The debut of Sans
Oh look, Sans has made its debut. It’s the new magazine put out by the splendid people at Fri Tanke who published Hatar Gud kvinnor? The theme of this first issue is religious oppression of women, including an interview with me, and there’s an occupied burqa on the cover. Barely had it hit the stands when a Christian think tank accused it of…wait for it…Islamophobia. Sayeeda Warsi would be so proud.
Sara Larsson and Christer Sturmark, the editors of Sans, wrote an article saying why the magazine is not Islamophobic and why the whole idea is bad and stupid. It’s in Swedish, but then not a few of you read Swedish, and then there’s Google translate. I used it and it did a pretty good job – there’s not much gibberish. I can give you the gist.
The Xians haven’t read the magazine yet – they’re just reacting to the cover. They seem to think the issue is all about Islam; it isn’t; it looks at all the Abrahamic religions. Islam does stand out, however, and the burqa is a good symbol of this. If including a picture of a burqa is “Islamophobic” then so is news coverage from Afghanistan. Accusations of Islamophobia threaten to paralyze the debate on human rights in general and serious assaults on women in particular. This is especially dubious when people do it from “from a very safe and cozy corner of the western media landscape.”
Damn right.
I’ve begged Sara to translate the article for me to publish; maybe she will.
Surely there can’t be that many of us Swedes here? =)
Anyway, I’ll get me some Sans tomorrow. Tack för tipset!
Of course there is. It’s Swedish!
Bork bork bork.
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Lars, there are a few! Sigmund for one, but he’s by no means the only one. Swedes have good taste. :- )
You’re welcome.
Sili: Thanks for reminding me of my favorite Muppet.
And while I’m not Swedish and neither speak nor read Swedish, by sheer coincidence I went to IKEA today. Or was it coincidence?
So if depicting a Burqua is Islamophobic then making peopel wear them must also be Islamophobic, since it encourages people to looka t and depict them. That means the Taliban are Islamophobes! Futhermore, they claim Islam as a source of authority so that means Islam must be Islamophobic!!
Whee, this is fun! No wonder so many theists do it.
Men jag är inte Svenska!
Jäg kommer från Irlande!
I do, however, live in Stockholm.
By the way I’ve been looking for that ‘Sans’ magazine in various newsagents here and haven’t seen it yet (so I wonder how exactly it could have offended anyone). In connection with burkhas, I was in Turkey recently for ten days and saw a grand total of one burkha (you see far more in Stockholm!). The Turkish locals don’t like them as they consider them a sort of foreign national dress. There are a lot of veils in use but the majority of women didn’t veil themselves and seemed to regard veiling not in terms of religious obligation but rather as a kind of provincial or countryside fashion. I heard it described as a sort of uniform of village women – the other requirement being a sort of hideous baggy pants that my wife tried unsuccessfully to buy to use as pyjamas (or maybe as a contraceptive!).
Urk yes I didn’t mean to say you were Swedish, Sigmund; meant to say you understood it. I know you’re Irish; you’ve been informing us on the background.
That was sadly predictable…
A commenter at Newsmill links to another good post, about pizza and Islam (a critique of an article that argued they both should be seen as similar, harmless contributions to Swedish culture)
Based on your nym, I already assumed that you aren’t a Swedish woman ;)