In Harmonium

Posted By Marc on April 14, 2010

Well, once again one of the primary characteristics of fanatical fundamentalists, in the pejorative sense, has shown up.  CBC announced that several of the radical Islamist groups in Somalia have banned music from being played on the radio stations there on the grounds that it is “un-Islamic”.  As the story noted:

Hosts at Mogadishu’s 14 radio stations said they had to comply, because those who didn’t were threatened with punishment.

“Today we see an official crackdown on the independent media.… The local radio stations stopped playing any kind of music or songs after the deadline given by the Islamists came to an end,” said Mohamed Ibrahim, an official of the National Union of Somali Journalists.

That characteristic, by the way, is a simple one whereby one group denies another group the ability to do something on pain of force.  What these fanatics don’t realize is that a lack of listening to music (or watching television in the case of Afghans under the Taliban), only produces a false sense of agreement along with a lot of distaste and anger.  This is conversion by terror, not by choice.

Category: Music
Tags: Music, Somalia