To Mo - Rifts and slants

Submitted by Michel C. Zala (United States), Jan 28, 2007 at 14:42

Hello Mo -

Your contributions here are appreciated.

Amazing, how you ( as far as I have read) have been able not to respond emotionally to attacks of the lowest level against your entire culture and religion.

I do not know, if I could apply such moderation in your shoes. That fact alone would deserve a ton of respect and demonstrates, what is so often missing here : maturity, even wisdom.

I do not know, if I misunderstood you, but the "war on terror" is a sad reality. Unfortunately a segment of radicals originating from your culture, have taken terrorism to a whole new level. Never before had the civilized word (not just the western world) faced an enemy of this magnitude on a global scale. The fear they have been able to instill in so many is one of the reasons for a growing climate of intolerance in response. It is indeed a very logical mechanism and must sadly be seen as achieved objective for them.

It is why to my opinon people like you, Plato and me must come together and stand firm by not allowing extremists within our own respective cultures to influence, heck dominate our actions and reactions.

You offered a plausible explanation for the lack of strong opposition against those people from within your culture. Having said that - I hope you agree with me, that such opposition en masse from within your theologists must arise, in order to fight the root cause or eliminate the base they recruit from.

People from our side can not force such "refiorm" upon you, it must come from within. We can only stand ready to assist upon request. So - the burden is on the Mos of the Islamic world to find the courage to stand against their own fanatics, as we successfully managed to overcome our own devils ( Hitler and our very own terrorists)

If I understood you correctly, you agree that ISLAM ( in a religious context spoken) can be twisted and used by fanatics to justify their actions. On that note, the reason that I allow myself to talk to you and with you about ISLAM is, that the Judeo/Christian culture seems to have pretty much overcome their aggressive period, whereas Islam is in dissarray with violence across the globe even within between factions of it.

Please see the above statement in the context that I see the very simple US consitution as a wonderful lowest common denominator with core values anyone from anywhere should be able to buy in as a common platform. (By the people for the people, all men are created equal, the freedoms and bill of rights for any indivdual no matter the culture, creed, origin or gender.)

For the sake of the argument, call it Democracy. I hence do not see it as undue interference, if the west tries to install, grow, support, develop such systems in a region where pretty much all modern principles of co-existence, equality or cooperation are being violated on a daily basis. I would even dare to offer that such is a moral obligation.

I also must exclude the topic of Israel/Palestine, which is a blog all by itself and leads to endless fingerpointing and what came first.

Having said that, Noah's call for reform of ISLAM rings definitely true, as it seems that the core of the current problems is situated there.

Do you see such efforts? Are your religious authorities ( Mufti?) as immovable as our Roman Catholic Church, where reform is almost impossible? Just to make myself absolutely clear here: I do not compare the RCChurch with ISLAM other than in its power and willingness to reform.

While proclaiming the dogma that no condoms shall be used in Aids infested Africa is a sad example of the state of the RCChurch, at least they presently do not kill in the name of the Christian God. In logical conclusion the needed reform of ISLAM is much more mission-critical.

How can this reform happen, Mo. What tendencies do you see? What do they preach to that regard in your own local Mosque? (by the way - where are you situated? - I am in the greater LA area.

TX in advance.

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