Differentiating Islamists from Islam is a grievous error

Submitted by Gary (United States), Sep 8, 2010 at 18:59

Nicholas D. Kristof published an Op-Ed column in the N. Y. Times on September 4, 2010, under the title, "America's History of Fear". In it, he describes the current attitude of non-Moslem Americans to Islam as simple xenophobia, and likens it to past xenophobic reactions to new immigrant populations, mentioning specifically "movements against Irish, Germans, Italians, Chinese" immigrants, and goes on to include Mormons, Jews, and Catholics among those who were victims of prejudice as evidence of a consistent bigotry by a substantial segment of the American public.

This column is pure bull masquerading as careful analysis. Of all the "victims" of xenophobic reaction he cites, only one has been a self-declared mortal enemy of our very existence, only one is committed by their belief system to destroy and then replace our basic principles, only one has sponsored suicide bombers that kill indiscriminately in pursuit of that goal. That is Islam.

I am a systems analyst, so my bent is to examine expressed needs in detail, looking for truth, then make a plan and create a solution that best meets the often conflicting goals of the client. Here, my client is the USA and its fundamental goal is to provide an environment in which the "Inalienable Rights" of its citizenry are secured, the first of these being "Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness".

All the specific rights adopted in the resulting Constitution cannot each be read in isolation since they inherently conflict with one another, but rather must be evaluated as a whole and, most importantly, in the context provided by the original document justifying our going to war -- the Revolutionary War -- in order that we might create that Constitution, derived from the Declaration of Independence, for our new country.

"Freedom of religion" does not mean, as a specific example, Jim Jones and his murders and mass suicides as being acceptable merely because, after all, his followers worshipped him as God's messenger. Even the followers of Charles Manson claimed their actions were based upon a "religious" conviction and continued to do so after being convicted and imprisoned.

Now Islam, and Islam alone among today's religions – let's not bring up the past evils of others as rationalizations for accepting this new evil as a "normal" part of a religion -- includes a large subculture dedicated to the total annihilation of our way of life, our very existence. That subculture is not isolated as other followers of Islam would have us believe. The extent of its financing makes it clear that the Islamic terrorists are supported, massively, by Muslim communities that give only lip service to the argument that the perpetrators are not really followers of the Qur'an, that they "pervert" Islam. The reality is that the Qur'an and those anonymous wealthy supporters are the foundations from which the Islamic terrorists spring and by which they survive and flourish, pursuing without quarter their unholy war against us.

So, suspicions of motives and close surveillance of that religion whose beliefs are, as dictated by the Qur'an, implacably opposed to the fundamental tenets of our country is NOT bigotry. It is a reasonable and completely essential response to an actual, self-confessed, dangerous enemy. That it is also a religion is an unfortunate situation, bringing into conflict, as it does, the Constitution's freedom of religion and the guarantee of fundamental rights in the Declaration of Independence from which the former stems.

It is common for our Supreme Court, in interpreting Constitutional rights as they apply to specific cases, to look to the history of that document and the arguments made in the drafting of its content. In this case, those arguments start and end with the Declaration of Independence's "Inalienable Rights".

Islam is, fundamentally at its core, the implacable enemy of all we stand for and all we believe. That is all ye know, and all ye need to know. That it is also a religion does not negate that, nor justify its claim to protection under the Constitution.

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