December 22, 2007

The Call: Let the Day Begin

Crooks & Liars has an interesting video on their "Late Night Music Club" today with what they call "a batch of pure, unstepped-on science fiction geek musical heroin." The song is The Call's "Let the Day Begin," played to a video montage of clips from "Battlestar Galactica" (the SciFi channel version). It's a rather interesting video. Check it out. (Run time: 4:01)

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Dunner,

Thanks for your post on my site. I apologize that my answer is off topic to this particular post, but I wanted to respond to your comments. After reading your comments on jihad from June 2007, I couldn't agree with you more. But I also found that opinions among Muslims vary widely, as pointed out by John Burgess from Crossroads Arabia. I can't begin to tell you how frustrating the multitude of interpretations of jihad I have heard. This fellow from MEMRI just provides another opinion. As for MEMRI's credibility among Muslims, I haven't had that experience, at least among Saudis. My personal feelings, though (and this appeals to the journalist in me), is that their translations appear pretty much down the middle. They don't shirk from critical elements of Muslims and give Israel a fair shake, although also critical. None of that bothers me but I try to be careful what I pick from MEMRI.

Regards,

Rob

JDsg said...

Rob:

I apologize that my answer is off topic to this particular post, but I wanted to respond to your comments.

Don't worry about that. ;) You could have commented on the Jihad post, and I still would have seen it as all blog comments get sent to my e-mail address.

But I also found that opinions among Muslims vary widely, as pointed out by John Burgess from Crossroads Arabia. I can't begin to tell you how frustrating the multitude of interpretations of jihad I have heard.

It is true, that "jihad" has a "multitude of interpretations," just like many other words in a variety of languages, including English. And, for the most part, those interpretations are benign; however, some people will take advantage of the less benign interpretations and, as John Burgess said on your blog, "This can lead to mischief from those who see profit in confusing the way the term is used."

From my experience as a Muslim, I think a significant problem is that a lot of Muslims don't know Islam that well. (This is a worldwide problem, and a fair number of American Muslims suffer from it as well, although usually in other areas unrelated to jihad.) One of John's posts had a very relevant point:

“'...the performance of jihad for the sake of God has included several Islamic Shariaa violations, foremost among which is the killing of people on the basis of nationality, color of skin and hair, and sect.' The document says that 'these violations lead to nothing but God’s resentment and indignation.' It adds that 'when a Muslim sets a goal for himself that exceeds his ability or that does not suit his situation then it is impermissible in Islam to use any illicit means to achieve this goal even if the goal itself is legitimate.'” (Rethinking Jihad... From Jail)

Jihad, of course, should not violate Shari'ah. The ends do not justify the means in Islam and, in fact, the means are perhaps even more important than the ends from an Islamic perspective. After all, as you pointed out, "Saudis understand that to wage jihad on their own and without permission from their ruler – in this case King Abdullah or the Grand Mufti -- against invaders or occupiers of Muslim lands is a serious transgression against Islam." Jihad, as the West understands the term, needs to be formally sanctioned, and can't (or shouldn't) be done willy-nilly by anyone whose nafs (ego) leads them on to do something stupid. So there is a problem, of ignorance, but it's difficult to get the word out to the misinformed before an act of violence may be done (and who may not listen anyway).