in most of my postings, i will be focusing on the faith of islam, which i consider to be the most distressing social problem in the world today. now, i don’t have any problems with muslims, but i do have a problem with islam. so i don’t hate the person but i hate the ideology.
like so many americans, i never really knew much about the faith. 9-11 happened and bush got on his podium afterwards to say that islam wasn’t the problem and that it is a religion of peace. i believed him then but now i know that he is either wrong or he was lying. i wasn’t always like this. i thought that the terrorists were only a minority, only the extremists. i was a 20 year old college student who was liberal, mellow, easy going, democrat who believed that all men were created equal and believed in the idea that the human race would one day be devoid of discrimination. 7-7 happened and i still didn’t care. i was just the average american college student who didn’t know better
what changed for me was during a 2-3 week period after the fall semester when i was left to my thoughts and decided to do some reading. i went to the bookstore and bought a book in the “current affairs” section dealing with the islamic terrorism threat. i read it within 1 night and went back to buy more books dealing with the subject. 7 more books were finished as well as books on modern slavery, the biology of racism, and global politics. i can only say that the time alone spent reading have changed the way i view the entire world, especially on islam.
if one goes online and type into wikipedia, “war on terror”, if one then takes a look under the section for “belligerents”, one notices a very interesting pattern, at least in terms of the names. if you want, take the time to do this very important excercise. just take a look at the superficial names of the groups the US is fighting. have you noticed the pattern?
anyway, my worldview took a drastic change and i decided to delve deeper into the faith, to learn more. when i was younger, i was into eastern religion, especially hinduism and buddhism and i still do consider myself to be a casual buddhist. so delving into islam was nothing new to me.
i am an engineer by trade and have a solid background in the sciences and believe in the power of rationality and logic. i am an agnostic and believe in certain traits from nihilism. when i began to research islam, i took a very methodical approach to the process. facts, references, citations, and proof was needed for any claims made by any side.
i started to notice a very interested phenomenon occurring in the news that i read, specifically msnbc.com and cnn.com. it seemed like almost every single day, there was some news that dealt with islam and its results, and i am not even talking about the war in iraq or afghanistan. stories of islamic groups bringing on lawsuits, of islamic groups harassing others, of fathers murdering their daughters over honor, of western public facilities being changed to accommodate the lifestyle, of muslims being offended or insulted in some way shape or form.
there is no doubt right now that islam and muslims are getting a lot of bad press and are projected in a negative light. the muslims claim that they are being treated as the bad guy when they shouldn’t be. their concern is valid and their opinions will be taken account. the main question that should be asked is this,
is the negative image of muslims and specifically islam itself in the present day based off of valid concerns and valid reasons?
i say yes. the reason why i say yes is because of what i know from what i have learned. i will say that i probably know more about islam and its past, its teachings, and its deeper implications than 99% of the rest of the american people. i have read, and read, and read. because of my search into islam, i have also had to delve into christianity as well, which i haven’t done before.
there is a common claim that many extreme liberals make which is not valid which has been expressed by people like rosie odonell and michael moore.
their claim has been along the lines of saying that christianity is just as bad, if not worst, than islam in promoting hatred and violence throughout its history. they treat (and probably think) the relationship of christianity to islam is like the two sides of the same coin, two fraternal twins who have a few small differences but in essence, they are the same. in my personal opinion, i think they are wrong in making that relationship or connection only because they themselves haven’t read enough and don’t understand the two faiths well enough. i just can’t imagine rosie or moore sitting down somewhere and cracking open a book.
that is all for now and any feedback would be insightful and appreciated.