An Austrian court has recently fined a citizen for yodeling while mowing his lawn, according to a report in The Kronen Zeitung newspaper.And why not? Yodeling is fun:
The citizen, 63-year-old Helmut G., was told by the court that his yodeling offended his next-door Muslim neighbors, who accused him of trying to mock and imitate the call of the Muezzin.
In Muslim tradition, the Muezzin is the chosen person at a mosque who leads the call to prayer at Friday services and the five daily times for prayer from one of the mosque's minarets.
The yodel is a song which is sung with an extended note which rapidly and repeatedly changes in pitch and makes a high-low-high-low sound. Developed in the Central Alps as a method of communication between alpine mountaineers or between alpine villages, the yodel later became part of the region's traditional lore and musical expression. The technique is used in many cultures throughout the world and Austria is one of the countries where it is most popular.
Unfortunately for Helmut G., his neighbors were in the middle of a prayer when he started to yodel. The Kronen Zeitung reported that he was fined 800 Euros after judges ruled that he could have tried to offend his neighbors and ridicule their belief.
Helmut G. clarified that “It was not my intention to imitate or insult them. I simply started to yodel a few tunes because I was in such a good mood.”
And here's some grown-up yodeling by one of America's great Western yodelers, Slim Clark:
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I'm sure our own existence will soon be deemed in the courts as offensive to Muslims, who won't have to raise another sword to annihilate all unbelievers. It's much easier to let the sword of PC multikulti do it.
ReplyDeleteOn a lighter note,pjToddler and I love the yodeling clips. ; )
@pjmom ~
ReplyDelete"The sword of PC multikulti." That sums it up entirely!
This is a bit bizarre. Guilt does not depend on doing something wrong or intending to do something wrong. Guilt is merely dependent on some Muslim claiming to have felt offended. Thus, Muslim receive special superior status under the law while non-Muslims become automatic inferiors. Hundreds of years of hard fought progress was reverses in the short time it takes a judge to deliver an opinion.
ReplyDelete@Chris~
ReplyDeleteThe Muslims may think that the Muezzin's call to prayer from a minaret is one of the "prettiest sounds on Earth," but the Austrian guy prefers traditional Alpine yodeling, which is not at all unusual throughout the region. Who knows what the judge really thinks. We just know who he fears.