irshaad.net

A while back, a right-wing Christian blog featured several posts which purported to be an attempt to understand Muslims and the Muslim “mindset” by linking to videos depicting a fundamentalist, extremist, political interpretation of Islam. Then the “extremist Islam” interpretive net was cast over Muslims in general - if it wasn’t Muslims’ actions (as depicted in the videos) it was their inaction as a whole that was at the root of current conflicts and atrocities. All this was, of course, just an “honest” attempt to understand Muslims and Islam as part of a dialog. This was my reply (I’ve coalesced several comments together):

I can point you to any number of websites, flash cartoons, graphics, articles, comments etc. that portray Muslims in general, Muslim religious figures, their Prophet, their practices, their religion etc. in the most heinous light, that talk incessantly of nuking Muslims, eradicating Islam and Muslims, that seem to condone the worst excesses of, or make light of the atrocities in Abu Ghraib and other places where the American military overstepped bounds. These are even more disgusting and unpalatable than the tripe you have posted. But that would just be tit for tat.

I don’t like one or the other - both are propaganda (although I find the neo-con propaganda more cold, heartless, savage, and savvy), both emerge from reaction to political situations. The politics of conflict always enable the very worst in human nature to froth up to the surface. There is a very low level of thinking involved, a lot of verbal thuggery and crudeness, and it doesn’t reflect well on our own humanity when we turn again and again towards the purveyors of these debased viewpoints and accept their portrayals as accurate depictions of one society or another. That is nothing except participation in propaganda.

Again, falling into one ideological camp or the other is easy and tempting but it moves no one any closer to a useful dialog or solution. We have enough people and websites thinking within narrow ideological boxes whose boundaries are defined by fear and prejudice against the “other” - who spend their time and effort trying to build antagonism, hatred and division all in service of dubious ideological causes - who attempt to influence, box-in, direct, and delimit other’s opinions to match their own political biases.

There’s a world of literature, of history, of political, and religious writings (Muslim and Christian) that illuminate and enlighten and build knowledge and understanding and enable the construction of bridges between religions, cultures and peoples. There’s a world of human beings out there as well and when you mingle with them, and talk genuinely (not condescendingly, antagonistically, or threateningly) with them, you may connect mind to mind and heart to heart and all this internet based propagandistic posturing becomes exposed for what it is. If you don’t understand Islam, you’re certainly not going to understand it through neo-con viewpoints - no more than a Muslim will understand America through an extremist Muslim lens. Shaking off stereotypes and caricatured views of other communities, other faiths, other peoples is a difficult thing to do since it requires us to step outside of our own ideological boundaries.

We live in difficult times - and in such times fear, doubt, prejudice, hatred, anger, suspicion, casting of aspersions, come to the forefront - these are all impulses and reactions that mentally blind us - and they blind our hearts, whether we are Americans, Christians, Muslims, Israeli’s, Jews, Arabs, whatever. “Can the blind lead the blind? Will they not both fall into a pit?….” (Luke 6:37-42)

There’s no doubt that there is extensive political turmoil in the world, there’s no doubt that storms of political and military conflict are raging - there’s also no doubt that by jumping into the fray, by propagandizing for or against one side or the other we only stir up the already turbulent waters, add to the negative emotion, increase the division, and impart greater motion to a very dangerous and ugly machine - and let’s face it, for some there’s a certain smug and easy ideological satisfaction in doing that.

Calming the waters is more difficult, it requires placing aside ego and extreme political ideology (the two are strongly bound together with the glue of fear) and quick judgment, replacing them with depth of knowledge and understanding. The politically religious (those who tie time-bound, worldly politics to their religion to the point of overshadowing religious principles) love to stir up storms (even if only minor tempests in teapots), but there are other paths available for anyone who gives faith, knowledge, and the worth of the soul a place above turbulent, Machiavellian power politics.

But as long as one approaches from the standpoint of a pre-set power-based ideology, then it’s a foregone conclusion that ideology will re-interpret or selectively focus on whatever bolsters the ideology. That’s polarization - and polarization is not dialog.