#sunni muslims

[songs-of-the-east]

Lak Grandaughter. Dagestan, North Caucaus, Russia.

[luminalunii97]

The reason I post on Tumblr is that I'm trying to spread the news about the Iran revolution and my targeted audience is non-iranians around the world. It's a fact that people of different nations mostly know each other by nationalities and not subgroups and ethnicities. For example, I know people from China or Russia or Argentina as Chinese and Russians and Argentines, but I have very limited knowledge about the cultural and linguistic diversity within different countries. I know about some ethnic groups through media or documentary programs, and I know more about the people of neighboring countries because of proximity and common grounds, but you can't expect me to know the demographics of every country around the world, and in return, I don't expect citizens of other countries to know the details of existing ethnicities in Iran, a country that has been isolated and pushed out of pictures for decades. With all these said I like to give very basic information about the ethnic structure of Iran's population.

Ethnic map of Iran

Iran has always been a multi-ethnic, multi-racial, multi-culture, and multi-lingual nation. Iranian is the nationality and not an ethnical or racial identity. Persians, Kurds, different branches of Turks, Balochs, Lurs, Arabs, Gilaks, Mazanis, etc, etc, are the racial or ethnic identities that have made Iran's body. These ethnic groups have their own language or dialect, their own culture and food, costumes and urban legends, and in some cases particular religion. This makes Iran a very colorful country, which obviously can be a place of wonder but also trouble.

Some of the Folk Costumes in Iran

The relations among these ethnicities and their relation with the capital and the ruling system through history is complicated and differs from region to region, dynasty to dynasty. As you might know, the country you know as Iran today is the remains of an old empire that has gone through many uprises and downfalls, wars and invasions, and rebordering. Here's a quick video of how Iran's borders have changed through history; got bigger, shrank in size, and moved east and west.

The trouble with having so much variety within a country is the unpleasant manifestation of racism, favoritism, and discrimination. This problem has gotten a lot worse under the islamic republic regime. Even though favoritism and racism by the government have existed to different degrees in previous dynasties, the Islamic Republic took it to another level and since it's a theocracy, they added the element of religion stronger than ever to the discrimination mix.

Currently, in Iran, the uneven distribution of wealth and resources, and the government's neglect in many provinces and cities have made a huge gap between prosperity levels in crucial cities like tha capital, Tehran, and everywhere else. Tehran currently is the most populated city in western Asia. It's actually overpopulated, and this overpopulation is causing many environmental problems like air pollution in the city. The main reason is immigration because of the concentration of facilities and opportunities in the capital in contrast with non-existent facilities in other areas. Many people, including my family, have moved to Tehran, temporarily or permanently, to get a better chance at education or finding a job.

Apart from financial fairness, the islamic republic has been dead set on destroying ethnic identities in Iran. Banning the writing, reading, and learning of native languages at schools is one example. In many cities around the country, Persian is not the first language of daily communication. Persian as the official language is the mediator language that makes it possible for people from different regions to communicate. Different accents of Persian are the main and only language in many cities. Some cities are bilingual, but in others, Persian is like English in European countries, just a mediator, not the main native language. Almost everyone can understand and speak Persian, but native languages are the preferred language of daily life in cities with the majority of that ethnic population.

Another example is the restriction on wearing native clothes. In this one, the Islamic Republic hasn't been completely achieved, but they've been able to pale the usage or change the original form of most ethnic styles. For example, to make all the Iranian women uniformly dressed, they successfully changed the colorful veiling of Baloch women to a Black chador.

The original colorful clothing of Baloch women vs the black chador Islamic Republic has forced on them

Last but not least, based on religious beliefs, cities with the majority of non-shia muslim populations face discrimination times and times worse. Lots of Kurdish and Baloch cities have a majority of sunni muslim people. In the recent protests, the level of oppressing violence these cities have faced is far worse than in other states. Where in Tehran they shoot us mostly with shotguns, they only use battle rifles in Kurdistan and Zahedan. In only one day, Bloody Friday of Zahedan, they killed at least 96 Baloch people. Baloch people are also the first group of arrested protesters the regime has started executing. They're being murdered by the regime everyday now. These were only discriminations they're faced during the protests. A region with many metal mines like gold, and various industries is in so much poverty you'd think it's a war-struck place. Poverty, lack of clean drinking water, and identity paper restrictions are some of the examples of problems in Sistan and Baluchestan province.

In Kurdish cities the regime brought Tanks and DShK to suppress people, as if a foreign army has striked. People of Kurd never accepted the Islamic Republic regime and have been fighting its authority for decades now. Mahsa Amini, as you probably know by now, was from a Kurdish city named Saqez. The protests started in front of the hospital she passed away in, in Tehran, but it turned into full on revolution at her funeral, in her homeland, where Kurd women took their headscarves off and chanted "jîn, jîyan, azadî".

Fighting regional and racial discrimination in the free democratic future of Iran will be another obstacle our nation should deal with alongside women's rights, children's rights, LGBT rights, and working group rights.

[professionalnooneatall]

Everyone Keeps Saying Make Something New, but When I make Something Aggressively New, I Get "not like that,"

I was talking with an Imam once and I asked him how a Muslim would go about doing the Hajj if they lived on Mars. With zero hesitation he said "Get on a rocket and go back to Earth, there's only one Mecca." The quote stayed with me and for over a decade I've been developing a television show around that sentence:

It's the far future. Humanity and our allies live throughout the Milky Way and there are Muslims on every planet where there are humans, which is to say all of them. Let me introduce you to the characters.

Master Fleet Adm. Achmed Abdul Qadir

Regal, bird like, rather tall with a well-trimmed mustache, salt and pepper hair, Qadir is a devout Muslim with a calm “been there done that” attitude from being Nearly 100 years old. Shrewd but compassionate, Qadir applies Islamic jurisprudence as often as possible, resulting in a high degree of compassion. Because of this Qadir was among the first wave of volunteers to fight under the banner of the Alliance first on Mars under NATO/METO and later as Alliance Forces Earth, and finally just the Alliance. Qadir is unflappable in nearly every respect. If he ever uses foul language, it’s not a good sign.

Command Sergeant Major Maya Abdel-Fattah

Lean, lethal and shorter than most people. Always wearing hijab in public. Cybernetic right arm starting at the shoulder. Maya is the strong, silent type. A full Alliance Marine, qualified planet and space she wears the Galaxy Globe and Anchor. Maya was widowed and lost her whole family in a space transport accident and so she transferred to the recently codified Alliance Marine Corps from Alliance Forces Earth Quartermaster Corps. Maya served with the Black Sword Brigade, a particularly tough unit specializing in deep strikes and decapitation attacks. She serves as the senior enlisted on the ship and if there's fighting to be done she can get it done from 1,000 meters to 1 centimeter.

Command Sergeant Major (ret) Robert W. Leary

Hearty, tough, Irish and Black American. Very American military, Qadir’s best friend, so much so Qadir’s actual wife, Jamila, referred to Leary as “My husband’s work wife” when they worked together under NATO and METO military operations before the Alliance conflict. Father died in Corpo Wars, mother retired from the 1st New York Brigade after the North American Protectorate was codified. Leary met probably his closest friend Achmed Qadir while on R&R leave in Iraq, specifically when he attended the completion ceremony for Al-Rahman Mosque is Baghdad. Leary is deeply atheist but very respectful and knowledgeable of many religions; he’s both street-smart and socially intelligent. Leary is also the Alliance Cultural Preservation, Restoration, and Development (CPRD) Officer, ensuring cultural needs and practices are cataloged and practiced, respected, and continued for and by Alliance personnel.

Lt. Cmdr. Dikembe Emenike

Eminke is the executive officer of the Grand Falcon. All four limbs are cybernetic, an aerospace engineer, a race car driver, and Chief Engineer in the construction of the Grand Falcon, the ship that takes Muslims back to Earth for Hajj. Emenike is an accomplished pilot and like most veteran pilots of the war has an absurd amount of flight hours. He was onboard a ship that had to use its jump drive system without calculation and it jumped into a planet’s atmosphere, subsequently crashed and plunged into that planet's ocean. Emenike was among the survivors and due to his actions - using the ship's propulsion to beach the craft on the nearest landmass - the casualties were low.

Master Chief (ret) Paulina Stevens “Boston” Abdur Razzaq

Boston is an Iranian American, punk rocker, with lots of tattoos,  lower jaw is cybernetic, it’s a subtle piece, though, and mostly matches her skin tone. She has close-cropped curly hair and a nose ring. Experienced medic and explosives technician, Boston formed her own contracting company - Iron Pineapple - after the war for “post-war and peacetime operations,” which has an extremely broad definition meaning her team didn't want for work. Boston has been divorced twice, from a man and a woman. She doesn’t do anything by half measures and this extends to her personal relationships. She connects intensely with people and intimate partners are no exception so her command style with her team is often very blunt but compassionate.

Maj. (Dr.) Mohammed Al-Aziz Billah

Dr. Billah, or "just Dr. B," as he would introduce himself, is stocky, bearded, intense, and driven but is kind and has an impeccable bedside manner. Billah is often in a doctor’s coat over his Alliance uniform. He is Qadir’s nephew on Jamila’s side. A devout Ahmadiyya Muslim, Billah saw becoming a doctor as a holy mission. He is a certified physician for both people and earth animals, having studied both sciences concurrently at Penn State. Billah served in Iraqi military as a combat doctor and in between tours he worked with members of the Jain Dharma as a veterinarian. His incredibly wide skill set made him ideal for treating non-human beings and many foundations for combat medical procedures were established by him and other members of The First Medical Fleet which would become Alliance Medical Command. His refrain, "Death Is my Only Enemy," became the official motto of First Medical Fleet, "Death Our Only Enemy"

Special Warrant 2 (ret) Shen She Zhan

Shen underwent sixteen very painful surgical procedures to increase her height and skin grafts to make her skin look like that of the Hiraska aliens whose empire threatened the whole galaxy with facial reconstruction including reshaping her jaws and her eyes were fully replaced. Her cover was blown but she was able to escape however he pod was intercepted by Alliance Forces Earth personnel who didn’t believe she was actually human. Qadir’s ship received the signal and he intervened but not soon enough. Qadir, Leary and Billah were there for her recovery so they are on the very short list of people she trusts, those three serve as kind of her “sounding board” for certain topics and issues. Qadir was furious with the task forces’ treatment of Shen and he disbanded the task force and several senior leaders were relieved of duty. After the war she joined Iron Pineapple and Boston became the fourth person in the galaxy she trusts. This history informs much of Shen's responses and actions. Among strangers, she is very controlled but given the presence of one of the four, she will speak her mind clearly.

Major (ret) Maria Shahid Rodriguez-ChavezMajor (ret) Maria Shahid Rodriguez-Chavez

Latino and Arab Christian. A real technical wiz Chavez can fix anything; hardware or software even if she's unfamiliar with it because she has an intuition about technology overall. Chavez is a trans-woman but presents as masculine in the war flashbacks. She is gradually becoming more and more comfortable with herself but will often retreat into her technological expertise and focus on solving tech problems rather than personal development. She often seeks guidance from Boston, Leary, and Billah. She is estranged from her father but is in touch with her mother and kid brother, who live the Leo City, the domed human settlement on Mars. Her plan settle with them somewhere and open a small business, probably an automotive repair shop and salon.

Senior Command Chief Jamila Qadir

Jamila is a highly experienced nurse with time in ERs, plague zones, and combat zones, and her compassion for humans is matched only by the sheer “lack of fucks,” she gives. Her compassion for people is matched by her husband Achmed, but she will not suffer fools gladly, will not make time for bullshit, and definitely won't stand for your nonsense. She has tried to play matchmaker for Leary on several occasions. It didn’t go well each time. She is often the smartest person in the room as she knows how to apply her knowledge of people learned through being a medical professional in any given situation.

Petty Officer 2nd Class (ret) Akira Shima 

Akira was a quantum navigation systems programmer and he is exceptional at that, having served on many task forces and has a mind for science and tactics but he is largely untested due to getting relegated to "IT bullshit" when he was in uniform. He is motivated to prove himself at every opportunity and is often unorthodox in his thoughts and actions but he is effective and when he combines his abilities with Chavez they are unstoppable. He is very intuitive and empathetic. He understands software interacting with organics as he often had to fix cybernetic limbs in the war when no formal technician was present. Shima is “always on,” and will often wake up in the middle of the night having dreamed of a solution to a problem he may have only heard about in passing.

Valerria Vall

Assigned a special advisor to the Grand Falcon, Vall is a member of the Omega, a race of beings who once fought a Terminator-style war between organics and machines. After about seventy years they realized it was pretty stupid and over time they became a “joint race,” the Hiraska saw them as the greatest threat to their empire and released a plague that destroyed all organic life in their home system. They barely survived and are now fully artificial. They founded the Alliance as an anti-colonial and defensive force against the Hiraska to prevent what happened to them from happening to any other beings. As they connect with new extraterrestrial species they send a representative to study and learn from their cultures, altering their whole physical and mental self to mirror that race to create a deep cultural understanding.

Kimi Running Rabbit

Running Rabbit is part of the new generation of humans that grew up off-world and is the youngest member of the crew. She is part of the Alliance Tribal Nations, a recognized part of the Alliance government’s judicial, social and educational systems. Running Rabbit began as an alliance cadet but the war ended and she spent two more years just training with little engagement against real threats. When she saw the Hajj ship needing volunteers she signed on with an individual contract. Like many other personnel who were born off-world, she’s only heard stories about how vicious earthbound humans were to each other but especially horrible to the indigenous peoples and she hates Earth and doesn't want to ever go there. This mission is the first time she has been around a significant population of earth-born humans. Kimi is well educated in languages, histories, and cultures through the Alliance Primary Education system but she has limits as they are "textbook,"

Lt. Cmdr. Jordan Nusholtz 

Nusholtz is the youngest pilot of the main ensemble and uses direct interphase to pilot vessels. While Qadir uses zero augmentation and Enemike uses maximum augmentation to pilot starfighters, Nusholtz is the middle ground between those two schools of thought/action and will come up with unique solutions within that content. In fact, he has skills and experience on par with Qadir and Enemike despite being at least a decade younger.. He initially joined under a task force assembled by the Israeli Defense Force but they withdrew from the Alliance after Mars was secured and Nusholtz joined the alliance as a pilot - and accepted a three-step demotion due to the nature of the alliance rank structure at the time - to bring the war to a conclusion and in solidarity with his adopted brother Anthony who is Palestinian.

Master Sergeant (Ret) Anthony Sydnor 

A former infantryman turned technical repairman, Sydnor is the Rosencrantz to Cmdr. Jordan Nusholtz’s Guildenstern, with a more absurdist sense of humor and a more practical view of the world. Sydnor is a widower but has three sons who are all in the Majiid initiative. He has a rather dim view of being in space, however, like many humans, he seeks the leave Earth behind and settle on one of the Alliance's home planets or even one of the terraformed planets which could include Venus would be preferable. He is Palestinian American and that informs his cynicism. He runs general supply on the Grand Falcon and if something needs to be acquired, he’s the one to acquire it.

Col. Rashad Ibn-Arai Al-Wali

Col. Al-Wali is the “by the book” type of person who doesn’t care much for individuality. He is an alliance sentience code enforcement officer, meaning he ensures the rights, history and dignity statutes for all living beings are, in fact, assured. Rather like a police officer but personal property isn't the goal. This also makes him the de-facto first contact officer. His personal feelings actually run counter to the sentience codes so in a way the codes are his “check,” to do the right things. The codes were NOT written exclusively by humans so in a way, he seeks guidance from them in much the same way Qadir does with Islam. However, Qadir seeks to justify compassion, kindness and justice whilst Al-Wali tries to justify his personal feelings and gets consistently thwarted.

[ccomelantartidee]

Reconnecting with nature whenever the world around feels too loud.🍃🐝🌿⛅️

[muslimahtradwiferevert]

[leroibobo]

the church of saint george/al-khidr (saint george) mosque in lydda, palestine.

newer houses of worship taking the place of older ones on the same sites is a history common throughout the middle east and europe - what makes this one different is that it houses both the "older" and "newer" ones at once. the original structure was a crusader church built on top of the ruins of a byzantine one, and a ruined section in its west became a sunni mosque during the mamluk period. in the 19th century, orthodox melkites got permission from the ottomans to build the church in the eastern section.

the church's crypt contains a sarcophagus venerated as the symbolic tomb of saint george (last picture).

[teenageascetic]

“Take my shirt and lay it over my father's face: he will recover his sight. Then bring your whole family back to me.”

Surah Yusuf verse 93.

In different eras and places among Muslims talismanic shirts were worn under the regular robes of people to offer protection from Nazar and Sihr. It is believed that this tradition dates back to the prophet Yusuf (Joseph). One of the more famous practitioners of this tradition are the Ottomans, sultans such as Cem Sultan and Süleyman-ı Evvel wore them. This Quran verse is what inspired this.

[secular-jew]

Cry me a river asshole

[jewkbox]

Thd Kurdish women fighting ISIS

All-female battalions of Kurdish soldiers have been instrumental in fighting ISIS

"In Syria, the women of the Kurdish Democratic Union Party (PYD) have been recognized for their all-female fighting force. This force, known as the Women’s Protection Units (YPJ) have been heralded for their bravery on the battlefield. Al Jazeera reported that Kurdish soldiers from the YPJ had singlehandedly killed over 100 Islamic State fighters.[1] In the defense of Kobani, it was reported that up to 40% of the resistance fighting force against ISIS was made up of Kurdish women."

By the way, 98% of Kurds are Sunni Muslims.

[muhibuallah]

Salaam and Hello friends!

I co-run a discord server called For God's Sake (pun absolutely intended). In relation to it's name, this server is for all people and religions/spiritualities and welcomes both casual conversations and light debate.

We use a mixture of forums/threads, text chats, and voice chats as well as a multitude of roles to choose from (and custom roles if none of them fit you).

Most importantly, we are an LGBTQAI+, plural systems, and alterhuman friendly space, with plenty of room for everyone of all ages (within Discord Terms of Service).

We would love to welcome more people into our space so please join us! If you have any questions or concerns, feel free to message me directly or send in an ask!

(List of our channels under the cut)

Theology+ (Category)

#general-theology

#scripture-study

#gnostics-heresies

#liberation-queer

#mysticism

#orthodoxy

#occult

etc...

Community Center (Category)

#general-chat

#arts-music-writing

#health-lifestyle

#animals-n-more

#lgbtqia2

#alterhuman

#politics

etc...

[luminalunii97]

Eid Al Fitr Mubarak to everyone who celebrates it. It is especially Mubarak to the Sunni Muslims inside of Iran who have been the victims of many human rights violations done by the Islamic Republic regime. May the next Eid, all of us be free from this murderous regime.

[which-qsmp-egg-would]

which egg would treat the masjid shoe racks as their own personal shoe store (because we cant wear shoes inside the masjid we put our shoes on a shoe rack outside the door and SOMETIMES you can get your shoes stolen, so its like a meme where ppl take pictures of the shoe racks and post them with the captions like "going shoe shopping")

Ramadan mubarak! (Sorry that this is so late in the season)

[ronnyraygun]

Talia and Baby Jay dynamic make my brain giggle.

[ccomelantartidee]

Lovely afternoon at the park🌤️ I’m blessed!🌼🤍

Wish you all a beautiful day💚

[muslimahtradwiferevert]

[teenageascetic]

“Allah سُبْحَانَهُ وَتَعَالَىٰ, through an infinite variety of subtle graces and goodness, invited people to Himself, but they did not respond to His call, so He afflicted them with diverse calamities, that by means of this torment they might return to Him, for He loves His creation.”

-Fatima Al-Nisaburiya.