Diceman

Let's pretend we were talking about the IRA and Northern Ireland. If you were to say to me "It's not the Irish people that are causing the problem, it's the IRA," I would be just fine with that. The reason is because the two groups - Irish people and the IRA - do not have a relationship of identity. The IRA is (for the sake of argument) composed of nothing but Irishmen, but one does not need to be in the IRA in order to be Irish. But when the two groups of people, muslims and those that are involved in Islam, are the exact same group, I become very confused as to how one group can be a problem and not the other. I'd even be ok with saying that militant Islam (without discussing how mainstream it is) is the problem - although, if this were a new thread, I would likely start arguing for a variety of qualifiers on that statement - because militant Islam (unless every single muslim is militant) must be a subset of "whole" Islam. But I just don't follow you on the difference between the two identities.

Referencing an earlier post you made, you asked if I thought that America had been hawkish, and if that meant that all Americans were hawkish. I think I can see somewhat what you mean here, and how it relates to Islam and individual muslims. But, on the other hand, being an American is not an article of Faith. It is more because of where you were born (barring the case of immigrants, for the time being). If Islam really is a militant religion, then aren't all devout muslims militant by definition? This could quickly, to my sense at least, start to turn into something resembling an Ann Coulter rant - that we ought to bomb their cities, kill their leaders and convert them to Christianity. I mean, what else do you do with people who are violent, by definition?

I also think that there is too much of a focus on recent history. I know this gets the goat of a good number of people (and I'm not saying it to convince you, but to outline why I think the things I do), but I really think it is relevant that we can see things like the Troubles in Ireland, like the Crusades, like the French and the English going at it for hundreds of years - no coincedence when the English were Protestant and the French were catholic. Other examples include residential schools in Canada, the Ku Klux Klan and neo-nazism and the Holocaust. All of these have major religious elements to them, even if there are other reasons given and other complicating factors exist.

So, with the equally shoddy track record of other religions in hand, we recall the fact that the Arabs brought about major advances - in mathematics in particular, but had scholars studying a variety of branches - and I think it shows that Islam has major positives to show for itself as well, provided a longer view is taken.

At the end of the day, for the above reasons, I don't really see Islam as being any inherently better or worse than any of the other religions out there. Yes, times have certainly been rocky for Islam for the past while. But that doesn't show inherent villainy, at least to me.

Interesting points. I will give that some thought.

Heh heh. I've been wanting to do that all day now.

My dad had a muslim boarder staying at his house for some time (about 2 years, if memory serves). My dad has the highest regard for this particular fellow, and he is a very devout muslim. My own take of him is that he is as we would think religious people to be: calm, friendly, giving, polite, so on and so forth. I know that religion is perhaps the most important aspect of his life - but I saw nothing of hatred for any groups - be it the West, America, or anyone else.

He left to go back to Algeria, just two months ago. I've been wishing he was around, so I could ask him some of these questions.

At any rate, thanks for the discussion.

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Kerostasis

It seems to me that it ought to be obvious where we draw the line between "we disagree with these guys", and "we think this movement is a global problem that needs to be stopped". That line is crossed when "they" (whoever "they" are, but in this case militant islam) gain the physical power necessary to reach out across the ocean and hurt us (whoever "us" is, but in this case the USA) here at home, and demonstrate the willingness to excercise that power.

Both of those criteria have been established for militant islam. Iran's pursuit of nuclear weaponry is also bringing it dangerously close to that border.

You can argue all you want about whether that definition is morally correct, but you're going to have an awfully hard time finding a better definition for practical application.

Edit: Having said this, I can barely remember if this is even the correct thread for it, since I haven't been in the Sandbox much the last week or so.

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CingularDuality

Hmmm, 3 tons of explosives and all the local mosque can say is "they were steadfast, religious people. There's no doubt about it. But here we always preach peace and moderation."

Where's the outrage? Where are the strong words from the religious leaders to their followers?

Oh, and look! What kind of group took over Somalia's capital? One with ties to Al Queda? Nah... Militant Islam isn't a global problem...

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USN_Squid

Here's a related example. This statement from the leader of The Muslim Council of Britain sounds more like a threat or promise than a call for calm. Why wouldn't he ask people to let the investigation take place and not be rash. He's talking to the Police and the Government asking them to take action or who knows what might happen? Instead, he should be talking to the Muslim community asking for their patience in a legitimate investigation. At least that's how I see it.

LONDON (AFP) - The police were under pressure to clear up the confusion over last week’s massive anti-terror raid or risk seeing angry Muslims “take the law into their own hands,” a Muslim community leader has warned.

The Muslim Council of Britain’s new leader Muhammed Abdul Bari said “trust could break down” if the police failed to explain why they launched last Friday’s raid, which has turned up nothing of a reported chemical weapons plot.

Relaying the sentiment that he heard during a visit late Monday to the east London neighborhood which was raided, Abdul Bari said “the message is the confusion, it’s the frustration and to some extent anger.”

Police arrested Mohammed Abdul Kahar, 23, and his brother Abul Koyair, 20, during the raid on their home at dawn by 250 officers. Abdul Kahar, who was shot and wounded, and Koyair have vehemently denied involvement in terrorism.

“People want to know what exactly happened and about the intelligence — is it genuine information, is it flawed — these are the questions police have to answer as soon as possible,” Abdul Bari said Tuesday.

“Trust could break down if things are not clarified,” said Abdul Bari, the secretary general of Britain’s largest Muslim organization. “Angry people can do anything, angry people can even feel that they should take the law into their own hands, so anger has to be directed into positive action,” he warned.

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AMosely

I can see both sides of this. I can see Squid and Cing's view that there doesn't seem to be an overwhelming message of calm coming from most of these Muslim leaders - in fact in some examples, such as this, it would appear quite the opposite. These sorts of messages - telling people to take the law into their own hands - do not help anyone.

On the other hand, I can understand why innocent Muslims feel that they are being unfairly subject to prejudiced and discrimanatory suspicions. I'm not sure how I would react to this myself if I were in this situation, but I would probably make an attempt to speak up peacefully and support leaders who took such a stand.

To mitigate this, officials need to be careful how they conduct these searches, seizures and prosecutions to eliminate ambiguity as much as possible - misinformation or a complete lack of information can clearly lead to the type of confusion and mixed messages we see in this Brittish example.

xTYBALTx

Orwell's position seems to rest on the assumption that pacifism is not an effective method of "resistance" - so to speak.

Is this assumption reasonable? Can we list examples of pacifism working and not working? Should we compare these to examples of armed resistance working and not working?

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CingularDuality

And that's the thing.... Prejudice is NOT always a bad thing. And the lack of anger from Muslim leaders contributes to the perception that this prejudice is good. If they spoke out and confirmed that the majority of Muslims don't support terrorism, then such prejudice would obviously be bad and I think we'd see less of it. This lack of outrage is hurting them.

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