Delicious LiveJournal Links for 12-21-2010

[andrewducker]

• Wow. There's a Qur'an etched in Saddam Hussein's blood. That's incredibly something-or-other.
  (tags: iraq islam religion blood quran saddam)
• British gay marriage rights battle takes to European courts
  (tags: rights uk lgbt marriage)
• Product placement on British TV gets go-ahead
  (tags: advertising tv uk)

Comments

[bart-calendar.livejournal.com]

If you air any American shows you are already getting product placement filled television. Or, really, if you guys air any American movies.

[a-pawson.livejournal.com]

On some shows they blur out products and logos when they are broadcast in the UK. I know on American Idol they blur out the drinks containers and on some other shows they actually blur out logos on clothes the actors are wearing. I suppose it's only a matter of time before they are able to digitally replace those with other products.

[bart-calendar.livejournal.com]

If you tried to blur out the product placement on any episode of 24 you'd end up with nothing but a blurry screen.

[cartesiandaemon.livejournal.com]

My God, is the Koran for real? It's not even so much about destroying everything to do with Saddam, but what you'd do with a Holy Book written in anyone's blood. I agree the best thing is probably to keep it in a vault and not talk about it until tempers have cooled...

[darkoshi]

I don't understand why the blood-ink Quran is such an issue. Unless there's an Islamic rule against writing in blood, why not auction the pages off, and use the earnings for the good of the country? If it were rather written in the blood of people that Saddam had tortured and killed, then I'd understand the dilemma.

It sort of makes me want to write something in my own blood. But I don't think plain blood would make a good long-lasting ink.

[drdoug.livejournal.com]

Auction the pages off?! Not going to happen. Religiously and politically impossible.

Religiously, it's about as haraam/forbidden as it gets to treat the Koran (any copy - well, certainly any copy in Arabic) with anything less than serious reverence. Separating it in to parts is Wrong. Selling each bit off separately to the highest bidder is worse sacrilege than giving out unwashed pairs of the Pope's pants as a freebie for all visitors to an abortion clinic.

Politically, selling off Ba'athist trophies widely seems ... unwise, let us say, if you're not keen for Saddam's party to make a comeback. It'd be like the West German Govt selling off Hitler souvenirs in 1949.

[darkoshi]

That makes sense. I suppose my lack of religion was showing.

My next idea would be to carefully put all the pages together into a well-built casket, and bury it in the same place Saddam's body is buried. Or based on another page I just read about how old Korans can be disposed of, one could wrap it in a clean cloth and bury it with a slab over it (as letting dirt fall directly on it would be deemed disrespectful).

[strawberryfrog.livejournal.com]

Unless there's an Islamic rule against writing in blood

"It was wrong to do what he did, to write it in blood," says Sheikh Samarrai. "It is haraam [forbidden]."

[darkoshi]

When I first read that, I wasn't sure if there was a scriptural rule against it, or if it was something cultural/traditional.

But I found this page: http://www.al-islam.org/laws/najisthings.html
which lists things which are considered unclean ("najis"). Blood is among them, and it says "Writing the holy Qur'an with najis ink, even one letter of it, amounts to making it najis. And if written, it should be erased or washed off. "