your answer

Submitted by (moderate) Muslim (though all real Muslims are moderate) (United States), Apr 5, 2007 at 22:08

But you did not answer her question as usual: would you be scared of a Christian? and I would add here or a Hindu or a Buddhist or a Sikh or a Hassidic Jew, riding a plane with you, or a muslim planning to get on the plane and sit next to you?

I would not mind if a person of Jewish faith, or of the Christian faith, or of the Sikh faith, or of the Hindu faith, or of the Buddhist faith, or of the Muslim faith, were to sit next to me on an airplane. I would mind if someone got on an airplane with the intention of hurting innocent people, I would mind very much. But let us examine the idea. One is not scared of someone on a plane because of what their faith is, but what they percieve their faith to be. I know Christian Arabs who are given dirty looks on airliners. White Muslims are fine on planes because no one suspects them to be Muslim. This question comes from the same train of thought which says "If I hear footsteps behind me and the person is white, I'm not scared but if they are black I am." It is merely a fear of a race. I know personally a Muslim woman who is white and never has been looked at twice on an airplane, and yet as I have said earlier Christian Arabs are. This is a sad truth in America that people look at others this way and we need to stop it. No man or woman is above any other except in their piety towards God. So to answer I would say that I would welcome anyone to sit next to me on a plane, provided they do not intend to cause me harm, and prove me wrong, but 99.99% of Muslims that have ever been on planes have gotten to their destination as planned, without any harm caused to anyone else. I say Muslims meaning people who claim to be Muslims, because obivously they are killers and not proper Muslims.

The question posed is therefore not so much about airplanes as it is about fear. It is asking do you fear anyone based on their religious beliefs or their skin tones. The sad truth from most people is yes, and this is understandable, at least the first one is, because if I did not know about Islam I would be afraid of Muslims too. If the average person actually met Muslims and interacted with them, not for the sake of an argument or to prove some one wrong, but really just to interact with them as humans on earth, then many people would learn how normal Muslims are. I have gone to a masjid all my life, and I have never once heard any single person, whether it be the head of the masjid or the oldest man or the youngest child ever say anything against this country. Some may have a serious problem with some policies of this country, and this is acceptable, nay it is encouraged under democracy, but none would actively harm the US or even help anyone attempting to do so.

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