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Rethinking multiculturalism; the plight of young Western Muslims
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| Fir3start3r |
A long read yes, but a very intelligent look at young Western Muslims and thier plight in Western society.
A serious read for those that truly want to understand our home-grown terrorists and what we (and they) can do about it.
I really enjoyed this article and it puts to light a lot of questions that we've been ignoring for way too long.
I look forward to some debate on this. Enjoy. :)
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Rethinking multiculturalism
How does a country respond to people who consider many of its key values anathema? It's a question Canada must answer, writes Robert Sibley.
Robert Sibley
The Ottawa Citizen
Saturday, June 10, 2006
CREDIT: Chris Mikula, The Ottawa Citizen
Muslims pack the Ottawa mosque following last summer's bombings in London. Western-born Muslims straddle a fault line. Their parents and community leaders want them to act according to the traditions of an Islamic society in which they have never lived. At the same time, they confront a secular society replete with all the lures of a hedonistic ethos they have been taught to despise.
Not surprisingly, everybody was surprised. Seventeen men and teenage boys, all devotees of Islam, are arrested on terrorism-related charges, and nobody -- friends, neighbours, family -- could believe they might have been plotting to kill thousands of fellow citizens.
Not in our neighbourhood, not in our community, not in our religion; such were the refrains of family, friends and imams. We've heard it before, of course. Last July, when four young men staged suicide bombings that killed 52 people on the London underground, the most shocking revelation for many Britons was that the terrorists were homegrown British citizens. Much debate followed, but a just-released study by the British government could provide no definitive answers as to why young men, born and raised in a liberal democratic society, would want to harm that society.
Now it's the turn of Canadians to ask such questions. Why would young men who aren't particularly poor, downtrodden, friendless or uneducated (at least in a technological sense) turn against the society that welcomed their parents? Why aren't they pleased to be part of Canada's multicultural society?
There are undoubtedly sociological answers to such questions, but the psychological responses probably go deeper. You might recall the young Californian, John Walker, and the young Australian, David Hicks, both of whom converted to Islam, became al-Qaeda recruits and were captured by American troops during the liberation of Afghanistan. Mr. Walker told his Islamic teachers that living in the United States "I feel alone." Hicks told friends he felt estranged from society and "didn't like the way things were going." Extremist Islam, it seems, provided them with a sense of meaning and purpose that wasn't available to them in the progressivist consumer societies in which they were raised.
We heard similar expressions of alienation voiced by a friend of one of the alleged Toronto-area terrorists. He told a television reporter that young Muslim males are regarded with suspicion by non-Muslims, have difficulties obtaining good jobs and, hence, have questionable futures in Canada. Right there you have a formula for the resentment that leads to social violence. Tell young men their lives are going nowhere, that they don't really belong, that they will have difficulties finding partners with whom they can raise families, or even jobs to support those families; well, you've got a group highly susceptible to the lure of extremism.
To acknowledge this is not to provide a sociological justification to terrorism. The "root cause" of terrorism is not the failure of Canada to accommodate these young men. Western society has it faults, and the experience of alienation is one of the downsides of our consumer-oriented, efficiency-obsessed technological society, but alienation and self-pity don't warrant plots to blow up buildings and kill innocents. To think that elevates narcissism to pathological proportions.
That said, the sense of alienation second-generation Muslim males feel toward the western society points to a deeper problem.
The English writer C.S. Lewis offers a way to consider the problem in his 1955 book The Abolition of Man. He thought modern educators do an inadequate job of helping young men acquire a strong sense of moral virtue. In men, he wrote, "the head rules the belly through the chest -- the seat ... of magnanimity, of emotions organized by habit into stable elements. The chest -- magnanimity (and) sentiment -- these are the indispensable liaison officers between cerebral man and visceral man. It may even be said that it is by this middle element that man is man: for by his intellect he is mere spirit and by his appetite mere animal."
Lewis worried that educators -- from teachers and parents to politicians and pundits -- were intent on suppressing this middle or "spirited" element in young men, the result of which would be the atrophy of men's capacity for self-sacrifice, magnanimity and noble ambition. It is the spirited element that necessarily mediates between ideas and instincts, between aggressiveness and nobility, he argued, to suppress the negative aspects of spiritedness would also suppress the positive side. Lewis sums up the confusion this way: "(We) remove the organ and demand the function. We make men without chests and expect of them virtue and enterprise. We laugh at honour and are shocked to find traitors in our midst. We castrate and bid the geldings be fruitful."
The ancient Greeks and Romans certainly knew better. They knew that alienation and violence are rooted in the same source as self-sacrifice and a sense of fairness. They knew that the impulse to violence draws from the same well as the desire to create art, build cathedrals and climb mountains. The male instinct to fight is also the instinct to protect children and rush into burning buildings. The ancients referred to this impulse as thumos, or spiritedness. Thumos literally means the breathe of life, the principle that animates human existence, the spirit that moves men to act.
For the ancients, a man's spiritedness defined his character, gave direction to his conduct and informed his capacities for reasoning. Young men are thumotic by nature, but they are not inherently reasonable. Their psyches need to be properly trained, educated to reason, lest they turn in dangerous directions. And because thumos can turn good or bad, depending on circumstances, the most important function of any society is the proper education of its young men.
Cicero underscores the ancient concern with thumos in Tusculan Disputations when he says that "just as a field, however good the ground, cannot be productive without cultivation, so the soul cannot be productive without education." But Cicero also knew that even the best education is no guarantee against poor character. The shaping influence of education "cannot be the same for all: its effect is great when it has secured a hold upon a character suited to it." The results of education depend not only on the quality of what is taught, but also on the character of those being taught. Hence, genuine education is an education of the soul.
This is also the great lesson in Plato's Republic. Socrates, Plato's main character, tries to educate the young men of Athens to direct their passions and ambitions to the service of the city, to channel their desire for honour into civic duty, to devote their intelligence to philosophy rather than tyrannical power.
Plato recognized that social order is threatened when the spirited psyches of young men are not directed to noble purposes. Which is to say, uneducated -- or miseducated -- young men are the most dangerous creatures on the planet. And they are doubly dangerous when their spirited nature is perverted by those who promise fulfillment through violence and destruction.
This is the promise of terrorism, and we underestimate the Islamists when we dismiss them as irrational or even psychopathic. As political theorist Barry Cooper writes in his book New Political Religions, when humans think they are chosen by God -- or by Allah -- they "are not crazy in the common-sense use of the term." Rather, they are "spiritually disordered," says Mr. Cooper, who draws on the concepts of the political philosopher Eric Voegelin.
Voegelin coined the term "pneumopathological" to describe those who live in a daydream fantasy about the world. Those gripped by pneumopathologies live in a "second reality" in which they imagine their actions will change the world to suit their fantasies. As Mr. Cooper puts it, "The terroristic act as a moralistic model is a symptom of the disease in which evil assumes the form of spirituality."
Such "spirituality" clearly motivated those who believed crashing planes into the World Trade Center would bring about a transfiguring clash of civilizations between Islam and the West. And it is this "spiritual disorder" that deluded young Britons, and now, allegedly, young Canadians, into imagining they served Islam by blowing up symbols of a society they had been persuaded to regard as a spiritually dead.
Numerous commentators have suggested that the "spiritual emptiness" of western society fosters Islamist hatred. The alleged Toronto terrorists, like the London bombers, are the children of Muslims who for whatever reason ended up in living in the land of bilad al-kufr, the land of unbelief. These children are caught between their parents' old society and the new society with its forbidden temptations. They are taught that the smorgasbord of western sexual mores and the glittering array of consumer goods are, in Mr. Cooper's words, "a Satanic temptation."
Thus, western-born Muslims straddle a fault line. Their parents and community leaders want them to act according to the traditions of an Islamic society in which they have never lived. At the same time, they confront a secular society replete with all the lures of a hedonistic ethos they have been taught to despise. The consequence for some is a resentment that turns into a "neurotic zealotry," to use Arab-American scholar Fouad Ajami's phrase, that seeks the destruction of the society from which they feel alienated.
On this point, the similarities between the accused Toronto-area Muslims and the London bombers is striking. Three of the four London bombers were second-generation British citizens whose parents came from Pakistan many years earlier. As teenagers, each became devout Muslims, frequenting mosques where their grooming as terrorists began. Similarly, most of those arrested in Toronto are second-generation Canadian citizens under the age of 25, whose parents had emigrated from Muslim countries. According to news reports, they "trained" together, and several attended the same Mississauga mosque and community centre. What they all learned, whether in Toronto or London, is that the West is a spiritual wasteland, the source of jahiliyya, a conspiracy to destroy Islam, and therefore deserves to be destroyed.
It's a pneumopathological teaching, to be sure. But it's also wrong: The worst oppressors of Muslims are Muslims themselves. Arabs slaughter black Muslims in Darfur. Sunnis and Shiites blow up each other in Iraq. Taliban terrorists kill more Afghans than western soldiers. As the Muslim writer Irshad Manji notes, "In the past 50 years, more Muslims have been raped, imprisoned, tortured and murdered by other Muslims than by any foreign imperial power."
Some may still want to argue that Canadian society is at fault for not doing enough to accommodate Muslim immigrants. But it's hard to see what more Canada could do without abandoning liberal, democratic principles. The Toronto District School Board, for example, has all but abandoned any pretense of being a public, secular school system by bowing to parental demands that devout Muslim children be provided with a place to pray during school hours. That's rather accommodating, yet some of the children who attended the board's schools are among those accused of terrorism.
So how do you respond to people who regard concepts of freedom, democracy, liberalism and tolerance as anathema? What do you do with those who cynically exploit principles of free expression and human rights to undermine the political order that sustains those principles?
Well, maybe it is time to stop being so accommodating. Maybe it is time to stop tolerating intolerance. Maybe it's time to reassert liberalism for what it once was -- a fighting creed.
Obviously, most Muslims want nothing to do with the "neurotic zealots" in their communities. Indeed, the RCMP and CSIS likely relied on members of the Muslim community in their investigations. Nonetheless, while not all Muslims are terrorists, all the terrorists of recent vintage have been Muslim. Clearly, there is a disconnection between the tenets of Islam, as interpreted by the Islamists, and the principles of western liberalism.
Most western countries regard themselves, officially or not, as multicultural societies. They assert the principle that different cultures have the freedom to develop as they wish, regardless of the standards of any majoritarian culture. But as political philosopher Roger Scruton argues, the result of the multicultural ideal has been to create a system of "apartheid" in which various cultures within a country refuse to assimilate to any substantive degree with the large order and exist independently of each other as much as possible. Anyone who questions this system, much less criticizes a minority culture, is censored and silenced by accusations of racism. Consequently, immigrant groups conclude they can live in a western society "as an antagonist and still enjoy all the rights and privileges that are the reward of citizenship," Mr. Scruton writes in his essay, "The Muslim Next Door: Can we live with him? Can he live with us?"
Thus, says Mr. Scruton, the notion of tolerance undermines itself. He points out the western ideal of tolerance emerged during the 18th century Enlightenment following centuries of religious warfare in Europe. This ideal is dependent on the concept of citizenship. Citizens, as philosophers from Montesquieu and Locke to Kant and Hegel taught, freely participate in the institutions that govern them, and their fundamental obligation is to obey the laws of the state that protects their freedom. "Citizens enjoy a single political culture," says Mr. Scruton, "with the nation-state as the object of our common loyalty, and a secular conception of law that makes religion a concern of family and society, but not of the state." Hence, western democracies generally impose no religious demands on citizen, ideally treat all citizens as equals before the law, and "safeguard a political heritage in which the freedom of the individual is the highest aim of government."
Mr. Scruton questions whether immigrants who won't accept those principles can be full members of western societies. "People who see law, social identity and loyalty as issuing from a religious or tribal source cannot really form part of the Western political culture, and will not recognize either the obligation to the state or the love of country on which that obligation is founded ... Citizens are not, and cannot be, members of a multicultural society, if that means a society with multiple and conflicting loyalties and rival systems of law."
This does not mean Muslims are incapable of being loyal citizens of western states, Mr. Scruton says, but it does mean that Muslim immigrants "must exchange tribal and creedal loyalties for loyalties of a different kind, found on common territory and a secular rule of law."
Can this new "loyalty" be taught and assimilated? Social psychologists often argue, as Mr. Cooper observes, that "Islamist immigrants plot the fall of the West because the spiritual emptiness of its materialism and hedonism is all they know." Admittedly, even non-Muslims might agree that the devotion to entertainment and titillation demonstrates the vulgarity and shallowness of contemporary western society.
But to think that is all there is to the West is the height of ignorance. In this regard, the Islamists' deficiency of knowledge betrays not only their ignorance, but their failure to learn the first lesson of war -- Know your enemy.
Not only will this failing eventually prove to be the undoing of worldwide Islamism, but it suggests how Canadians can respond to the presence of homegrown second-generation Islamists: It is time to abandon the cultural relativism of multiculturalism, time to restore the western canon to our education system, time to teach those who come here what this country, and the West as whole, is all about. Multiculturalism cannot be used to promote intolerance. As Matthew Arnold might say, Canada needs to insist that immigrants learn the best that has been thought and said in western culture.
This doesn't mean we should deny the brutality and horrors of western history, or ignore other cultures. But it does mean we shouldn't feel guilty about or apologize for the West and its history. For all its flaws and failing, western civilization, unlike any other civilization, has a singular redeeming quality: a history of opposing those who suppress human freedom and dignity. This, arguably, is the source of the the West's spiritual richness, a richness that the Islamists, in their ignorance, don't understand.
Canadians have every reason to be concerned that a dozen second-generation Muslims have turned their backs on the country that took in their parents. We -- and that includes Muslim communities -- must do a better job of educating such young men, a better job of guiding their spirits to see reason.
A place to start would be Plato and Cicero, followed by Montesquieu, Locke, Hegel ...
Robert Sibley is a senior writer with the Citizen.
© The Ottawa Citizen 2006
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| Q5echo |
it's a good article, however i'm not convinced of the author's notion that the lack of cultivation of young men's "spritedness" or "virtue" on the part of teachers, politicians, society ect. is even partly at fault. why haven't we've seen more of these dis-effected youth rising up violently? maybe they have'nt been molested by the right people. (i use the word molested in it's literal, non-sexual meaning)
even if i'm wrong (which certainly can be the case since the entire culture is foriegn to me) that still doesn't bely the virality <--word? and viciousness of this hijacked religion. |
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| Q5echo |
told ya i could be wrong
| quote: | We failed our youth: Imam
Congregations urged to take responsibility for influencing young minds
But some Muslim Canadians upset by backlash following last week's arrests
Jun. 10, 2006. 04:34 PM
HEBA ALY, SURYA BHATTACHARYA AND THULASI SRIKANTHAN
STAFF REPORTERS
Imams across the GTA urged families and communities to take more responsibility for shaping the minds of young Muslims, following the arrest of 17 young men and boys on terrorism-related charges last Friday.
In Mississauga, North York and Scarborough, they spoke to thousands gathered for Friday afternoon prayers, some addressing concerns about backlash, others urging the community to have faith in the Canadian justice system to provide a fair trial.
"There is nothing wrong in saying we failed our youth," said Imam Munir El-Kassen at the Toronto and Region Islamic Congregation in North York. "We did not fail them intentionally, but our community was in a formative stage and our youth searching to fill the vacuum within received wrong advice and training.
"We should be more careful in controlling the youth in the public domain — not everybody should be allowed to talk or lead the youth. They are the most vulnerable."
Imam Husain Patel, at the Islamic Foundation of Toronto in Scarborough — where several of those accused prayed in the past — echoed that sentiment.
According to Statistics Canada, there were 579,640 Muslims in Canada in 2001 — a figure projected to rise to about 780,000 by this year.
"It will be a very small minority if they are found guilty," said Mohamed Elmasry, president of the Canadian Islamic Congress, who
joined the prayers at North York.
He added that this was not the time for political rhetoric about different kinds of Islamic values.
But Muslim Canadians at two of the three mosques the Toronto Star visited expressed how troubled and angry they were about the backlash that followed last week's arrests.
>link< |
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| Fir3start3r |
There's always going to be disenfranchised youth in any culture, however considering the circumstances surrounding these particular youth and what's currently going on in the world, there's more focus and attention.
Yes, it's going to be uncomfortable for everybody, however ignoring a problem doesn't make it go away. I'm happy the Muslim community here is getting this sense from the rest of us and is actively hitting this head on, at least here in Canada; can't say anything about what happening in the States. Maybe someone can enlighten us? |
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| trancaholic |
| quote: | Originally posted by Fir3start3r
I'm happy the Muslim community here is getting this sense from the rest of us and is actively hitting this head on, |
What are they actually doing - besides giving statements to the press? |
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| shaolin_Z |
| quote: | Originally posted by trancaholic
What are they actually doing - besides giving statements to the press? |
Nothing. They're all a bunch of ing loosers. Muslims are incapable of doing anything constructive. :rolleyes: I'm pretty surprised at your lack of understanding of the entire situation and tension between Muslims and the West. Stop supporting repressive murderous regimes, installing military bases, and controling the region's resources. Perhaps then you'll have a ing leg to stand on with all this bitching and complaining. Your problem is you trust the media and the system in general too much. Stop being so naive, snap out it man. The media and the politicans (involved in international affairs) lie to you everyeday to cover up their horrific crimes and further their own interests (and they couldn't care less about how many lives they destroy or nations they cripple in the process). Ofcourse, you don't even know about half the that goes down in the Middle East since the press (for obvious reasons) won't cover it. The media WILL NOT ING COVER anything that would present Muslims/Arabs in a positive light, OK? (As long there is a reason to do so). Refer to this post in the other thread:
| quote: | Originally posted by shaolin_Z
If you want the population to go along with a war policy, make them distrust, fear, and hate the "other side." It's a technique that's been used through out history, especially in the modern post industrial world. Go take a look at old newpapers etc (I actually had to do this research for a paper, and I was going through "respected" outlets like NY Times and Washington Post). Now you can let your concern turn into fear which turns into hate. The choice is your's. |
There a whole lot more I could say, but I simply don't have the energy to right now since your comment was infuriating and offensive as hell (not due to ill intention or anything, but lack of responsibility and ignorance) and because you won't believe anything that's not from a Westerm sourse. Your utopain view of how Western goverments work (i.e. their actions and intentions behind them in relation to foreign policy, how they magane the general population through the use of heavy propoganda) and total lack of understanding of power will only keep you in your blissful state of ignorace. Take some ing responsibility and wake the up. Stop elected these jack asses in to office who implement policies which are largely responsible for the deteriorating state of the Middle East rightnow.
(Note: My last comment was a general comment, not specifically directed at you).
EDIT: Nothing pisses me off and disgust me more than dishonesty and hypocricy. And a deliberate chosen state of ignorance is borderline dishonety/hyporciy IMO.
EDIT2: Stop killing our brothers and sisters in the Middle East/making their lives miserable. Things will be very different once it stops, and Muslims won't feel like they're constanly targeted by the West. |
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| qussay |
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i agree with you 100 % !
The main reason is controlling the resources , so in order to do that , they have to have presence in the region , which means they have to create a reason to be there .... you do the math !
The media DOESNT cover anything good regarding Arabs/Muslims , it even goes out of its way ( if not creating ) to cover stories , were Arabs/Muslims are portrayed as murderers and terrorists so you wont feel any sempathy when they get slaughtered, and gives excuses for the death of soldiers !
however, this still doesnt give any excuse to suicide bombings especially when Arabs/Muslims are living abroad , when host countries have given them citizenships and welcomed them and their families .
| quote: | Originally posted by shaolin_Z
EDIT2: Stop killing our brothers and sisters in the Middle East/making their lives miserable. Things will be very different once it stops, and Muslims won't feel like they're constanly targeted by the West. |
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exactly ! i couldnt have said this better myself ! |
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| trancaholic |
| quote: | Originally posted by shaolin_Z
Nothing. They're all a bunch of ing loosers. Muslims are incapable of doing anything constructive. :rolleyes: I'm pretty surprised at your lack of understanding of the entire situation and tension between Muslims and the West. Stop supporting repressive murderous regimes, installing military bases, and controling the region's resources. Perhaps then you'll have a ing leg to stand on with all this bitching and complaining. Your problem is you trust the media and the system in general too much. Stop being so naive, snap out it man. The media and the politicans (involved in international affairs) lie to you everyeday to cover up their horrific crimes and further their own interests (and they couldn't care less about how many lives they destroy or nations they cripple in the process). Ofcourse, you don't even know about half the that goes down in the Middle East since the press (for obvious reasons) won't cover it. The media WILL NOT ING COVER anything that would present Muslims/Arabs in a positive light, OK? (As long there is a reason to do so). Refer to this post in the other thread:
There a whole lot more I could say, but I simply don't have the energy to right now since your comment was infuriating and offensive as hell (not due to ill intention or anything, but lack of responsibility and ignorance) and because you won't believe anything that's not from a Westerm sourse. Your utopain view of how Western goverments work (i.e. their actions and intentions behind them in relation to foreign policy, how they magane the general population through the use of heavy propoganda) and total lack of understanding of power will only keep you in your blissful state of ignorace. Take some ing responsibility and wake the up. Stop elected these jack asses in to office who implement policies which are largely responsible for the deteriorating state of the Middle East rightnow.
(Note: My last comment was a general comment, not specifically directed at you).
EDIT: Nothing pisses me off and disgust me more than dishonesty and hypocricy. And a deliberate chosen state of ignorance is borderline dishonety/hyporciy IMO.
EDIT2: Stop killing our brothers and sisters in the Middle East/making their lives miserable. Things will be very different once it stops, and Muslims won't feel like they're constanly targeted by the West. |
You've clearly read a lot more into my post than was meant to be there. It was a simple question, which I thought was quite valid considering what the article quoted by Fir3start3r actually said. If you have built up some anger over something I've posted elsewhere, why don't you find that post and reply something factual to which I can reply in a meaningful manner?
That being said, I think that some parts of your post needs a response:
First, don't go strawman on me. I don't "support repressive murderous regimes, install military bases, and control the region's resources". I never supported the war in Iraq, I've never voted for Bush, and I only support the continued presence of Danish troops in Iraq because the Iraqi democratically elected government has asked them to stay (in a formal letter). Moreover, I don't "trust the media and the system in general too much". I don't even own a TV (or a radio for that matter). I do not "chose a state of ignorance", but actively seek out blogs and alternative news sites.
Second, all my "bitching and complaining" has been directed towards Islamists living in the West, and I dare say that I have quite a leg to stand on in these matters. In fact, I invite you to go find me something terrible I've said that hasn't been backed up by either arguments or sources.
Third, when spewing things such as "The media and the politicans (involved in international affairs) lie to you everyeday" and "The media WILL NOT ING COVER anything that would present Muslims/Arabs in a positive light", you ought to back it up. After all, why should I trust you - with no evidence - over the entire press corps? |
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| shaolin_Z |
| quote: | Originally posted by trancaholic
You've clearly read a lot more into my post than was meant to be there. It was a simple question, which I thought was quite valid considering what the article quoted by Fir3start3r actually said. If you have built up some anger over something I've posted elsewhere, why don't you find that post and reply something factual to which I can reply in a meaningful manner? |
It wasn't any particular post I was referreing to, but rather this attitude of "we've been so good to you, why aren't you helping us as a people." (<--- this statement is utter BS) Which isn't terribly different from "if you're not with us, you're against us" in todays political climate. What disappointed me was you're adherence to this point of view (and I really hope I'm mistaken here). Note, this is in context to the bigger picutre, it's not like there isn't political dissent in the West and people speaking out. The only problem is, they're not in postions of power and have little to influence in pragmatic terms. Their efforts are heavily over shadowed by the establishment, which does the opposite. And most of these people are marginalized and aren't really heard by the general population (the media, which is in bed with the same people that run this coutnry atlest, is particularly dedicated to smear campaigns and destroying their credibilty in the view of the general public).
| quote: | Originally posted by trancaholic
That being said, I think that some parts of your post needs a response:
First, don't go strawman on me. I don't "support repressive murderous regimes, install military bases, and control the region's resources". I never supported the war in Iraq, I've never voted for Bush, and I only support the continued presence of Danish troops in Iraq because the Iraqi democratically elected government has asked them to stay (in a formal letter). |
I wasn't. Note the last few lines of my post. It wasn't directed at you personally, it was a general response to the attitude I descried above. The fact of the matter is that these extremist wouldn't exist in the first place if it weren't for Western corperate and strategic interest in the region and US foreign policy. And these ed up policies were implemented by "democratically" elected Westerm leaders. So everyone shares some burden of responsibility to and extent. It's hypocritcal and highly irresponsible to blame someone else for the consequences of your actions. You reap what you sow (note, generic you here again).
| quote: | Originally posted by trancaholic
Moreover, I don't "trust the media and the system in general too much". I don't even own a TV (or a radio for that matter). I do not "chose a state of ignorance", but actively seek out blogs and alternative news sites.
Second, all my "bitching and complaining" has been directed towards Islamists living in the West, and I dare say that I have quite a leg to stand on in these matters. In fact, I invite you to go find me something terrible I've said that hasn't been backed up by either arguments or sources. |
And how much of the information you gather is from Western sources and how much of it is from Muslim/Arab sources?
| quote: | Originally posted by trancaholic
Third, when spewing things such as "The media and the politicans (involved in international affairs) lie to you everyeday" and "The media WILL NOT ING COVER anything that would present Muslims/Arabs in a positive light", you ought to back it up. After all, why should I trust you - with no evidence - over the entire press corps? |
Well, I sort of did with that general comment on population control and propoganda. And in order to flesh out a substantial detailed response, that would just require tons of research with footnotes and sources, which I don't exactly have the time for. I'm guessing living in Denmark, you're not really exposed much to anti-Islam/Muslim/Arab propoganda (since I have a hard time believing that you wouldn't be able to pick up on it). Why don't you try bringing up this subject (not necessarily in a direct manner if you're not compfortable with it) with Muslims in Western nations like the US, Britain, France, & Germany etc. Ask them about their experiences of facing discrimination and prejudice, most of which is stems on misrepresentaiton and demonization of a religion and entire people.
BTW: The term "Islamist" to refer to these people is just another reflection of anti-Islam propoganda and misrepresentation. There is nothing Islamic about their actions or policies, majority of the time it's IN DIRECT CONTRADITON to the Quran's and the Prophet Mohammad's teachings.
On another note, you're right as far as most 'moneyed' Muslims go. I would call these bastards "good muslims" just becuase some of them have recieved degrees from prestegious Westerm institutions (note, by moneyed muslims I'm referring to those with plenty of resources, at least financial resources, both in the West and the East). They generally don't give two s about other Muslims and are usually, passivley or directly, working with the West to advance Western interest in the region. As far as the people invloved in various Middle Eastern regimes go, they're nothing more than corrupt aristocratic s who comply with Western interest in the region to maintain status quo and accumilate and centralize more wealth and power. They DO NOT respresent , and are enemies of the general population.
Plus, people really need to break out of this sheepish mentality of assuming that the religious establishment or moneyed Muslims represent the will of the Muslim people.
EDIT: Another thing, I have a hard time believing that there wouldn't be an uproar if innocent white people were being illegaly kidnapped, tortured and detailed in Guantanamo Bay and other secret prisons. But it's ok if they're Arab/Muslim. This sends a pretty strong message to the Muslim community. They don't give a about you or your rights. It's ok to dehumanize you, regardless of whether or not you're involved in terrorism. (note, obviously this isn't directed towards you at all, and is a very generalized statemnet lacking specification). My point is, why the hell are Muslims some how obligated to appease everyone else when no one gives two s about them? Why do they have to dispel Western paranoia and prove that they're all not kamakazi pychos with bombs strapped to them? I don't think any group should have to constantly prove their innocence, and by default be assumed to be guilty of something that has nothing to with them.
The world is alot less racist than it used to be and no one would put up with (atleast I hope) an immediate overt concentration camp type scenario where everyone, man, woman, child, elderly, is dragged form their homes and rounded up in labour camps and gas chambers. The goverment simply wouldn't be able to get away with something that obviously tyranical. If you observe history, there's plenty of indications and developments that make this scenario seem not too far fetched in near future (a decade or two, possibly even less?), which is another reason why many Muslims are far more terrified of another terrorist attack on Western soil, US soil in particular, than any other westerner and hope to God no more terror attacks take place.
And I'm guessing you've already seen the articles and papers, which are even originate from respected academic circles, drawing parallels between the Nazi germany and what's going on in the US today. |
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| Fir3start3r |
| quote: | Originally posted by shaolin_Z
And I'm guessing you've already seen the articles and papers, which are even originate from respected academic circles, drawing parallels between the Nazi germany and what's going on in the US today. |
That's no surprise coming from the academia; they've been making that equation forever...
(They sure do miss those good ole' Vietnam days...) :rolleyes: |
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| Fir3start3r |
| quote: | Originally posted by shaolin_Z
EDIT2: Stop killing our brothers and sisters in the Middle East/making their lives miserable. Things will be very different once it stops, and Muslims won't feel like they're constanly targeted by the West. |
If you actually read the aricle above, you'd know that's not true.
It's usually the Western powers that get ASKED to stay for fear of themselves...
From above:
| quote: |
It's a pneumopathological teaching, to be sure. But it's also wrong: The worst oppressors of Muslims are Muslims themselves. Arabs slaughter black Muslims in Darfur. Sunnis and Shiites blow up each other in Iraq. Taliban terrorists kill more Afghans than western soldiers. As the Muslim writer Irshad Manji notes, "In the past 50 years, more Muslims have been raped, imprisoned, tortured and murdered by other Muslims than by any foreign imperial power.
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| DJ Shibby |
The other day I was daydreaming and for some reason 9/11 came to mind. I lived in the tri-state area at the time, and had seen the tower fall, and had seen, with an even heavier heart, the days directly following.
I remember a sense of patriotism that drove us since to the brink of madness.
I remember a stillness in the air, and us New Yorkers, unaccustomed to talking to one another, spoke openly on the street and on the trains about who we knew who had escaped in the tragedy, or been injured, or ... worse. And our condolences were passed around like lollipops at halloween.
I remember a collective emotion, that has since been galvanized and abused by the ones in power. A collective mindset that I've never seen since, and probably never will. A collective feeling of dread and sadness, shared by EVERYONE. It was thick, it was in the air and in our souls, and it brought us down, down, down.
Most of all, I remember the way we, and I, treated anyone of Arab descent after the incident.
I remember getting gas, at a gas station; in New Jersey, it is law that you do not pump your own gas, someone who works at the gas station does it for you. Perhaps this was for safety; perhaps it was to create jobs. Who knows?
Either way, most of the people who owned the gas stations were, of course, of arab descent... and their lackeys who pumped the gas were, thus, also of arab descent.
I remember some scared, white man, an american flag he bought for 50 cents stuck to the back of his pickup... he was yelling a threat at a completely innocent arab who was pumping his gas like a ing indentured servent: "Go back to Saudi Arabi you ing terrorist".
Wow, it was intense. He wanted to kill that poor kid, pumping his gas, and only for the fact that he was wearing a turban. That arab suddenly came to represent all that was dangerous and ill with the world. But it wasn't the kid with the turban who represented everything dangerous and ill with the world... it was us. I regret to say that I felt it in my heart, too. And we were abused for it ever since.
It's a sad thing, what happened, and the crimes that were committed in the following weeks...
I, for one, and for the nothing that it's worth, especially to the dead, apologize, because I was part of it, and did nothing to stop it.
It seems that our patriotism has died down into paranoia, and our faith has boiled into a movement of unknowing, fearful numbness.
It's a hard lot being an american these days; how proud we were, and to look at us and the world now is tough. It's really tough. Tears-to-the-eyes-for-what-could-have-been tough, because they really did win.
We watched the Berlin Wall crumble, and we got a taste of some of the best years we'll ever know. I'm thankful as all for that fleeting chunk of golden age.
Keep your heads up and keep hope alive; this our final weapon.
peace and love,
jay |
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