Muslims, not the media or the terrorists, tells us about Islam

Submitted by Rajeev (United States), Nov 17, 2010 at 03:03

Dear Dr Pipes:

Your reader Ahmad again repeats the tired argument that people misjudge Islam because their knowledge of it comes from the media. I do not think so. We do not judge Islam according to what we are told about it in the media. Most of the media is very pro Islam and if we were to learn about Islam from the media, we would have had a very favorable opinion of it. And we also do not make our opinion of Islam based on the actions of terrorists because we surely know that a few thousand terrorists in a group of a billion people don't mean much.

So where does our opinion of Islam and Muslim come from? Our opinion of Islam and Muslim comes from Muslims themselves. You see, if hundreds of Muslims line up the streets of our cities when a terrorist bomb kills tens of Israelis or Iraqis or Indians, our opinion of Muslims will change in a minute. If tens of Muslim scholars write essays that demanding special privileges for Muslims in secular societies is not ethical, our opinion of Islam will change in a minute. If some Muslim social scientists write critical essays on how Islamist policies have harmed the Muslim population, our opinion will change right away. If we meet some Pakistanis opposing Palestinians and some Palestinians opposing Kashmiris and some Kashmiris opposing Iranians, our opinion on Islam will change very quickly. If some Muslim theologists stand up for the rights of Christians to build churches in Mecca, our opinion of Islam will change in the blink of an eye.

You see it is wrong to blame the media or the terrorists for how the rest of the world perceives Islam. It is the silent majority of Muslims that creates our opinion.

Note: Opinions expressed in comments are those of the authors alone and not necessarily those of Daniel Pipes. Original writing only, please. Comments are screened and in some cases edited before posting. Reasoned disagreement is welcome but not comments that are scurrilous, off-topic, commercial, disparaging religions, or otherwise inappropriate. For complete regulations, see the "Guidelines for Reader Comments".