is it culturally and legally insensitive?

[mwrkhan]

Originally posted by BanglaCool
One of the reasons we won against Aussies is precisely this, but on the other side. Symonds the key middle order spanking batsman and wicket taking medium pace bowler was suspended because of drinking. I insist you don't promote such acts to our national team, which is also against our norms. Who do we identify with Bangladeshis or Australians?

The quote was tongue in cheek, did you seriously believe I was promoting alcoholism in the team?

You are talking about norms, please see my earlier post in the thread where I mentioned that the BD team happily posed with the bottle of champagne. Look at the BC frontpage photograph. It is quite clear that the team didn't find it objectionable or else they would have kept the bottle out of sight and not flaunt it the way they did.

This is really not a big deal.

[mwrkhan]

Originally posted by Logen
Are you sure that USA legal age of drinking alcohol is 21?
I thought it was 19.

It is 21 in the vast majority of states (48 out of 50 I think). It is 18 in Europe and Australia. It was 18 in the US until 1986 when the organization called MADD (Mothers Against Drunk Driving) successfully campaigned to raise it to 21.

[babubangla]

What's the big deal about it?
There is no reason to create a scene by refusing to take the bottle. After all, it is a gift!! Many times we get gift from others and do not like it...still we don't let the presenter know it. The same principle should be applied here. Just take it and if you don’t want it---pour it down it in the toilet bowl. Best of all---keep it as a souvenir. After all, if you keep it for long time, you can even get a fortune after your retirement by selling this Champaign bottle.

[cricman]

we all know shane warne would of gotten drunk right if he had played and won MOM.

he took the bottle and it doesent mean he drank from it.

[paco]

Who drinks champagne anyways ? They should've given him a bottle of Tequila

[Locutus]

specially the white stuff from Mexico. Tequila Sauza is the best.

[Sham]

No its 21 in the US, 18 in Britain.

Firstly, its not insensitive, culturally, religiously or in any other way. They are following their custom, and if we don't want to drink it, we don't have to.

Secondly, I couldn't care less what the Pakis do with it.

Thirdly, I think Ashraful should take a sip. Might change his fortunes.

Fourthly, for the people who will take exception to my third point, please understand that it is not a serious statement, even though that bottle would be emptied of its contents within a very short time if I could get my hands on it, and therefore please don't start a religious debate about the haramness of drinking.

And lastly, something cannot be legally insensitive. It is either legal or illegal and in this case, its perfectly legal.

[DotBall]

Originally posted by Rumi
Asraful and Bangladesh team was honored with champagne during the award ceremony after the BD vs OZ upset ODI.
Question, as some observer commented, is it a show of cultural insensitivity on the part of the organizers? I don\'t know about UK, but in USA it is absolutely illegal to serve anyone below 21 with alcoholic beverage. Ashraful is not 21 yet. What would happen if MOM went to Nazmul, nafees, rana, Enamul or others below 18 or 21?
BTW what does Pakistani\'s do with the champagne?

It is definately not insensitive to present Ash with a champagne bottle. It is the tradition of NetWest Sponsored series and it is insensitive to think of it cultural insensitive act. Now, giving someone alcoholic beverage who is below 21 in illeagal at states and if the age restriction is same in England then those organizers might be in trouble.

[Zunaid]

sham - you had to stir the the pot er umm champaign glass here with the third. ;-)

We have quite a little storm in a champaign glass going on here. My crystal glass protends one of those long and interminable religious flame wars.

[Zobair]

I think we can leave it to the discretion of the player. In this case, the artless way in which Ash kept thanking Allah is ample evidence of where his loyalties lie. I have no doubt Ash looks at the champagne bottle more as a trophy than anything else. Our players "Almary showcases" (mantle what?) are generally pretty bare and I am sure a jumbo-sized champagne bottle would like mighty nice in there?

PS: How many of you guys drink from a tequila bottle? When we first moved back to Bangladesh, I remember we got all these empty glass alcoholic beverage bottles of different shapes and sizes. My word they stank! Anyways, they were soaked in water for a few days, then thoroughly rinsed with detergent and then once the stink was gone we used them as water bottles (boiled water stored in the fridge). So there you go! One more use of a champagne bottle even if you don't fancy the original contents inside.

[ekatturerBangalee]

Originally posted by Spitfire_x86
It's just a trophy, not a drink. Nobody is required to drink if they don't want to.

I don't think why it can be considered offensive.

Yes, absolutely; So, what's the fuss about?
I don't understand.
Why bringing ISLAM and RELIGION here.
This is game of CRICKET; an unique situation where we won and received a trophy which happens to be a champagne bottle.

"Mogoz Dholai" ar kake bole -- Let's gow up folks and discuss cricket and don't mix Cricket with Religion.

Just one quote I would like to add here, " if you are a Muslim, you should be praying and not play cricket when it is time to pray" ---- Get it!!!!! Do we do that????

[allrounder]

It all depends on the person who gets the gift. If you give a present to someone and he/she is not offended by it, then that is the end of the story.

Now if a third person finds that the gift was inappropriate then he/she should take it to the person who took the gift happily not the person who gave it.

[Sham]

Originally posted by Zunaid
sham - you had to stir the the pot er umm champaign glass here with the third. ;-)

We have quite a little storm in a champaign glass going on here. My crystal glass protends one of those long and interminable religious flame wars.

Zunaid bhai, surely you know how bored I get when I'm not in the middle of a storm of some kind on this board. So, for me to see a thread like this and resist the temptation to add fuel to fire would be most uncharacteristic.

[NoboBarta]

Originally posted by Rumi
Asraful and Bangladesh team was honored with champagne during the award ceremony after the BD vs OZ upset ODI.
Question, as some observer commented, is it a show of cultural insensitivity on the part of the organizers? I don\'t know about UK, but in USA it is absolutely illegal to serve anyone below 21 with alcoholic beverage. Ashraful is not 21 yet. What would happen if MOM went to Nazmul, nafees, rana, Enamul or others below 18 or 21?
BTW what does Pakistani\'s do with the champagne?

Which culture are you talking about? Bangladeshi? Or, international cricket? Surely the latter considers it as a norm. ..Bangladeshi? Dhaka or outside Dhaka? Gulshan/Baridhara? Or Ajimpur/Mirpur? It all depends on where you come from.
If anyone has watched YGTL on NTV recently (just an example), he/she would actually appreciate the fact that Ash got a bottle of champagne! Diversity of Bangladeshi culture gets little affected by a bottle of champagne rather appreciates the extension into another culture like international cricket.

[Zephaniah]

If any champagne bottle is about to start a civil war then Ash can always give it to me.

I'm still twenty something, I still want to save the world!

[Hasib]

Geez ppl...WHO CARES!!!

[adnan_zaman]

the main thing is bangladesh is muslim majority country.........drinking is absolutely prohibited in islam...........therefore the management should do a better job next time, by telling them to keep the champagnes away inshallah..........
It doesnt matter wat tradition they (westerners) follow, we are not like them, ("This world is the paradise for the unbelievers"....Sahih al Bukhari).........our aim is the next world along with this world........ we have no similarities to english or aussies......so therefore its really quite unacceptable to presented with champagne to our players (regardless of whether any of them drink or not).....................

[NoboBarta]

Originally posted by adnan_zaman
the main thing is bangladesh is muslim majority country.........drinking is absolutely prohibited in islam...........therefore the management should do a better job next time, by telling them to keep the champagnes away inshallah..........
It doesnt matter wat tradition they (westerners) follow, we are not like them, ("This world is the paradise for the unbelievers"....Sahih al Bukhari).........our aim is the next world along with this world........ we have no similarities to english or aussies......so therefore its really quite unacceptable to presented with champagne to our players (regardless of whether any of them drink or not).....................

So it is a religious issue not a cultural issue! I guess then, Ash should give the bottle to Taposh B. Hope his religion would not prevent in accepting international cricket culture! Then you might be happy and say that Taposh is not a part of BD culture because majority are Muslim in BD!

I agree with most participants here that this is not a place for religious discussion. So, shouldn't religiously biased people be prevented from posting any comment or reference? What does Bukhari say about cricket?

[yaseer]

should we debate that long with this issue?
this is so simple fact........do you know what FIFA is trying to impose? FIFA want all the member countries must have female national team.......so BD started Female foot-ball lague.........now FIFA want female foot-ballers to wear tight shirts and very short pants (like female voley-ball players....like panties).........what will you say to this??
The whole thing can be said as world politics.........
so....champaign issue is very small here in my point of view...........but i agree that......it would be better if we could rejected to take the bottle............but can we do that practically speaking??

[al Furqaan]

Thirdly, I think Ashraful should take a sip. Might change his fortunes.

ash could also take a hit of dro, or perhaps a snort of coke, just one acid trip, just one tinny-winny shot of heroin, or just one small mushroom.

what is the difference between, those drugs and alcohol?

none.

it would change his fortunes, send em to an early grave and hell afterwards.

we want the best for our players, we dont wanna make em into drug addicts. keep em healthy.

as for the issue of insensitivity, if ash found it offensive he could refuse the champagne. its just a trophy. besides he can use it for its best purpose: as a disinfectant!

Edited on, June 20, 2005, 5:09 PM GMT, by al Furqaan.

[bop]

As far as I am concern, I would rather see all Bd players shower with champagne and posted not only in British media but also all over the world than poverty stricken Bangladesh once again under flood water!

Originally posted by Rumi
Asraful and Bangladesh team was honored with champagne during the award ceremony after the BD vs OZ upset ODI.
Question, as some observer commented, is it a show of cultural insensitivity on the part of the organizers? I don\'t know about UK, but in USA it is absolutely illegal to serve anyone below 21 with alcoholic beverage. Ashraful is not 21 yet. What would happen if MOM went to Nazmul, nafees, rana, Enamul or others below 18 or 21?
BTW what does Pakistani\'s do with the champagne?

[fwullah]

BD team management should have intervened before.

We didn't know that we would win before the match. :P

[AsifTheManRahman]

ek moder botol dise dekhe koto kahini howe gelo...amader asholei kono kaam nai

[BushidoTiger]

It is really pathetic and appalling to see how almost everything manage to be linked with religion (pls. spare me w/ responses proving how everything IS linked with religion).
C'mon people...we don’t live a homogenous culture. We were at England..not in Islamistan. Their intention was not to belittle us or undermine our religious sensitivity by presenting champagne (no matter how much the conspiracy theorist wanna believe).
It was a celebratory gesture. Nobody asked him to pop the bottle and shower everyone with it. If Ashraful doesn’t drink, all he has to do is either pour it down the sink someone suggested earlier or give it to Dav or other members who may have better usage for the fine bottle of goods.
There is a couple of stereotyping here…we are assuming that all non Muslims/Bangladeshis drink alcohol while all Muslims abide by the religious prohibition against drinking alcohol. We all know better…

Years back when L.A Lakers was wining championships with Karim Abdul Jabber as a captain, they would have Magic and rest of the guys pop open the celebratory champagne and spray each other under the gleaming eyes of the captain at the sideline. Everyone knew Karim’s preference and made sure he wasn’t sprayed with the substance that he personally avoids.
Why is that we have to dissect every thing and look for phantom agenda on EVERY gesture? Somebody brings it up and there goes one fatwa just to be trumped by yet another one.
Let’s relax and savor the moment..!!

[chucker]

BD is more religiously zealous now than it has been before and it is also reflected in this group where religion should be the last topic to talk about.

Dont you think that this discussion is also insensitive to the non Muslim BC members?