@Finn dAbuzz,
Quote:In essence he replied just as millions of Americans would: How can we make them any angrier at us?
We can't make the angry ones any more angry but we can definitely nudge some of the moderate ones over the edge.
Unlike most of my liberal acquaintances, I'm not a big fan of immigration or refugee resettlement — not for the reasons usually cited by conservatives, however. But focusing on a particular religious group (even if restricted to a few nations) is predictably just the sort of response which courts a worldwide chorus of opprobrium.
Quote:You would think, wouldn't you, that this remarkable sense of pride and honor that underpins their culture along with the sense of community defined by ummat al-Islamiyah, would result in them doing all they could to take care of Muslim refugees and not only not leaving it to the infidels, but getting angry if the infidels balk in any way.
No, personally I wouldn't think that. Islam isn't that kind of belief system. Its doctrines are too obscure, too wedded to a mythologized 7th Century nomadic culture. There's no tradition of "higher criticism" and critical study of the religion's origins has been suppressed. Indoctrinated with the idea that God is beyond all comprehension and trained to ritual submission, there's no place for independent critical thinking. The sense of pride and honor you describe doesn't grow out of an individual's sense of growth, stoic virtue, or personal achievement but solely from belonging to a group and conforming to its doctrines.
If the West were really serious about defanging radical Islam it could ignore individual Muslims and work instead to delegitimize the faith itself. Remnants of paganism could be exposed, revisionist critiques could be applied to the early history of the faith, psychologists could describe and deconstruct its interior logic, Hollywood could produce movies featuring apostate heroes, comedians could lampoon the notion of angelic messengers or Divine Will. The Mission: Make Islam Irrelevant! I only see one big drawback to this sort of cultural campaign: people could just as easily use similar stones of fact and logic against the glass cathedral of Christendom. Ooops!
