The Tells: Rationalizing Absolution for a Wicked Thing

(from the Day Books of DAHarrod)

January 1, 1994 (Sat) 1:23am - Freeman Lake - New Year's Day

Well, my first entry of the new year. I call this piece, Rationalizing Absolution for a Wicked Thing.

OK, the first rule is that there is none greater than He (Subhana wa ta'alah) and He makes the rules.

The second rule is that there are things that are required and things that are forbidden, and in between them are the things that are permitted. Of the things that are permitted, there are things that are encouraged and things that are discouraged.

Now I'll skip down a few rules and get to the nut ... It is a Bad Thing to take pictures of women with no clothes on. By the same rule, any money obtained that way is cursed money, and it will contaminate the rest of your wealth if you accept it. It's like money someone would get by murdering a merchant and robbing him; blood money.

Well, pornography is the same as robbery and murder - it's a Forbidden Thing and anything associated with it is cursed. That means you cannot use the money to make up for what you did. It does not help that the money pays for an education for a doctor - the person who finds a cure for cancer or AIDS. Blood money cannot wash away the sins of the flesh.

Part of my problem is that one person's "pornography" is considered by others to be "art" that is worthy of gracing public buildings, paid for by public funds. This is a cultural bias. From an Islamic perspective, photographs of a woman not wearing the proper covering (hijab in Arabic) are haraam (forbidden).

Most forms of music are also forbidden (both for lyrics and for the passions it arouses), but the semi-nude marble carvings of Liberty and Justice on some courthouses and museums are traif [like ham or bacon; the flesh of dead pigs] to any muslim. On the other hand, I will not let my Islam come between me and my Mozart Cds [Compact Discs]. Each person must decide for themselves how much they are willing to test the limits of Divine Commandment.

The popular composer and singer Cat Stevens embraced Islam a number of years ago, and changed his name to Yusuf Islam. All of the royalty payments go into a trust fund for charities to muslims around the world. He does not touch the money, and he has forsworn it. But it is one of the things he did before he became a muslim, and he vociferously denounces his past life as an example of how one should not live their life.

I know the difference between a Bad Thing and Discouraged Thing, which eliminates any gray area considerations. Showing people, and charging them money for, pictures of naked women is a Bad Thing. But I want to do it for a Good Reason.

Somewhere else I ramble about education, and that you can't know what kinds of things you're not supposed to look at (like naked women) unless you know what it looks like. You can see a lot of Bad Things by accident in your everyday life. I once exited a subway car in Munich to face a 15 foot high semi-nude woman ... her nipples were the size of dinner plates, and they were at eye level (I'm six feet tall). If I had not been a muslim, I would have taken a picture of it as a souvenir.

Sign in a London train station. (1971) Here's a photograph taken in a train station in London ... the sign indicating a unisex toilet with handicapped accessible facilities. I must tell you about the "water closets" in the men's department at Harrods, in Knightsbridge. These are marble-walled rooms, about eight feet on each side (you cannot touch the walls with both arms outstretched) and high ceilings. The floor is tiled from wall to wall, and the walls extend from ceiling to floor. Did I mention that these are solid marble walls, and that the fully-sealed door and sill are solid oak? There is a transom over the door, but it is higher than one can access without a ladder.

Harrods - the store by day. Ah, yes ... this is Harrods, the world-famous department store in London.

OK, so now I have told a story about toilets. Some people might be offended by the subject - most would agree that there is an appropriate place for such discussion - few would say that this is a Bad Thing that I have perpetrated on others.

Now, suppose I were to show you a picture of a naked woman? Hey, you didn't know you were going to see it! You would do one of two things ... you would keep looking at it, or you would immediately shut your eyes and ask God's forgiveness for doing a Wicked Thing.

I'm not here to judge. As a muslim I know what I should do. So, why would I willfully subject you to this "near occasion of sin"? As a lesson. If I were a teacher at a medical school, I would have to assist students as they handled naked, female flesh during examinations. Even an x-ray technician, although they do not actually see women nude, examine their sexual organs at a different wavelength than visual light ... is their "sin" greater? I mean, this is a Permitted Thing that is neither encouraged or discouraged, and it is medical.

So, we agree that doctors and others with a Medical Reason can do something that under other circumstances is a Very Bad Thing. The other forgivable situation is education. This brings us back to me and what I'm going to do.

I've written a piece called Chicks for Free. In good Victorian style, it has an appropriately long-winded subtitle ... What every parent should tell their daughters about the difference between Art and Pornography, illustrated by nudes suitable for family viewing (no "naughty bits" exposed).

The title page has a semi-nude on a sofa, and the caption reads, "This could be your daughter - Would you display it in your home?". It then goes on to inform the viewer ...

This image, "Nudes on a sofa", was taken in the solarium of my patent's house in Washington, DC. It was the summer of 1968, I was 18 years old, and one of my grandmothers was in the house at the time as a chaperon.

This is the message I'm trying to spread ... I did some Bad Things before I became a muslim, things that I'm ashamed of and have sworn never to do again. There are a lot of young people who could make some of the mistakes that I have made unless someone warns them about just how it can happen.

This is something for parents to use with their children, in the privacy of their homes or in their schools, at a certain age (differing for each family and child). This is like potty training, when it is OK to talk about public bathrooms in England.

Anywho, the first time I gave a copy to a muslim brother, I had to apologize for subjecting him to the sight of nude women. I guess he read it aloud to his wife because she refused to see them. This taught me to print copies without the figures, but I left a box and the caption for each one.

To avoid the sin, shame, or embarrassment that might accompany seeing something that you know you shouldn't look at, I am distributing copies that can be reproduced for discussion; one without the pictures described, unless they are "clean".

And thus do we come to the matter of money. I want to put the nudes and the text onto a multimedia compact disc (CD) for distribution. I don't want to make any money off of it. I don't want to commit a Sin. On the other hand, I want people to know these things and use them to teach and warn others.

I was one of the first kids on my block to buy the book by Carl Sagan, et.al., about the Voyager Record. When the Voyager probe was launched in the 1970s toward a rendezvous with the outer planets, it carried an analog recording of voices and pictures etched into gold foil. The cover of the 12 inch, metal phonograph disk was inscribed with pictographs that explained how to assemble a "phonograph" to play the sounds and assemble the pictures from the "digital" images (recorded as analog tones).

This set of over 100 pictures contains micro-photographs of a human egg being fertilized, human embryos at several stages of growth, and a mother suckling an infant. It has schematic drawings of the human reproductive systems, explaining male and female sexuality, with scales for establishing dimensions. These are textbook quality line drawings that any responsible parent would feel comfortable sharing with their children when it comes to that inevitable "birds and the bees" confrontation.

They did not include a photograph of a nude man and a nude pregnant woman, although they did include the outline schematic which showed the seven-month fetus in situ. It is the 32nd figure in the Voyager record. Here is that schematic; forgive me if it offends you.

Some people were apparently outraged at the thought of spending government money to send "filth and smut" into space. A lot of Christians were offended. There was a similar hue and cry over the Pioneer plaque, also shown here, and again, my apologies to those who think it is "dirty". However, I hope that you will show it to your children some day when they start to ask you those questions.

Viewed in this context, publishing the nudes that I photographed 20 years ago does not seem to be such a Bad Thing. The problem is paying for it. I cannot afford to give CDs away at ten dollars each.

There is also an obligation to be repaid. I promised some of the models that they would be paid from the profits on the sale of their pictures. Implied in that contract (a signed and witnessed agreement in each case) is my intention to actively pursue publication of their pictures in the nude (or, at least, partially disrobed). Even though I have forsworn that life, and should be considered free from that obligation, I have the conscience of my culture - the 16th Rule of Acquisition states: A deal is a deal.

Here came the brainstorm. I had planned to set up a corporation to handle the fiduciary responsibilities of publishing the CDs, and to manage an escrow account (25% of the net profits after expenses) for the models. Now I see that the expenses can equal that 75% profit to which I would be entitled. There would be 25% for the models, and I would get nothing.

Actually, there's a part I forgot to mention ... I found myself in a bit of a "damned if I do or don't" situation. The muslim brother pointed out that the photographs of my mother are not appropriate from an Islamic perspective because she is not "properly covered". One shot is doubly scandalous; she is in a bathing suit, and she is in a swimming pool with Count Basie, a man who is neither her husband, her son, or her brother.

Given that the line had been drawn that fine, I rebelled. Granted, I have found a photograph of my mother climbing Mt. Fuji, wherein she is wearing G.I. fatigues (long-sleeved, baggy) and a regulation, full-visor cap, so you really can't see her hair. And I found several of her (with my sister and my father) from before I was born, in which she is wearing a coat and cap. But if I am to publish any of my journal, I must include pictures of my mother, regardless of her attire.

So, I will ask for forgiveness on the Day of Judgement for exposing people to pictures of my mother not wearing a nun's habit (which is exactly the same level of chastity and propriety specified as hijab in Islamic law). Now, in for an penny, in for a pound, as they say.

So, the only way I can publish any of my work is if I do not take any of the profit. Yes, I am fully aware of the fact that I am still doing a Bad Thing, even if there is not profit in money. The risk I take is that someone's immortal soul may come into peril if they see one of these pictures.

It's like I'm messing with someone else's karma without them having any choice. But that's like totally bogus - the most that I could do is be the straw that breaks the camel's back. Besides, nobody screws up someone else's karma unless it was supposed to happen that way. I mean, that's how karma works, isn't it?

This may not be enough. This is the kind of "victimless crime" that I will have to answer for some day [see Judgement Day]. I'm willing to take my chances, that the worthwhile things that come from this effort will outweigh the sin that I knowingly commit, because for the life of me, I can't judge for myself just how bad a sin it is. Allah knows best, and Allah is Most Forgiving.

That is all I have to say. -=DAH=- 01-Jan-94