November 7, 2008
The Obama Nations
[Originally published in Hürriyet Daily News]
WASHINGTON - In his recent book, “The Obama Nation,” conservative pundit Jerome Robert Corsi was criticizing the growing popularity of the then Democratic presidential candidate. If he wants to keep on, he might now consider writing a sequel: “The Obama Nations.” For now not just millions of Americans, but also billions of foreigners are inspired by the hope that the African-American president-elect spreads.
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Posted by Mustafa Akyol at 2:48 PM | Comments (2)
November 5, 2008
The Right Man at The Right Time
[Originally published in Hürriyet Daily News]
WASHINGTON – On the very last night of his tireless, 21-month-long campaign for the presidency, Senator Barack Obama, who is now appropriately termed “President-elect,” spoke to a huge crowd in Manassas, Virginia. In a vast open field, he found almost 100,000 people who had been waiting for hours to hear his voice. And I was among them.
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Posted by Mustafa Akyol at 4:32 PM | Comments (0)
November 3, 2008
The Campaign of Change and Hope
[Originally published in Hürriyet Daily News]
VIRGINIA - The young African-American lady at the national headquarters of the Democratic Party in Washington DC is like a commander in chief. As groups of young and dedicated supporters of Barack Obama line up in front of her booth, she gives them orders to follow. “You need to go all the way to Richmond,” she says to a group of five, “Barack needs you there.”
This is one of the hundreds of spots throughout the United States at which Obama supporters are organized for “canvassing,” i.e., door to door lobbying for the presidential elections. Other presidential candidates, including Obama’s rival John McCain, have used canvassing too, but many political commentators agree that the Obama campaign has been the most efficient one in American political history in rallying and organizing so many people on such a big scale.
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Posted by Mustafa Akyol at 4:42 PM | Comments (0)
October 12, 2008
Will Non-Muslims Go to Heaven, Too?
[Originally published in Turkish Daily News]
WARSAW – I was walking heedlessly in the Old Quarter of the Polish capital last Sunday until I saw a group of joyful singers on the street. Then I stopped and stared. They were about a dozen young Poles who were singing and clapping in the middle of a busy street and in the midst of a bitter cold. Soon, I realized that their art was very much related to their faith. As evangelical Catholics — a category which I just learnt that exits — they were praising God and calling on other people to do the same.
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Posted by Mustafa Akyol at 1:04 PM | Comments (14)
Good Morning Capitalist Vietnam
[Originally published in Turkish Daily News]
HO CHI MINH CITY - Some of the most striking images of the ’70s were from the fall of Saigon to the North Vietnamese forces. After a bloody war that lasted for two decades, the Vietcong had finally captured this capital city of U.S.-supported South Vietnam in April 1975. While the Americans were hastily evacuating their personnel, the gates of the Presidential Palace, which used to host the pro-U.S. leaders of the south, were crushed by tanks of the People’s Army of Vietnam. It was a victorious day for communism — and a tragic one for capitalism.
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Posted by Mustafa Akyol at 11:21 AM | Comments (0)
September 20, 2008
Let's Get Over With This Crusade-Phobia
[Originally published in Turkish Daily News]
The most tragic-comic news story of this week came from the central Anatolian town of Kayseri. A film crew was shooting a documentary about the medieval past of the town, and they decided to use the city's ancient castle as a stage. But when they put a Crusader's banner, a white plate with a red cross, on the walls, all hell broke loose. Dozens of Kayserians gathered under the castle to protest against the irritating banner. This is Turkey, one man yelled angrily, and we want only the Turkish flag.
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Posted by Mustafa Akyol at 2:47 PM | Comments (1)
September 13, 2008
The Protocols of The Learned Elders of Globalization
[Originally published in Turkish Daily News]
BRUSSELS -Turkey's Kemalo-nationalists, who think that globalization is a heinous conspiracy against the Turkish nation-state, would be absolutely horrified if they were here these days: The capital of Europe is hosting a global event which not only asserts the inevitable progress of globalization, but also celebrates the rise of "inter-dependence." For those Turks who are obsessed with their country's "full independence" and "untouched sovereignty," this, I am sure, will sound like the voice of evil. Yet it is simply the echo of reality.
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Posted by Mustafa Akyol at 4:50 PM | Comments (1)
May 15, 2008
God Save The Queen, Indeed
[Originally published in Turkish Daily News]
The first time I went abroad, I was 16, and my destination was Britain. My parents had sent me to spend a summer in London, so that I could improve my English and “see the world.” Staying at a warm family house in Richmond, and touring the whole city almost everyday, I had cultivated a beginner's admiration for Her Majesty's country. Actually, at first sight, there were few oddities. I could never understand, for example, why their washbasins had two separate taps, through which you either freeze or burn. But the plus side was dominant.
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Posted by Mustafa Akyol at 10:13 AM | Comments (3)
March 27, 2008
The Religious Way to The Open Society
[Originally published in Turkish Daily News]
NEW YORK – Peter Berger, one of the world’s leading authorities on sociology of religion, put in a nutshell what all secularists, and especially Turkey’s fuming ones, should get. “Modernization does not necessarily secularize societies,” the Boston University professor noted, “it rather pluralizes them.”
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Posted by Mustafa Akyol at 10:13 PM | Comments (2)
December 29, 2007
Reflections On The Devolution In France
[Originally published in Turkish Daily News]
Chou En-Lai, the late prime minister of communist China, was once asked what he thought about the French Revolution. He declined to comment, and explained, “It's too early to tell.”
That was in the early 1960s. Perhaps today it is a little bit less early to comment on whether the French Revolution really was a good idea. That seminal event – which inspired not just the French but also many other revolutionaries in many countries all around the world, including Turkey – has borne some notable fruits by which we might judge their political roots.
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Posted by Mustafa Akyol at 9:39 AM | Comments (9)
September 28, 2007
Cartoons of Muhammad and Clash of Civilizations
[Originally published in in Swedish in the Göteborg-Posten, and Turkish Daily News ]
As if we haven't had enough troubles with the Danish cartoon crisis of 2005, yet another one erupted recently in Sweden. Artist Lars Vilks pictured a cartoon showing Prophet Muhammad's head on the body of a dog, and the daily Nerikes Allehanda published it Aug. 19. Not too surprisingly, many Muslims found the depiction highly insulting. Demonstrators took the streets in Pakistan and burnt a Swedish flag. Egypt, Pakistan and Iran made diplomatic protests. And just recently, Al Qaeda in Iraq offered a $100,000 reward for anyone who kills Vilks.
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Posted by Mustafa Akyol at 12:01 PM | Comments (1)
March 25, 2007
'300': Orientalism (and Fascist Aesthetics) for Beginners
[Originally published in Turkish Daily News]
This week I went to see the new chic movie, "300," which tells the story of the ancient Spartans' last stand against an invading Persian army. Yet what I have found in the film was, besides all the spectacular photography, a crude Orientalism and a thinly veiled fascism.
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Posted by Mustafa Akyol at 10:02 AM | Comments (29)
November 28, 2006
Intelligent Design in Turkey: Up-and-coming
A Reuters news story titled " Creation vs. Darwin takes Muslim twist in Turkey " has also noted the advance of ID in this country. It reads:
"Intelligent Design (ID), a more recent argument about life's origins that is championed by U.S. Christian groups, may also be making the leap across the Atlantic. ID says some organisms are too complex to have evolved without some superior cause, but avoids calling that cause God because that would ban it from U.S. science textbooks.[Mustafa] Akyol, a Muslim believer who says Darwinism is incompatible with his faith, has been waging an uphill struggle to popularize ID here. But most Turks show no interest because they see no need to avoid naming God. His lonely campaign got an unexpected boost last month when Education Minister Huseyin Celik hinted on television that he might want to see it added to Turkish textbooks."If it's wrong to say Darwin's theory should not be in the books because it is in line with atheist propaganda, we can't disregard intelligent design because it coincides with beliefs of monotheistic religions about creation," he told CNN Turk."
Yes, ID is making progress in Turkey — and this is only the beginning!
Posted by Mustafa Akyol at 5:22 PM | Comments (0)
December 1, 2004
Show Us More of The Other America
[Originally published in The American Enterprise magazine, also available in PDF]
"Why do you hate us?" Since the horrendous events of 9/11, Americans have been posing that question to Muslims across the globe. The first answer from someone like me, who is repulsed by terrorists who kill in the name of Islam, is that most of us do not hate you. Yet it must be acknowledged that radical Muslim rage is real in many countries.
This rage is often irrational and ill founded. There is, however, one crucial source of anti-Americanism that is built on a genuine threat. Many Muslims are put off by the moral decline that seems to have pervaded American culture during the second half of the twentieth century. They worry that it will be exported to their own children and societies.
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Posted by Mustafa Akyol at 12:25 AM | Comments (3)
September 14, 2004
Why Muslims Should Support Intelligent Design
[Originally published in Islam Online]
I have traveled a lot around the US and the UK, lecturing to Muslim audiences. One common trait I have noticed is the concern Muslims feel for the future of their children. Several conferences I attended had topics such as "Saving Our Families" or "How To Raise Our Children As Good Muslims." The reason for this concern is obvious: These Muslim families are living in a highly secularized society that has cultural traits that are destructive to traditional values. The profane culture of MTV, pornography, consumerism and hedonism — what political scientist Benjamin Barber calls the "The McWorld" — is at odds with Muslim values.
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Posted by Mustafa Akyol at 4:41 PM | Comments (3)
