thepeel
Joined: 08 Aug 2004
|
 Posted: Tue Jul 03, 2007 10:35 pm Post subject: At a Theater Near You ... |
 |
|
THOMAS L. FRIEDMAN
| Quote: |
But this movie gets more confusing every time you watch it. When you watched it on 9/11 it was about America�s presence in the heart of Arabia. And when you watched it on 7/7 it was about unemployed and alienated Muslim youth in Britain. In Jordan not long ago it was about a wedding at a Western hotel. In Morocco recently it was about an Internet cafe. And two days ago in Yemen it was about seven Spanish tourists who were killed when a suicide bomber drove into them at a local tourist site. Wasn�t Spain the country that quit Iraq to get its people out of the line of fire?
Because these incidents are scattered, we�re growing numb to just how crazy they are. In the past few years, hundreds of Muslims have committed suicide amid innocent civilians � without making any concrete political demands and without generating any vigorous, sustained condemnation in the Muslim world.
Two trends are at work here: humiliation and atomization. Islam�s self-identity is that it is the most perfect and complete expression of God�s monotheistic message, and the Koran is God�s last and most perfect word. To put it another way, young Muslims are raised on the view that Islam is God 3.0. Christianity is God 2.0. Judaism is God 1.0. And Hinduism and all others are God 0.0.
One of the factors driving Muslim males, particularly educated ones, into these acts of extreme, expressive violence is that while they were taught that they have the most perfect and complete operating system, every day they�re confronted with the reality that people living by God 2.0., God 1.0 and God 0.0 are generally living much more prosperously, powerfully and democratically than those living under Islam. This creates a real dissonance and humiliation. How could this be? Who did this to us? The Crusaders! The Jews! The West! It can never be something that they failed to learn, adapt to or build. This humiliation produces a lashing out.
Of course, not all Muslims are terrorists. But it�s been widely noted that virtually all suicide terrorists today are Muslims. Angry Norwegians aren�t doing this � nor are starving Africans or unemployed Mexicans. Muslims have got to understand that a death cult has taken root in the bosom of their religion, feeding off it like a cancerous tumor.
This cancer is erasing basic norms of civilization. In Iraq, we�ve seen suicide bombers blow up funerals and schools. In England, seven out of the eight people detained in the latest plot are Muslim doctors or medical students. Doctors plotting mass murder? Could that be? If Muslim leaders don�t remove this cancer � and only they can � it will spread, tainting innocent Muslims and poisoning their relations with each other and the world. |
http://select.nytimes.com
Bang on. |
|
FAQ
Search
Memberlist
Usergroups
Register
Profile
Log in to check your private messages
Log in
