Whenever something gets banned, people will find a way around it. Simple human nature. This is even more so if the entity doing the banning is a government. Tunis – yes, the laundry is being well and truly aired about that oh-so-stable country aplenty now – has not only banned the call to prayer on their official TV channels, but has also banned all religious programming on them too. Guess what happened immediately after their dictator was thrown out:
Tunisian TV channel resumes Adhan broadcasting
January 17th, 2011 – 11:17 UTC by Andy Sennitt.
A Tunisian TV channel has reportedly resumed broadcasting the Adhan [Call to Prayer] after the ousted president Zine El Abidin Ben Ali fled the country amid widespread anti-government protests. Ben Ali ended his 23-year rule on Friday after weeks of street protests all over the North African country.
The Arabic language Al-Mofakirat Al-Islam website said in a report that Tunisia’s Channel 7 TV resumed broadcasting Adhan five times a day. “He (Ben Ali) was against broadcasting Adhan, holding Friday prayers in mosques during his rule,†the website said. The ousted president was also “bitterly opposed to hijab (Islamic dress code) and imposed a ban on many veiled Muslim women,†Al-Mofakirat Al-Islam added.
Ben Ali ruled Tunisia for more than two decades. His era was marred by repeated human rights violations and torture. On Sunday, acting leaders in Tunisia discussed the composition of a unity government as post-revolution unrest continues to grip the North African country.
Source: Press TV via Media Network
I’m willing to bet that the pendulum now will swing from the one extreme of robbing the Tunisian people of one important element of their identity, religion – through to the other end and we’ll see the rise of Islamism and Islamist sentiments.
So who and what gets sacrificed at the alter of extremism? Common sense and moderation.
We have quite a lot to learn from the “Tunisian Experiment”, and the wise will benefit most if they take time to understand what transpired and why and try to enact those lessons in their own societies with the inculcation of the respect for human rights and their freedoms of faith, association, thought and speech, and not to shove one doctrine or another down people’s throats.
The next few months and years will be very interesting indeed for Tunis and the Arab world in general. I just hope that this transition, painful as it will be, will be beneficial with the minimum loss of life and hardships.
Comments
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QVOrnjc6bg8
This is what we want according to this Qasida – Unity.
وأكد الغنوشيعلى تطبيق مبدأ ÙÂصل الدولة عنالدين.
http://www.alquds.co.uk/index.asp?fname=latest/data/2011-01-17-15-56-35.htm
The new PM is apparently stressing the separation of Religion and state. This is going to be interesting. Elections need to be held within 60 days and it should be open to all parties without exclusion at this stage. Otherwise we will most likely see more problems.
Lovely. A wise first step.
Anybody with an interest in The Middle East developing into an area with regimes that rule according to and openly dare promote, secular, liberal, democratic values, is following the events very closely.
“Anybody with an interest in The Middle East developing into an area with regimes that rule according to and openly dare promote, secular, liberal, democratic values, is following the events very closely.”
It will be very surprising if Tunisia goes that way, at least in the near future. Much more likely is a take over by Islamists. They are much more determined than the democrats – it is the same problem as when the Marxists were taking over the world.
Extremists win because they think about nothing else.