Daily Archives: September 24, 2008

London’s Olympic Park toilets to turn away from Mecca out of respect for Islamic law Daily Mail [UK], by Staff

Toilet facilities are being built at London’s Olympic Park so Muslims will not have to face Mecca while sitting on the loo. The Olympic Delivery Authority has said it wants to produce an ideal venue for people of all cultures, faiths, ages and abilities for the 2012 Games and beyond. The Islamic religion prohibits Muslims from facing the Kiblah – the direction of prayer – when they visit the lavatory.

On commenter said,

Now I don’t care which way the Olympic toilets face and I certainly have no serious problem with anyone’s respectful courtesy to a religious group. But let’s face it. This isn’t about religious sensitivity at all; it’s about terrorist blackmail. Other religious groups (especially Christianity) are regularly dissed and no news editor, education official or toilet designer cares a naught. The adherents of the slighted religion simply sigh over the lack of respect and go on about their business. But a viciously intolerant religion that blows people up when it perceives an offense? That’s what turned the toilets.

If I had only read this poem when I was young, I might have acomplished more. And these lines maybe explains why, also.

If you can meet with triumph and disaster
And treat those two imposters just the same;

If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you;
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too;
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or, being lied about, don’t deal in lies,
Or, being hated, don’t give way to hating,
And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise;

If you can dream – and not make dreams your master;
If you can think – and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can bear to hear the truth you’ve spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to broken,
And stoop and build ’em up with wornout tools;

If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breath a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: “Hold on”;

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with kings – nor lose the common touch;
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you;
If all men count with you, but none too much;
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run –
Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,
And – which is more – you’ll be a Man my son!