Two Ways Of Life

Just compare these two British ladies' feelings about Islam and Muslims. The first one is Lauren Booth, who has just converted to Islam. The other is Julie Burchill, a fellow journalist, who is commenting on Lauren's conversion.

See what a huge difference Islam makes in one's life.

Lauren Booth

About Western women converting to Islam

With “those feelings put into you in the UK and, I'm afraid, in the US about Islam being a frightening religion for women to join” … It is definitely not easy for a Western woman to convert to Islam. Everything that you have been shown about the way that Islam is treated in the West says to you that this is going to be difficult ... It is pretty massive. It is not a trendy religion in the West as you all now watching this. It is not Buddhism or Kabbalah.”

On her feelings after embracing Islam

“I feel really really happy. I feel more content than ever. I have always been a happy person but I feel more content than ever with everyday existence; I feel less stressed; I feel time and more hours of the day. I do not know why that is. I do not know if that has anything to do with Islam, but personally I feel very content.”

Her views on western media Islamophobic approaches

“… if they attacked me too harshly in the mainstream media, they reveal the Islamophobia that is latent in a lot of their writings.”

Her personal experience of converting to Islam

“I do not feel under pressure, but I do respect the laws. I have given up alcohol, which for an English woman is quite a leap. I found it easy. I do not want it anymore. That is something strange. I do not want alcohol at all…. I am finding that I want to spend more time in the company of other Muslims though. This is interesting. Just because suddenly people who are not Muslims seem slightly more sarcastic, more consumerist rather than being able to converse in a more spiritual way and I like these conversations.”

On discriminations against Muslims

“The one difficult thing for me in this converting to Islam has been the fact that it will affect the way I am perceived by people who watch my work with Palestinian organizations quite closely and critically because the sad truth is at the moment if you are a Muslim in the Middle East you are listened to less than if you are a Christian or if you a Jew. This is not the Christians' fault, that is a monologue that is coming over from the neo-cons from America and it has to do with the disrespect of the Muslim people so I don't think that my converting is going to help with my causes that I want to help in Palestine unfortunately, but I will give me energy to carry on when I find it difficult and it will give me the chance to pray even more for the people of Palestine, which is a good thing.”

Commenting about Tony Blair, her brother-in-law

“I wish it would have an impact in making him think that good rational people can become part of a community that have been much maligned and attacked by policies that his friends in Israel and his supporters in America have been part of over the past ten years and I wish he would take a closer look at those actions and what they have done in Iraq and Afghanistan and the role Israel plays in tormenting people in the West Bank in Gaza and East Jerusalem. I wish he consider Muslim people on a parallel as other people of the world instead of lesser people.”

Julie Burchill

Here is the other woman. She writes for the British newspaper, the Independent. In her column on Lauren Booth's conversion to Islam she has written the following under the heading: 'What sort of woman freely converts to Islam?'

On her own failure to convert to Judaism

“Last year I took the first steps towards converting to Judaism; also last year, I abandoned my attempt. It was partly that I find it hard to stick at any discipline, being bone-idle and highly hedonistic (for instance, I was only a lesbian for six months).”

On Trinity

“I found the Jewish idea of one deity far more sensible than the Father, Son and Holy Ghost free-for-all. I'm well aware that everyone who isn't a complete self-deluding fool finds themselves preposterous at times”.

On Islam

“Of course, there is one religion which proscribes its followers under threat of death from rejecting it, and that is Islam. Which just happens to be the one that Lauren Booth (born a Catholic called Sarah) has opted for.”

Spewing venom on Lauren Booth

“It's hard to know where to start when describing the sheer ickiness of Booth. That she works as a paid stooge for the murderous Iranian regime's television channel has to come pretty near the top. A woman, choosing to act a front for a gang of thugs who uphold the punishment of death by stoning for adulteresses! This is surely Stockholm Syndrome gone gaga.”

“Her entirely inappropriate addiction to the spotlight, although she was obviously designed as one of Nature's plus-ones, is another stand-out feature. A failed actress, a mediocre hack, it's pretty fair to say we would never have heard of her had her half-sister not married a man who became Prime Minister. And now her meal-ticket is Mohammed.”

On Lauren's following dietary laws of Islam

“Yes, it seems that even the faith she was raised in isn't narrow-minded, patriarchal and oppressive enough for the sensation-hungry Booth, who having tried everything else is so jaded that she can only get a kick from self-denial. (There does seem to be a particular affinity between Catholics and Muslims – Jew-hating is a great bonding agent.) And a kick it is – she describes her engagement with faith in terms that veer between the drooling of a clammy adolescent ("this shot of spiritual morphine, just absolute bliss and joy") and that of a recovering alcoholic clinging desperately to the wreckage of her sobriety ("I haven't had a drink in 45 days!")

“Maybe like a lot of Western cowards, she thinks that if she sucks up to Islamism hard enough she will be spared its rage.”

On Islam

“What sort of woman freely converts to a religion which supports the oppression, torment and murder of thousands of Christians, homosexuals and spirited women, worldwide, every year? The sort of woman who writes love letters to a serial killer, I reckon. Still, might as well look on the bright side. Go on, Lauren, treat yourself to a full-face and – most essentially – mouth-covering burka!”

On her own beauty or lack thereof

“When I was young and gorgeous, occasionally someone would be brave or dumb enough to tell me that if I had my gappy teeth fixed, I would be even cuter. I would always say the same thing: "But if I had any more sex, I would be in a wheelchair. And surely the only reason people want to look better is to have more sex?"

“Decades on, my looks gone, I don't despise people who have cosmetic procedures but I do feel pity for them, because it means that: a) they haven't got the life they want and: b) they care what people think of them, and that's always a bit of a buzz-kill. With this in mind, I couldn't help smirking to see that the gappy teeth which some sad souls tried to convince me would blight my life are now all the rage, with women paying up to three times the cost of standard perfect teeth for customised nasty veneers featuring gaps and staining.”