Naeem's Blog

‘What do you want to be when you grow up?’*

This oft-repeated question heard across countless primary schools quite nicely sums up the problem with schooling. For the purpose of school is not about what you want to achieve when you grow up or how you want to improve society, but about which career path you wish to choose. The purpose of schooling is to get you a job. The purpose is to create cogs for the economic machinery – you may become a dull cog (garbage man, waiter, teacher) or a shiny cog (lawyer, doctor), but cogs you will all become.

Schooling creates career professionals. This is pounded into students from day one with the constant question of what you want to become.

This is the major concern for high schoolers when they choose a university to attend.
This is the major concern at the university level when students choose which degree to pursue.
And this is the major concern when the college student graduates and ‘enters’ into society.

Education has always taken a back to seat to careerism.

After all, every society has its own barometer of success. Hunter-gatherer societies placed a premium on those with adept hunting skills. Societies based on warfare deemed an individual with excellent fighting skills as successful. Tribal societies perceived strength in numbers, so a large number of sons was considered invaluable. In our modern capitalist society, one who has a ‘nice job’ and thus has accrued the most wealth is considered most successful.

But as Muslims, we have our divinely-sanctioned definition of success – faith and piety. Regardless of how good or bad we may be at hunting, fighting, or shopping, our success is measured by our level of spiritual development and servitude to our Lord.

And so, schools have failed at developing humans and have merely become the gatekeepers for the job-based professional economy as well as the national military. They have perfected the means for churning out ‘human resources’, citizens pliant enough to subserviently fit into the capitalistic model or become unquestioning soldiers in the battlefield. Schools excel at producing eager consumers and smoothly functioning bureaucrats.

Additionally, I am convinced that sending our kids off to school for 8 hours a day to be raised by complete strangers contaminates the parent-child bond. It plants the seed of deviation away from the parent’s thought-process. It paves the way for the child to accept, maybe even celebrate, a difference of opinion with his parents.

Once this reverence is corrupted, the child ceases to see the parents as sources of guidance deserving ultimate respect, viewing them instead as guardians charged merely with the child’s physical well-being and sustenance. The influence and sovereignty of the parents is eventually replaced by outside institutions such as school, government, or pop-culture.

Instead of impressing upon them the importance of family, religion, and community (social values that schools of the past focused on), modern day schooling hammers into our children’s minds that the most important goal is to get into a good college. And they must get into a good college in order to get a good job. And they must get a good job so as to live a comfortable life.

And that, my fellow readers, is the crux of the schooling failure.

The essential goal of schooling is materialistic success. Anything more is icing on the cake. Enlightening of the child’s mind, if it occurs, is merely accidental. To say otherwise is naïve at best.

I’m choosing not to be naïve.

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*I ranted in a previous post on my issues with a similar socio-cultural phenomenon - the casual question of 'What do you do?'

Having two school-age children (ages 12 and 10), education is of the utmost importance to me. I have sent both of them to school since KG and after years of persistent frustration, I have come to the conclusion that modern-day schooling is one of the greatest wastes of time.

I am convinced that schools are in the business of training, not educating, our children - in the same manner that animals are trained. Schools are factories of mass human training. They replicate the industrial model found in automated factories, churning out graduates in the same way factories churn out cars or laptops.

Schools produce graduates, not human beings. Schools excel at preparing their end-product for a capitalistic life in modern society. Schools provide a hierarchical education for a hierarchical society, embodied by the cubicle corporate lifestyle. Schools are perfect at producing docile, obedient citizens content with the status quo. Schools fill the role of creating cogs necessary for the machinery of society.

Schools do not engender a strong family or culture or religion. In fact, they undermine all of the above, replacing them instead with loyalty to the self, nation, and institutions.

The potential of most every child is stunted by this schooling system. I refer not to the ‘educational’ potential – that potential measured by report cards and SAT scores. Rather, I refer to the human potential – that potential to be a complete Adamic human being, who understands the true nature of the universe in ways the angels cannot even comprehend.

Our humanity is measured by more than grades and report cards. Life is more than homework and tests. Knowledge is more than some concocted curriculum taught at school.

Children and young adults need to understand man’s place in the universe. They need to actualize the higher purposes of life. They need to learn about the spiritual even more than the physical. They need to embody higher morals and ethics.

And this is not material that can be covered a few hours a week at Sunday schools. These subjects are the crux of our very being and yet, we have all accepted a model of education where these fundamentals are given lip service at our local Masjid. We have silently fallen in line with the rest of society, choosing to focus our children’s intellectual efforts on worldly studies.

And it’s not as if the schools excel in the worldly studies. In addition to the incredible absence of spiritual guidance, the schooling system fails to prepare children for the real world. Schools leave them disconnected, existing in a created space dedicated purely to children.

We fail to engage our children in mature topics, viewing them as mere receptacles for useless information such as Social Studies, Health, and Language Arts. When will they learn the affairs of the adult world? We coddle them in a manner that stunts their maturation process, leaving us with 23-year old adults playing video games and watching UFC.

Manufactured concepts, such as teens and tweens, thrive and take over the mind of young adults, robbing them of their productive place in greater society. Instead they are relegated to the periphery, in classrooms and study halls, playing nary a role in society at large.

After years of schooling my own children in this failed system, I have cast aside the artificial importance placed on my child’s ability to memorize data and regurgitate it for testing purposes. I have rejected all the counterproductive efforts required for homework, school projects, and exams. While the schooling system may prepare my child for the next grade or a good college or a good job, it fails miserably at producing a complete human being.

So I’m choosing to focus on educating my children instead of training them. Maybe they won’t become ‘successful’ engineers or lawyers or doctors (only a small percentage of all schooled children actually do), but my definition of success is not dictated by mainstream society.

Most Americans are well aware of the recent travails of the US Government in finalizing their federal budget. In making his case for balancing the budget, Obama argued that “every day, families sacrifice to live within their means. They deserve a government that does the same."

However, Ted Rall makes his counter-argument against this myth that American families are thrifty and keen on balancing their personal budgets. In addition to informing us of the facts (the average family has a debt of nearly $11,000), he posits this interesting scenario:

“If consumer credit vanished, the corporato-capitalist system currently prevailing in the U.S. would deteriorate from its current, merely unsustainable form into total chaos. Without credit cards and other loans citizens would seethe, trapped between the mutually irreconcilable forces of falling wages and the aggressive advertising and marketing of products they would never be able to afford. There would only be two possible long-term outcomes: revolution, or the ruling classes would be forced to pay substantially higher wages to workers. To corporate elites, the latter choice would be too unpalatable to countenance.”

Of the two possible outcomes of a credit-free society that Rall discusses, the latter (paying higher wages to workers) is a very intriguing situation. It would undoubtedly cut into the colossal wealth of the top one percent, but the resulting economic justice would provide for a far more acceptable standard of living for the majority.

Such a course of action, I believe, is promoted by the Islamic economic ethos. This is but one example of what the Shariah would provide to its participants – a more just economic system, where capitalistic greed is not given the absolute free reign it has been afforded by modern-day capitalism.

Too bad such intellectual thought exercises are missing from the discussions on Shariah.

Instead, let us continue the fear-mongering and adventures in disinformation. After all, why bother trying to understand the intricate details of Islamic economic jurisprudence when it’s so much easier to simply pass off scary images of bearded Mullahs, honour killings, and dhimmi taxes as wholly representative of Shariah?

I have long questioned the role of major pharmaceutical companies in misdirecting and corrupting healthcare. They carry too much power in influencing the type of care many doctors give to their patients.

For example, here in Riyadh, it's all too common for a doctor to prescribe a litany of drugs for any and all ailments. I can't even begin to count the number of times that we took Humza to his pediatrician with allergy-like symptoms and returned with 6 to 7 different medicines.

There is big money to be made in this business of selling drugs.

This documentary from Al-Jazeera sheds some light on the "pervasive fraud, fatal side effects, and huge kick-backs paid to doctors" that plagues Big Pharma.

Also, these articles (here, here, and here) will provide some background on how the unimaginable greed displayed by these multi-billion dollar corporations is placing our lives at risk.

The latest finding is this Newsweek article that questions the foundation of many medical studies, which center around drugs and their supposed benefits.

"A study might ask whether coffee raises the risk of joint pain, or headaches, or gallbladder disease, or hundreds of other ills. “When you do thousands of tests, statistics says you’ll have some false winners,” says Ioannidis. Drug companies make a mint on such dicey statistics. By testing an approved drug for other uses, they get hits by chance, “and doctors use that as the basis to prescribe the drug for this new use. I think that’s wrong.” Even when a claim is disproved, it hangs around like a deadbeat renter you can’t evict. Years after the claim that vitamin E prevents heart disease had been overturned, half the scientific papers mentioning it cast it as true, Ioannidis found in 2007...

Of course, not all conventional health wisdom is wrong. Smoking kills, being morbidly obese or severely underweight makes you more likely to die before your time, processed meat raises the risk of some cancers, and controlling blood pressure reduces the risk of stroke. The upshot for consumers: medical wisdom that has stood the test of time—and large, randomized, controlled trials—is more likely to be right than the latest news flash about a single food or drug."

And finally, here is a nice article on the corporate dollar corrupting medical research.

Yes, let us keep believing that capitalism is but a minor inconvenience in these troubling times. While so many Muslims have convinced themselves that theological teachings, political participation, or spiritual purification are the various roads to true reform, this economic juggernaut of free-market capitalism is getting a free-pass while wreaking unbelievable havoc throughout the world.

Must-read article by Reverend Frank Julian Gelli on the World Cup:

"Capitalism-plugged football is the new opium for the people. A counterrevolutionary tool. So David Cameron had the flag flying over Downing Street yesterday when England played the US. The bankers, financiers and public school toffs in power want to keep the opium flowing. By contrast, faith in God is about liberation. About arousing people up from their drugged slumbers. About a bright new dawn. Listen to the Apostle to the Gentiles:

‘It is full time for you to wake out of sleep. For salvation is nearer to us than when we first believed; the night is far gone, the day is at hand.’(Romans 13:11-12). Kick the habit, folks. Kick the Cup, O you new Gentiles. Time to wake up!"

Seems like the good reverend reads my blog:

"And it's this need for a diversion from 'life' that needs to be countered.

One reason for the Islamic prohibition of drugs and alcohol is the suspension of reality that is a consequence of their consumption. As mature, responsible adults, it is our duty (to ourselves, our families, and to our fellow man) to remain cognizant of our actions and our surroundings. By doing so, we are to constantly strive to become closer to the Ultimate Reality (swt).

Instead, we have become preoccupied with ways to distance ourselves from reality, thereby distancing ourselves from *the* Reality (swt)."

MM posted this amazing debate on the Freedom Flotilla massacre between Ahmed Bedier and the Israel consul general in Florida. I can't put into words how impressed I am by Ahmed Bedier.

Azra put up a flashy ad by a SA telecom in support of the World Cup. As I commented on her blog, these types of ads truly disgust me. They deify sports and athletes as objects of worship. The world stops when the game begins. It was done with Jordan many years ago and it's being done today.

Judge for yourself:



File this under 'News to me' - it's illegal to send money to the Taliban. Not just for American citizens, but for Emiratis.

Seems that these folks sent money to the Afghan Taliban and in return got beat up by UAE police, who also threatened to sexually abuse them or a family member, and eventually were sentenced for three years for financing a terrorist organization.

The arm of the American legal system is very long indeed.

For too long, we have all heard the American government, as well as the puppet media, making loud declarations about the Taliban funding its operations by trafficking opium. Such propaganda* serves to present the Taliban forces as not only barbaric terrorists, but also evil drug dealers. And to boot, it places into disrepute the image of their insurgency in the Muslim world.

But a 2009 report by UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), as broken down in this FPIF article, paints a picture quite divergent from the disinformation being spread by the occupying forces. The FPIF article does an excellent job in breaking apart the arguments that the opium drug trade is being fuelled by the Taliban.

First of all, the UNODC report estimates that only 10-15% of Taliban funding is drawn from drugs, the rest coming from private sources outside the country.

The FPIF article continues:

“The total revenue generated by opiates within Afghanistan is about $3.4 billion per year. Of this figure, according to UNODC, the Taliban get only 4% of the sum. Farmers, meanwhile, get 21%.

And the remaining 75%? Al-Qaeda? No: The report specifies that it "does not appear to have a direct role in the Afghan opiates trade," although it may participate in "low-level drugs and/or arms smuggling" along the Pakistani border.

Instead, the remaining 75% is captured by government officials, the police, local and regional power brokers and traffickers — in short, many of the groups now supported (or tolerated) by the United States and NATO are important actors in the drug trade.”

Yeah, let’s not forget the allegations that Karzai’s brother is involved in the heroin drug trade.

Another factor often conveniently overlooked is how the Taliban generate revenue by taxing ALL farmed land under their control, regardless of which crop is grown on those fields. So if the farmers are paying the Taliban taxes on cultivated poppy seeds, this is twisted and presented as the Taliban are active in trafficking opium.

Finally, and I believe this is most critical in understanding the dynamics of the sinister opium trade in Afghanistan, is the transformation of opium poppies into heroin. This process cannot take place without a special chemical precursor called acetic anhydride, which is not found in Afghanistan.

The FPIF article states:

“The report identified "Europe, China, and the Russian Federation" as "major acetic anhydride sources for Afghanistan." For instance, 220 liters of acetic anhydride were intercepted this year at Kabul airport, apparently originating from France. In recent years, chemicals have also been shipped from or via the Republic of Korea and UNODC's 2008 Afghan Opium Survey pointed to Germany as a source of precursors.”

Obviously, the Taliban have nothing to do with the smuggling of this chemical from Europe into Afghanistan. The answer to who is bringing in this precursor can be answered by the old adage ‘Follow the money’.

Besides the incredibly corrupt Afghan government, many stand to benefit from a thriving drug trade originating out of Afghanistan. It's worth noting that the CIA doesn't have a clean history when it comes to covert drug trafficking.

“In other words, intelligence agencies, powerful business, drug traders and organized crime are competing for the strategic control over the heroin routes. A large share of this multi-billion dollar revenues of narcotics are deposited in the Western banking system. Most of the large international banks together with their affiliates in the offshore banking havens launder large amounts of narco-dollars.

This trade can only prosper if the main actors involved in narcotics have "political friends in high places." Legal and illegal undertakings are increasingly intertwined, the dividing line between "businesspeople" and criminals is blurred. In turn, the relationship among criminals, politicians and members of the intelligence establishment has tainted the structures of the state and the role of its institutions including the Military.” [Source]

This role played by Western banks is repeated in the FPIF article:

“The report says that over the last seven years (2002-2008), the transnational trade in Afghan opiates resulted in worldwide sales of $400-$500 billion (retail value). Only 5-10% of this is estimated to be laundered by informal banking systems (such as hawala). The remainder is laundered through the legal economy, and importantly, through Western banks.

In fact, Antonio Maria Costa [UNODC Executive Director] was quoted as saying that drug money may have recently rescued some failing banks: "interbank loans were funded by money that originated from drug trade and other illegal activities," and there were "signs that some banks were rescued in that way."”

It becomes very clear when the dots are connected that the argument of Taliban drug trafficking is a classic red herring when it comes to America's Afghan policy.

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*I wrote before about the disinformation campaign employed by the American occupying forces in attempts to defend their losing ways in Afghanistan. This drug-trafficking myth is merely another example of this strategy.

I am convinced that too many of us living in industrialized nations have lost sight of what it truly means to have trust in our Sustainer. With our guaranteed salaries and medical insurance and pension plans, our lives are meticulously laid out to safeguard against every possible curve ball thrown our way.

We have assured ourselves that our Rizq (sustenance), present and future, will come primarily from our own efforts. The more we struggle and strive, the more we shall accomplish and achieve. Sure, our belief system dictates that everything comes from Allah (swt), but our attitudes expose our hypocrisy.

Our provisions are not coming from Allah (swt), but from our paychecks.
Our medical services are not provided by Allah (swt), but by our health care provider.
Our homes and automobiles are not protected by Allah (swt), but by our insurance companies.
We feel secure since protection is provided by the police force and fire department.
We needn’t worry about losing our credit cards as the companies have policies protecting against fraud and theft.

And with everything guaranteed, insured, and protected, where has Allah (swt) gone in our daily lives?

Don’t get me wrong. None of what I mentioned is inherently wrong. They are merely ways we implement the Prophetic advice to ‘tie the camel’. But the problem arises when we become so consumed with securing the camel that we build a fence around it, install a camera system, and hire a security force.

Where did the second part of the famous Prophet guidance go (‘and trust in Allah’)?

We are so busy with establishing safety nets and emergency funds that we have forgotten the more essential principle of Trust in Allah. These devices are desperate measures created by a desperate civilization that has lost all ties with its Creator and Sustainer.

Yet, we are falling in full step behind them, mimicking their every act, in creating a lifestyle safe and secure from the randomness of Divine ‘interference’.

So instead of expending our energies towards higher goals and objectives, we have become infatuated with tying down the proverbial camel.

Modern society dictates that not only must we provide for today and tomorrow, but we must engage all our energies into securing next year and the year after. Not only must we strive to provide for our family’s basic necessities, but we must save up for college funds, expensive weddings, and retirement costs.

Allah (swt) will not provide, our actions scream. Our 401(K) will.

And with our trust in our Creator withering away, we feel a greater urgency to incessantly pursue our Rizq - all the while forgetting that our Rizq is actually running after us.

“And how many a living creature is there that takes no thought of its own sustenance; God provides for it as [He provides] for you - since He alone is all-hearing, all-knowing.” (29:60)

“And there is no living creature on earth but depends for its sustenance on God” (11:6)

Let us focus our efforts towards that which matters and leave our sustenance to the One who has sustained everything in this world since its inception.

Allow me to share a tale that nicely captures the essence of our sustenance and how, regardless of what we do, it runs after us:

In a remote village, a young man was asked by his gentle elderly mother to eat his breakfast before leaving home. Bursting with energy and in a rush to begin his day, he declined and scurried off on his way. Being the caring mother she was, she quickly ordered her young daughter to follow after the boy with the plate of food to ensure he ate it. Said the loving mother, ‘Do not let him see you, lest he reject it again. Simply leave the food nearby, so when he becomes hungry, he will eat it at his leisure.’

The sister surreptitiously followed her elder sibling through the forest all the way to the local river, where she watched as her brother jumped in for a morning swim. After he got out, he stretched out under a nearby tree and proceeded to take a nap. Figuring he would be hungry after his nap, she laid the plate of food some distance away from the tree and returned home, certain that her brother would eventually find his breakfast.

Coincidentally, a group of no-good hooligans were convening nearby and discussing plans for their next act of thievery. While arguing back and forth, the gang leader smelled the scent of fresh food and followed it back to the same plate. Desperate for a home-cooked meal , the lot of them eagerly decided to share the food amongst themselves, until the leader paused and reflected. He shared his concern that the plate could potentially be a devious plot concocted by a rival gang.

‘The food may contain poison’, he grumbled. ‘Scout around and see if you find one of them spying on us.’

They ran about looking for anyone hiding away, until they came upon the young man sleeping under the tree.

They immediately pounced upon him and carried him back to their leader, who ferociously demanded the boy confess to setting up the poisonous plate of food. The young man repeatedly denied it until the leader decided it best to ‘test’ the food by force-feeding the hapless lad.

They made him eat every last morsel and eagerly awaited for the poison to kick in. Soon thereafter, they realized that nothing of the sort would occur and so dejectedly beat the boy one last time and went on their way.

The boy limped his way home and upon seeing his bruised face, his mother shrieked, ‘What happened my son?!’

With half a smile, he admitted, ‘Dear mother, my Lord had decreed my sustenance in the form of your hearty breakfast. One way or another I was destined to eat it. I declined the choice to eat it by your blessed hands, so Allah willed for me to eat it by the punches and kicks of those less savory.'

Pilger is spot on with his definition of Americanism, especially the final sentence about a popular culture designed to distract and stultify the masses:

"Norman Mailer once said he believed the United States, in its endless pursuit of war and domination, had entered a "pre-fascist era". Mailer seemed tentative, as if trying to warn about something even he could not quite define. "Fascism" is not right, for it invokes lazy historical precedents, conjuring yet again the iconography of German and Italian repression. On the other hand, American authoritarianism, as the cultural critic Henry Giroux pointed out recently, is "more nuance, less theatrical, more cunning, less concerned with repressive modes of control than with manipulative modes of consent."

This is Americanism, the only predatory ideology to deny that it is an ideology. The rise of tentacular corporations that are dictatorships in their own right and of a military that is now a state with the state, set behind the façade of the best democracy 35,000 Washington lobbyists can buy, and a popular culture programmed to divert and stultify, is without precedent."

John Pilger, Have a Nice World War, Folks

My friend Marc Manley responded to my recent post on the scourge of Secular Capitalist Islam for which I’m greatly honored. Its always nice to get critical feedback, whether in the form of comments on my blog, emails in my Inbox, or dedicated blog posts.

So I will respond to his response in kind – with a post of my own.

I will begin with a clarification, one that I feel is a bit unnecessary. I made overarching generalizations in my original post. I realize that. But it should have been clear that everything I stated is applicable to those cases where the ‘shoe fits’.

I am completely aware of the existence of American Muslims who are NOT giving in to the secular capitalistic way of life and are NOT willing to sacrifice any Islamic principles in the molding of their American Muslim identity. They have not deceived themselves into believing in the validity of the Secular Capitalist Islam that I spoke of so critically. They are not the target of my critique.

Did I really need to explicitly state that? I guess so.

Now, let me address the contentions of the good brother, beginning with his comparison of American Islam in its infancy to the growing pains that Muslims must have gone through in ‘traditional’ Muslim outlets such as Egypt, Morocco, or Pakistan.

“It is very easy and convenient to think of Egypt as a Muslim country now, but what was Egypt’s transition like, from a non-Muslim polity to a Muslim one? What struggles did Egypt have to go through to negotiate this transformation? Even to this day, there are folk holidays still in practice such as Shams an-Nasim.”

In my original post, I alluded to this point when I stated that “[American Islam] is NOT Islamic with simply an American twist, like what may be found in China or Indonesia or Africa – those instances of Islam were never born in such a hostile environment (to Islam in specific and religion in general), necessitating great conciliatory gestures from its followers”.

I am convinced that when Islam was introduced in the cases that I mentioned as well as Marc’s examples it was a completely different experience than what we are witnessing in America. The power politics were simply not the same, which makes the comparison between then and now as day and night.

Historically, Muslims never entered into a land except as victors. They never suffered from inferiority complexes. They rode into those lands with their heads high and their core values even higher. The indigenous non-Muslim masses were scrambling to adopt the ways of the Muslims in order to “jump on the bandwagon” of the winning side.

Need I ask, who is jumping on whose bandwagon nowadays?

And in those rare cases, where they were not the conquering force (e.g. Indonesia), they were not entering a hostile environment, where their beliefs were being demonized and their traditions were being belittled. Theirs was a pre-modern time where principled religious beliefs were celebrated and embraced, in stark contrast to the current-day atmosphere which finds an anti-religion secular worldview proudly boasted in America.

In such challenging circumstances, where not only Islam, but religion in general is under attack, how can American Islam be nurtured and allowed to blossom *on its own terms*? In such a charged environment, where American Muslims are told to choose a side, how can American Islam genuinely develop its own character? It is naïve to remove the political context from the equation when analyzing the introduction of Islam into new lands.

The other point that Marc brought up was the typical counter-argument presented whenever Muslims in America are criticized – “Well, look at the Muslims in [choose any Muslim country]. They’re even worse than us!”

Living here in Riyadh, I’ll be the first to admit that crass consumerism has hit the shores of Saudi Arabia in a disgusting way. And sadly, this is the case all over the Muslim world. Muslims are falling over each other to talk, walk, dress, and act like their Hollywood heroes. The ‘tradition’ of the West, as glorified in the media and the web, is being replicated all over the Muslim world.

But the key difference is that Muslims in these lands are not sacrificing their Islamic identity in pursuit of this hollow lifestyle. As repulsive as it may be to see Muslims opting for gaudy Bentleys and Guccis, jet-setting in Europe, and clubbing in Dubai, no one is attempting to incorporate these social mores into a new flavor of Islam.

And that is my greatest fear – an Islam that has taken such conciliatory steps in order to assimilate with its adopted culture that it has sacrificed core Islamic principles.

Yes, all the illnesses found in American Muslims are becoming apparent in Muslims around the world. But these other Muslims are not in the formative stage of their Islamic identity, this most critical stage in the development of a child, a people, or a civilization. These other Muslims have centuries of Islamic tradition to fall back on, when faced with a philosophical crisis. These other Muslims have Islamic institutions built on principles of truth, not compromise. These other Muslims never had to concern themselves with conflicting loyalties between their adopted nation and their deen.

What of the American Muslims?

As I was coming into my personal Islamic awareness many years ago, I was convinced that the light of Islam would reignite itself from within America, similar to how Prophet Musa (as) was raised and reared in the house of Pharoah. Back then, I viewed the Muslim world as backwards and in need of serious guidance – which American Muslims, stripped of cultural baggage and historical hiccups, would readily provide them.

But recently, I’ve begun to feel serious disillusionment with this entire “American Islam”* project.

Maybe it’s all the desperate talk of Islam being compatible with western democracy, which is in actuality a crooked corporatocracy.

Maybe it’s the post 9-11 lulling that saw so many Muslims tone down their stance against American's secular hedonistic ways and imperialistic aspirations out of fear of sounding unpatriotic.

Maybe it’s the unfounded need by American Muslims (under immense pressure from MSM and the American military industry) to constantly denounce terrorism and the unfortunate extension of this condemnation to now include Islamists, who, although having never partaken in acts of terrorism, have nonetheless incurred their wrath.

Maybe it’s the convenient acceptance by many American Muslims of principles of gender relations as understood by Western society, relegating centuries of Islamic tradition on the role of men and women to history’s dustbin.

Maybe it’s the glaring dilution of the Islamic concept of Jihad, or worse, its deliberate suppression altogether.

Maybe it’s the callous attitude of American Muslims striving for the American dream while participating in a system that is ravaging the entire world, politically, militarily, economically, and environmentally.

Maybe it’s the unquestioning adoption of capitalistic maxims which finds American Muslims enslaved by their struggles for better jobs, bigger homes, and nicer cars – all the while claiming to be adhering to the Sunnah of our Prophet (saw).

Whatever it is that’s causing my unease, my dear brother Yursil captured my feelings quite well with his recent posts on Suburban Capitalist Islam (Part 1 and Part 2). While he didn’t address all my grievances, he did well to introduce a long list of oddities found in American Islam.

I particularly like his characterization of American Muslims as naively accepting of their adopted culture, as long as it doesn’t outwardly contradict any Islamic teaching. This includes the whole McDonalds, blue jeans, and Hollywood outlook of American culture. The widely accepted view is that American Islam can be formulated by simply weeding out the haram components of American culture and freely embracing what remains.

The problem is that the ethos of these remains is not Islamic.

The result is not American Islam, but a twisted version that I prefer to call Secular Capitalist Islam (taken from Yursil's term 'Suburban Capitalist Islam'). This Islam is primarily American, with an Islamic veneer, not the other way around. It is NOT Islamic with simply an American twist, like what may be found in China or Indonesia or Africa – those instances of Islam were never born in such a hostile environment (to Islam in specific and religion in general), necessitating great conciliatory gestures from its followers:

Change can only come about by way of assimilation and integration - otherwise, we will be deemed foreigners, anarchists, or terrorists.
The interest-based banking system is too entrenched to be questioned – the best we can do is minimize our exposure.
The educational system is our fast-track to success, regardless of any negative socio-intellectual repercussions.
Mixing politics with religion is taboo.
Scaling the corporate ladder is the only way to prosperity.
Gluttonously living beyond our means is completely acceptable.
All technological advances must be blindly embraced, regardless of socio-spiritual impact.
All forms of entertainment (adapted to Islamic mores, of course) are a necessary release from the pressures accumulated in daily life - this includes movies, music, sports, vacations, etc.
Environmentalism is about reducing our ecological footprint, not reducing our consumption.

These are the views underlying Secular Capitalist Islam, the core of which is fundamentally at odds with the Quranic worldview. And no amount of window dressing can alter this reality.

Just like most everything else in American culture, we’ve opted for the drive-thru version of actualizing Islam in America. Our instant recipe consists of slapping on a hijab or growing a beard, implementing the personal acts of worship, meekly presenting Islam to our friends and coworkers, and attending feel-good weekend Islamic programs, all the while diving headfirst into the American way of life.

And yes, I am aware of the American Muslim mantra that we have greater religious freedom in the West than our counterparts in the Muslim world. That may be true. And if it is, it makes the sin of Secular Capitalist Islam even more egregious. For instead of using this freedom to become moral leaders in the West and challenge the status quo, American Muslims have chosen passivity and integration, fearful of the repercussions of speaking out.

Where is the sacrifice that is inherent in the declaration of Tauheed and rejection of Taghut?

Where is the sacrifice that is inherent in the proclamation of love for the Prophet (saw)?

Sadly, Secular Capitalist Islam has replaced these sacred endeavors with the very profane struggle for the American dream.

In part 2, I want to discuss the legacy our children will be inheriting from us, the founding fathers of Secular Capitalist Islam.
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*I place the term in quotes because I’m not comfortable with creating varying flavors of Islam, but since the term is commonly used by so many American Muslims, I’ve stuck with it.

There are no coincidences in life. None whatsoever. Every single event takes place for a reason.

A few days ago, I posted about the unfortunate loss of my wife's purse, which contained, among other items, her two credit cards.

Then today, I was listening to a lecturer talking on Riba (Interest/Usury) present his argument against keeping credit cards. And I must admit, to date, his argument has been the most effective one I've heard:

When signing up for a credit card, we all agree to pay the interest fees in case the full balance is not paid off after the first month. Many Muslims (including yours truly) convince themselves that everything is halal as long as the payment is made before the end of the month.

But in essence, would we ever sign a similar contract that required us to drink a glass of beer at the end of the month if we didn't pay the credit card balance?

Worse yet, would we ever sign a contract that required us to fornicate with our neighbor's wife if we didn't pay the credit card balance?

In reality, the contract we are signing with the credit card company is much worse than the above examples. So how can any sane Muslim ever sign the dotted line on a credit card contract?

Simple, yet powerful.

And with that short lesson I am able to connect a few more dots in my life. The loss of the credit cards combined with the effect of the lecture has inspired me to be rid of these shiny plastic devils once and for all.

Al-Jazeera recently exposed some US military personnel distributing Bibles and spreading the Gospel to locals in Afghanistan. The US Army denied the report citing quotes taken out of context and an overall misunderstanding, stating that "it is not our position to push any specific kind of religion."

Al-Jazeera fired back with this article, including an unedited video clip of various chaplains discussing their 'strategy'.

While this mindset is a bit annoying, I just don't get all the uproar over this sort of military preaching. What's the big deal? Isn't that what conquering forces do? Muslim forces did the same thing for centuries. Why should we cry foul?

What pisses me off is the absurd stance taken by the US Army. Why deny the existence of missionary efforts? It's such a farce how they present themselves as some benign, humane army, respectful of local customs and religions.

Get off your high horse. You people are no better than any other conquering force.

You see, I'm really not worried about folks in the Muslim world changing religions. I'm more bothered by the cultural and economical proselytizing that's long been taking place in places like Iraq and Afghanistan.

The US Forces are not Christian crusaders on a mission to convert or kill, as much as they're foot soldiers for free market capitalism and liberal values antithetical to local cultures.

If anything, THAT should be our greater concern.

It all started with my Saudi co-worker telling me how his wife reminds him of a GMC Suburban.

Odd, I thought to myself, I never considered it a compliment to describe one's wife as an oversized SUV, but hey, different folks, different strokes.

He continued by explaining the odyssey of his marriage, which began as it does for many youth - in need of money. But since the Shariah compliant banks don't offer straight up cash loans, he had to take a popular, alternative route.

He went to a dealership and financed the Suburban (valued at around 100,000 riyals) over a 5 year payment period. He explained how outside the dealership there are individuals with 'bags of money' waiting to buy your newly purchased vehicle (of course at a discounted rate).

The dealer sold the car, the middle man made his pretty profit, and best of all, my friend got the cash he needed to help him get married. Perfect!

Not really, I thought. Although each transaction is permissible in Islam, the entire transaction wreaks of a straight-up money for money loan (read: Riba) with the commodity (in this case the Suburban) thrown in as a mere formality.

But wait, it gets even better.

There are some banks here in Saudi that are using steel as the commodity in order to give out loans. It's the same as the example of the Suburban, except that man standing outside the parking lot with the money is taken out of the equation. The bank conveniently replaces him, ending up as both the seller and the buyer, all in order to allow you to get a halal cash loan.

Here's how their magic works: You walk into the bank needing say 50,000 riyals. The bank sells you 50,000 worth of steel for 60,000 over 5 years. Then they buy it back from you for 50,000. You walk out of the bank with 50,000 in hand and a debt of 60,000 to be paid over 5 years.

In fact, my friend told me that the steel actually does exist, in some warehouse outside Riyadh, in order to comply with the Shariah board's requirement. Someone he knows actually wanted to go out to see the steel in order to verify the 'validity' of the transaction and sure enough, the warehouse was there, full of steel. Some worker over there actually laughed how no one has ever come to visit the premises since its creation several years ago.

But I digress.

Now I'll be the first to admit that there are few topics as daunting, complex, and mysterious as Islamic finance - astrophysics and female psychology are two that immediately come to mind. But even I can understand that one of the fundamental principles of Islamic finance is that money can't be made from money. The Islamic economic system is a commodity-based system - transactions are based on buying and selling goods, not buying and selling money.

How in the world can these people convince themselves that they're partaking in a halal transaction?

In the end, I shake my head and think how fitting that a society that has made a sham of Islamic morality, has done the same to Islamic economics.

So is it just me or does anyone else see the eerie similarities between the actions described above and the actions of Bani Israel when they left their fishing nets out on the Sabbath, and returned the next day in order to collect the fish?

Both adhered to the letter of the law, while flaunting the spirit of the law.

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UPDATE: I did some more research and found that Saudi scholars have not sanctioned the second type of transaction, where the bank sells the commodity and then buys it back. However, they have approved of the first example (where the SUV is sold to a guy outside the bank).

Nonetheless, many banks in KSA perform both types of transaction, banking (pun intended) on the customer's ignorance of the fatwa details.

That being said, I still find it extremely questionable that I can walk into a bank, finance some steel (or rice or whatever) that everyone knows I will never use, and then walk out and sell it for straight up cash. Although it complies with all the Shariah requirements, it reminds me of the saying: If it walks like a duck and talks like a duck...

I've written on this before (here and here), but its worth repeating over and over again: American-style consumerism is a dangerous virus that is dragging the entire world down with them. The current financial crisis is merely the latest manifestation of the sickness. This article sums up the dilemma quite well - the pursuit of happiness has been replaced with the pursuit of comfort, the comfort supplied by gadgets and goods.

It's very interesting how he compares the Hajj stampedes to the recent stampede at Wal-Mart that killed one and injured several others. The religion of consumerism is no different than other religions, even celebrating its very own holidays (Black Friday).

One noteworthy difference is that extremism is much more rampant in the religion of the free market than other traditional religions.

However, the more crucial difference between the two, religion and consumerism, is that the latter simply can never provide true happiness. Goods need to constantly be replenished with newer goods:

"A consumer economy only works if consumption of goods provides only temporary pleasure. That is, if happiness is infinitely deferred, so that buyers continue to buy more and more goods and services. By definition, the consumer can never be satisfied, at rest or happy. Which means she will always feel lacking. The pursuit of this sort of happiness creates a vicious circle of growing anxiety and dissatisfaction."

He concludes by hitting the nail on the head when he describes the sheer shallowness propagated by the preachers of consumerism with the Seinfeld analogy:

"We are like the 30-something characters in Seinfeld, who know they are immature, who know they are avoiding the responsibility of building meaningful relationships and of leading meaningful lives - and who don't really care."

On a related not, I was a bit perturbed by the always entertaining Haleem who recently made a comment on the sad life suffered by villagers back in his home country of Bangladesh:

"Anything happens in the village the whole village will gather to watch. Seriously. They have no life, poor people"

That overly simple life that some may look down upon is no worse than the exciting, happening life we are mired in.

In this short yet comprehensive interview with Wayne Madsen, he provides an excellent 5min summary on the major players involved in the Congo crisis. Plus he provides this little tidbit:

"It's much easier to loot a country when it has a destabilized government and various warring factions. You don't have to deal with one central government - you can deal with whatever warlord is controlling whatever diamond or gold mine you're trying to exploit."

That's exactly what I wrote in a previous post where I detailed the roots of the war in Congo.

BTW, be sure to bookmark the Real News Network. They've got amazing news reports with perspectives you'll never find in the MSM.

If you never understood the concept of Disaster Capitalism, the raging conflict in DR Congo is a textbook case.

More than 80 per cent of the world's coltan is in Africa, and 80 percent of that lies in territory controlled by DR Congo's various ragtag rebel groups, armed militia and its corrupt and underfunded national army. Coltan is a key ingredient in the production of electronic devices such as laptops, personal digital assistant, and mobile phones. Additionally, the country has rich deposits of diamonds, gold, cobalt, timber, and other natural resources.

"the Democratic Republic of Congo has the world’s purest and largest deposits of strategic minerals, including gold, coltan, niobium, cobalt, heterogenite, columbite (columbium-tantalite or coltan), copper and iron. Heterogenite exports coming out of Congo are alone valued at between $260 million (at $20/lb.) and $408 million (at $30/lb.) every month. That’s between 3.1 and 4.9 billion dollars a year. Diamonds account for another billion dollars annually. Oil has been pumping off the Atlantic Coast for decades, but now oil and gas deposits are being exploited from the great lakes border region—Lake Kivu (methane gas) and Lake Albert (oil)—and deep in the province of Equateur. And then there are the dark rainforest woods that sell by the thousands monthly for around $6000 to $12000 per log." [source]

With the re-surge in violence in DR Congo over the past weeks, it presents us with another opportunity to revisit Naomi Klein's Disaster Capitalism.

Basically the theory starts off acknowledging that old-school colonialism is long dead and new-age colonialism (Iraq) is too costly. Thus new ways have to be created to continue feeding the insatiable capitalist system. The newest way is to either wait for a disaster to strike (Katrina, tsunami) or initiate/agitate for one (civil war, invasion) and then send in the economic vultures to scoop up the natural resources at bargain basement prices. The West as well as newcomer China have become masters in exploiting the shock of the victim for their economic gain.

"If the Congo were at peace and able to hold democratic elections, its citizens might gain control over its resources, either by claiming national ownership (as Iran and Venezuela do with their oil) or by regulating the multinational companies that seek to profit from those resources. The violent atmosphere, however, makes it impossible for the Congolese government to challenge corruption within or to exert any authority over multinationals seeking profits. It is thus in the interest of the multinational companies to keep the Congo at war.

And this intentional destabilization is precisely what has been happening. A panel of experts set up by the UN Security Council in 2000 issued a series of reports over the next few years describing how networks of high-level politicians from Congo and neighboring countries, military officers, and business people collaborated with various rebel groups to fuel violence in order to gain control over Congo's resources. For example, in 2002 the UN panel noted that as much as 60 to 70 percent of coltan in eastern Congo was mined under the surveillance of the Rwandan military, using the forced labor of Rwandan prisoners.

A 2003 follow-up report by the panel listed eighty-five multinational companies that had profited from the war in Congo, including six U.S.-owned companies: Cabot Corporation, Eagle Wings Resources International (a subsidiary of Trinitech International), Kemet Electronics Corporation, OM Group, and Vishay Sprague." [source]

The chaos has not only been taken advantage of by these corporations, but has also been spurred on by them. What is commonly written off as internal tribal strife or a primitive war over land, the complex conflict in central Africa is much more indicting of the western corporatocracy.

By enlisting the services of Rwanda and Uganda, long time allies of the US, to maintain an atmosphere of political instability and civil strife, business interests remain protected.

"Rwanda and Uganda are allies of the United States, some would even say they are client states to US and British interests. Both countries receive financial and military aid from the United States, World Bank and other Western institutions. This aid has continued unabated even during the invasions of the Congo. During a Congressional Hearing in 2001 held by Congresspersons Tom Tancredo and Cynthia McKinney, it was documented by experts under oath that the US provided military aid to Rwanda during its first invasion of Congo in 1996." [source]

"A 2003 United Nations investigation into the illegal exploitation of natural resources accused both Rwanda and Uganda of prolonging their armed incursions into Congo in order to continue their plunder." [source]

Another angle often overlooked in the analysis is that of the contracts signed between multinationals and DR Congo - contracts heavily favoring the corporations.

As stated in this video report by Dan Rather, in 2005 the cash-strapped Congolese government signed unbalanced contracts handing over share of its mineral-rich mines to no less than 60 foreign companies. These deals were so rotten that even the World Bank, themselves notorious for privatizing national resources the world over, criticized their "complete lack of transparency" and stated that the government "may not have received the full value of the mines".

He also reports how the US embassy in DR Congo had a strong role in pushing one of those crooked deals through, involving Arizona-based Freeport-McMoran, one of the largest copper companies in the world. US support didn't just stop there. A US government agency by the name of Overseas Private Investment Corporation (OPIC) supported Freeport with $400million of financing for the projects.

However, those contracts are now under investigation by Congolese president Joseph Kabila.

"In a 2002 report, the U.N. alleged that many foreign mining companies, eager to exploit the lack of a strong central government in Kinshasa and avoid paying fair market value and taxes on the minerals they extracted, signed contracts with commanders from the invading countries as well as with then-President Laurent Kabila, who was struggling to cling to power in the face of the international onslaught. These contracts almost universally favored the mining companies. That is, until May of last year. In a move that sent ripples through the DRC mining community, the government announced that 63 mining contracts, many of them signed during the civil war of the late '90s, would be reviewed by a special ministerial committee." [source]

One wonders whether the current violence in DR Congo has anything to do with the review undertaken by the current Kabila administration of those 60+ mining contracts.

"Kabila’s government has taken the opportunity of a major review of mining contracts to terminate contracts with US, European and Australian companies in favour of Chinese firms. Few companies are prepared to discuss their position in Congo, but those under threat include First Quantum Minerals, Freeport McRoRan, BHP Billiton and Anvil Mining. Vast mineral reserves may be handed over to Chinese firms in the government review." [source]

So folks, be on the lookout for any military intervention sponsored by the UN, the US, or Europe. After all, business interests must be protected.

'Any armed “humanitarian” mission to Congo would be a thin disguise for a naked imperialist intervention that was intent on pillaging the resources of this mineral rich country.' [source]

Antonio Guterres, United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees reminded the world in his January 2008 interview with the Financial Times of London that “The international community has systematically looted the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) and we should not forget that.”

Let us not forget that the root of the conflict in DR Congo is not a civil war. It is not local tribes jostling for control of subsurface resources. It is not about redressing injustices carried out in the Rwanda genocide (as justified by Rwanda president Kagame who has 'has vowed to root out the Hutu militias from eastern Congo').

It is a contrived conflict intent on destabilizing the region and shocking the locals while the international community plunders and loots.

Last night, Riz Khan, who is Al-Jazeera's counter to CNN's Larry King, interviewed John Perkins, a former economic hit man.

Not sure what an Economic Hit Man (EHM) is? Neither was I until Perkins laid it out for a dummy like me to understand:

"There were two primary objectives of my work. First I was to justify huge international loans that would funnel money to Main and other US companies (such as Bechtel, Halliburton, Stone & Webster and Brown & Root) through massive engineering and construction projects. Second, I would work to bankrupt the countries that received those loans . . . so they would be forever beholden to their creditors, and so they would present easy targets when we [the US] needed favours, including military bases, UN votes or access to oil and other natural resources."
- Excerpt from Confessions of an Economic Hit Man

Here's the bigger picture of how EHM's work to permanently cripple a nation's economy:

1. Economic hit men, working for imperialistic engines of capitalism (otherwise known as the American empire, the G8 nations, and their multinational corporations) identify impoverished nations in need of major development of their infrastructure.

2. Using vehicles such as the IMF, USAID, and the World Bank, they generously make billion dollar loans to Country X to help develop and advance the nation. In addition, they are nice enough to generate complex plans of national development to help guide the locals.

3. However, since the country has no homegrown industries to actually carry out said programs of development, America and its cohorts will contract out the services to their own corporations. Thus the loans go directly from the Western governments back to Western corporations, with some skimming off the top by corrupt local officials in Country X.

4. Once the billions have been squandered, normally on special pet projects that only benefit the select few, Country X is hamstrung for the next century struggling to pay off the loans. This means that domestic funds which normally would have gone to provide basic services to the locals are now rerouted to the coffers of the West.

5. But the altruistic West is not done screwing, er I mean saving, Country X. They kindly propose to bail out Country X by waving some of the loans, but with a few minor strings attached. For example, Country X must cease to provide governmental subsidies to local industries and at the same time open the doors to free trade by doing away with tariffs and other trade barriers, essentially destroying any chance of sustainable livelihood by its citizens. Or another example would be Country Y has to sell natural resources A, B, and C or O, I, and L at below-market cost to the West.

And there you go, five easy steps to eternal financial debt and a grim future of poverty and despair for every developing and under-developed country.

And before you accuse me of propogating conspiracy theories and freemasonry crap, this stuff is pure and simple capitalistic greed.

The same inertia that powered the American auto industry to destroy the public transit system and is currently undermining the hybrid car is behind the EHM phenomenon. And its that same mentality that prevents the billion-dollar pharmaceuticals from allowing cheap generic drugs to enter the markets of the Third World.

These imperialistic engines of capitalism are very real and very ugly.