The WGA has voted to end the strike!!

YAY!!!

The Office! 30 Rock! Oh how I’ve missed you!

Don’t mind me. There’s just something in my eye. . .

The song began.

I sat there, guitar in hand, pressing down on the appropriate notes as displayed on the screen.

According to the TV screen, I was hitting every note. Considering it was my first time playing Rock Band, not a bad feat.

I’m totally getting the hang of this, I thought to myself. I’m actually pretty goo-

“Bushra, are you looking at the left?” Soerha asked, bringing me out of my reverie.

“Huh?” I asked.

“You’re on the right,” she clarified. “I could tell you weren’t looking there.”

I looked at the right part of the screen and it showed that the player, me in this case, had already failed twice.

I was playing according to Soerha’s side of the screen. So she was hitting all her notes, not me. I had been taking pride in her accomplishments.

Oops.

Oh well, I did end up getting better though as the day progressed. Sort of.

I went to a lecture last night at Stanford as part of a series of lectures that the Stanford Muslim Students Association is putting on. Despite the rain, I still decided to go to because I had read the speaker’s book and since I really liked it, I wanted to hear him speak.

While his speech was good enough, it wasn’t what I was expecting. Not because he went off topic or he didn’t have anything interesting to say, but because he didn’t sound like how I thought he would. I was expecting someone with a formidable voice, one that was dripping with authority.

Instead. . . not so much.

I have to admit, it threw me off for a bit and it took me a while to focus on his talk.

That’s what happened the first time I heard Cornel West speak (in a video) – he didn’t sound like how I thought he would sound.

Oh well.