(Mohammed cartoon by ex-Muslim dissident artist Bosch Fawstin.)
You don’t need to go to Afghanistan or Doha to find Islamic Sharia law being enforced, complete with penalties for blasphemy.
You can find it right here in America.
This story took place at Hamline University in Saint Paul where punishing blasphemy has made a comeback courtesy of woke administrators, Islamist staffers and Muslim Brotherhood front groups.
A faculty member had included in their global survey of art history a session on Islamic art, which offered an optional visual analysis and discussion of a famous medieval Islamic painting of the Prophet Muhammad. A student complained about the image’s inclusion in the course and led efforts to press administrators for a response. After that, the university’s associate vice president of inclusive excellence (AVPIE) declared the classroom exercise “undeniably inconsiderate, disrespectful and Islamophobic.”
Neither before nor after these declarations was the faculty member given a public platform or forum to explain the classroom lecture and activity. To fill in the gap, on Dec. 6, an essay written by a Hamline professor of religion who teaches Islam explaining the incident along with the historical context and aesthetic value of Islamic images of Muhammad was published on The Oracle’s website. The essay was taken down two days later. One day after that, Hamline’s president and AVPIE sent a message to all employees stating that “respect for the observant Muslim students in that classroom should have superseded academic freedom.” The essay’s censorship and the subsequent email by two top university administrators raise serious concerns about freedom of speech and academic freedom at the university.
The instructor was released from their spring term teaching at Hamline, and its AVPIE went on the record as stating: “It was decided it was best that this faculty member was no longer part of the Hamline community.” In other words, an instructor who showed an Islamic painting during a visual analysis — a basic exercise for art history training — was publicly impugned for hate speech and dismissed thereafter, without access to due process.
The Oracle provides more context. And a process that looks more like Pakistan than America.
Along with the involvement of the Muslim Students Association, an Islamist campus hate group whose chapters have been linked to the Muslim Brotherhood and antisemitic acts.
The Oracle has since learned that the event in question occurred on Oct. 6, when a professor shared two depictions of the Prophet Muhammad in class, while discussing Islamic art. One was a 14th century depiction of the Prophet and the other was a 16th century depiction of the Prophet with veil and halo.
Within Islam, there are varying beliefs regarding whether the representation of the Prophet Muhammad is acceptable. The majority of those practicing Islam today believe it is forbidden to see and create representations of Prophet Muhammad.
That’s because the majority are Sunnis. Shiites are more relaxed about it. But woke academics pander to Sunni Islamists and have been prepped to treat any depiction of a genocidal pedophile warlord as a hate crime.
Aram Wedatalla, a Hamline senior and the president of Muslim Student Association (MSA), was in the class at the time the photos were shared.
“I’m like, ‘this can’t be real,’” Wedatalla told the Oracle. “As a Muslim, and a black person, I don’t feel like I belong, and I don’t think I’ll ever belong in a community where they don’t value me as a member, and they don’t show the same respect that I show them.”
Deangela Huddleston, a Hamline senior and MSA member, also shared her thoughts with the Oracle.
“Hamline teaches us it doesn’t matter the intent, the impact is what matters,” Huddleston said.
Wedatalla emailed MSA’s leadership team and members of the Hamline administration on Oct. 7, the day after the incident. On this same day, she met with President Fayneese Miller. Dean of Students Patti Kersten also called Wedatalla and apologized for her experience.
Note the MSA part. This was a hit organized by a campus chapter of an Islamist organization that believes in the supremacy of Islamic law over civil rights.
Aram Wedatalla is a Sudanese immigrant who is now imposing Islamic law, as is the norm in Sudan, on Americans.
What did the professor really do that was so offensive? Nothing from an American standpoint. But the instructor’s real offense was challenging Islamism by suggesting that there were different approaches.
That’s the sort of thing that gets you beheaded.
In the video of the class, the professor gives a content warning and describes the nature of the depictions to be shown and reflects on their controversial nature for more than two minutes before advancing to the slides in question.
The Oracle was able to identify these two images using video of the lecture. The first was a 14th century depiction of the Prophet receiving his first revelation from the archangel Gabriel, created by Rashīd al-Dīn, a Persian Muslim scholar and historian.
The other depicts the Prophet with a veil and halo. It was created by Mustafa ibn Vali in the 16th century as part of an illustration of the Siyer-i Nebi (the Life of the Prophet), an earlier, Ottomon Turkish epic work on the life of Muhammad.
“I am showing you this image for a reason. And that is that there is this common thinking that Islam completely forbids, outright, any figurative depictions or any depictions of holy personages. While many Islamic cultures do strongly frown on this practice, I would like to remind you there is no one, monothetic Islamic culture,” the professor said before changing to the slide that included these depictions.
In the Oct. 8 email to Wedatalla, the professor stated that they “[let] the class know ahead of time” what would be shown and to give students time to turn off their video.
“I did not try to surprise students with this image, and I did my best to provide students with an ‘out,’” the professor wrote in the email.
“I also described every subsequent slide I showed with language to indicate when I was no longer showing an image of the Prophet Muhammad. I am sorry that despite my attempt to prevent a negative reaction, you still viewed and were troubled by this image.”
With Islamists embedded as social justice activists and the MSA, the professor’s fate was sealed.
MSA students and their advisor Nur Mood, Assistant Director of Social Justice Programs and Strategic Relations, met with members of the administration on Oct. 10 to discuss the incident and how to move forward.
“This [incident is] much deeper and it’s something that in a million years, I never expected that it would happen here at Hamline. I hope this is the last time I see something similar to this,” Mood said in a Dec. 2 interview with the Oracle. “There’s a lot of apologies all happening, but the harm’s done. I think we should have started more focused about the healing process.”
Healing from the experience of religious dissent. Do we live in an Islamic theocracy? How is it possible to deny it.
The professor of the class emailed Wedatalla that Saturday, Oct. 8.
“I would like to apologize that the image I showed in class on [Oct. 6] made you uncomfortable and caused you emotional agitation. It is never my intention to upset or disrespect students in my classroom,” the professor wrote in the email to Wedatalla, who shared it with the Oracle.
Apologies, of course are futile. The goal is to take heads and impose Sharia.
The Nov. 7 email from the Dean of Students also outlined a plan to address Islamophobia, with steps including an in-progress forum on Islamophobia and a reporting form. In the future, the responses to “bias and hate incidents” will come from the Office of Inclusive Excellence, Everett wrote.
Kersten noted that Hamline is in the process of rolling out a “diversity component” for new students beyond orientation. Mood suggested that all faculty could be required to take a training on Islamophobia.
Mandatory Islamist indoctrination for every student. Are we living in Afghanistan?
As of Dec. 6, it is unclear what process the professor was afforded to respond to allegations.
Faculty received an email on Nov. 29 from the Office of Inclusive Excellence regarding this semester’s final Community Conversation which will focus on Islamophobia. This event will be led by Jaylani Hussein, the Executive Director of Minnesota’s chapter of the Council on American Islamic Relations.
Mood recognizes that this is only another step in the process of making the campus more inclusive.
“I work with the leadership team, to make Hamline a place that Muslims – faculty, staff or students – are proud of and I want to be part of that. I’m very optimistic about this and hopefully we’ll get to that place,” Mood said.
Where’s FIRE, the ACLU and all the academic freedom people on this? Or do they only care when elementary school teachers are restricted from promoting sex and dangerous hormone treatments to first graders?
Creeping Sharia.
Bosch is great.
Got me thinking of how this might affect teaching at art schools.
Bosch is indeed
Islamic art is largely reduced to Koranic calligraphy so that the infidels rewrite the koran
I had an art instructor who was trying to bring Islamic into her teaching. I didn’t much of the try, as I knew more about her method – and could point an equally as rich tradition native to the European experience. Think Book of Kells, and go from there. And could say this same tradition was more ‘welcoming’ of the Islamic background then anything from Islam.
It ought to go without saying, I was not ‘popular’ with her. But, she did ask me to take her non-Western art history course. Simple. It would have been her and me covering the dialogue in a classroom with the rest of the class listening. Sorry to say – I didn’t take her up on the request. Nothing against the course. I love the arts from India, and having an more than general interest in China, and especially Japan.
But – I am not interested in being converted to the religion of ‘west is bad’.
“inclusive excellence”. The corruption of our language continues apace.
just assume that the newspeak means the opposite of its linguistic meaning
“I’m like, ‘this can’t be real,’” Wedatalla told the Oracle. “As a Muslim, and a black person, I don’t feel like I belong, and I don’t think I’ll ever belong in a community where they don’t value me as a member, and they don’t show the same respect that I show them.”
Simple solution. Leave the community.
he’s got a simpler solution, making it his community and pushing us out
From the article it seems that the depictions were made not by Jews or Christians or even atheists. They were made by practising Muslims who themselves are part of the Muslim community. What this proves is that there is not one monolithic Muslim point of view on this. To satisfy all points of view is impossible. what if there is a Christian that objects to a free discussion on the various depictions of Jesus at the Council of Nicea in a course on Christan history? Or a Jew that objects to any nonorthodox Jews being called Jewish? If one is not comfortable on a subject and prefers to obtain their learning by studying just what their own interpretation of their religon prescribes, then they are free to opt out of an academically free course. No one forces anyone to participate in things they don’t want to. The students were notified of the subject matter in advance and it seems that they decided to force a confrontation.
This is typical for how Islam is treated by Dhimmis. If not, Sharia enforcement presents the revelation that the artist has drawn his own conclusion, if they catch him (OSP=Old Style Pronoun).
Muslim students take an art class but they do not want to see art?
Other faiths have sensibilities regarding some depictions but being sincere about do not to go where these are presented.
This is just another set up to gripe, play the victim, yet bully and dominate.
SUE, SUE, SUE !
all you need to read to be informed as to what the muslim brotherhood and their ilk are up to is a book recently published ” the secret apparatus ” by cynthia farahat . you will then understand completely how the u.s. has been white anted with the help of democrats and republicans . americans are on their own with no one to have their back , its only down hill from here .
This silly issue will provide gainful employment for several lawyers.
Actually, Hamline has a good reputation in that alumni normally find it easy to find employment – or have done up to now.
Where’s FIRE, the ACLU and all the academic freedom people on this? MIA, Sadly America is no longer is the land of the free and the home of the brave. You can’t blame Aram Wedatalla a Sudanese immigrant or MSA students. They are doing what they believe it is true. America you invited them here and they came. And now you have to live with their demands. America look at the mirror. You asked for it.
Muzzies can’t take a joke or urchin of anything else civilized.
*”much of anything else civilized”
Sad, but indicative of the intolerant mindset common to those with certain rigid beliefs, part of which is their conviction of the superiority of those beliefs, and the political activism which comes with it. Contrast this with the truly American way of allowing each person to have their beliefs as long as they don’t interfere with those of others. These foreign students do not understand the principle of freedom of religion and how it operates here. American freedom includes the freedom to object, and to walk away from what you do not like. One might say, if you like Sudanese sharia law so much, why did you come to America? America’s freedom of expression, enshrined in our Constitution, has allowed individuals and groups to flourish despite not everyone having the same exact beliefs, with great rewards for those who are able to develop tolerance of differences. Some religions do not value this type of freedom, and we see the results in this situation. Again, a sad thing, but hey, as someone said, better these people go back to where they came from instead of trying to change America to their land of origin. .
America values freedom above religion. Nobody has a right to demand to be treated with respect. If you have a problem with that then get the F out and go back to your S hole country. Here’s a little something for you:
Mohammed sucks Allah’s penis ! Eat excitement immigrant scum.
America values freedom above religion. Nobody has a right to demand to be treated with respect. If you have a problem with that then get the f out and go back to your Shit hole country. We must ban all immigration permanently. The 1965 Civil Rights Act was treasonous. We’ve doubled pur population with immigration in less than 60 years. The Statue Of Liberty is a Freemasonic abomination and should be removed. Anyone at Front Page who blocks this comment is a God Damn Hypocrite.
Censorship is for losers. Front Page removed my insult of Mohammed and Allah. Pussies. If Muslims want respect they have to convince people to give it to them.
I do not agree with this instructor being fired. I believe one can be for free speech without being phobic towards a faith that one may be questioning. In this case Islam.
Your last paragraph to me is as troubling as what happened to this instructor. Elementary teachers are not PROMOTING sex or hormonal therapy. I hope you are not the opposite side of the same coin. Would you encourage teachers to be fired if they teach comprehensive sex education classes? Or to not have sex Ed taught in schools? Maybe I am not reading it correctly.
Tim