Nada,
I'm not sure you're representing the position accurately of Shiite
muslims. Far from all muslims take offense. Many, but not all Sunnis
do, and some, but not nearly as many Shiite's do. Furthermore, I'm not
sure I believe you are in a position to state that there will be no
demonstrations. There have already been demonstrations, as reported in
the news. You cannot predict the future, and is both folly and
dangerous to give assurances that you have no ability to uphold.
Finally, I would appreciate that the conference organizers not dismiss
something that potentially could affect the safety of conference
goers, and not assume that skepticism and criticism equates to poor
knowledge of Islamic belief, or uncivilized behavior. That was
dangerously prevelant within the Alexandria bid team during the
Wikimania bids, it's dangerously prevalent in Egypt's demonstrations
(and official state action, no less) today, and it seems borderline
prevalent in the tone of your post.
When the government of the country that we are hosting a major
conference in, completely bans the sale of foreign newspapers for
displaying pictures of Muhammed, and chastises the ambassadors from
other countries for doing so, we have every right to be concerned
about the status and safety of Wikimania. And we have every right to
express our dismay in the heavy-handed censorship displayed by the
Egyptian government, censorship which is fundamentally opposed to
Wikimedia principles.
-Dan
On Feb 20, 2008, at 6:26 PM, Nada RADY wrote:
Dear all,
I’m Nada, one of the organizing committee in Egypt, and I'd like to
give some comments on the issue brought up here, as I can see some
points are misunderstood from some parties.
Firstly, I’d like to clarify why there was that ‘strong’ reaction
towards the pictures being published on Wikipedia’s article, it’s
just because Prophet Mohamed is considered the most complete human
being ever created and that belief exists at the heart of all
Muslims. Pictures of him mainly when not even close to reality being
drawn by painters ages after he died, is widely rejected among
Muslims (Sunni specifically), for example, I have never seen those
drawings but on the pages of Wikipedia! And I think that major part
of the Egyptian people and Islamic countries will think of the issue
in a much different way than you do see, I hope you got what I mean.
Here in Egypt, We shall not be expecting any demonstrations before
or even during Wikimania, and we can just assure you that those
circumstances won't harm the event activities or personals. What
have made me say so is our experiences in previous conferences that
may have had much stronger contradictions with Egyptian attitude.
Finally, I would appreciate that we won’t make a big deal of this
issue if we’re all looking forward for the success of this
conference, I hope this would be resolved in a civilized way on this
mailing list that reflects good knowledge about Islamic beliefs and
freedom of speech in the same time, which don’t contradict at all
with each other if both are understood well.Best Regards,Nada Rady
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