Islam can be such a whiny religion sometimes.
Take the recent flap after the UK declared Queen Elizabeth would bestow an honor on the author Salman Rushdie. Pakistan’s parliament demands that Britain withdraw the knighthood for Sir Salman amid street protests there carrying banners threatening to “Shoot to Death” Rushdie. Iranian protesters chanted “Death to the English” as Ayatollah Ahmad Khatami explained the problem: see, Rushdie wrote a book a couple of decades ago that depicted the Prophet Mohammed in a silly fashion. For Khatami, the crux of the matter is that “They have awarded him only because he insulted the prophet.”
Writing about Mohammad may be insulting, but threatening to shoot a man and wishing death upon a nation, now that’s tacky! Whine, whine, whine. Teacher, someone was mean to my prophet! Teacher, make him stop! Boo, hoo, hoo.
I tell you what. I just started a new religion, and it is a profound insult to my religion when someone gets all uptight about honorary knighthoods bestowed by rich old English biddies with tiaras. I demand that the nations of Pakistan and Iran immediately apologize.
My father once explained to me that the insult to Islam in Rushdie’s book was so subtle that only Moslems could understand what it was. Then a professor explained to me he had written about prostitutes and given the prostitutes the same names as the Prophet’s wives.
I always though Rushdie was one of those dry, boring, pedantic people until I saw him on Moyers and was electrified, then heard his name after listening to him. His ideas are invigorating, but he is no friend to any religion. No wonder his books are banned.