Having fun / making fun

Posted on October 5th, 2008 by martijn.
Categories: Some personal considerations.

ISIM director Asef Bayat recently presented a paper “Does Islam Have No Fun?”

“Does Islam have no fun? So, why is that Islamists are so apprehensive of the expression of everyday pleasures– singing, dancing, mundane festivities, private parties, bustling street corners, and secular celebrations? The paper attempts to explore the logic behind Islamists’ fear of “fun”– a metaphor for the articulation of individuality, spontaneity, joy and lightness. I argue that anti-fun sentiments are not necessarily rooted in Islamic doctrine, nor are they necessarily religious. Rather, they represent a particular regime of power.”

What is fun and what is not fun is not that obvious. Some things you can have fun with and some things you can make fun of. What fun is is decided based upon specific historic trajectories of every category of people. Fun is for example watching the Mickey Mouse comics. For some anyway, I find them very boring. Others apparently find them evil such as Islamic scholar Muhammad Munajjid according to a Memri translation:

What is the position of Islamic law with regard to mice? The Shari’a refers to the mouse as “little corrupter,” and says it is permissible to kill it in all cases. It says that mice set fire to the house, and are steered by Satan. The mouse is one of Satan’s soldiers and is steered by him. If a mouse falls into a pot of food – if the food is solid, you should chuck out the mouse and the food touching it, and if it is liquid – you should chuck out the whole thing. Because the mouse is i-m-p-u-r-e!

According to Islamic law, the mouse is a repulsive, corrupting creature. How do you think children view mice today – after Tom and Jerry? Even creatures that are repulsive by nature, by logic, and according to Islamic law have become wonderful and are loved by children. Even mice. Mickey Mouse has become an awesome character, even though according to Islamic law, Mickey Mouse should be killed in all cases.

People had fun with that remark (so backward!) and find it scary at the same time (poor innocent mouse, it is just a comic!) and probably the ‘death sentence’ for Mickey Mouse contributed to making it into a fatwa; both reactions clearly linked to the current Islamdebate in the Netherlands and fairly recent national and international events and therefore not to be taken as self evident. As pointed out earlier it was a loose remark of Muhammad Munajid commenting on the influence of ‘the media’ and certainly does not qualify as an offical fatwa. Muhammad Munajid posted a response to his Mickey Mouse remarks on Youtube: HERE.

Another issue people could have fun with are the revelations of daughters of radical imams, in particular those who have gone astray by going into the erotic business. An example of this is the daughter Yasmin (who has changed her name from Youssra) of Omar Bakri, in Dutch reports about this issue usually refert to as ‘hate-imam’ or ‘radical imam’, who has become a pole-dancer.  It is fun for some because it seems to be the opposite ofwhat her father wants, or maybe her father even paid for her breasts? Or as the fun result of what goes around comes around?Not a surprise of couse Omar Bakri (whose lessons I followed a few years ago in the chatroom of his organisation back then) himself denies the whole story:

All these vulgar accusations are completely fabricated and unfounded and cannot be accepted by any sane person without proof, except the one who is a kaafir (non-Muslim), or the one who is envious or the one who has a grudge against Islam and its people.And this girl (if she does exist) has nothing to do with my family regardless. And indeed I never did and never will have any interview with those pornographic newspapers like the Sun or its associates, who continue to publish lies and fabricate stories and interviews against those Islamic activists and Mujahideen.
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The Sun newspaper is aware that in this day and age, it is quite possible to fabricate any accusation and attribute it to any Muslim activist without him having the ability to defend himself or his honour. This is even more so particularly when they discover that the Muslim activist is holding firmly onto his Islamic principles, that he will never arbitrate to the man-made law or to any man-made court, whether British or otherwise for whatever reason, because it is known that to arbitrate to man-made law is an act of apostasy which takes one out of the fold of Islam.

The truth is that my family comprises of six children (three males and three daughters); Muhammad (30 years old, married with 2 children); Yussra (27 years old, married with 3 children); Abdul Rahman (21 years old, married); Rukan (18 years old, married with no children); Rayah tul Islam (13 years old) and Bilal (10 years old).

It is known amongst my family and my beloved ones and my students that my family is a very conservative family with an Islamic upbringing that abides by the Islamic commandments and that none of them are engaged in any prohibited professions (according to Islam) or even those occupations which could cast doubt.

I’m not going to say here who is wrong and who is not because I don’t know and maybe it would spoil the fun for some of us. In all cases having fun with people or making fun of (or not) says at least as much about the people having fun then about the objects of fun.

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