{"id":4,"date":"2008-08-27T17:16:08","date_gmt":"2008-08-27T17:16:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/cityofbrass\/2008\/08\/child-abuse.html"},"modified":"2008-08-27T17:16:08","modified_gmt":"2008-08-27T17:16:08","slug":"child-abuse","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/cityofbrass\/2008\/08\/child-abuse.html","title":{"rendered":"child abuse"},"content":{"rendered":"

I am pleased to see that Mr. Syed Mustafa Zaidi of Manchester, UK has been found guilty of child abuse<\/a>. Zaidi, a Shi’a muslim, forced two young boys to participate in a ritual self-flogging<\/a> exercise during the holy month of Ashura, in which Shi’a lament the martyrdom of Imam Husain AS, the grandson of the Prophet SAW. This act of self-flogging is an extreme one, only observed by a tiny fraction of Shi’a muslims, and even Zaidi’s own religious community expressly forbade boys younger than 16 to take part in the ceremony. That has not stopped Mr. Zaidi from (predictably) claiming that this is an issue of religious expression and a necessary act of faith. <\/p>\n

The issue is notable because it serves to highlight the necessity of governmental oversight of
\nreligious practice. Not to define what religious practices are
\n“correct” or not, but rather to simply be blind to religion when
\nevaluating issues against the law. The question of whether
\nself-flagellation is an authentic Islamic or Shi’a practice is a
\n(bloody) red herring – the question is simply whether the actions
\nviolated Law. And they did, so Mr. Zaidi deserved to be prosecuted
\naccordingly. Bringing this issue into the domain of religious freedom
\nonly serves to cloud the issue, and taint the entire muslim community,
\nSunni and Shi’a alike.<\/p>\n

(see related discussions at Talk Islam<\/a> and at Deenport<\/a>)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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City of Brass is his weblog, which was founded in 2002 under the name UNMEDIA. He is a co-founder of the annual Brass Crescent Awards. The name City of Brass refers to the Story of the City of Brass in the Thousand and One Nights, and the poem by Rudyard Kipling of the same name: Here was a people whom, after their works, thou shalt see wept over for their lost dominion; And in this palace is the last information respecting lords collected in the dust. -- Thousand and One Nights, Story of the City of Brass IN A land that the sand overlays, the ways to her gates are untrod, A multitude ended their days whose fates were made splendid by God, Till they grew drunk and were smitten with madness and went to their fall, And of these is a story written: but Allah Alone knoweth all! -- Rudyard Kipling, The City of Brass (1909)"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/cityofbrass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/cityofbrass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/cityofbrass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/cityofbrass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/165"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/cityofbrass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/cityofbrass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/cityofbrass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/cityofbrass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/cityofbrass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}