Satan loves the Olympics

By Janet Albrechtsen
The Australian
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/
August 17, 2008
Janet Albrechtsen Blog
131 Comments

NOTHING makes Satan happier than the Beijing “bikini” Olympics says Saudi cleric Muhammad Al-Munajid. In an interview aired on Al-Majd TV on August 10 and translated by the Middle East Media Research Institute, the unhappy cleric slammed the Olympic Games - past and present - for its debauched display of women’s bodies. “The world’s worst display of women’s clothing is the women’s Olympics,” he said. “No exposure of women’s private parts on a global scale could make Satan happier than Olympic games that include women’s sports.”

“What women wear in the Olympic games are among the worst clothes possible. The inventions of Satan, with regard to the exposure of the body in gymnastics, in swimming, in whatever, in tennis… Women have never got naked for sports like they do in the Olympics. It is aired to billions of people worldwide. The problem is not just with the spectators who are present. The whole thing is aired on TV...”

As the Wall Street Journal’s Olympics blog pointed out, with record numbers of women competing in Beijing, Satan must be one very happy man. Forty two per cent of the 11,000 athletes competing in Beijing are women, a nice scorecard for equality given that only 26% of competitors in 1988 were women.

The cleric is entitled to his views – and to express them.

It’s a pity then that Sherry Jones was not given the same chance to express hers. Her first novel, The Jewel of Medina, due to be published in early August was pulled by Random House after concerns were raised that the book would offend Muslims and become a new “Satanic Verses.” The publishing house described the book as "a fascinating portrait of Aisha, child bride of the prophet Mohammed, who overcame great obstacles to reach her full potential as a woman and a leader’’.

Then it spiked the book. Not after receiving threats from radical Muslims, mind you. Just “cautionary advice” said Random House deputy publisher Thomas Perry, from “credible and unrelated sources” that “publication of this book might be offensive to some in the Muslim community… [and]…incite acts of violence by a small, radical segment.” Notice how we no longer wait for actual death threats or violence to erupt, as was the case with Salman Rushdie’s Satanic Verses and the Danish cartoons, before we chisel back the right to freedom of expression? Now our western sensitivities lead us to anticipatory surrender - just in case.

History professor and Islam scholar Denise Spellberg, who was asked to review Jewel of Medina described it as “a very ugly, stupid piece of work” which made fun of Muslims and their history. She said “there is a long history of anti-Islamic polemic that uses sex and violence to attack the Prophet and his faith” and claimed the novel “follows in that oft-trodden path, one first pioneered in medieval Christian writings.” So The Jewel of Medina was quickly canned in the name of political correctness, the principle of free speech once again sacrificed at the modern altar of hurt feelings.

Christianity and its believers are robust enough to endure vigorous criticism – be it serious or salacious. Think Nietzsche’s The Antichrist. Or Freud’s Future of an Illusion. Or Bertrand Russell’s essay “Why I am a not a Christian”. Or the endless scribbling about Christian fascism. Or the enchanting work of Andres Serrano who stuck a plastic crucifix in a glass of his urine to create Piss Christ. The journal, Arts & Opinion, described the ensuing controversy as “a clash between the interests of artists in freedom of expression on the one hand, and the hurt such works may cause to a section of the community on the other.”

It’s a shame that each time a clash of interests involves Muslim hurt, the West raises the white flag with increasing alacrity. When does Western surrender end? Fencing off Islam from critique and curtailing the West’s long-cherished right to freedom of expression won’t help anyone. If aspects of Islam need to confront modernity, it won’t happen by tiptoeing around Muslim sensibilities, treating them like children too vulnerable to deal with the tough questions. That treatment will only encourage victimhood and more censorship. And it will undermine the core reason for the West’s success: its commitment to testing ideas – and religion is just that, after all - by holding them up to challenge.

One blogger had this to say: “Listen, Christianity is central to my life, but if you want to write a novel attacking it or dump a crucifix in urine and call it art, my feeling is: knock yourself out, you brave thing, you. I’ll argue with you here, and again at the gates of heaven, in perfect faith that the truth will win out in a free market of ideas.”

Let cleric Muhammad Al-Munajid talk about Satan smiling about skimpy bikinis at Beijing all he wants. And, please, let Ms Jones write about Muhammad’s child bride. If not for the sake of Islam, then for the sake of the West.