Tuesday, January 10, 2006

sean muttaqi, vegan reich and the hardline movement

The following is an interesting contrast to the previous entry.

Sean Muttaqi is a Muslim who takes a very atypical perspective when it comes to animals. He was a member of a political punk band named Vegan Reich which developed and catalyzed something called the Hardline movement

The Hardline philosophy was said to be rooted in one ethic (the sacredness of innocent life), but in reality the ethos rested on that base and on an idea of an immutable Natural Order. Put in more specific terms, Hardline can be described as a synthesis of deep ecology, straight edge, animal liberation, leftism, and Abrahamic religion.


And so when discussing the Islamic dietary laws and the concept of qurbani, Sean Muttaqi emphasizes the sanctity of life throughout:

Every Surah of the Qur'an came to Muhammad (sal) in response to certain events that were taking place of a period of many years. In the case of halal dietary laws, before their implement, many people were slaughtering countless animals, in very inhumane ways - wasting much of the food, and treating animals abhorrently. Living in a desert environment, vegetarianism wasn't a possibility and thus not a practical answer to this situation and problem. So what Muhammad (sal) said, and what the Qur'an says, is that one must treat animals fairly, and if one must kill to survive, they must do it in the most humane manner possible (and also, since only Allah can create life, the animals life must be taken in the name of Allah, as only Allah has the right to end such a life). Never is indiscriminant murder encouraged or even condoned. Far from that, what was encouraged was that less killing be done - and that when it must be (for survival) that one must share the meat with the poorer members of society, and to be less gluttonous in one's eating habits, so that less life must be taken.


Muttaqi has developed his ideas in some interesting directions. It is my understanding that he is no longer with Vegan Reich but is behind the Uprising Records label. And he also has a number of his articles still available on the Al Qadar website. (The articles are generally well-written and flesh out the ideas of the Hardline movement. They do a reasonable job of presenting basic Islamic principles in a way consistent with vegan politics.)

Interview with Sean Muttaqi
Hardline Movement
Uprising Records
Al Qadar Website

16 comments:

DA said...

Hi

Because I'm a Muslim with a punk/hardcore background, and Vegan, people sometimes assume I had something to do with Hardline/Ahul-l-Allah/Taliyah, but that wasn't case, although I know some people involved pretty well. Hardline self-dissolved a while back, and doesn't exist anymore, Ahul-l-allah became Taliyah who still exist but don't have an official name or do dawah anymore, etc.

I like Muttaqi a lot, he's a very intelligent guy, but the people who have unquestioningly followed him put me off. Taliyah was a good example of unquestioning following; Issa Adam Naziri would start saying something, e.g. Angels and Jinns are space Aliens, and everyone would just follow. Or he'd just say "Okay, we're not focusing on social justice issues anymore, we're just gonna train hard so when the mahdi comes, we can be his army" and the bulk went along unquestioningly.

Incidentally, Bawa Muhayadeen was a committed vegetarian, as was sufi poet Al-Ma'ari, among others. Ali Bin Abu Talib(RA) was quoted as saying "Do not turn your stomach into a graveyard for animals".

Abdul-Halim V. said...

Thanks for the supplemental info.

Anonymous said...

A couple of clarifying points:

1. This individual did not have anything to do with Hardline/Ahl-i Allah/Taliy`ah (three completely different groups that involved some of the same people, though many different ones). He did, towards the end, post on the website forums.

2. Sean held the exact same views about Angels, Jinn and the like. The main disagreement between the two on THIS matter was that Sean did not believe it should have been talked about openly.

3. This individual had not even paraphrased, nor misquoted, but entirely fabricated a quote by saying two main false ideas, those are:

a). That the Taliy`ah was literally purported to be a physical army, fighting a literal war, for a literal, physical man, against a military enemy. That was not the objective and it was not the perspective of the group. If this individual took things said in this way then this further illustrates his detachment from the group.

b). As well, he fabricates the notion that social justice issues where not concentrated on "anymore." The point was that those who remained with that network of individuals decided to get away from RHETORIC that served no purpose other than to bolster the egos of "activists." These individuals instead decided to work toward TANGIBLE results rather than rhetorical tough talk. Since most self-professed "activists" and "revolutionaries" do not know how to do much of anything that yeilds TANGIBLE results, they attack those who suggest moving beyond mere rhetoric and radical tough talk (focusing instead on REAL change). For example, consider that not ONE of the Black Panther Ten Point Plan was actually ever achieved. In such an example there was lots of talk, lots of nice Peanut Butter and Jelly sandwiches in the ghetto, but NO lasting change in the community. In the case of the individual who made these false comments, he is speaking as one who is detached from the inner city and ghetto communities and fabricating lies against someone who himself lives in the ghetto and works with people in his community to bring about local positive change; change that he does not wear on patches and buttons on a backpack.

4. Lastly, this individual - with no direct connection to the Taliy`ah at any point - is claiming that "the bulk went along unquestioningly." The reality is that no one but Sean ever claimed to lead any group. The "bulk" discussed, debated and sometimes argued about a wide array of issues. The "bulk" put forward ideas and articles ONLY when there was a majority agreement and no major disagreement on such issues. Even those who left - those who felt more affinity with Sean - when Sean was called out on various issues, at no time voiced dissent about such issues. THEY were the only ones who went along "unquestioningly," only later to say that they disagreed. Had they voiced disagreement then discussion would have ensued and such articles may never have been posted in the first place.

As things stood, those closest to "Issa Adam Naziri" (a pen name that Sean gave to me n 1998), were those who debated with me the most fiercely. You can find these people still close to me today and we still discuss and at times debate. My perspective is ONLY accepted by them when i provide enough DALEEL to convince them BASED on that daleel.

Islaam does not value OPINION or qiyaas. It values PROOF or DALEEL. Any discussion of controversial ideas should be based on daleel and not qiyaas. i often convinced so many because i painstakingly detailed HUNDREDS of pages PER ISSUE of daleel on any given controversial topic. The same cannot be said about ANYONE who claimed dissent with me; posthumous to the groups dissolving.

Beyond that, those who left the group almost all abrogated veganism and vegetarianism. Though Sean retained the vegan diet he ceased to be a supporter of it for most people. In short, the poster has no idea what he is talking about.

Shalom, Salaam, Shanti, Peace...
Mikhah David Naziri
http://www.myspace.com/mikhayah

MBD said...

In addition to http://www.myspace.com/mikhayah you can check out my less-used blog on this site (created in large part to deal with eBullshit).

http://mikhayah.blogspot.com/

Peace.

Anonymous said...

One might want to add a little background info just as I remember it on the previous posting:

isa adam naziri has posted on hardcore forums for close to a decade. he used the pseudonym "YBA" for his militant ramblings that could hardly been taken seriously. Even worse, he took himself dead serious and suffered from the discrepancy of him being a rural hardcore kid as opposed to the leader type he wished to be. While he always loved to talk about himself, it was painful that noone seemed to care. All-time low was the article Isa wrote in his fanzine "Destroy Babylon", in which he confessed to his girlfriend in tears that he was "hardline". Being constantly laughed at, he at some point in time stopped posting and reappeared as part of the hardline central commitee, apprently now feeling in a position of power. This highy absurd part of hardline history required chapters to submit applications to be accredited by Isa. Obviously, chapters of course did not submit and so Isa, along with Sean by the way, realized that they had failed once more. Isa then reappeared as designer and main contributor to the Ahl-i Allah website. for reasons unknown to me, the website vanished after some time and Isa once more appeared as creator and main contributor to Taliyah. Using hardline documents, in which the word hardline had been substituted, the site quickly was removed also. Now here he is back with his myspace page. He still loves to talk about himself, likes to spend a lot of time on his computer and he still likes revolutionary talk. Some things never seem to change.

MBD said...
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
MBD said...

This is an absolutely hilarious comment. Sean and i orchastrated the closing of Hardline. i have 10 page letter from him from 98 where he asked me repeatedly to jump back in and promote the Ahl-i Allah with him and "phase out" Hardline. Why was i the one to front this? Because people had accused him of doing as much when he wrote Vanguard 8 (with a couple of others, though i was NOT claiming Hardline at the time), and they would have all INSTANTLY jumped on him doing this and tried to regain control of what he himself wanted to dissolve. Why did he want to dissolve it? Because like it or not, BELIEVE it or not, he didn't (and doesn't), believe most of the stuff he wrote in Vanguard #1. He had left Hardline 92 and only came back when he didn't like the fact that it never took on the ethnic flavor that he had desired for it (leaning more towards the Weathermen influence and less towards that of MOVE).

"Constantly being laughed at" was never a concern of mine. That is perhaps one of the few semi-correct points you made though. The rest was absolutely a sign of how much of an outsider (or how dellusional) you were.

The "registering" of the HCC never involved me. It involved Sean, Alex and those involved with Vanguard 8. i honestly could not have cared less. When Sean wrote to me in 98 asking me to help transition Hardline into the Ahl-i Allah and put Hardline to bed for good, i was happy to help, as i had seen first hand how Hardline was only successful in synthesizing the Weathermen with MOVE (don't believe me, ask yourself where Uprising got their logo from). Now, after Alex moved from Hawaii, when that Hardline experiment failed, Sean asked me to make Cincinnati the HCC address. This, however, was only until we shut it down from 4/20/99 to 9/9/99. The dates were deliberate and planned WELL before i ever publically took on the job.

Now obviously, after i called out Sean semi-publically, for a lot of the hustles he was running on people he got "buyer's remorse" with having "appointed" me as "Minister of Propaganda." Nevertheless, revisionist history doesn't do much to wipe the minds of those who were THERE and were involved on the inside.

As for wanting to be a "leader," you apparently have me confused with Sean. The second that he left the Taliy`ah we IMMEDIATELY de-centralized it and i REFUSED to accept position as "leader" even when many people asked me to. Since we all disolved the Taliy`ah, i STILL refuse any position of "leadership" in any group or organization. Sean, conversely, has started groups, appointing himself as the unchecked "leader" for decades.

Moreover, yes i like to spend time on the computer, as you do too apparently, and as Sean did when he lurked on message boards. The difference was that i was told (by him), to stir shit up. That i did, whilst i took the heat and he reclined back in the office that people thought was a Kung-fu school they were sending him money for, whilst he spend most of the day surfing the web. Calling him out for this and other things to such financial contributors is what led to him and i falling out. Yes, it's easy to have a holier than thou view of someone and their role in things, when you simply do not know them.

Ironically, i never got on the computer, didn't know how to so much as click on the Explorer icon on my dad's computer and go online, nor did i have an email address before Sean told me that i should and would need to as "Minister of Propaganda." i am now online so much because in those years as a designer and writer - commissioned by Sean himself - for the Ahl-i Allah and Hardline, i gained skills that led to me making a living as a professional webdesigner. i am a quick learner.

But me, me, me, i am talking a lot about myself; touche! But i would have to ask you what teenage hardcore kid makes a zine that doesn't talk a lot about themselves? And moreover, i don't think i could have been THAT boring in doing so since Destroy Babylon sold more copies than all of the Vanguards put together likely did, haha. But whatever, i will happily admit that Destroy Babylon was silly and that i wrote a lot of silly things like teenage hardcore kids do.

But, in closing, i'm not "rural" in any sense of the word. This is just plain silly. i'm from a predominantly black area and live in what would be called the "ghetto" by most people who don't live there. Of course, this no more gives me credibility than Sean being raised primarily in Laguna Beach strips him of his.

Anonymous said...

you are so full of yourself you can't even see it.

MBD said...

Call me full of myself, call me whatever you want. But at least with me you get a person who isn't a coward who goes behind peoples' backs and talks shit "anonymously."

Anyone who knows me - even those who disagree with me on almost everything - will say that you never have to worry about two-facedness with me, or me gossiping.

So how's about you worry about yourself and i'll worry about me?

Anonymous said...

Hello MBD, a couple of hints for your argumentation, I recall Guav saying that you weren't strong at this and it looks like sadly it hasn't changed. If you write ramblings, be sure to hit the spot. Don't misquote. Don't fall into statements that are untrue.

Let's give an example: You say: "The "registering" of the HCC never involved me." Too bad, that I never said this. The guys statement said "reappeared as part of the hardline central commitee". Which you confirm by saying, that you were even amongst those, who shut it down. Quote: ""we shut it down...". If you want to reply to a statement, be sure to adress it correctly.

It's sweet to tell about how and when and why you got on the computer, however, no one really cares about this. The original comment stated "you spend a lot of time on the computer" and as you confirm again, this is true. As always there is the issue that you ramble a lot, however you don't adress any statements in the text you apparently want to argue against.

So just as back in the time you ramble over 9 paragraphs, however you don't really say anything. Dude, grow up!

I see on your myspace webpage, that you are now hopefully luckily married with very nice looking children. You have made a fool out of yourself in the younger years, so please draw a line now. Don't try to defend your ridiculous past behavior with just as ridiculous argumentation.

Be happy about your family and life you have now, I wish you all the best.

MBD said...

"Hello MBD, a couple of hints for your argumentation, I recall Guav saying that you weren't strong at this and it looks like sadly it hasn't changed. If you write ramblings, be sure to hit the spot. Don't misquote. Don't fall into statements that are untrue."

First thing's first: don't use other people not involved in the discussion to justify your points. i don't know Guav. i don't recall EVER having met him, let alone having argued with him.

Furthermore, citing Guav is not something that give you anything other than scene points. Guav is just a hardcore kid; no offense to him. He's not a scholar, he's not pursuing Graduate Studies in any program that i'm aware of, and he's certainly not recognized by his debating skills outside of the hardcore scene (and even then i had never heard of him aside from him being friends with Earth Crisis).

Citing him STRIPS you of credibility, rather than lending credibility to your position. Relying on someone who is neither here to back you up, nor is being quoted outside of gossip, and - worse - has no distinguishable credentials reduces such a reference to nothing other than name-dropping on your behalf.

"Let's give an example: You say: "The "registering" of the HCC never involved me." Too bad, that I never said this."

What are you, five years old? "Too bad that I never said that." Seriously.

"The guys statement said "reappeared as part of the hardline central commitee". Which you confirm by saying, that you were even amongst those, who shut it down. Quote: ""we shut it down...". If you want to reply to a statement, be sure to adress it correctly."

Okay chief. To clarify Sean and i made the decision to shut it down. Actually, to clarify even further, Sean discussed it, initiated the idea on the phone with me, we talked about it and i put it into action. You ultimately don't know who nor what the HCC was, who was in it, when, how, why or anything else. So please at least stop embarassing yourself by trying to correct me on what essentially was discussed by me and one other person before we told others the plan.

"It's sweet to tell about how and when and why you got on the computer, however, no one really cares about this."

i like to give background. i'm sorry that sweetness displeases you so much. In the future i'll do my best to sound as tough and macho as you when i'm writing on a fucking blog.

"The original comment stated "you spend a lot of time on the computer" and as you confirm again, this is true. As always there is the issue that you ramble a lot, however you don't adress any statements in the text you apparently want to argue against."

God knows i like to ramble a lot. Nevertheless, rambling doesn't disprove anything that i said. The real issue - to me - is why you are apparently so insecure that you waste time writing about people you don't know on the Internet.

Additionally, i spend a few hours a week on the Internet. i also work, teach Martial Arts, take Martial Arts, and am a full time University student; all the while managing to spend more time with my family then the average dad and husband. So while i have had more Internet time in the past when i had a job designing websites for a company for a few years, i don't actually spend much time online anymore. Writing this response will probably take me all of five minutes. Even then, i'm spending this time because you're attacking me. YOU, on the other hand are spending this time because you are insecure and attack people you neither know, nor know anything about.

"So just as back in the time you ramble over 9 paragraphs, however you don't really say anything. Dude, grow up!"

Okay dude.

"I see on your myspace webpage, that you are now hopefully luckily married with very nice looking children. You have made a fool out of yourself in the younger years, so please draw a line now. Don't try to defend your ridiculous past behavior with just as ridiculous argumentation."

All i can ever do is aspire to be as mature as you. Thank you for showing me such a good example.

"Be happy about your family and life you have now, I wish you all the best."

i am both happy about my family life, and happy for all the blessings that i have found in life. Nevertheless, i would be happy as well to not find post-hardcore gossip about me from "anonymous" people who don't know me. Thanks!

Anonymous said...

Talking about Hardline without mentioning group violence against single individuals is a bit off the mark. Hardline followers advocated and often practiced physical violence against those who they didn't approve of, viz those who drank, smoked or ate meat. Hardline was the precursor to much of the Straight Edge violence that has occured in the nineties. This writer is obviously intelligent enough to know this (unless he is a straight edge apologist in which case there is little hope of honest discussion). So I wonder what his motivation is in overlooking the elephant in the middle of the room.
We have now had deaths in Reno and Utah that I know about and it's fairly safe to assume that there have been others. The phenomenon of Crew violence based on the fascistic notion of "purity or else" is not the whole story but it is absolutely a part of it. In fact any discussion of the band Vegan Reich should begin with
their reasoning for using the word "Reich" with it's obvious connotations, especially given the hypocrisy of choosing such a name and then talking about "the sanctity of life."

Abdul-Halim V. said...

I'm not sure if you meant to criticize me for the original post or some of the other comment-posters. As far as I'm concerned, feel free to post any factual information or thoughtful opinions which you feel would add something to the conversation. I'm certainly not an apologist for Vegan Reich (I'm surprised if anyone got that impression). At most, I'm interested enough in them to talk about their positive aspects on my blog but that isn't meant to cover-up or deny any negatives which are based in fact.

Don Durito said...

Damn. I type in a search for Vegan Reich, and there this post shows up. I was a friend of one of the band's drummers (back around the end of the 1980s), a cat named Jon, and was just trying to see if I could figure out what he was up to. It's been a good twenty years, but I seem to recall that Jon got a bit disillusioned with the Vegan Reich crew and split. A letter or two under the Vegan Reich name were printed in a zine called MaximumRocknRoll around that time that struck me as highly intolerant, and definitely out of character for Jon. Maybe that was it. Don't know. I'd have to ask him.

Nice to know that one of the band's members has gone off into some interesting and positive directions.

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