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June 26, 2006
The DaVinci Code and Oriana Fallaci
The rain kept me indoors most of the weekend, researching salaries of city administrators and School Department administrators in the 2007 budget. My findings? I'll write a column this week, but I can tell you the salaries aren't the issue; it's the size of the raises, on both sides of the municipal aisle, that raise eyebrows.
This is the point School Committee member Jackie Doherty was trying to make,
although she threw a dart at the city side, without mentioning similar increases
in the schools. I don't want to belabor the issue here. I'll take it up soon
enough.
Back to the rain. My wonderful wife could only take so much of it - not of the water puring down from the heavens - but my researching salaries on her time. She ordered me to the movies, to watch The DaVinci Code. That was an experience. A packed theater with teen-agers playing cell-phone tag during the movie. It got so excruciating that I wished for the Lord to miraculously summon an army of angels to the second row, seats 4 through 12, where they could harness these irritating twits with hand and facial restraints. At least for two hours.
Finally, an usher showed up, after the crowd began yelling at the kids, who continued tto shout back. Unbelievable! Worse, the kids refused to leave the theater when instructed to do so. Instead, they called their parents on their cell phones. Eventually, they got up and left, to applause movie-watchers. Anyway, The Code was a decent flick, although I couldn't help but wonder if a similar movie on the Islam faith could ever be shown without generating an uproar and protests. Let's face it: Catholicism takes it on the chin in Dan Brown's book and Ron Howard's movie. Catholics, however, aren't calling for a jihad against actors and actresses who appeared in the movie. Neither is Brown living in seclusion, forced to do so by extremist Catholics seeking his head on a platter.
While the Church has expressed displeasure with Brown's fictional theories of a union between Jesus and Mary Magdelene, it hasn't issued an order for suicide bombings or excommunication. Which brings me to Oriana Fallaci. The Italian journalist, one of the best international reporters of her time, went on trial last Monday iin Italy, for writing and vocally expressing her opinion about the Islamic faith.
She
basically says Islam treats women like subhumans and is a violent, if not backward
religion. A local imam outside of Florence took issue with Fallaci's comments
and urged the Italian state to arrest her for "treason" against religion. He
based his claim on an archaic Italian law that prohibits people to defame or
demean religion. A judge agreed and filed charges against Fallaci. Fallaci,
who didn'tshow up in court last week, is suffering from cancer and lives in
both New York City and a villa outside of Tuscany.
She rarely announces her visits to Italy, sensing that she'd be arrested and imprisoned for saying what she feels is the truth. "If I were a Christian symbol in their country, I'd be either stoned to death or beheaded," says Fallaci, "but they can come to my country and build a mosque where they can plot to overtake the world." Fallaci's outspokenness was prompted by 9/11. Since the U.S. terror attacks, she has written two books condemning Europe's response - or lack thereof - to the spread of Islamic fundamentalism. I've read both: "The Pride and the Rage" and her latest, "The Force of Reason."
While the books have sold more than 3 million copies worldwide, you'd be hardpressed to find them on display shelves of any local book stores. Seems like Fallaci's harsh words might offend someone. In fact, several stores in the San Francisco area have refused to carry the books, which refer to Europe as "Eurabia". Fallaci's core belief is that Islam's goal is to spread throughout the world and to eliminate religious tolerance and democracy. It's hard to fathom that anyone expressing their thoughts on religion in this country - no matter how harsh those opinions - could ever wind up in jail. At the same time, I doubt a politically correct Hollywood would ever do a movie depicting the brutality of some followers of Islam, as well as Islam's inequality toward women and other minorities.
A movie would enlighten people too much to a culture that is stuck in time and unwilling to move into the modern era. Hollywood would get more grief than ticket sales. Of course, not all Muslims see things so narrowly. They are the moderates, and they are too few in number to make a difference right now unless they get security to express their opinions. I urge all Muslims to go watch the Da Vinci Code. If Catholics can tolerate the attacks on their faith, why can't Muslims tolerate Fallaci's?
Posted by JimC at June 26, 2006 10:54 AM
Comments
Good comments about the Da Vinci Code movie/book and the response of Catholics to it. The riots that happened over the cartoons about Mohamed show the disparity in tolerence. The cartoon jihad also showed how Europe seems to quickly cave in to islamofacists.
Europe is at a crucial turning point. They have allowed the flood of unrestricted immigration into their countries and now noticing that islamofacists are now trying to change or outright take over their countries. Holland seems to have reached a critical mass in this regard with the brutal murder of the descendent of Van Gogh. The Dutch finally started to wake up after that murder and are now rightly realizing that you can't just be all open and sunshine with people whose only aim is to destroy your way of life and replace it with their own intolerant version of religon.
Posted by: Dr. No at June 26, 2006 12:50 PM
Amen Jim! And God bless Oriana Fallaci for having the guts to call it like she sees it. Nothing gives me a bigger laugh than women who decry the United States and President Bush for taking down governments that treat them as nothing more than slaves and sex toys.
A word of advice to Hillary, Barbara Boxer and the rest of the anti-Bush ladies. Go do some volunteer work in the middle east helping the cause of women's rights. Chances are you will have a change of opinion. If you live long enough, that is.
Posted by: Osama Bin Hiding at June 26, 2006 1:15 PM
I read Ms. Fallaci's " Rage and the Pride" sensing I disagreed with her philophically. I fell in love with her brain. Serious issues, humor, courage and intellectual knowledge of histroy written with a flow of reason and logic that has few equals. I try to read works of writers I assume I will disagee with on issues. "Can't learn reading about thinks I know!" You come away from reading Oriana with a knowledge that you have not experienced before and a wonderful respect for her intellect. A unique uncommon sense. I wish had her brain. "Force of Reason" is better.
Posted by: oriana's fan at June 29, 2006 1:35 PM
