Tuesday, October 12, 2004

Dhimmis D'Jour (And Just A Little Bit Of Bias)


Check out this story at the Beeb. Now, the headline is 'Beard row Muslim sacking appeal'. So it's a row about a bloke who claims Muslims must have beards, right ? Except history shows that the demands of Sha'ria are somewhat flexible. Take for example the rules against interest. Certainly, if beards are compulsory for Muslims there're a whole lot of folks in Pakistan and Turkey - to name but two countries - that haven't got the memo. Seems to me this is, as Charles Moore calls the rules on interest, actually a hardening of the religion, not an accommodation of its existing custom.

But still, let's give the Beeb the benefit of the doubt. Let's suppose the guy really does want to grow a beard. Is that so bad ? Can't we just cut him some slack ? No doubt some lunatics will claim this is yet another example of the camel's nose, but hey ? Can't we all just get along ?

Except we read on into the body of the article and find this:

The tribunal was told Mr Mohmed, a customer service assistant, also refused to serve alcoholic drinks to customers in the first-class lounge and a manager suggested he should wear gloves.


A customer service assistant who won't serve drinks is like a hairdresser who won't work with sharp objects. This is hardly some off-the-wall addition to the job. What is being attempted here is yet another case of tapping in, another attempt to establish special stautus and rules for Muslims that don't apply to anybody else. Virgin is being asked to assume Dhimmi stautus, bending to meet whatever demand the exploding community places on it. Meanwhile, the Beeb - which has long been the very exemplar of British Dhimmitude - is covering for the Islamofascists. Again.

Doubtless, some people - not all on the Left - will claim that we have to 'respect his religion', y'know, kind of like they'd defend the right of fundamentalist Catholics to get jobs with the British Pregnancy Advisory Service - wouldn't they ? Well, let me make it real simple for the hard of thinking: if you believe that the devil lives up your left nostril when you sleep (yes - the Islamoids do believe this) that's religion, if you think people who own hankerchiefs deserve to die, that's ideology. Muslims claim Allah won't let them behave like normal members of society. Fine, they have the right to believe the Earth was created by space monkeys if they want - but there is no moral right by which they can force other people accomadate them.

UPDATE:

Down in the comments, EU Serf reminds me that the EU has just backheeled Rocco Buttiglione on the grounds of his strong Catholic beliefs. Of course, Mr Mohmed specificaly disavowed any intent to let his beliefs intrude on his job, where as Mr Buttiglione.... what d'you mean t'other way round ?

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