Update IV (9/8): Diana West writes:
Five years after the attack on Pearl Harbor, World War II was over, Japan and Germany vanquished. Five years after September 11, we still speculate as to who, or what, our enemy is. We have had a brief fling with “Islamic fascism” — a phrase that, in its 20th-century-European political connotations, is misleading about jihad’s 1300-year-old religious roots. But now, in the president’s just-released “National Strategy for Combating Terrorism,” we’re back to plain vanilla “extremist ideology.” We seem to find a generic comfort in being vague.
Not me — as even the occasional reader of this column likely knows. The “who” are Muslim jihadists; the “what” is Muslim jihad. There is violent jihad (terrorism), and there is “quiet jihad,” the peaceful consequence of the demographic shift of Muslims into the West. Both, however, result in Islamization — the spread of Islamic law. This is a dire threat to what could have once upon a time been summed up by the word “us.”
Emphasis added.
Update III (9/8): A good question from commenter and blogger Big Mo:
“I would like to know why we all went nuts over South Africa’s loathsome apartheid in the 1980s, demanding that they change everything about their society and culture, but we’re seemingly content to bend over and take it from radical Muslims who have absolutely no intention of integrating into Western society. They instead want to force Western society to conform to Islam.”
———————————————————————————————————–
I honestly don’t know what’s worse: Muslims and foreigners who want this free and wonderful country to change to suit them, or our tendency to prostrate ourselves before them and concede to their ridiculous demands.
Back in June I wrote about Muslims in Maryland who wanted their religious holidays on the school calendar. Today I had the displeasure of reading about public swimming pool policy changes based on Muslim sensibilities, safety standards be damned.
Utterly stupid, and I don’t often use the word stupid. It’s a lazy way to express frustration, but at this point, I don’t care.
If Muslims had their way, sharia would be the law of the land (think I’m exaggerating?), and homosexuals, for example, might be stoned to death or hanged. The bozo bloggers who complained about an “offensive” sentence in this post would have a lot more to worry about than a black woman blogger who thinks they’re hysterically humorous as well as hypocritical. 
Barbaric Muslim honor killings are taking place in western Europe right now. (Also see Britain examines “honor killings” and Honor Thy Father — Or Else.)
In the United States, taxpayers are supporting Islamofascist sympathizers.
Blogger Debbie Schlussel frequently covers “Dearbornistan” follies in the for-now great state of Michigan. In 2003, 52 of 53 football players at Fordson High School were Muslim. Hmm…an all-American team? I can almost hear PC-supporting doofuses screeching, “So what?” But I find it alarming.
That’s not even a fraction of what’s out there, people. I’ve read stories about public school children reading from the Koran (but not the Bible) and Muslim enclaves in this free and civilized country that want to incorporate sharia into our system of jurisprudence. The nerve of a religious group that still enslaves human beings in this day and age…
No matter what anyone says, never believe that “all cultures are equally valid.” (Intelligent people don’t.)
That is pure BS.
(Newspaper image from Truth and Grace)
Addendum: Another beheaded journalist.
Update: Here’s an amazingly non-liberal post at The Huffington Post.
Update II: From frequent commenter Heliotrope:
A minor point, but it sticks in my craw: When I was still teaching, I had a Muslim student in public school who was permitted to leave the class to offer his prayers. A space was provided for him to store his carpet and to face Mecca.
Meanwhile, the local community got exercised over a group of Young Life kids who ate lunch together. They didn’t like the fact that the kids joined hands and quietly said grace.
I was required to spend time with the Muslim to fill in for any instruction he missed. (He left during tests and could have consulted more than guidance from Allah.)
But the Young Life students were treated as an aberrant force bent on infecting the school community. Finally, they were ordered to pray individually and “discretely.â€
Must Christians adopt the sword and their own form of Sharia law to regain respect?
Another commenter writes:
Another note about the PUBLIC high school, Fordson High, in Dearborn, MI…the cafeteria lunch food is all prepared halal-style (or however it’s properly termed). In addition, I know of a woman who gave birth at Oakwood Hospital which is also in Dearborn. She ended up having a Muslim roommate. She was told her husband could not stay in the room with her and their new baby because it went against the “roommate’s†religion.
I live in another Detroit suburb and have in this past year run across women both at Target and Borders wearing burka’s and walking behind their husbands while shopping. To see that extreme practice close up and in such “all-American public places†is very unsettling…
Darn right it’s unsettling, and I don’t care what any PC hack says about it. What Muslims choose to do in their own homes is their business. But when my country starts to change to accomodate Muslims’ religious sensibilities, while treating Christianity — one of the pillars of western civilization, our whole way of life — like a loathsome disease, it’s time for action.
Enough talk.
But we must be OPEN to other cultures VALUES. We can’t force them to change to our values. That would be wrong. We must be accepting. We must change it is wrong to stop them from having 4 wifes. Just because we send parents to jail for abusing (spanking) their children doesn’t mean we should stop their culture of keeping their family Honor. You know that all other cultures are BETTER then our brutal culture.
Sorry, I can’t go on. I sometimes try and think like the multicultural ^*(&%$#(9. But I can’t keep it up for long. I find it necessary to think and remember history and multiculturalist never do that.
As the Dutch are saying now. Become Dutch. Accept Dutch culture. OR LEAVE.
Comment by Dan Hamilton — 09.07.06 @ 9:49 am
LaShawn,
Soon after 911, I read a book called “Teach Yourself Islam”, by Ruqaiyyah Maqsood, a teacher and practicing Muslim. If you have time, you should read it. It is very interesting to see how many of the items, such as divorce, jihad, polygamy and capital punishment (for former Muslims who speak against Islam) are explained.
Comment by Belle — 09.07.06 @ 10:43 am
Give us a sample of what’s in the book, Belle.
Comment by La Shawn — 09.07.06 @ 11:05 am
This is why it’s difficult for me to believe anyone who claims that there’s no organized (however loosely) attempt to subjugate Christianity in this country, and it’s operating under the thin veil of “fairness” and “understanding”.
Real understanding would bring a far different outcome.
Comment by Mark La Roi — 09.07.06 @ 11:11 am
What was wrong with the 2003 football team?
Comment by tvd — 09.07.06 @ 11:24 am
We’re going to have to get mad people and quit the PC stuff in this country before it’s too late. It takes guts to put your name and face to issues that can cause retaliation such as the hate mail LaShawn gets or the threats that Michelle Malkin gets. We are each responsible for the future of this country. The illegal immigrant issue is a prime example. We will be called racists if we say ship them back home but ya know what, I’d rather be called a racist than accept the assault by illegals on this country of our values and our laws. We’ve let it go on far too long and now our very way of life is threatened. Now come the Muslims and while they are a small minority, if we allow them to assert their religious law on us, our children and grandchildren will pay a price we cannot even fathom.
Write to your elected representatives. Watch your community … your schools …your city council actions, etc. and take action before it’s too late.
Comment by dianne — 09.07.06 @ 11:42 am
Thanks, La Shawn. This morning’s post woke me up more surely than any cup of coffee. God Bless.
Comment by Rob Rumfelt — 09.07.06 @ 11:59 am
You’re right on target, sis. We’ve got leaders and former leaders who advocate terror and destruction coming to this country on the day BEFORE we remember what happened to us 5 years ago, and all the tragedy TV media can report on and people here are interested in is how much poop baby Suri did in her diaper!! God help us!
Comment by Gina R Johnson — 09.07.06 @ 12:02 pm
I often travel to Muslim areas for the purpose of knowing first hand what the interaction is between Muslims and other religions. I have lived among the people and paid close attention what goes on in their daily lives. My trips last several weeks and among the places I have stayed are Indonesia, Thailand, Australia, Fiji, Egypt, Turkey, Morocco, Spain, Italy, Germany, England, Holland, Sweden, Croatia, Serbia, and many places in the US. In every place I have visited, Christians and Jews are under some form of assault as infidels. In many areas, the local police have permitted the implementation of Sharia law to be ignored. This is particularly true in Toronto, Stockholm, Munich, Paris, London, Madrid, Java, Detroit, and a multitude of suburbs and small towns across the US and in Europe.
In Egypt, Mubarak sends hundreds of heavily armed troops to “watch” certain Mosques on Friday. The King of Morocco has no illusions about radical Islam and he keeps a heavy thumb on the religion, as does the government of Turkey and the government of Thailand.
The only Western government that is realistic about the threat is Australia. There, the government has told the Muslims to adapt or get out. Australia knows that the largest Muslim population and in many respects the most radical population is just above its northern shores in Indonesia.
US and Western European liberals are stuck on stupid. They believe that they can negotiate peace and persuade radical Muslims to negotiate their fundamental religious beliefs.
I have met a lot of easy going Muslims. They drink alcohol, eat pork, don’t pray to Mecca, etc. They are MINO’s: Muslim In Name Only. But if you really lean on them, the Muslim brotherhood usually comes roaring out as a blood bond.
This religion is largely practiced by seasoned traders. They know exactly how to reassure you while taking you to the cleaners. But when the targets of their conversion jihad are not very sophisticated, they are hardly reluctant to use the sword.
Australia has placed informers in the Mosques and keeps a very close tabs on the Muslim community. Still they have huge problems. Not long ago, Lebanese immigrants raised Cain over how Australian women were dressed on the beaches in Sydney. This led to citizens confronting one another.
People need to follow the local news around the world to know what is really happening. The PC press in the US and Reuters and the AP will never report the facts.
Comment by Heliotrope — 09.07.06 @ 12:06 pm
According to this book Muslims believe that theft (unless for food or a necessity) requires amputation of the hand. Capital punishment is allowed for adultery, and for former Muslims speaking out against Islam. Drunkenness is punishable by flogging. A man can divorce his wife by declaring his intentions 3 times in three months. A woman can divorce a man only by appearing in front of a religious court and using certain guidelines. It seems like there is a big disparity between what is written in this book and what seems to happen in real life.
Comment by Belle — 09.07.06 @ 12:13 pm
Couldn’t wearing all those heavy clothes and coverings in a swimming pool weigh you down and make one MORE susceptible to DROWNING???
I’m just saying….
Comment by Tiffany in Houston — 09.07.06 @ 12:17 pm
BTW, how come the Muslim football players can have a prayer at a school sponsored football game, but the Christian/Judeo kids can’t? The really ironic thing about all of this is that if the Islamic fundamentalists succeed with their Jihad, the liberals (who seem so supportive of the terrorists) will be the first to go. Scary for all us.
Comment by Belle — 09.07.06 @ 12:19 pm
That’s one reason the “no street clothes” policy is in effect at public pools. The first time a Muslim drowns because her heavy burqa dragged her down, expect public pools to hire more lifeguards or “Muslim sensitive” lifeguards.
Courtesy of the taxpayers…
Such putrid PC accomodations defy common sense. Something an ordinarily reasonable person would do for SAFETY is considered offensive to Muslims. What’s that saying about hell in a handbasket?
Comment by La Shawn — 09.07.06 @ 12:19 pm
LaShawn,
Our country is turning into a tolerant nation of fools. This frankly goes well beyond BS. The muslim kid did not deserve to have “special” rights. All the other kids had no problem obeying the rules. If that child would have drowned because of his excessive clothing, then the parents would have been ready to file a lawsuit. I don’t understand how some people are able to blur the lines between “equal” rights and “special rights”. This is a perfect example of tolerance out of control sad too say.
Comment by Tyrone — 09.07.06 @ 12:21 pm
#10- I meant to say that it seems like there is a big disparity between what is written in this book about how peace loving, forgiving and fair Islam is and what seems to be the reality. It something you need to read to really understand.
Comment by Belle — 09.07.06 @ 12:24 pm
Did anyone see the hospital burqa now being used in England? I tell you it is a bedpan nightmare!!!!
http://72.14.209.104/search?q=cache:u-olc93sDv8J:www.usatoday.com/news/offbeat/2006-09-05-hospital-gown_x.htm+hospital+burqa&hl=en&gl=us&ct=clnk&cd=1
Comment by Belle — 09.07.06 @ 12:29 pm
I don’t understand people moving to this country and then refusing to “get with the program”….why don’t they just stay home? Love it or leave it.
Comment by LeeAnn — 09.07.06 @ 1:25 pm
I read an article from the BBC about two boys in Iran (they were 16 & 18, if I’m not mistaken) who were whipped, flogged, and hung in a public square for having sex with each other. That’s right, just for being gay. Like any article about savagery, it made my blood boil (as did the fact that the BBC chose to post pictures of the boys being executed, something I thought was unnecessary).
You can bet that humanitarian groups and gay civil rights groups weren’t being very “tolerant” in their outrage. Those who speak of multiculturalism obviously don’t take the time to consider the cultures they want to accept. I don’t mind a woman who wishes to cover her head with a scarf or people who want to pray to Allah five times a day. It’s brutality that I’m against.
And I hope no one out there puts Christians on par with Muslims. Rude though some can be about the subject, at most they want to convert gays, not kill them.
Comment by Jay — 09.07.06 @ 1:30 pm
I totally understand where you are coming from. If the public school systems don’t allow the Bible in the classroom, then they shouldn’t allow the Koran. Or the Torah. If religion is going to be taught in public schools, then all religions need to be taught.
I don’t think Americans should have to learn Spanish to keep their jobs. I think spanish speakers should have to learn English to get a job.
As far as Muslims holidays? My stomach turned on that. I’m not for celebrating religious holidays let alone Muslim religious holidays.
Comment by Shavonne — 09.07.06 @ 1:48 pm
Why is Islam making inroads into our society? Blind leading the blind. To the unsaved, any Peace is prefereable to being at peace with God. So every nutty religion that promises Peace on human terms, even Islam, is considered “respectable”.
I’ve lost friends over this.
“Oh, please don’t offend anyone by telling them that they are going to Hell if they don’t believe in Jesus Christ!”
I’d rather risk offending and see Heaven more fully populated.
Comment by Doug — 09.07.06 @ 2:53 pm
I don’t understand people moving to this country and then refusing to “get with the programâ€â€¦.why don’t they just stay home? Love it or leave it.
Perhaps because in their country of origin, they don’t get to choose things like what to wear, so they want to come to a country where they have that option?
I don’t see how wanting to wear clothing in a swimming pool is a subjugation of Christianity. It seems dumb to me — I mean, you can buy modest bathing suits that look like wet suits, and some even come with little dress things to put over them, and surely they’re better for swimming than normal clothes — but I wouldn’t be offended as an American if someone wanted to swim in swimming pants rather than swimming trunks. How is allowing someone else to wear something different than traditional American swimwear an attempt to institute sharia law? If I’m reading correctly, they still have to put up with everybody else wearing bikinis, or stay home to protect their sensitive eyes, and that’s fine by me.
I also don’t see the problem with a Muslim majority football team. Why is that at odds with an “all-American” team? Are Muslim faith and American citizenship mutually exclusive? Okay, so a select group of Muslim teams chose offensive names — that’s nothing new in sports in this country. I remember a few years ago, the latest wave of pressure to change “anti-Native American” names. I’m sure some team names are offensive to Native Americans, and some of them were changed because of public demand; same as with the stupid Muslim team names.
Obviously, I have a problem with honor killings; and I think that public schools should teach major sections from many major religious texts. I know in my New York public high school we were assigned readings from the Koran, the Old Testament, the New Testament, the Bhagavad Gita, and some Buddhist writings, depending on which country and which historical period we were learning about at the time.
Comment by Alexandra — 09.07.06 @ 2:59 pm
I can’t speak for anyone else, but I never claimed wearing a burqa in a pool was a “subjugation of Christianity.” My point is that we are dropping safety standards to idiotically low levels to accomdodate a religion’s laws. People have “freedom” to wear what they want in the U.S. with reasonable restrictions, and those restrictions apply to Muslims. You can’t wear whatever you want in a public pool, for crying out loud. As I said in a previous comment, as soon as some burqa-clad Muslim drowns, the taxpayers will bear the burden of safety restrictions above and beyond what has worked just fine in this country for years.
The same happens with illegal aliens from third world countries like Mexico. Some lived in filth and squalor back home, and bring filth and squalor with them, including diseases, to the United States. Because they jumped the border, with no regard for law abidingness, they go through no medical screenings.
About the “Native American” (as someone born in America, I’m a native American, too, by the way) team names supposedly offensive to American Indians, that was a mostly bored white liberal movement. American Indians themselves didn’t seem all that offended with team names like “Redskins.”
I have serious problems with a majority Muslim public high school or college football team or a majority Muslim anything in America. No convoluted reasons why. I just don’t like it. I think it bodes ill for our already weak-spined, accomodationist stance in the age of Muslim global terrorism. So-called separation of church and state is set in stone for the Christian faith. You think Muslim majorities will put up with that? Please!
Comment by La Shawn — 09.07.06 @ 3:05 pm
Really? In my area, there were lots of protests by whatever term you’d rather me use in place of “Native Americans.” Anyway, I just don’t see why law-abiding Muslim citizens, with a strict moral code, are bad even for a nation suffering from an ‘accomodationist’ stance. I prefer anyone with a moral dedication and an ability to play the game to be given a chance, especially over the stereotypical immoral football players who have the real weak spines.
I’m eager to read about “Native American”-led — as opposed to white liberal-led — protests against offensive team names. Do you mind giving me a general idea of your location so I can look for a news story? - Admin
Comment by Alexandra — 09.07.06 @ 3:20 pm
Alexandra,
Law-abiding citizens of any religion who keep a strict moral code is not a problem. It’s just that those of a certain faith have a track record of brutally forcing their ethical code on others. Cf. the dress code of women on Australian beaches.
Comment by fuzz — 09.07.06 @ 3:36 pm
Alexandra, they don’t want to just control their own actions and beliefs, they want to force other people to adhere to their belief systems. These issues at the beaches, pools and schools are just the beginning. Their jihad is to turn the world into a muslim world. And if you would look a little closer at the football team, you would see that they are PRAYING, something Christians and Jews are prevented from doing at public school.
Comment by Belle — 09.07.06 @ 3:53 pm
Did the all-Muslim football team have cheerleaders? What did they wear? Did the families of Muslim girls allow them to try out?
The part that disturbs me is not so much that folks want to practice their faith as much as they want to force the rest of us to practice their faith and its inherent misogyny–but only when it suits them and inconveniences the rest of us. The football players broke their fast for Ramadan to win football games, surely girls can wear a modified swimming costume. And while they go on about the need to “protect” Muslim girls from male eyes, they don’t respect “infidel” girls at all (see also the epidemic of violence toward women in Sweden and Norway by Muslim teenage boys). Pah.
There’s plenty of countries with sharia law imposed; the U.S. doesn’t need to be one of them.
Comment by Radish — 09.07.06 @ 4:08 pm
Well, I have grown up around and competed in competitive swimming. I have likewise taught swimming for years. There really is no significant safety risk when it comes to swimming fully clothed. Wet clothing will add a few pounds to you and some drag, but it is not much different from the individual actually weighing those extra pounds. If you are a competent swimmer, you may not move around as smoothly as you otherwise would, but it adds no significant drowning risk. If you not a competent swimmer, you shouldn’t be in deep water without close supervision.
Our reason for requiring bathing suits was for the most part maintaining appropriateness based on standards for swimming attire. It really looks bad to have a bunch of folks swimming in street clothes. Also, cotton clothing tends to hold in soap from the wash and that excess soap may reduce the time it takes for the water to become murky.
I have faced numerous situations in the school environment whereas boys refuse to wear Speedos at swimming meets and adolescent girls refuse to swim in classes unless they can wear t-shirts. The t-shirt thing amazed me because in their warped sense of modesty, they fail to understand why wet t-shirt contests are popular.
Of course in public schools, I have no choice but to accommodate (school administrators are wusses) and I had to require that if they wear t-shirts, they must wear a bathing suite under them. And these are Christian girls.
I recall a Hispanic girl whose parents were very religious. She wore a skirt down to her ankles every day. Her parents sent a note to the school stating that the girl was not allowed to dress in gym clothing, whether it be shorts or warm-ups. The note specifically stated that doing is a sin and that God will punish females who dress like males. The result was that the girl wore a long skirt to gym everyday with no penalty. What could we do?
I have had Muslim girls in swim classes and they did participate fully dressed. This dress included nylon warm-up pants, long sleeved shirts, and swimming caps. It really didn’t bother me, especially since Muslim girls tend to be sweethearts and among the most well behaved students, along with Asian girls.
I think that if full bodied clothing is important, the Muslim parents must make the greatest effort to accommodate. A little investment can allow for something suitable to them and the people in charge of the swimming pool.
http://www.jelbab.com/product.asp?prdID=400415
Whenever we
Comment by Shade — 09.07.06 @ 4:17 pm
A minor point, but it sticks in my craw: When I was still teaching, I had a Muslim student in public school who was permitted to leave the class to offer his prayers. A space was provided for him to store his carpet and to face Mecca.
Meanwhile, the local community got exercised over a group of Young Life kids who ate lunch together. They didn’t like the fact that the kids joined hands and quietly said grace.
I was required to spend time with the Muslim to fill in for any instruction he missed. (He left during tests and could have consulted more than guidance from Allah.)
But the Young Life students were treated as an aberrant force bent on infecting the school community. Finally, they were ordered to pray individually and “discretely.”
Must Christians adopt the sword and their own form of Sharia law to regain respect?
Comment by Heliotrope — 09.07.06 @ 6:11 pm
#21. Alexandra notes: I know in my New York public high school we were assigned readings from the Koran, the Old Testament, the New Testament, the Bhagavad Gita, and some Buddhist writings, depending on which country and which historical period we were learning about at the time.
Alexandra, you have knowingly or accidentally exposed the paucity of public education. How long would it take for an “average” teacher to have a solid, but general understanding of the Old Testament? The New Testament? The Bhagavad Gita? The Koran? The teachings of the Buddha?
When articles of faith are reduced to a few sound bites for the high school classroom they are likely to lose all semblance of religious meaning. Furthermore, they are offered up by an instructor who, in all likelihood, is little more than a non-believer.
Liberals are always quick to note that graveyards have been filled with people who had religious differences. But how blind those same liberals become when a militant religious threat crests the hill.
Comment by Heliotrope — 09.07.06 @ 6:31 pm
Islam does not want acceptance of multiculturalism, they want only their culture, their religion, their law. Islam is evil. Until/unless people open their eyes to this evil they will be writing their own death sentence in this world and the next. Islam is a backward religion set to eliminate all the advances of Western civilization. Islam is in a war against the modernity of the west.
A person (culture) cannot rise upward while forcing another down. The treatment of the female gender by those of the Islamic religion(culture) is an abomination. It is impossible to advance as a people while holding back half of their human capital. Too much energy, effort, assets are spent keeping women down, 2nd class, subservient, property.
Why feminists in the Western world don’t rise up and fight this threat to womenhood I will never understand. As a Christian, conservative, feminist I understand all too clearly. Most feminists worship at the altar of abortion. Too bad they don’t realize that if Islam wins, there will be no abortion except the excessively late-term beheadings of all infidels.
If that little Muslim girl was truly free like other little girls she didn’t just want to enjoy a swim with her friends, but I am sure she also wished for a bathing suit just like her friends were wearing. But if she wore a suit borrowed from a friend her father or brothers or other male relative would be required to murder her for offending their honor. What a great religion! (scarcism)
Why must Muslim women be covered? For their own modesty? One can dress modestly without a burqa. Or because Muslim men don’t want (trust) other Muslim men to look at their wives, sisters, mothers, daughters? I don’t appreciate the lack of body cover in fashion this day. I don’t care to have the flesh of another involuntarily forced into my daily view, but I am more offended by the women in burqas. It is not religiously inspired modesty, but subjugation of women by men.
Comment by Judy — 09.07.06 @ 6:37 pm
Another note about the PUBLIC high school, Fordson High, in Dearborn, MI… the cafeteria lunch food is all prepared halal-style (or however it’s properly termed). In addition, I know of a woman who gave birth at Oakwood Hospital which is also in Dearborn. She ended up having a Muslim roommate. She was told her husband could not stay in the room with her and their new baby because it went against the “roommate’s” religion.
I live in another Detroit suburb and have in this past year run across women both at Target and Borders wearing burka’s and walking behind their husbands while shopping. To see that extreme practice close up and in such “all-American public places” is very unsettling…
Comment by nancy — 09.07.06 @ 6:58 pm
Belle:
Alexandra, they dont want to just control their own actions and beliefs, they want to force other people to adhere to their belief systems. These issues at the beaches, pools and schools are just the beginning.
As the laws are about more inclusive, not exclusive, dress, I find that jump a big one to make. I also agree with Shade on the unlikely event of more drowning or suing. I was a lifeguard for many years at a public pool, and even if a child was more likely to go into distress while swimming fully clothed, you would still follow the exact same procedures for helping them, and the clothes wouldn’t really inhibit anything you would do to save them. There’s really no more likelihood of suing and settling than there are with normal bathing suit-clad children, at least that I can think of. If a child goes into distress, you do what you are trained to do, and if you follow the procedures accurately you are legally pretty safe. As Shade noted, there are full-coverage suits more appropriate than street clothes, not just for Muslims — I’ve seen them marketed towards Christians as well. If full-body coverage was important to me, I’d invest in one of those, simply because it would be a drag to wear sopping wet clothes.
Heliotrope:
Alexandra, you have knowingly or accidentally exposed the paucity of public education. How long would it take for an average teacher to have a solid, but general understanding of the Old Testament? The New Testament? The Bhagavad Gita? The Koran? The teachings of the Buddha?
Not long at all. We were not studying these documents the same way theologians do; we studied them to grasp a beginner’s understanding of major world religions. The intention of us reading religious texts was not to provide us with a complete spiritual knowledge of each religion, but rather to give us some idea of what the major beliefs and tenets of each religion are. We read them the same way we read excerpts of Macchiavelli — they are a snapshot of a culture, and they can’t be fully understood without intense study, but that doesn’t mean that studying them at any level less than full intensity is inappropriate. They were an important window into cultures that cannot be explained without including literary and religious influence.
Judy, I often struggle with accepting the burqa as well:
It is not religiously inspired modesty, but subjugation of women by men.
However, as I believe that people are free to believe what they choose, and I know several women who willingly wear a chador and feel freed by it, I settle my grudge with the burqa by opposing only forced wearing of it. I have several Orthodox Jewish friends who wear wigs to school to cover their hair, and scarves at home, and I can’t imagine any God who would be displeased at me feeling the wind blowing in the hair He gave me but it’s their hair, not mine. All of my friends who wear the chador say that they enjoy how it exempts them from sexual comments on the street, and how it marks them as “pure” women so that there are no questions as to their intentions in any given situation. I personally prefer to wear jeans and to make my intentions known if the need arise, but I’m fine with them wearing it on their sleeves, so to speak, if it makes them more comfortable. Sometimes, it is inspired by religious modesty, and while I don’t agree that modesty needs to be carried out to the furthest degree, I’m also not offended if someone chooses to do so.
Comment by Alexandra — 09.07.06 @ 7:28 pm
#32 Alexandra: I take exception to the idea that a hit and run exposure to religion, culture or surgery can ever result in ” a beginners understanding of….”
In fact, reducing religion, culture or surgery to a modicum of politically acceptable talking points is “redutio ad absurdum.” It is an exercise in paying lip service.
If you were a teacher and asked to reduce the Koran to 90 minutes of instruction, how would you go about producing a coherent, balanced and meaningful set of excerpts? In fact, would you possess the extensive background to even approach the task?
You note that “we read them the same way we read excerpts of Macchiavelli (sic) they are a snapshot of a culture, and they cant be fully understood without intense study, but that doesnt mean that studying them at any level less than full intensity is inappropriate.”
My argument is not with the concept of “appropriate,” but with what the with “message” which the abbreviated selection was intended to convey. I have written and lectured extensively on the mind of Machiavelli. Most drive by encounters with the man reduce him to an “ends and means” formulation that entirely misrepresent the importance of his philosophy and works.
It is challenge enough to help a high school student to decipher the meaning of a Shakespeare classic without dumping expurgated catch phrases of the world’s great philosophical underpinnings on him.
A little learning is not only a dangerous thing, it leaves the student with a false sense of security that he thinks he knows what he is talking about.
Comment by Heliotrope — 09.07.06 @ 8:39 pm
Alexandra, the key to your comments lies with your stated belief that people should be free to choose what they believe. Islam does not allow that choice. It can not. You can not be a good Muslim and live in a world that does not acquiesce to your belief system. Jihad is the struggle to change the world into a world where everyone is a faithful follower of Islam. You sound like the book I read. One needs to read between the lines.
Comment by Belle — 09.07.06 @ 9:11 pm
Here’s a true story for you. When I lived in the suburbs of a big Midwest city, my child went on a public school field trip to the local islamic center. The kids were learning about the major religions in school. While they were there, the leader taught them about Islam. He even was kind enough to recite their profession of faith and encouraged the children to say it along with him. He asked the children if they believed in Allah and the prophet. The children yelled out in unison, “Yes!!!!” Well, most of the children did. My son said “No!”, at which point everyone stopped and looked at him. He later told me that he did not “get it”, and did not understand why Christians and Jews kids were saying they believed in Islam. I later found out from a Catholic lay teacher that what happened at that Mosque was really a conversion of sorts. It seems that all those little Christian and Jewish kids had been converted to Islam by reciting the islamic profession of faith. Interestingly enough, that was the last year that the school went on that field trip!
Comment by Belle — 09.07.06 @ 10:02 pm
To comment #31
If I was told my husband couldn’t be in the room with me after giving birth to our kid because of someone else’s religion, I would have laughed at them and demanded my husband to stay.
As far as swimming in public pools, there are such things as wet suits and swimming caps. The Duggars make their children wear wet suits to maintain modesty, Muslims can do it too. I couldn’t imagine swimming in a Burka.
Comment by Shavonne — 09.07.06 @ 11:09 pm
If it’s a swimming pool, then one must follow the rules of the pool, so to speak. If the rules are changed by the owners of the pool, then that also is their business.
I agree with Shahid Malik (UK Labour MP), that ‘anyone who wants Sharia Law should go and live in Saudi.’
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2092-2320096,00.html
Here, in a converted Muslim’s own words, is the ‘truth’ of Sharia:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/religion/religions/islam/beliefs/sharia/practical.shtml
The last paragraph, for me, pretty much sums up the ‘reasons’ for sharia: Control. Fuelled by a desire for religious power, paranoia and patriarchy.
I admit I am strongly prejudiced against religious law and fight the merest whiff of ’sharia’ in the society in which I live. Fortunately, or unfortunately, secular law is our only (legal!!!) protection from religious nut-jobs other than taking the fight to the street as war.
I likewise oppose any government’s arrogance in assuming the role of parent. Yet, who protects countless innocent victims of tribal/cultural/religious family abuse?
It’s a weird balance we still try to strike between the rigid laws of Ancient-Desert-God worshippers and the voted laws of humans.
I was raised breadline working class, and social life was mostly ‘pubs’. In the local pub, behind the bar, was a legend, carved and painted on wood:
It said:
“No politics. No religion”.
I thank the landlord for many, many peaceful evenings amongst polite company who could return to their differences when they got home
Comment by JohnD — 09.08.06 @ 5:19 am
Hey:
If anyone starts the Anti-Islamic society of America, I will join even if I have to pay dues.
Be damned if this country is turned into a Muslim fief under my watch.
Comment by Justin — 09.08.06 @ 5:55 am
No Sports Illustrated special issue:
A public swimming pool in Ypsilanti, Michigan, will allow Muslims to wear clothes in the pool, which they do for modesty. (La Shawn Barber)…
Trackback by Pajamas Media — 09.08.06 @ 6:25 am
I recall discussing this on another website several months ago. The topic had to do with a horrific story about the guy (I think from Pakistan) who killed 3 or 4 of his daughters in front of his wife. Slit their throats, all because his oldest daughter was interested in a young man that he didn’t approve of.
That culture does have some strange extremes associated with it.
But so does the Western World…. David Koresh, Warren Jeffs, etc.
It’s the distortion & exploitation of religion in general that is the problem that prevents cultures from getting along. Always has been, always will be.
Comment by The Angry Independent — 09.08.06 @ 7:10 am
OFF TOPIC: (but not completely unrelated)
Talking about Bush admin incompetence and the U.S. bending over to appease others….
Here’s something else you all may be interested in.
Pakistan creates safe haven for Taliban (& their Al Qaeda allies) & other terrorists. Recently got this from TMV…
http://www.themoderatevoice.com/posts/1157554003.shtml
Whatever happened to “those who harbor the terrorists will face consequences…blah blah blah”???
I just heard a report this morning with Bush saying he is o.k. with the above Report about Pakistan cutting this deal.
I really think that behind closed doors the folks in the Bush admin. have egg on their faces and don’t want to admit how they have screwed up. Just a couple of years ago they gave Pakistan the special designation of “Major non-Nato Ally”. This cleared the way for the U.S. to sell all kinds of weapons to Pakistan. (I guess sales for the U.S. corporate Defense industry is more important than just about anything).
India is probably saying “We told you so” right about now.
Comment by The Angry Independent — 09.08.06 @ 7:27 am
Heliotrope, would you suggest then that students learn nothing at all until they are able to devote years to each specific study? We learned the major works of art of each period we studied as well; I would never think that high school students could fully understand some of history’s greatest artists in a week of study devoted to each one, but those courses were both a basic understanding and a jumping-off point to further study. How can you understand history if you don’t understand the most basic cultural forces that shaped people’s actions? I sure as heck didn’t get as much out of Madame Bovary back then as I did the last time I re-read it, but I got enough out of it to garner an inkling of what it was about and to ignite a desire to learn more about it.
Yes, it’s a shame that students often remember only trite “better to be feared than loved” aphorisms, but all learning starts somewhere. It’s a shame that we allow babies to crawl when there’s so much of the world to see that crawling is a wholly inadequate way to see it. Few students will learn to “walk” in every subject they encounter — some will choose math, and some will choose English, etc — so some will only vaguely remember that “the ends justify the means,” or that there is a hypotenuse in every right triangle that for some reason or another is very important. But I don’t take that to mean that students should learn everything to its fullest extent, or nothing at all.
Belle:
I suppose we must agree to disagree on the point that one can choose whether or not to be Muslim. All my experiences with Islam have shown me that it most often does allow the choice to believe or not.
Comment by Alexandra — 09.08.06 @ 8:56 am
Enigma Al-Qaeda
For those bloggers who have the time, would like to learn more and perhaps engage in some dialog / discussion, I recommend a visit to LaShawn Barber.
Trackback by Dave Lucas' Notes — 09.08.06 @ 10:40 am
“while treating Christianity — one of the pillars of western civilization, our whole way of life — like a loathsome disease, it’s time for action.
Enough talk. ”
First, I just want to know what does this mean and ask a more direct question I’ve been wondering. What exactly do you want us Muslims to do? Is your proposition mass conversions? If you are Muslim woman who believes, as I do, in modesty and who choses to cover her hair, (as many christian and jewish women believe also, btw) am I to hide my beliefs. Are we going to revert to the tactics of the Spanish Inquisition? I really want to know what I am going to have to start dealing with, what to tell my children.
Because this entire post is so inflammatory, its just stoking the fires of hatred and some nutcase is going to run with it.
Instead of dealing with valid concerns, that Islamic practices are allowed while Christian ones are not, you are making this to a pure hate fill attack. I mean clothes in the pool, I know plenty of non Muslims who do that (t-shirts and shorts) and you know good and well its not a saftey hazard. Schools with large Jewish populations offer kosher food. Honor Killings happen in lots of cultures including Hindu, Christian, and Sikh. Its not justified but violence against women is more common in highly patriarchal cultures. (See a recent rape case in Italy where the woman was blamed for the jeans she wore). Do you have some valid concerns, yes, but when you present them like this, it just does get lost and you just sound like a hate monger.
Again as you’ve said, its your blog and such posts make good reading I suppose.
Comment by anonymous muslim — 09.08.06 @ 11:03 am
I would like to know why we all went nuts over South Africa’s loathsome apartheid in the 1980s, demanding that they change everything about their society and culture, but we’re seemingly content to bend over and take it from radical Muslims who have absolutely no intention of integrating into Western society. They instead want to force Western society to conform to Islam.
Comment by Big Mo — 09.08.06 @ 11:22 am
What strikes me as funny is that if islam had taken over the world before the modern age we would have no swimming pools at all. There would be no muslim friendly bathing suits and sports wear for girls. The idea never occured to them until they suddenly realized that they were in competition with the West and set out to try and proove that muslims can have just as much fun as anyone else and that they can do anything that anyone else can all covered up.
They basically saw our girls and boys having fun at various sports and enjoying the wonderful feel of being in the water out in the warm sunshine of summer.
Never mind whether its a safety issue or not. Its flat out ridiculous to be fully clothed in the water. Swimming in fully soaked street clothes and walking around with them clinging all over your body isnt as fun, free and comfortable as wearing a proper swimsuit. This is what they should be called on. Even wearing a full body swimsuit robs a person of the wonderful feel of sun and wind on skin. The fact is that the very notion that muslim girls can have just as much fun or be just as comfortable as a girl who can wear the kind of attire that is designed with practicality and comfort in mind is pure horse doo.
But these facts dont even scratch the surface of the real problem here. That is the inroads these folks are making in turning back the clock on the normalization of the female body. Personally, I prefer to wear more clothing than some other women even in the pool where I wear a pair of shorts in addition to my one piece bathing suit. I personally dont approve of the extremes that some women go to to expose their bodies in public. But when I think about it, I think its wonderful to feel the sun on my legs, back and arms and not get second glance from anyone. My arms and legs and neck and skin are the same as anyone elses. They are mine. I am beholden to noone. Not my dad. Not my brother. Not my future husband. They have no claim to my skin. They have no right to ask me to give up the feel of sun or the breeze on my skin. Its wonderful to have that choice. Because I have my choices and treasure them, I must applaud the choice of women who choose to wear bikinis etc. If they can pull it off, they add healthy beauty to scene that even for a straight girl like myself can appreciate. When I see them I think of how beautiful the human form, both male and female, can be. It is not a thing to be feared and when normalized within certain moderate parameters, the sight of that form is not at all disruptive. A woman in a bikini here in the West where the sight of her is normal faces only the occaisional whistle or “hey baby”. But go to where the sight of the female body is not normal and the sight of a woman’s hair or arms is an invitation to rape. The woman in the bikini is truly free to choose what she wears. The other woman has no choice but to cover herself whether she likes it or not.
I think we run the risk of losing sight of that fact when we talk in terms of muslim girls being more modest than American girls. When we start conceding the field to those who claim that there is no barrier to fun or comfort or safety to allow muslim girls to swim fully covered we begin to lose ground on the larger issue of what is best for women. Sure this girl and others like her have the choice now to be different and to covort in the pool alongside other girls who have made a different choice. But what happens when there are more and more girls like her. As the numbers increase, the definition of normal, of modest, of “good girl” changes. The pressure then mounts for good girls to prove how good they are by covering more and more. Once this idea becomes entrenched, it becomes difficult and then impossible for a woman to choose not to cover all of her skin and hair. This was and is the trajectory whereever muslim women start “choosing” to be more “modest”. The inevitable result is that over time less and less women get to choose until the point where no women gets to choose to feel the sun and the wind of their skin and hair. That is unless she wants to be raped or jailed or otherwise abused and shamed.
This is what we should be talking about in these cases. If the girl insists on being less comfortable and having less pleasure out of doors and while swimming then the rest of us, then that is her choice. I think we must counter with the insistance that she wear a islamically friendly bathing suit instead of bending the rules against street clothes. And we sure better be loud and clear on why we think that her so-called greater “modesty” is bad idea for all women and why no woman should ever choose to be like her. Above all we should make sure that our daughters and sons realize that nothing short of true freedom and liberty is at stake here in this debate between us and our ways and them and their whacked out dress code.
Dont be fooled by their attempts to have their “modesty” and swimming and sports too. That is a smoke screen to take the pressure and attention of the fact that they are simply wrong about the female body and that our girls and women, from the girl in the bikini to the girl in shirt and shorts out on the soccer field, are just flat out better off and more comfortable and more free than theirs.
Comment by peggy — 09.08.06 @ 11:28 am
Alexandra,
your experiences show you that people had a choice in whether to be Muslim or not. My experiences indicate otherwise.
I have done a substantial amount of work with abused women and children. I find that what happens in the Muslim culture and community is very much akin to the psychological struggle within the dynamics of an abusive relationship. Those of us on the outside think that those within the abused situation are free to leave and freely choose to stay. But we view their actions from our own “free” perspective. Psychologically these individuals are not truly or purely free to make decisions. They fear. And their choices are made from fear.
I would find it freeing to wear a headscarf every day — freeing from shampooing, conditioner, blow dyers, curling irons, hair spray, and $$$$ spent at the hairdressers. But if my failing to wear a hear scarf would be viewed by members of my family as indication of my being a “bad” person, a betrayer of my religion, an evil wanton woman, and open me to sexual abuse or harrassment — yeah — choosing the headscarf would be the easier path to take. Just like letting the husband punch me every now and then would be easier to handle then trying to leave the abuser.
I am concerned about your friends who wear a chador and say that it exempts them from sexual comments on the street. What freaking streets are these women walking that sexual comments are so frequent and the only way to avoid sexual comments is by covering up? This belief is just one of the steps down that slippery slope that a woman dressing a certain way is inviting and deserves to be raped.
Comment by Judy — 09.08.06 @ 11:31 am
Correction
I didnt complete the following thought.
“They basically saw our girls and boys having fun at various sports and enjoying the wonderful feel of being in the water out in the warm sunshine of summer.”
It should read
“They basically saw our girls and boys having fun at various sports and enjoying the wonderful feel of being in the water out in the warm sunshine of summer and they became jealous. That’s the only reason there are any of these challenges at all.”
Comment by peggy — 09.08.06 @ 11:38 am
If you don’t agree with the principles of sharia, make sure you don’t go to Caribou Coffee.
Comment by CJ — 09.08.06 @ 12:15 pm
A commenter over at La Shawn Barber’s Corner responds to her post, Third World PC BS: “I would like to know why we all went nuts over South Africa’s loathsome apartheid in the 1980s, demanding that they change everything about their society and culture, but we’re seemingly content to bend over and take it from radical Muslims who have absolutely no intention of integrating into Western society. They instead want to force Western society to conform to Islam.â€
Pingback by Renaissance Blogger — 09.08.06 @ 12:40 pm
Anonymous Muslim,
It couldn’t be more clear from the post what we want you to do: adopt Western values. The very fact that you live in this country means that Western values are superior. That’s the very reason you live here and not a Muslim country. Muslim countries are, by and large, failed states or dictatorships. They are that way because of Islamic values, or the dictators that are needed to suppress Islamic extremism. One of the few exceptions is Turkey, which adopted secularism thanks to Ataturk. The simple Muslims in this country can do is stop pushing their values on us. If you don’t like it here, move to an Islamic country where your ‘values’ are already in place (Iran, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, ….)
Comment by Walt Schulte — 09.08.06 @ 12:43 pm
Lashawn,
I’m quite bothered by your comment about how you don’t like a majority of muslim anything. You sound just like those racists back then who did not like a majority of black anything. That said, I’m an african american female and my fiancee is a muslim from pakistan. He is a wonderful man: very intelligent (phd is physics), serious, and open minded. He has friends who are just like them and his friends have friends just like them. Sure, every religion has bad apples but we have to look at how the media portrays muslims, they make us believe that they are all staunch raving lunatics. I’m not trying to use the “I’m tolerant of black people because my maid is black” jargon. I’m just trying to say that muslims get a bad rap just like we african americans get a bad rap. There are far too many wonderful muslims out there to deserve the amount of hatred they face.
Comment by edub — 09.08.06 @ 12:55 pm
anonymous muslim,
Why anonymous? Can words on a blog hurt you? Are you afraid or something? I just dont see the reason. I dont say this to attack you. I am genuinely curious. Whats the problem with giving your name? This is a free country anonymity isnt necessary even in the public square. This is the country where one can have even the most outrageous views and not be punished for speaking them.
I find it very disturbing if you are hiding because you think you have to. You couldnt be more incorrect about the West if that is what you think. We talk loud and say extreme things because we are free to do so and because we believe in the value of all ideas and because the person that can freely express an extreme idea or emotion is much less likely, not more likely, to resort to physical or other more aggressive means to express themselves. You are more safe with someone who is above board in their opinions than someone who smiles to your face but feels otherwise.
Now to your points.
Your response to LaShawn’s comment gets what she is getting at completely wrong I’m afraid. I read her words as a call to reverse the trend of driving Christianity from public life while bending over backwards to accomodate islam in that same sphere. Mass conversions? Yes we would like to see that. Christians believe that our religion is true and the best for mankind so of course we want to see others accept the truth. But if you mean something like forced conversion, then heavens no! Christianity formed a pillar of this great nation because we so desired religious freedom and from the outset people of other religions and of no faith at all have been free and equal citizens of this nation. If we hold a value to like freedom of religion to be something dear to us, we believe that same exact freedom should be for everyone not just for us. Dont listen to the fear mongers in your own community. You have nothing to worry about on that score.
However, we do have a problem with the aggressive way that muslims are forcing changes to our society. The Amish don’t force us to accomodate them in our greater society. They live apart. There is a minimal degree of contact between us and them and so the accomodation is minimal as well. Orthodox Jews also from time immemorial lived apart even when found living in large cities. Given the choices found in America, they had a choice too. Do we force public institutions and fast food chains to stop serving pork and observe halacha rules? Or do we open up our own restaurants and leave McDonalds alone. Do we have our own private schools or do we force public schools to institute special rules just for us that dont apply to other students? Do we show some American initiative and open up our own private pools and other health facilities? or do we demand that Bally’s and the public pool provide us with special facilities?
These two groups chose to not bother us and make demands of us that would force changes in our way of life and create imbalances between us and them.
When one group has a very demanding code of life and insists on full accomodation in every sphere of life instead of opting to build and live their lives largely in their own private sphere, only one thing can happen. The group with the less demands are imposed upon and that is not only wrong, it is impolite and unneighborly.
Take the muslim majority high school vs the Christian majority high school for instance. Christian majority school does not force the minority muslims to eat pork. For the Christian child in the muslim majority school that has the halal kitchen, the ham sandwich that they can eat is not available. Same goes for restaurants in muslim dominated areas. Say there is a chain restaurant that normally serves pork. But to bring in the muslim majority of the area, the pork is cut from the menu. The Christian living in that area who wants to have the pork item wont be able to find it there and will have to go out of their way to get it or else move out of that area(as so many have).
The problem we have with muslims is their insistence on full accomodation in the public sphere and their agressive tactics to transform it into something more islamically friendly. The only end result possible of this campaign is imposition on others and disparity between people whether they like it or not. There is no possibility of another outcome. If you want to avoid imposing on others, then the only option is the kind of separation that others have opted for.
Where we really have a problem is the very strong sense that we get that there is no option in islam to live apart as the Amish do. We get the very strong message that muslims have a religious duty to make any society they live in more islamic. If you can refute that you have that duty to change our society to better reflect your concept of what society should be like, then you and your friends need to be very loud about it and urge muslims to either fully assimilate or else create an arrangement to live apart in the same peaceful and polite manner that others have before you. Model yourselves on the Amish or the Hasidim, who are to a one loyal and peaceful citizens of this country and whom we are more than happy to leave alone in their enclaves to live as they choose, and there will not be a problem anymore. Can you do that? That is the question all of us want to know.
Comment by peggy — 09.08.06 @ 12:56 pm
#42 Alexandra asks me: “Heliotrope, would you suggest then that students learn nothing at all until they are able to devote years to each specific study?”
Of course not. But you will admit that reading Madame Bovary and tip-toeing through the tulips of religion are in no way related.
I taught humanities at the high school and college level. I do not see how art and literature overviews relate to teaching less than Cliff Notes sanitized summaries of religions.
I fought the whole “Bible as literature trend.” Heck, you can teach TV Guide as literature if you are creative. You can call the “P*ss Christ” pure art and claim it is neutral as a religious statement. You can watch Madonna hump a cross on an altar in the sanctuary and call it aerobics.
Religious studies are not benign strolls through the park. Kenneth Clarke did his level best to explain that all religions are a primitive exposition of man’s need to express the creation myth. Poor dead Kenneth now lies moldering in creation myth limbo somewhere and the religions of the world have moved on without his brilliant elitism.
When public schools have been beaten over the head for permitting any form of (Christian) religion to intrude, how can you expect me to believe that your little frolic with religious studies amounted to anything remotely resembling a philosophical understanding of the tenets of those faiths?
In sum, yes, I think the public schools should keep their hands off of religious “education” of any sort and stick to mocking it through gross interpretations by having a field day with “The Crucible” and the fanaticism of John Brown. There is plenty out there to keep the liberals supplied with ammunition to fire at their favorite Bogey-men, the fundamentalist Christians.
What is the purpose of having the students read over some Wikipedia type pap about the major religions? World history texts normally do their neutral best on the major religions. It is a great shame that the ACLU has forced us into this box. But we are in it. Presenting the basic texts of religion in a neutral and “benign” way is not possible. They are Holy scripture and can not be “de-Holy-ified” by even the most clever of cynics.
Comment by Heliotrope — 09.08.06 @ 1:03 pm
Walt,
How are western values superior? The last time I checked, the innovation wheels of this country were not spinning do to the efforts of americans. From my experiences in graduate school (where americans are in the minority except in certain fields like english, history, sociology….) it is the foreigners who are getting the phds, the lucrative jobs in higher education and industry. Do you have a child in college? Chances are, he is being taught by a foreigner? Been to Microsoft? The people who build your operating systems are from other countries a vast proportion of them are muslim and hindu.
It is very easy to throw words out like superior western values but if you happen to take a close look you will see who is really running this country. You will see that the driving force behind technology and medicine are foreigners many who move here not becasuse of superior values but because we make it so easy for them to move here, beat us on our own turf, and come out shiny and clean. It is just the truth. The analogy I like to use is BEST BUY. Americans sell the electronics but who is actually designing it? You would be surprised at how many foreigners (a vast majority of muslims) make it possible for us to enjoy the luxuries that we do.
Egads! The regretful consequence of open commenting…
Dear, foreigners may have the high-tech jobs, but who do you think developed the technology? Why, do you imagine, they are here instead of the Third World countries from which they fled? (Here I’m referring specifically to Indians and those hailing from Muslim countries.) That foreigners are working in these sorts of jobs speaks ill of our lousy education system, not the driving principles behind the development of the education system. If foreigners are “running this country,” what is stopping them from transforming their own Third World holes into First World gems, as western man has?
You’re a black woman in the best country on the planet, a country based on “western” principles that allow you to express your anti-America views without fear of imprisonment or death, with the privilege of attending university, an idea that sprung from western thought, and you think this way? God help the future generations, those who must carry on this great experiment. If you are any indication of how young Americans think, the future is bleak, indeed. - Admin
Comment by edub — 09.08.06 @ 1:07 pm
Anonymous muslim,
Here’s another qiestion for you. Would you agree that either all religions are fully accomodated in the public sphere or else none of them should be? Right now, open public expressions of Christian piety are being driven from the public sphere while muslim expression of piety is being welcomed. Headscarves are as much an advertisement for the faith of a muslim girl as Christian prayer and tracts do to the faith of the Christian. But the one is welcomed and accomodated and the other is banned. Tell me that muslims dont see the headscarf as a means to invite interest in your religion. I’ve seen even moderates praise it for its utility in attracting people to learn about islam.
Now I have something for you to think about. If it takes forcing someone else to be uncomfortable or restricted in order for one to feel comfortable and unrestricted isnt there something wrong somewhere? Would the more neighborly choice be to choose to retrict oneself in that person’s presence and put up with some discomfort rather than to do that? Would you make it a habit to hang around where you were uncomfortable? Probably not. But as long as there was some private area where you could feel comfortable what would be the harm of spending most of your time in that sphere? Why insist on enlarging that sphere to include the whole world when that means imposing on others?
Comment by peggy — 09.08.06 @ 1:28 pm
#44 “I really want to know what I am dealing with, what to tell my children.”
As a Christian in a Muslim country, what would I need to deal with? What would I tell my children? What would you advise me to tell my children? I won’t go into the list of things that are punishable in Muslim countries, but the list is long and the punishment is horrific.
The answer for you is to advise your children that your religion prohibits you from participating in some of the customary freedoms and activities of Americans in America. We Americans are largely Christian, but even Christians must make moral choices in determining what we allow our children to see and do. You must simply do the same. It’s called freedom.
Comment by dianne — 09.08.06 @ 1:37 pm
Edub,
Actually, I graduated from an engineering school about 3 years ago. The majority of my teachers were white Americans or Europeans, Chinese, and one or two Indians. The majority of the graduate and PhD students were Chinese, Taiwanese, or Korean. I think the reason Americans aren’t filling these positions is because of our abysmal public education system, which is run by liberals more interested in public education bureaucracy and unionization than in actually teaching children or upholding standards. In fact, John Stossel did a great expose on this a week ago on television. The majority of semiconductor design is done in Silicon Valley, Taiwan, and China. Much software design is done here and in India, where 85% of the population is Hindu. Muslims are few in those countries. Your criticism would be better directed toward the Democrats and the teacher’s unions than against me. Also, most of the electronics we sell in America are made in China because land and labor are cheaper there, not because their civilization is superior. Japanese and American businessmen are, by and large, responsible for the manufacturing boom in that country.
Comment by Walt Schulte — 09.08.06 @ 1:59 pm
anonymous muslim,
One last comment. I know I’ve already said quite a bit.
I want to correct you on your contention that Christian women choose to cover their hair for the same reason and with the same goal or intention as muslim women do. (I cant speak for Jewish women so if there are any Jewish women who would like to please feel free) Think of what I am about to say as an education freely and respectfully offered.
While modesty has always been important for Christian women it has always also had a different meaning. Christian modesty is not based on an understanding that the woman’s body and hair is disruptive to society and niether has it been seen as the property of the husband. Christian women were encouraged to be modest in relation to the very immodest Greek culture into which Christianity was first revealed. Modest dress was not defined. A woman’s hair has never been made a taboo or the treasure of her husband. Neither were any other body parts defined as taboo or shameful to show in public. Christian modesty was always in the context of opposition to the prevailing culture and is practiced in moderation in relation to that culture. In other words, in our culture today we know that the sight of a woman’s skin and hair should be normal and that this is a good thing for women. We know now that it is every bit as important for a woman to be as comfortable outside her home as a man is and that she has every right to enjoy the pleasures of wind and sun wherever she goes. We have come to this correct conclusion precisely because modesty was never defined by what body parts are covered and instead was defined by a womans attitude toward and relationship with her prevailing culture. Christian modesty is satisified by finding the middle way and the balance between revealing all without a sense of dignity and the other extreme of covering all where the whole of a woman’s body is seen as too dangerous for proper society to see. A healthy medium is found between having no respect for the body and seeing it as so extremely precious that a natural and free life for the women becomes impossible and she can never just go outside without making a production of putting on scarf and coat and veil.
The only definite words about Christian modesty are about make up jewelry etc. While these things are not taboo for us, these words are given to us to speak to the Christian woman that she is worth more than her appearance and that a woman who can free herself from worry about it is better off than the woman who feels compelled to wear it.
As for covering the head, this has always been primarily defined as an act of humility and not of modesty. Christian women are encouraged but not required to wear a head covering in prayer and as a symbol that she is either under the headship of her husband or in the case of nuns, under the headship of Christ. (BTW nuns are by definition always at prayer so the head covering covers that recommendation as well) The head covering when worn is a reminder to be womanly demur in disposition and to submit oneself to the husband just as the husband submits himself to the wife. It is a reminder of an attitude that the Christian woman should cultivate.
The extent of the head covering has been also culturally defined and has followed fashion. The requirement for those who feel it is satisfied as long as something is on the head. LaShawn could probably tell you about the absolutely wonderful tradition of wearing hats to Church in the African American community. Those marvelous hats were worn both out of humility as the Bible recommends but they also represent the crown of the believing woman waiting for her in heaven. This is one of the more perfect interpretations of Christian teaching as can be found in this world, in my opinion. If only I, a white girl, could look so good in such vivid and dramatic styles I wouldnt hesitate to adopt the practice!
I hope this makes the differences clear.
Comment by peggy — 09.08.06 @ 2:09 pm
I’m grateful I have smart readers. Thanks for taking the time to comment, Peggy.
Comment by La Shawn — 09.08.06 @ 2:18 pm
Walt,
You are not understanding my comment. I’m not commenting on where the production takes place i’m commenting on who is in charge of the innovation–it’s only a few americans who hold this title. You are absolutely correct in your arguments about the public school system failures but that is a huge part (and deficit) of our “western superior society”. Let’s face the truth, we are not superior, let’s not even pretend that we are free (this world is so pc that we can’t even enjoy our freedom of expression) that is why it is refreshing to read blogs like lashawn. We are a bunch of scared individuals who play the blame game to make up for our shortcomings. We are loosing it (you even agree with this given your comments on the public school system). All of our top notch programs (MIT, HARVARD, STANFORD…..) are full of the foreigners many of whom hail from Muslim countries and we can’t comptete with them. Be honest with yourself. Can you really hold a torch to them? I will speak for myself, they give me a run for my money. What’s scary is this…they come here, get the awesome education our universities offer (trust me, foreign high schools are much, much better than our superior ones but our Universities give them many more opportunities when they decided to settle back home), and they go home and develop and cultivate the ideas on their own soil. What’s going to happen when we, as americans can’t compete any longer? This is what is scary. It’s scary to sit in a classrom (graduate) and watch american kids eyes bulge with horror as a detailed mathematical proof is put on the board and watch as the chinese and indian and pakistani kids eat it up when they can’t even properly speak english. It’s scary to know that this year (I’m a second year graduate student) of the 3 americans enrolled in the program (out of 17 students) two are not coming back because they can’t handle it.
This is the reality. We are loosing the battle and we need to do something about it besides living in denial.
And to Admin: Trust me, they are. They come here, stay for awhile, make good money, but you’d better believe me when I tell you they are sending it back and are building infastructure in their own countires. Look at Iran, they have nuculear systems as powerful as ours. Look at China, it’s growth is off the charts, look at India, growth off the charts and their women there are holding more executive positions than ever before and both highly skilled men and women are opening domestic compaines that sell softdrinks, candies, clothing… that offer true competion to many american firms. Check out IIT in india, they are turning out some of the highest skilled indiviuals on the planet who are opening companies in india like you would not belive. Look at pakistan check out LUMS, see how pakistani students who have come to the United States have gone back to their country and opened up a school that rivals MIT. My fiancee is leaving the US this december to take up a faculty position there. Check out the stats on how many individuals are coming here to study but are going back. They are going back. Economic development takes time but we will see in about 10-15 years tremendous growth in these countries.
Admin, the idea of university came from ancient china and egypt. Westerners were hovering over fires in caves while ancient chinese and egyptians were discovering physics and geometry.
Trust me admin. I am the future. I am an african american who is able to compete with not only these foreingers but with my fellow americans and can out prove any stereotype out there that one may have regarding a black woman. I have skills that can carry me to any part of the world and I can survive there. I can build a damn in africa (I was a civil engineer, mathematics, and economics undergraduate), teach physics in china, or discuss economic development in India. I can survive a challenging phd/jd at one of the best schools in the country and i can run an interior design company (you should check out my coffee tables: http://www.edessedesigns.com). I can live outside of my comfort zone and can ask questions that many are afraid to ask. I can accept my shortcomings (I have many) and I can accept defeat. But the thing I am most proud of, is my ability to see an accept the truth, which I got not from my western upbringing but from my relationship with GOD or ALLAH, or whatever you may want to call him.
This tit-for-tat about what foreigners can do and what we can’t do is a separate issue. Just because this generation of Americans is dumb, relatively speaking, doesn’t mean previous ones were. It is because of these people, dedicated to democracy, freedom, capitalism, etc, that the country exists in the first place. Any foreigner with the opportunity to come here will do so and exploit this land of milk and honey, honey. I wish you were actually sharing new information, but you’re not. There is nothing new nor surprising about foreign workers beating out Americans in the high tech field. Does that mean their home countries are somehow better than this country? In your and their dreams.
And I have no doubt that people from China and Third World hell-holes like India are sending money back home. Americans, for whatever reason, are being outpaced in the high tech field, but that doesn’t disprove or negate the greatness of the west. Unfortunately, subsequent generations care less and less about such greatness. About the “hovering over the caves” idea, I recommend you read Charles Murray’s Human Accomplishment. No matter what China or Egypt may have developed, it was the west than harnessed the power and expanded upon various discoveries and inventions. PLEASE read that book.
That you are an entrepreneur is great. I’m ecstatic. I highly recommend the lifestyle. I still worry about a younger generation that thinks like you, no matter what educational level you attain or who you are able to “compete” with or how many businesses you own. - Admin
Comment by edub — 09.08.06 @ 2:54 pm
#44 “I really want to know what I am dealing with, what to tell my children.â€
Why don’t you start by telling your children that they are lucky and blessed to be living in this great country that is populated by good, kind, generous, and innovative people. Tell your children that they can go to school here for free, and that people can worship where they wish, they can wear the type of clothing they want, they can live where they wish, they can talk to the opposite sex without fear of “religious police”. Tell your children that whatever their sex, they can pursue the career they wish. Tell your daughters that in America they have the same rights as your sons and that in America no one has the right to injure, imprison or kill them because they go against the family’s wishes. Tell your daughters that in America the female body is not considered the path to evil. Teach your children your religion, but understand that in America they are free to practice whatever faith they wish, even if that means no faith. But above all, tell your children to thank God everyday for giving them the chance to grow up in a society that values personal freedom. Tell them that to have such freedom is a basic right in America. If these things are too frightening for you to tell your children, then you have no business being here.
Comment by Belle — 09.08.06 @ 3:32 pm
My point is that, every single complaint is directed toward the Islamic beliefs, not toward the minority extremist who are essentially motivated by political issues. These comments and post imply that every single Muslim in America is a threat, when this is an out and out lie. The overwhelming majority of Muslims are law abiding and contribute to society. Just because they happen to have conservative moral beliefs, some how they are now all the enemy.
Why is it wrong to ask for accommodation? As I mentioned before, its done by other groups. If the facility or school doesn’t want to comply than so be it. Why is it wrong to ask?
It seems to me your gripe is with school administrators and the like whom you believe to discriminate against Christians.
Peggy: There is no point in trying to refute you because you have already made up your mind that every thing a Muslim woman does is because she is being oppressed by some man. God forbid she actually has a brain and wears hijab(head scarf) because she loves God and wants to live her life in obedience to God in part by being modest. In fact the majority of Muslim women in America don’t wear it, so they can choose not to. I read a lot of Christian womens blogs and plenty of them want to be modest too, and are sick of this societies culture of immodesty. But you have us all figured out so I won’t waste my time.
And lastly, did women not swim before the bikini was invented? The overwhelming majority of women in the world would not be comfortable in a bikini, no matter what their religion. You can go to India and see Hindus in the water with their full Saris on. Its just a different cultural mindset, not everyone is comfortable walking around in what is essentially underwear.
Comment by anonymous muslim — 09.08.06 @ 4:52 pm
#62
I think the “conservative moral beliefs” we’re most worried about in Islam are those that say “slaughter the infidels.” The fact is, while the majority of Muslims aren’t terrorists, the rest sympathize with them or put forward these inane arguments about atrocities committed in the past by other religions or cultures. When Westerners start trying to immigrate to Islamic countries, you’ll have a leg to stand on.
Comment by Walt Schulte — 09.08.06 @ 5:03 pm
a few more people to respond to
I’m anonymous because I dont want my friends to see how much a I waste time on the internet, I think some of them read this blog. I guess I could have just made up a generic Muslim name. OK, I’ll be Laila.
I did want to agree with one point. Personally I dont think Muslims should be constantly asking for accomodations particularly in the public schools. I think many immigrants came here and saw how the Jews were accomodated in NYC, and Philadelphia and I thought they would have the same right. I dont think they realize they are not as welcomed here as the Jews so I think its a waste of time. I think Muslims should work together more to have their own facilities, schools and can be more independent.
Comment by Laila formally anonymous muslim — 09.08.06 @ 5:13 pm
Walt the West has been in the Muslim countries for hundreds years.
A history of the Middle East by Peter Mansfield is very informative
Comment by Laila formally anonymous muslim — 09.08.06 @ 5:19 pm
This is a link to an article on “lawful islam” - or how the muslims use our own laws against us. I haven’t had time to read all the comments, so sorry if I repeat something that’s been said, but it’s definitely worth considering.
http://tinyurl.com/rlboz
Comment by suek — 09.08.06 @ 5:20 pm
anonymous muslim - I think that many non-radical Muslims and Biblical Christians would find common ground as far as modesty is concerned. I have two sons, but if I had daughters, there’s no way I’d let them dress as a “pop tart” like Brittney Spears or Agulara or Madonna, or even emulate them in private or public.
There were many Americans disgusted and outraged two years ago when Janet Jackson’s boob was exposed on live TV during the Super Bowl. Some people said we should just “grow up” and “get over it” because it was “just a boob” but I was at a friend’s home where lots of children were watching. UGH. It wasn’t “just a boob” to us.
Walter in post #63 makes a very good point, however, in that the majority of Americans are afraid of Muslims, or worried when we see these massive protests with Muslims shouting “death to America!” “death to all infidels!” and the like, and also rioting over a bunch of cartoons, the terrorist bombings, beheadings and the like.
You seem like a reasonable chap. What we would love to see and hear is more and more regular Muslims standing up and saying “enough!” and standing with us, instead of remaining silent. Instead of organizations like the feckless CAIR claiming victimhood every week, we’d love for regular Muslims living in America to take a strong stand against the insanity being done in the name of your religion.
Instead, we’ve heard almost nothing. The silence, in fact, is deafening. We take silence as silent approval.
If you want accommodation, how about proving that you don’t stand with those who want to slaughter us? Because of your silence, the burden of proof, unfortunately, rests with you and your fellow Muslims.
Be a proud Muslim and STAND WITH US against the monsters who murder in the name of Islam! THEN you’d find a lot more Americans much more willing to accommodate you.
Comment by Big Mo — 09.08.06 @ 5:25 pm
Anonymous muslim, your true feelings about this country lie in your comment “sick of this societies culture of immodesty”. Apparently, you do not feel you are a part of “this society” and it seems you find it’s culture repulsive. Cloaking your disdain for the West under the pretense of “religious values and modesty” doesn’t work. Again, we can read between the lines. And by the way, there are many cultures both present and past, in which the women swim….naked!
Comment by Belle — 09.08.06 @ 5:33 pm
anoymous muslim,
What a cop out. I am very disappointed. I went to great pains to describe the differences in how we understand modesty and how you understand it because i assumed you were a reasonable person with a brain that would read my words carefully. In return you assume that I am unreasonable and there is no point in even trying to do the same for me.
I never said anything about it not being your choice. I never said a word about oppression by men. I never said that muslim women do not have brains. You are reading into my words sentiments that are not there.
My point is that islamic beliefs about modesty are extreme, unhealthy and unneccessary and that we Christians have never had the same understanding of modesty that you muslims do. Everything I said was meant with all due respect but you go off on me like I attacked you.
There is way more to the headscarf than so-called modesty. It comes packed with a host of ideas that are bad for women. You may choose to wear it now but by its very nature there will come a day in the lives of one of your descendents where enough women will have chosen it that it will become expected of all “good girls” and the choice will be gone for any girl that doesnt want to wear it.
Why is it that a woman’s hair must be covered? Why is a womans hair provocative to men or a such a sensitive part of the body that only a relative must see? Why isnt it normal? Why is it so sexual? When you really start digging and thinking about the implications of considering normal parts of the body as things that it is immodest to expose it becomes anything but such a simple thing as loving and obeying God by being modest. Islam has a very definite definition of parts of a womans body that it is wrong or disobedient to expose. Its the reasons behind those attitudes that are unwholesome for women.
I really wish you would read what I actually wrote. I would also appreciate you answering my questions instead of avoiding them and getting on your high horse about how horrid I am. Do you really know me? I learned all that i know about islam from muslims. I have muslim friends. I thought about what they told me with an open mind and I think muslim beliefs are very unhealthy.
If some modesty is good it doesnt follow that an extreme form of modesty is better. As I told you, Christians occupy the middle range on the issue of modesty between too little and too much modesty. Too much of anything is never good. There are always unhealthy consequences in going to extremes. In my mind you are not more modest than me. Your beliefs are not more conservative than mine. I have thought alot about islam and have listened more than your assumptions would have you believe. I have come to the thoughtful conclusion that your beliefs arent just more in degree than mine. They are very different than mine and deeply flawed. To you, Islam is just Christianity taken seriously. To you, muslims are more moral and concerned about modesty. To me, Islam is not Christianity at all in any degree. If you were to really listen to me and to other Christians instead of learning about us from other muslims you would soon realize that.
Further, you do not need to cover yourself in order to love and obey God. What does covering yourself have to do with love? Do you also cover yourself out of love for your husband? Why does your version of God ask you to cover? Why is it important to him. What reason does he give for commanding it? Why is it that the more one loves God the more one must cover? Are you trying to prove your love to God? Doesnt he know how much you love him without you having to prove it? I know the answers to at least some of these questions and I know the answers to why Christian modesty is not the same concept. The answers and reasons are totally different even if the word we use for them are the same.
You will say perhaps, that a covered woman commands more respect from men or that an uncovered woman lacks dignity or that hiding your body from men allows you to be close to God all the time without being distracted by worrying about what men are thinking about you.
My question is why? Why isnt a woman’s internal qualities more impressive than her physical beauty? Why does a powerful woman need a special outfit to command respect? Why is a woman’s dignity something that she puts on before she goes out of the house instead of something that she possesses in herself and which couldnt be taken away from her even if she was stripped of her clothes in public? Why do you worry so much about what other people think of you that you cant be close to God unless you adopt a means to control their thoughts about you? Why is your ability to concentrate so fragile? Why cant you feel safe without a special costume?
Like it or not there are attitudes and ideas behind the wearing of the headscarf and covering all of the body that are not good for anyone. They are bad for men. They are bad for women. And they are bad for society. They are every bit as bad as it would be if women were forbidden to wear clothes in public. These are extreme ideas of unhealthy origin. They are far from the wholesome middle.
Comment by peggy — 09.08.06 @ 5:50 pm
#66
We could go back and forth for days on historical injustices, and Islam likes to dredge up the Crusades, the loss of Al-Andalusia, ad infinitum ad nauseum. I’m more interested in current events. Islam likes to play the historical victim card to excuse its actions. Absent of any historical injustices, Islam is still a religion of the sword.
Comment by Walt Schulte — 09.08.06 @ 5:57 pm