This is so infuriating that I honestly don’t even have the words to describe how reading it made me feel. The hubris, the audacity of these people; That they think so highly of themselves that they feel justified in taking from the world an irreplaceable part of its history.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jan/28/mali-timbuktu-library-ancient-manuscripts
A Pun Involving Travel 
(╯°□°)╯︵ ┻ ━┻
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What truly sickens me is that this is Islamic Culture, Islamic Science and Islamic History which is being wantonly destroyed. Along with the complete eradication of all traces of the Sufi history in Mali, it is apparent that the intention is to destroy everything which stands in opposition to the absurd reductive Wahabbi strand of Islam.
Edit: Just saw on C4 news that the wahabbbists even destroyed centuries-old Qur’āns. Words actually fail me.
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This is why things like the google library scanning project are important.
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Benjamin Staffin I should mention that the very first thing I thought when I read this was “If we didn’t have scans of these pages, we should have.” The real tragedy here is that the idea that a given piece of physical media is disposable has taken such thorough root in global culture that it can cheapen a piece of physical media that is irreplaceable.
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