who else will admit it?

Submitted by Fred Baehr (United States), Nov 7, 2010 at 14:25

Dr. Hamid makes excellent points and very frankly. I just want to thank him for adding another voice for reform to this important and I hope growing conversation. The most usual response I get when making some of the same points is a statement of equivalent guilt citing Christian or Western depredation upon Muslims, the most common being, "what about the Crusades?" Exactly, what about them? Well they took place almost a thousand years ago after 400 years of Muslim conquest of theretofore Christian (and Animist) lands. I can't think of one event from that long gone time that directly affects modern reality, and I am a history buff. Referencing the Crusades as a reason for violence now is just absurd yet both the jihadis and their liberal apologists bring them up as though they had lost sons and daughters in the fight. In fact, few people on earth can trace their personal lineage to any individual involved, the theory of nationalism had yet to even develop, and not one country in the world today existed at the time. There was no France or Germany or Russia or Iran or Saudi Arabia or Ottoman Empire or England and certainly no United States at the time.

But one faces a kind of religious mysticism when encountering the minds of committed liberals on questions having to do with the comparative validity of religions. They insist that all faiths are equally valid and that there is no way to escape one's own racist paradigm as to such questions, therefore to ask such questions is inherently racist. The truly committed will also inform you that as a matter of fact there are in fact no facts,but merely narratives and other discourse, all of course of equal invalidity. Of course the narrative of power is more invalid than the many suppressed narratives of oppressed, so the progressive thing to do is validate those narratives as a way of further invalidating the narratives of power, thus distancing ourselves from the oppressors. It is obvious though that to bring up examples of bad behavior from within the narratives of the oppressed is racist (or colonialist if you are talking with a Marxist), and cannot be allowed to sully an enlightened debate, which leaves very little room for debate, enlightened or otherwise.

I hope I find more honest opinion like Dr. Hamid's and Dr. M.Z. Jasser of AIFD. I hope they might become the new voice for positive change in Islam. I wish our government would recognize such views as the real voices of Muslim moderation and, dare we say, modernization?

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