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Saudi Arabia: It's all in the name

Ayesha Saldanha · 23:41 · Middle East & North Africa

lingua → bn · mk · es

It is common practice for converts to Islam to adopt Muslim names. But is it necessary - and what kind of name is appropriate? One Saudi blogger ponders the question, while some others are thinking about the use of aliases in the blogosphere - and yet another encourages the government to ‘name names'.

Zuhair asks whether you need to change your name when you change religion, in a post entitled ‘What if my name were Peter?‘:

سؤال يخطر على بالي حين اسمع عن تحول احد غير المسلمين الى الإسلام. ا ذاو ما يفعل بعد النطق بالشهادتين هو تغيير اسمه الى اسم عربي. ولا ادري كيف أصبح الاسم العربي هو الاسم الإسلامي؟ وهل لو احتفظ الإنسان باسمه الذي سماه أبواه سيكون إسلامه ناقصا؟ ولست هنا اتحدث عن الناحية الشرعية اذ اني لا اعرفها ولكني أتسائل عن الحكمة وراء تغيير الأسماء. وهناك امر اخر فبعض أسماءنا العربية هي ترجمة لأسماء مسيحية او يهودية مثل يوسف وداود وهي أسماء أنبياء بني إسرائيل ونستخدمها نحن المسلمون. فهل يعني ذلك اني لو ترجمت احد أسماء الحواريين لاستطعت استعماله؟

A question pops to my head whenever I hear that someone has converted to Islam. After declaring the Shahadah, the first thing they do is change their names into an Arabic one. I don't understand when Arabic names became Islamic. Does it also mean that if a convert kept the name his parents had given him, his Islam would be lacking? I am not speaking here from the perspective of Shari'a, which I don't know. I am just wondering about the wisdom behind changing names. There is also another issue. Some of our Arabic names are translations of Christian and Jewish names, such as Yousef (Joseph) and Dawood (David), which are the names of the Prophets of Bani Israel and which we use as Muslims. Does this mean that if I translated one of the names of the disciples [of Jesus] I could use it too?

Ali Al Omary wonders whether using a pseudonym online is a good thing:

يتخّفى معظم كتاب المدونات والمنتديات خلف أسماء مستعارة أو أسماء وهمية, وقد يمتلك بعضهم عدة أسماء يكتب مرة تحت هذا الاسم ومرة تحت ذاك!!!
وقد يعتبر البعض أن هذه الظاهرة ظاهرة شكلية لا يجب الوقوف عندها أو السعي إلى التخلص منها, وأنا لا أتفق مع هذا البعض, بل أرى فيها أحد أهم العوامل المتسببة في فقر الويب العربي وتدني مستوى التواصل والحوار بين أفراده.
صحيح أن التخفي خلف اسم مستعار, من شأنه أن يمنح المتخفي هامشا أكبر من الحرية والانطلاق دون قيود, إلا أنه سيضعف لديه الإحساس بالمسؤولية الأدبية, وقد يبدد من نفسه الطاقة التي تدفعه إلى بذل الجهد في إنجاز عمل ما بشكل جيد.
بالطبع؛ لا مانع من أن يكتب البعض تحت اسم مستعار حين يكون هنالك ضرورة تسّوغ له ذلك, أما أن يتحول الإنرنت إلى حفلة تنكرية, فلا أظننا سنعزز من وجودنا في هذا العالم بهذا اللون من الهرب الجماعي.

Many of the bloggers and commentators on online forums hide behind pseudonyms. Some of them may even have several names, and write under this in one post and under that in another!! Some may consider this phenomenon to be a superficial issue which should not be considered or reversed - and this is something I don't agree with. I think this is the one of the main reasons for the poor condition of the Arabic web and the low level of communication and dialogue between those who use it. While it is true that hiding behind a pseudonym gives the writer more freedom and enables him to write without inhibitions, it also diminishes his sense of literary responsibility and lowers his motivation in exerting energy online. Of course, there is no harm in some electing to write under pseudonyms when there is a reason for that - but I don't think we will be able to make our presence felt online when we all escape en masse and turn the Internet into a masquerade.

Meanwhile, the blogger Someone has decided that honesty is the best policy:

الأسماء المستعارة تمنح صاحبها مجالاً واسعاً من الحديث في كل شيء، فللمستخدم مثلاً أن يتقمص فكراً ويكتب بلسانه ويشارك وينتقد ، وهو لا يعتقد بشيء مما يكتب ويقول، ومن دون أن يكون لحديثه أثر شخصي عليه سلباً أو إيجاباً ، وربما تعرض كلامه للسرقة الأدبية من دون أن يكون له الحق في الاعتراض القضائي لأنه مجهول أساسا

Pseudonyms give writers the scope to write about everything. The user is able to adhere to a thought, write, participate and criticise, all the while not worrying about what he had thought and said, and without it having either negative or positive effects on his personal life. But his work may also be plagiarised - and he wouldn't have the right to protest in court because he is unknown to begin with.

…أما الأسماء الصريحة، فأول رسالة نفهمها حينما نقرأ اسماً صريحاً هي مسؤولية تحمل التبعات، وهذه مسؤولية عظيمة وخطيرة ، خصوصاً إن خاض المرء مخاض النقد ، فحالة المجتمع التي نحن فيها لا تسمح للناس بأن يفرقوا بين الكلمة وبين قائلها ، فكل ما يقوله يعود بشكل أساسي إلى شخصه. وكل النقد الذي يتفوه به المرء سوف تعود نتائجه في النهاية إلى رصيده الشخصي عند الناس حتى وإن كانت له سوابق تشفع له ، وهو ما يجعل علاقاته الاجتماعية في خطر محدق، بل في بعض الأحيان حالته الأمنية لن تكون على مايرام.

As for real names, the first thing which comes to mind when we read them is the responsibility of facing up to consequences. This responsibility is great and grave, especially when the blogger is criticising others. The society we live in doesn't allow people to differentiate between words and who is saying them. Everything a person writes will return to this person and every time he criticises something, it will be added to his personal record among people, even if has had precedents which excuse him. This leaves his social relations in danger and at times, his security may be threatened.

انطلاقاً من المسؤولية الفكرية للكلمة التي نكتبها، ومن قيمي ومبادئي التي تفرض على المرء أن يخوض مبادرة الإصلاح والتغيير في شتى الميادين، ومن منطلقاتي التي تنص على تحمل التبعات الشخصية لما أكتب من أفكار ورؤى وتقبل النقد حولها بصدر رحب ، ومن رؤيتي التي تحتم على كل ناقد الإفصاح عن نفسه وشخصه، حتى يؤدي نقده غرضه،
فإني أعلن التالي:

أولاً: تغيير اسمي المستعار “someone” الذي أكتب به التدوينات إلى اسمي الصريح : فهد الحازمي.
ثانياً: الإفصاح عن ما يمكن الإفصاح عنه في صفحة النبذة الذاتية، مثل النشأة والدراسة وغيرها من الأمور.
ثالثاً: إمكانية استيراد البعض من كتاباتي ومقالاتي المنشورة في مواقع مختلفة مثل الإسلام اليوم ومجلة العصر وفضاء الفضائيات وغيرها إلى المدونة مع إضافة تعقيبات وأفكار جديدة حولها.
رابعاً: يُبلغ أمرنا هذا إلى الجهات المختصة.

والله يستر وبس ، ويعيننا على تحمل التبعات.

Stemming from the intellectual responsibility we shoulder for the words we write, and from my values which decree that a person should initiate the process of change and reform in all areas of life, and my belief that a person should be responsible for the ideas he writes and able to accept the criticism he gets, and my opinion that a critic should reveal his name and personality to fulfil his goal, I declare the following:

First: I am changing my pseudonym from 'someone' and will write my blog under my real name: Fahad Al Hazmi.
Second: I am declaring what I can in my ‘about' page, such as my upbringing, education, and other matters.
Third: I will try and retrieve what I can of my articles, which have been published on other sites, such as Islam Today, and update them with new ideas and add them to this blog.
Fourth: I would like the concerned authorities to know about those decisions.

And may Allah be able to protect me, and enable me to shoulder the consequences of all this.

And speaking of names, John Burgess, a former US foreign service officer who blogs about Saudi Arabia, comments on the importance of ‘naming and shaming', in a post entitled ‘Time to Start Naming Names in Saudi Arabia‘:

There is a tendency in Saudi Arabia – as in most other Arab countries – to not air dirty laundry in public, even other people’s dirty laundry. Thus, we hear about crimes, but never about who committed them. … It was quite a shock, in fact, when the Saudi Ministry of Interior released names and photos of Al-Qaeda terrorists within the Kingdom in 2003, creating the first public ‘Most Wanted’ lists. If government acknowledges that crimes against the public have been committed, it does have a duty to inform the public that there are dangerous people about. It’s not enough to arrest them as the vagaries of the Saudi courts could very well mean that these people are out of jail and again committing crimes and the public has no warning whatsoever. Shame is a powerful tool in Arab culture. Governments and media should use it, when appropriate, to reach ends in the service of society.

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Georgia, Russia: Feeding Looters and Refugees

Veronica Khokhlova · 23:23 · Eastern & Central Europe , Central Asia & Caucasus

lingua → es · mk · fr · bn

See Global Voices special coverage page on the South Ossetia crisis.

A number of Tbilisi residents gathered in front of the Russian embassy Saturday for a protest prank against looting. LJ user oleg-panfilov posted photos and wrote this (RUS) about the initiative:

[…] To the Russian embassy in Tbilisi they brought old refrigerators, toilets, rolls of toilet paper, irons, bottles of vodka, forks and spoons, clothes and other objects that [looters from the Russian army] took interest in during their visits to private houses of Georgians, state institutions, military bases and army barracks.

People are coming up to have a closer look, shake their heads, laugh. Cars that are passing by are honking…

[six photos]

Tbilisi-based LJ user tony-geo wrote critically (RUS) about the stunt:

“Let's Feed the Russian Army” Action

The action itself is, of course, a powerful PR weapon. But only as long as many Russians get to know about it. I suspect, however, that neither [Vremya news show on Channel 1], nor [Vesti news show on RTR] are going to cover this action.

Here's what I mean. A Russian woman, mother of a Georgian officer, horrified, says that her mother in [Kaliningrad] has no idea whatsoever of what's going on in Georgia and thinks that the Georgian army is still attacking Tskhinvali, which is being courageously defended by the Soviet army. Thank God, she hasn't put a curse on her grandson, who is killing Russian soldiers in that Tskhinvali.

I confirm this report. I talked to my sister in Russia yesterday. Formally, my sister is Georgian, but she was born and grew up in Russia, just like myself, and has only spent a total of a few weeks in Georgia in the 30 years of her life. But she kept her Georgian maiden name when she got married […]. Anyway, she's also clueless about what's going on. Most ordinary people do not use the internet and satellite TV to get reliable news - they are watching what the [Russian state-owned channels] are showing. So why should it be surprising that this majority firmly believes that the Russian troops have not stepped outside Tskhinvali […]?

But this isn't my point. In a kindergarten [in one of Tbilisi's neighborhoods], there are 110 refugee families with lots of children. Social aid hasn't made it there. They put them there and that's it, if there's time - we'll help you. At this kindergarten, unlike at the school in the same area, there are children's beds at least. Most people sleep on the floor. There are no blankets and mattresses. They eat what they can buy on the money they've got left. As you understand, they don't have much money left. Yesterday, food was delivered just once to this kindergarten. Stale bread. For 110 families - seven kilos of sugar.

Last night, I took a sack with children's clothes, which I had planned to take to the central donation point […], to this kindergarten. We (along with my neighbors) also took 20 kilos of sugar and one and a half kilo of butter there. Today I've brought them fruit, milk, [matsoni] and diapers.

Georgians, damn it, enough of the information war. Look out of the window, there are kindergartens and schools packed with refugees out there. First, take what you can to them, and then go to the Russian embassy. […]

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Egypt: Death of Three Arab Cultural Icons

Lasto Adri · 22:18 · Middle East & North Africa

lingua → mg · fr · bn · ar

The Arab world lost three of its cultural icons in the spam of a month. They are Egyptians philosopher Dr Abdel Wahab El Miseiri and film maker Youssef Chahine and Palestinian poet Mahmood Darwish. Egyptian Blogger, ElGharep, or The Stranger, reflects on the loss in this post [Ar].

فى خلال شهر واحد تقريبا توفى ثلاثة من أكثر من أسروا الثقافة العربية وهم على ترتيب ميقات الوفاة د. عبد الوهاب المسيرى و يوسف شاهين ومحمود درويش
الأول كاتب والثانى مخرج والثالث شاعر ….يختلفون فى المجال الثقافى فعبد الوهاب المسيرى الفيلسوف المصرى صاحب موسوعة اليهود واليهودية والصهيونية والذى أعطى كل مالديه أسرئا للثقافة …يوسف شاهين مخرج الوعى والذى جسدت أفلامه كل ألم مصرى وعربى من فيضان النيل ف”بن النيل” و النكسة فى ” عصفور ” وتوقعه بالنصر فى “الأرض” والكثير من الأفلام التى عبرت عن شئ واحد فقط وهو المصرى وقضاياه وأخيرا…محمود درويش ” شاعر الأنتفاضة والذى كتب بكل أسى عن شقاء الاجئ الفلسطينى المسحوق أمام قوة الأحتلال الصهيونى الغاشم وتخاذل الأنظمة العربية المخزى

Three of the greatest people who impacted Arab culture have died last month, in the following order: Dr Abdel Wahab El Miseiri, Youssef Chahine and Mahmoud Darwish.
The first was a writer, the second a director and the third a poet. The three of them differed in their cultural dimensions. El Miseiri was the Egyptian philosopher who wrote the encyclopaedia Jews, Judaism and Zionism. He exerted everything he had to enrich the culture. Youssef Chahine was a director whose movies tried to record all of the Egyptian and Arab people's pain, such as the Nile's flood in Ibn El Nile (The Nile's Son), the setback in Asfour (Bird), and his expectations of victory in El Ard (The Land) as well as many other movies that discussed one thing: Egyptians and their problems. And lastly, Mahmood Darwish, the Intifada poet who wrote about the misery the Palestinian refugees due to the Zionist invasion, and embarrassing weakness of Arab governments.

He adds:

الثلاثة يتشباهون فى شئ واحد ورئيسى الشأن العام والذى ظل مسيطر عليهم الى أخر لحظة فالمسيرى ظل الى أخر نفس رئيسا لحركة كفاية المصرية المعارضة بالرغم من سنه الكبير الذى لا يتحمل المطاردات الأمنية لأمن النظام المصرى ….وشاهين صاحب أقسى الأفلام السياسة نهاية بفيلم “هى فوضى ” والذى عرى فيه النظام البوليسى المصرى والذى لا يعبأ بالقضاء ولكن بأمنه فقط ….وأخيرا محمود درويش والذى الذى أستقال من منظمة التحرير أثر توقيع أتفاقية “أوسلو” فلم يقبل التخلى عن أى حق فلسطينى

Until the last moments of their lives, the three shared a common interest - Public Affairs. El Miseiri, despite his old age, was a prominent leader in Egyptian opposition movement Kifaya. Chahine made the toughest political movies, ending with his film Heya Fawda (It is Chaos), which exposed the Egyptian police, who don't care for justice, but have other internal interests. Last but not least, Darwish resigned from the Palestine Liberation Organization after the signing of the Oslo treaty as he did not wish to abandon any of the Palestinian rights.

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North Africa: Bringing Home the Medals

Jillian York · 16:40 · Middle East & North Africa

In the run up to the 2008 Olympic Games, there was much speculation on how the Middle East and North Africa would fare. Although Turkey is the only Middle Eastern country to medal thus far (in athletics, weightlifting, and Greco-Roman wrestling), North Africa is enjoying great success. So far, Egypt's Hesham Mesbah and Algeria's Soraya Haddad and Amar Benikhlef have all medaled in Judo (bronze, bronze, and silver, respectively), Morocco's Hasna Benhassi took home a bronze in the women's 800m dash, and Tunisian swimmer Oussama Mellouli scored gold in the men's 1500m freestyle.

The official Tunisia.com blog congratulated Mellouli on taking home Tunisia's first gold medal in 40 years:

Congratulations to Oussama Mellouli who dug in when it counted to beat the legendary Grant Hackett over the 1500 meters swim in the games.

In what is a tough event Oussama beat the odds and delivered the first gold for over 40 years!

Algeria.com details Algeria's Olympic history, shares the stats so far, and gives a bit of encouragement:

It is hoped that between the track athletes and the boxers that Algeria will be able to add a few more medals to their collection, and walk away from another successful Olympic Games. Algeria has shown their ability to be worthy competitors and it seems that every year they are growing in strength and diversity.

Morocco's The View from Fez shared the exciting news of Hasna Benhassi's bronze medal, Morocco's first in Beijing, praising the runner for her success:

Benhassi was already among the greatest Moroccan women athletes in history even before her silver medal 800m performances in the Athens Olympics and the World Championships in Helsinki in 2005 and Osaka in 2007. She had won gold at 800m in the 2000 African Championships and at 1500m in the 2001 World Indoor Championships in Lisbon, becoming only the second female Moroccan athlete, after Nezha Bidouane, to win a World Championship title. But she has remained very much in the shadow of her brilliant compatriot, Hicham El Guerrouj.

Although Libya has not yet won a medal, its bloggers have been talking about the Olympics. Anglo-Libyan blogged the opening ceremonies and discussed swimmer Asmahan (Mercedes) Farhat's first race:

Yesterday I watched the swimming heats on BBC but they never showed the 100-meter breaststroke that Asmahan Farhat took part in, the picture on the left is Asmahan getting ready for her swim, she did not do that well although she did manage to break her own record but she enjoyed taking part, you can read her blog entry, it was funny reading how she was dressed in an east Libyan costume by old ladies, to me this is the best and most beautiful Libyan costume.

Farhat, a Libyan-American competing for Libya, wrote a blog post for her local U.S. newspaper about participating in the Olympics, and said this about getting to warm up in the same lane as Michael Phelps:

During warm up I got to swim in his lane. That's right, right next to him and I will honestly say that nothing makes you swim faster than when Michael Phelps is swimming behind you and you don't want to get in his way!

When he swims past you, you can feel the power that he pushes the water with and how smooth he moves in the water. Most swimmers I've swam in a lane with you can feel them fighting the water and the waves are choppy, but when he swims next to you there are barely any forceful waves.

It is unbelievable, it's almost like the waters moving with him. It was the most memorable warm-up swim I've ever swam for sure!

Although bloggers are proud of what their countrymen have accomplished, one blogger feels that Arab countries could do more. Musings of a Proud Arab posted on the eighth Olympic day, frustrated by the lack of Arab medalists. The Jordanian blogger, who lives in the UAE, encourages Arab countries to unite for the gold:

We should not be there just to participate for our national flags to fly within the Olympic Village and in the Parade of Nations. This got me thinking and I want to share a solution with you; have ALL of the 22 Arab countries contribute half of their budgets to a collective consolidated budget that will be used as a Regional Trial to choose the BEST ARAB ATHLETES and train them to bring us gold.There are several reasons for this; 1) the Arab common person is united in their support of Arabs in the Olympics as it reflects on all of us (where we are really united), 2) it allows the countries to still have their symbolic participation in the Olympics (with half their budget), and 3) it will derive the athletes of the poor excuse that I did not perform because I did not have the support, especially financial from my National Olympic Committee.After all, the Arab countries combined have the same population of the United States. And we never hear complaints from them that on there are too many Californians with their Olympic athletes and not a single Alaskan!So, will this be an ideal or can the League of Arab States seriously work on achieving it from 2009? As a corporate person, I would place 12 gold medals as our target for 2012 London Olympics!

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Pakistan: Musharraf has Left the Building

Teeth Maestro · 13:49, August 19th, 2008 · South Asia

lingua → zht · zhs · bn · sw · fr

Eight years, three hundred and five days ago a peaceful coup masterminded by a Pakistani Army General overtook the reigns of power from the then ruling corrupt leader Nawaz Sharif. It was then the promise of a new tomorrow; it was then a romantic walk towards the faint vision labeled as the ‘enlightened moderation' and definitely a step towards the ridding society of a plague called corruption. Pakistanis celebrated then, but very soon people realized that this blessing had slowly grown into an unwanted plague and the stay had become an unwelcome dictatorship. After many moons of tyranny, yesterday marked the end of a reign of power barely 60 days shy of nine years, Pakistan turns over a new leaf.

It seemed to be a normal day for Pakistan but it turned into a roller coaster of adrenaline pumping and rumor mongering session for its citizens as news started to flow. For the people it was one rumor after another flooding from TV newscasters to SMS's and even emails; it was as if the fate of Pakistan were to be decided by each other. Deadpan Thoughts quite easily summarizes the roller coaster of rumors in one sentence saying “The phone beeps - Mushy’s being impeached..go put on GEO [a TV channel]..NOW“. Some had us believing that this outgoing chap would go down fighting while some on the other hand conspired for the restoration of judiciary as his last vengeance but in the end it fizzled out to be a valiant outgoing speech, throwing in the towel before his tearful adios which Siam's Blog shares ‘A grim-faced Musharraf backed by Pakistani flags and a portrait of the country's founder' to say “I leave my future in the hands of people.”

Pervez Musharraf - Image credit: World Economic Forum Photostream in Flickr and used under a creative commons license

The tearful good bye on the 18th of August by Musharraf came barely four days after the celebrations of the 61st Independence Day. Pakistan gingerly marks the end of a long nine year dynasty. His concluding remarks were mostly a walk back into history as penned down by The Pakistani Spectator, which was just to highlight his services for the people and for the country.

Pakistani bloggers reacted with mixed feelings, on one hand some celebrated Musharraf by chiming in with the ‘For he is a Jolly Good Fellow' tune, while some faithfuls were quick to lend him a standing ovation but most cautiously celebrated the end of a dictatorship. Sarcastically Yeah That too had a few words to share, Ammar wrote about how the new ‘Cat Fight' is now about to begin, Chowrangi talks about Pakistan's future after Musharraf, Psychotic Discourses sheds light on the new form of Demon-cracy, MB confuses us with the talk about circle of circuses.

The immediate question that remains lurking is whether Musharraf is allowed to seek asylum outside of Pakistan or will he be put to trial for the charges alleged against him. Its definitely a tough juncture for Pakistan with a lot at stake.

One does wonder what next, wherein lies a huge mixture of political wannabes eying for the top slot, though the onus of pulling the country out of the mess lies squarely on the shoulder of Asif Zardari and Nawaz Sharif, both unelected politicians entrusted with the faith of a nation to hopefully pull this country out of the mess it now finds itself in.

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Kazakhstan: Olympic Blogwatch

Adil Nurmakov · 06:47 · Central Asia & Caucasus

lingua → mg

The Beijing Olympics have moved political debates in the Kazakh blogosphere to the background.

Alim Atenbek is upset with the uniform of the Kazakhstani team [ru]:

Officials always want to make a buck on everything, and the Olympiad is not an exclusion. The government allocated 68 milion tenge for 226 kits - or 2,500 US dollars for each - but eventually the quality of fabric and tailoring was so bad that they had to remake it hastily. The tender for sale of tours to Beijing Olympics was very dubious too - a barely known tourist firm won it.

(more…)

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