Good column by Nicholas Kristof: Apology to Muslims
The entire column is worth a read. His conclusion:
Many Americans honestly believe that Muslims are prone to violence, but humans are too complicated and diverse to lump into groups that we form invidious conclusions about. We’ve mostly learned that about blacks, Jews and other groups that suffered historic discrimination, but it’s still O.K. to make sweeping statements about “Muslims” as an undifferentiated mass.
In my travels, I’ve seen some of the worst of Islam: theocratic mullahs oppressing people in Iran; girls kept out of school in Afghanistan in the name of religion; girls subjected to genital mutilation in Africa in the name of Islam; warlords in Yemen and Sudan who wield AK-47s and claim to be doing God’s bidding.
But I’ve also seen the exact opposite: Muslim aid workers in Afghanistan who risk their lives to educate girls; a Pakistani imam who shelters rape victims; Muslim leaders who campaign against female genital mutilation and note that it is not really an Islamic practice; Pakistani Muslims who stand up for oppressed Christians and Hindus; and above all, the innumerable Muslim aid workers in Congo, Darfur, Bangladesh and so many other parts of the world who are inspired by the Koran to risk their lives to help others. Those Muslims have helped keep me alive, and they set a standard of compassion, peacefulness and altruism that we should all emulate.
I’m sickened when I hear such gentle souls lumped in with Qaeda terrorists, and when I hear the faith they hold sacred excoriated and mocked. To them and to others smeared, I apologize.
He should go back and live among them then along with each and every one of that foul cults’ supporters. They have no valid place within American society.
jonolan
19 September 2010 at 10:06 am
You, sir, are a traitor to American ideals—and to the US Constitution, which is neutral on the topic of religions. I do not like the Taliban, but I am able to distinguish between it and between normal Muslims practicing their religions, just as I am to distinguish between evangelical crazies and normal Christians.
LeisureGuy
19 September 2010 at 12:09 pm
Brave words, but based upon a proven falsehood. If America was only at war with a tiny fringe of Islam the threat of violence by them in response to the Idiot Jones’ proposed Qur’an burning would not have been the international crises that it was. Nor would that response – which happened anyway just due to the “threat” of the burning – have happened.
Please understand, I don’t think you’re wrong for your emotional response, but I know that it’s based upon a false postulate that is dangerous to the people of the Civilized World.
Please think about that.
jonolan
19 September 2010 at 2:02 pm
America is in fact only at war with a tiny fringe. Or have we attacked all Muslim nations while I’ve been typing?
Take a look at the large emotional masses of idiots that regularly gather to rant in this country, the Tea Party being the current example.
You seem quite clearly to be a religious bigot: willing to let idiot Christians off the hook, but holding all Muslims responsible for their idiot fringe.
LeisureGuy
19 September 2010 at 2:12 pm
You just don’t seem to get it. If it’s just an “idiot fringe” of the Muslims then how could they be such a threat as to make their potential response to the burning of the Qur’an worthy of international terror and outcry?
I think it’s safer to say that we might need to cultivate – at a distance – the “sane fringe” of Islam.
But yes, I’m less worried about the “idiot Christians.” In recent centuries they’ve largely only killed among their own insular groups. I see them as far less of an immediate threat and, therefor, not high value targets at this time.
jonolan
19 September 2010 at 2:49 pm
I do not think it is worth debating with Jonolan. His picture depicts where he is coming from. All he needs is a Klu Klux Klan hood and he’s got it. Back to the Stone Age of non thinking bigots. Unfortunately the world is full of them now. Victims of the now, ‘opiate of the masses’, the media.
Ron Martin
Thailand
Ron Martin
21 September 2010 at 11:03 pm