The Big Smoke

In the swinging, cool Islamic London that Mr Hodges imagines (TO 1920) would a Gilbert & George retrospective be allowed? And would Time Out still have a Gay & Lesbian section? Or is this a ‘right-wing’ fantasy? Maybe I have it all backwards and Mr Hodges won some type of Time Out-sponsored creative writing award.
R Pettengill, NW3

I am a gay Muslim, and I ran away from my country because of my religion, and found refuge in London. If, for any reason, it becomes an Islamic city, I’ll leave again. I want to ask the people interviewed who said that Islam is about inter-faith relations and social justice: do we, Muslims, not call Christians ‘kuffar’ (blasphemers)? Also, what do Muslims think about gay people? I was kicked out by my own family for my sexual preference! What about women? My own mother (of 12 children), was treated as a reproducing machine.
If the prophet Muhammad said the world is green and beautiful, he also made people convert to Islam with his sword. Islam is not how you pictured it and never will be.
Cucumber, by email
Feature continues

I have read your publication for over 20 years and this issue was one of the most forthright pieces of journalism I have read in ages. Thank you for offering an alternative voice and for providing a balanced view; it would have been very easy for you to sensationalise the Muslim community and probably sell more copies but the path chosen by your team was the right one. Column space was given to Muslims with views more in tune with the majority from within the community. Peace is all we want. London needs its Muslims and Muslims living in London love living here. London’s future rests with all its inhabitants contributing equally to its welfare. Salaam to all.
Ifraz Mughal, by email

I found the article thoughtful and informative but I wonder why Michael Hodges thinks that ‘halal’ and ‘junk’ food are mutually exclusive, given the proliferation of chicken and chips takeaways with the halal sign in the window.
Catherine Oliver, by email

If Michael Hodges had any credibility as a journalist, it is long gone now. What London, England, the UK and the world need is the loving message of Jesus Christ; his message of peace, selflessness and charity. Not the religion of the mad mullahs with its ‘convert-or-die’ philosophy.
Disgusted, by email

I can’t see anyone being free to practise their religion openly in any Islamic capital, whether it is Cairo or Khartoum or Karachi. Try being a Christian or Jew in Iran. You won’t last long. Don’t even get me started on the subject of leaving Islam. ‘Apostatis’ is punishable by death in most Muslim countries.
Harry Stiles, W11

To even ask such a stupid question as ‘Is London’s future Islamic?’ is beyond the pale. My answer to the question is ‘No, it bloody well is not!’ I would have said: ‘Over my dead body’ if I didn’t think that was precisely the idea!
J Metcalfe, by email

It seems that Time Out is less interested in providing balance to the sensationalist ‘Londonstan’ nonsense piloted by Melanie Phillips et al, than selectively using Islam to rubbish modern society and the people who live and work in it. The anti-alcohol argument and dietary cant took us into the realms of the Daily Mail. Next time Time Out wants to express its loathing for mass society, I suggest you do so without a set of Islamic crutches.
Jim Tracey, by email

Michael Hodges’ article on London’s Islamic future is absurd. You just have to look at cities in which Islam has a dominant role in shaping public policy – Tehran, Riyadh, Damascus, Khartoum – to see that these are not the sort of places that a liberal, secular or otherwise non-Islamic person would want to live. In all of these cities, women who appear publicly without hijab are victimised, homosexual acts are punishable by death, bizarre periods of fasting and arbitrary diets are enforced and drink is banned. These are just the restrictions mandated by Islam’s holy texts, not to mention the controls on freedom of expression and association which tend to accompany them. Why would more Islamic influence turn London into some kind of paradise on earth, when it turns other cities into theocratic police states?
Matthew Anderson, SW2

Michael Hodges, no doubt tongue in cheek, argues for an Islamic London. Personally, I like pubs and I like a pint. I like to see couples, regardless of marital status and gender orientation, free to express their affection openly. I’m less keen on women being swathed in black (we all need sunshine to produce vitamin D). I think that teaching faith in schools is indoctrination, not education; I think cutting off parts of small boys’ penises is indefensible child abuse; I reject death and amputation as legal penalties. In short I have no wish to ‘submit to Allah’, or to any imaginary being.
John Radford, E15

I would like to warmly congratulate your publication on the ‘Is The Future of London Islamic?’ story. As my organisation tries to combat the forces of extremism and cynicism we often try to persuade Muslims, up and down the country, to stop thinking of the media as a monolithic entity hell-bent on promoting Islamophobia. I found the articles both interesting and refreshing. Thank you for proving my point.
Zulfi Bukhari, CEO of the Muslim Public Affairs Committee, by email

I was shocked and horrified by your thoughtless and provocative cover and article on Islam. I have no idea what Michael Hodges was trying to achieve other than to make mischief. All the Muslims interviewed rejected the thrust of your issue, but were too polite to challenge the unpleasant questions posed to them. The uniformity of their answers showed what we all realise: that Michael Hodges’ fascist scenario of an Islamic London exists only in his mind. Reading between the lines, I sense an underlying hidden agenda; no one could accuse him of inciting people to fear and hatred, because he has bent over backwards in his article to prove the opposite. I recently visited the British Library’s exhibition ‘Sacred’. Now therein lies the difference between an intelligent and educated response to today’s Islamaphobia and Hodges’ cynical, counterproductive article.
N York, by email

It’s great to have a London magazine with worthy opinions to counter the tripe the free papers call news, but the Islam piece by Michael Hodges was journalism at its worst. His arguments were so tenuous I doubt that he even believed them. I’m sure your gay and lesbian readers wouldn’t be comfortable with Islamic law, and as an atheist I find your peddling of this medieval nonsense offensive.
Sam Moon, E1.

Michael Hodges probably believes that he is being radical in his advocacy of Islam, but the reality, as his weekly column illustrates, is that he seems to share the fashionable idea that his fellow citizens are morally degenerate, too materialistic and spiritually void. As a result he seems to want Islam to act as some kind purifying agent on the corruption he sees all around him. Some of us, on the other hand, feel that our free, materialist, democratic and secularist society does not need to be subjugated to any kind of pre-Enlightenment religion in order to thrive and do not feel that we need the heavy hand of religious authority to solve the problems we have in the twenty-first century. It would be preferable if he confined his anti-humanistic rants to his weekly column, where they can be rapidly skimmed over and ignored.
Tony Bremner, by email

Comments on timeout.com
Neu Mizt said… Just wait. When the Muslim population in Britain hits critical mass, you will have the following choices: a) Become an Islamic country; b) Partition your country; or c) Civil war. If you won’t fight for your land and civilisation you will live in a mullahtocratic hellhole. History is littered with civilisations made extinct by Islam. European civilisation is next.

Reza wrote… I was born a Muslim. I left an Islamic country to live in Britain because it was a secular country with western European values. Articles like this are typical of our snivelling, liberal elite – a shameful, unquestioning bunch of cowards blinkered by their default multiculturalist dogmas and irrational sense of moral superiority. Don’t let the idiots who write this type of thing turn this once-great country into the stinking Islamic hellhole my birthplace has become.

Dan from Colorado wrote… Of course this is satire; the first sentence gives it away. ‘Mohammad Sidique Khan Square’: he was one of the 7/7 bombers. Cheers Michael Hodges: I like your way of saying ‘For God’s sake Britain, wake up!’

Veritay wrote… I was very impressed with the dignified response of the Muslims interviewed. I do believe that the religion needs to wake up and shake off the people who are bringing it into disrepute and shame. I myself come from a 32-year Catholic-Muslim marriage and I cannot see a problem with a future multi-faith multicultural London.

A selection of US blogs
Ace of Spades wrote… Wow: have the Brits gone insane? I live in New York City and have been waiting for the other terrorist shoe to drop ever since 9/11 but, in some ways, this sure and steady accommodation of a backwards and barbaric ideology is even worse. Like putting a frog in a pot of cold water and slowly turning up the heat. He’ll be parboiled before he figures it’s time to jump out!

Earnestness wrote… Not since the psychotic ravings expectorating from the cherry lip-glossed orifice of Ted Rall has a man so stoked the fires of my love/hate relationship with the concept of free speech.