Wednesday, December 29, 2010

If Muslims were treated like Christians in America

If Muslims were treated like Christians in America...from http://www.jihadwatch.org/2010/12/if-muslims-were-treated-like-christians-in-america.html

Pointing out a glaring and largely unnoticed double standard. "If Christians Were Treated Like Muslims," by Gary Bauer in Human Events, December 28:
  • [...] If Muslims were treated like Christians in America, Muslims would have to tolerate the defamation of their holiest images in our national museums, acts which would be called "artwork" -- and, if particularly provocative, even given taxpayer-funded grants from the National Endowment for the Arts. They would also have to accept Korans being burned and thrown into toilets, which instead of inciting worldwide outrage and retribution would provoke a collective shrug of the shoulders.
  • If Muslims were treated like Christians, Muslims would be mocked by late night TV talk show hosts and lampooned in crude cartoon parodies. If Christians were treated like Muslims, conspicuous Christianity would be celebrated by our elites as a sign of our diversity and open-mindedness, not disparaged as an embarrassment, a nuisance and a breach of the law. 
  • If Christianity were treated like Islam, our students would be taught a white-washed version of Christian history, with the troubling bits miscast or omitted from textbooks and lesson plans. 
  • If Christianity were treated like Islam, if an evangelical Christian committed an evil act in the name of his faith, he would be portrayed in the media as a deviation from, not a personification of, the Gospel message. Meanwhile, our political and media elites would hasten to assure the public that evangelical Christianity is a religion of peace and that the vast majority of evangelical Christians do not support terrorism. 
  • If Christianity were treated like Islam in America, our president, a professed Christian, would proudly attend Christian-themed dinners and events while skipping Ramadan dinners, not vice versa. And Muslim politicians would go out of their way to assure people that their faith would not affect their policy-making. 
  • If Christianity were treated like Islam, Christmas and Easter would be publicly celebrated for what they are -- the signature events of Christianity, marking the birth and the death and Resurrection of Christ -- not stripped of all their theological meaning and transformed into secular holidays devoted to crass consumerism. 
  • If Christians were treated like Muslims, NASA would be tasked with reaching out to Christians and recognizing their faith's profound achievements and contributions to science, math and engineering, instead of being told to make Muslims feel good about their rather meager scientific accomplishments. 
  • If Christians were treated like Muslims, the Catholic Church's stances on sex, contraception and human life would be revered as welcome departures from our over-sexed, self-obsessed culture, not condemned as a cause of disease and death in the less-developed world. And if Muslims were treated like Christians, the application of Sharia law around the world would be met not with stony silence but with the outrage it deserves. 
  • If Christians were treated like Muslims in America, amusement parks would celebrate "Christian Family Day," (Six Flags recently celebrated "Muslim Family Day"), and Christians would be asked to embrace, not set aside, their religious convictions at the door when they entered the public square. Meanwhile, Muslim imams, not Christian pastors, would fear hate crimes lawsuits for preaching orthodox views of sexuality and sin. 
The notion that American Muslims face discrimination, even to the point of violence, is often posited by America's elites. But that idea evaporates under scrutiny. Remarkably few hate crimes are reported against Muslims (fewer than one-eighth those against Jews). What's more, Muslim immigration to America has risen sharply since September 11, 2001, and Muslims thrive, economically and educationally, once they arrive.
 
In fact, it is Christians, not Muslims, who increasingly encounter cultural elites who are hostile to their beliefs and values....

1 comment:

  1. I have been following the case of Asia Bibi, a Christian mother of five children who has been sentenced to death under Pakistan's blasphemy laws. She allegedly insulted the Prophet Muhammed. There is nothing even remotely like her case involving a Muslim in non-Muslim countries.

    I have often been puzzled by the strange alliance between hardcore Islamists and secular progressives who run the media, universities and (I'm sorry to say) many churches. Many Muslim countries are openly theocratic, and have a marked intolerance for women and homosexuals. One can safely discount the official explanation that secular progressives are motivated by a desire for "tolerance", since these same secular progressives are notoriously intolerant of Christianity.

    The only conclusion I can reach is that secular progressives see Islam as a rival to Christianity, and have adopted the attitude that "the enemy of my enemy is my friend". Many Christians hold that God's commandments are superior to man's laws. This enrages secular progressives, who view collectivist government as the one true god.

    It's true that Muslims also believe that Allah's commandments trump human laws. But I believe that secular progressives do not view Islam as a threat to their power, since Muslims living in the West are (at present) a minority when compared to Christians. By openly fretting about "Islamophobia" secular progressives hope to create the illusion they are tolerant of religious faith when history suggests otherwise.

    Muslims should not get too comfortable basking in the approval of secular progressives. There have been many cases where secular progressives have suddenly reversed course on a variety of political positions. Secular progressives once supported free speech; they now advocate for campus speech codes and "hate crime" laws and other contrivances to suppress ideas they hate. There have been similar flip-flops on free trade, government transparency, the plight of Jews, and ethics. The instant secular progressives feel threatened by Islam they will turn on Muslims with the same fury now reserved for Christians. Bank on it.

    As to whether Muslims and Christians have common ground when it comes to religious freedom, that is a complicated issue - and this post is already far too long! Personally I would not hope for much when it comes to a Muslim-Christian alliance on this issue.

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