Looks like sweetto's latest thread has bas been chopped * - after I spent an hour carefully composing a response to something Tom ssid, reflecting that of others, along the lines of, "Look at what your religion does before slinging shit at others." My paraphrase, but I think all those sentiments and words have been employed.
Part of the problem, in the Islamic mindset, is who Muslims consider to be Muslims which allows them to ignore, by a kind of self-sophistry, the cancer at the very core of their religion.
Even ignoring the sectarian squabble, over a millenia old, between Shi'ites and Sunni, there is still the inbuilt seed of dispute over what the Q'ran says. A true believer, or so I am led to understand, should learn the Q'ran by heart - the reason for madrasas. Then each person should live by his or her personal interpretation of the words. The Taliban (= "students") are originally the product of Pakistani madrasas.
Trouble is, like the Jewish bible, you can interpret much of it to condone death and violence if you accept it literaly. Those Muslims who follow the peaceful interpretations will claim that those following the violent ones are not true Muslims and, therefore, we should not judge their whole religion by their actions. Those who follow the violent interpreration view the others as weak and unfaithful. Each faction feels that they can claim the others sre not Muslims, that they can be disowned, or even killed, with justification.
Trouble is it can be hard to distinguish the border between the two factions from the Western perspective. They do not wear a badge showing their peace : violence ratio so, if there are violent Muslims about all Muslims are a little suspect. How do we tell the peaceful hadji from the violent jihadi if each is simply walking down the road or boarding public transport.? The nervous looking one is likely to be the innocent experiencing anxiety at being thought a bomber; the steady and proud one may be experincing the martydom complex, sure in his mind that he carries an expresdion of his god's will in his rucksac.
I am one who, despite having Muslim acquaitances who are really good people, thinks a little Islamophobia is a healthy reaction in certain circumstances. We have a thriving, and usually peaceful, "international quarter" in Gloucester, from Irish through Europeans, Africans, Afro-Caribeans and Asians to Chinese. If it were the latter setting bombs there would be a degree of Sinophobia. But it is the action that counts, not the religion, colour or nationality to my mind.
* Oh,, no it hasn't! But, for some reason, I got a message saying that the thread did not exist or I was not authorised to access it. So I assumed it had been slagged.
