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Originally Posted by Baraka_Guru
Well, that's the U.S. For the time being, anyway. Actually, no. It isn't, really. But, whatever.
If Canada maintained its culture, lifestyle, and morals, we'd still be British and French colonials hating one another. Now, we simply hate one another while bringing more "crap" into the mix. Because you know what? We've been bringing our "crap" over here since the start. That's the New World. I'd hate to see the U.S. get left behind in the next cultural revolution. I'd hate to see them stagnate like so many Third World Muslim countries.
Men killing women isn't a new problem. Religion is a catalyst, sure, but to say multiculturalism doesn't work is a bit ignorant. Multiculturalism has been working for decades. People can feel isolated in society even if their family has been around for generations. There are far too many success stories to uniformly criticize a phenomenon that isn't going away anyway.
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But Baraka, do you really think we (the US) is/will stagnate? We are at our most diverse and will only continue to do so. It's what makes us great!! To me, the US greatest strength is its diversity. I don't see us stagnating at all. Our culture is always evolving and changing. We are one of the most dynamic cultures ever. Canada is also very diverse, except for maybe Quebec (there's your legacy of hate). Canada is rated very highly in standard of living and quality of life because in my opinion, it embraces diversity.
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Originally Posted by abaya
Demographer checking in for the sake of numbers... interestingly, I looked briefly on Wikipedia for the global distribution of Muslims by country, and the total number of Muslims living in the "Middle East" (including Afghanistan in the ME, even though it's actually in Central Asia) and Africa is a bit less than or equal to the total number of Muslims living in Indonesia, India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh alone.
Indonesia, in fact, has a higher absolute number of Muslims living there than any other country in the world. So, out of curiosity, do you also see them as a nation full of strife, at the same level as the countries in the Middle East? |
Indonesia DOES indeed have a lot of ethnic strife and is a nation of strife including ethnic cleansing of minorities (Chinese, Timorese) and intolerance of other religions. They also have extremists and terrorists as well. I wouldn't blame it on Islam though as these problems stem back a ways. But Islam does play a part.
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Originally Posted by willravel
It's not a good place to go to the airport, though. If you're Muslim, that is.
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Why? How would they know what a Muslim looks like? Muslims aren't a race, they are a religion and very diverse, like Judeaism. I think poor Hindus and Sihks get more grief at airports than Muslims.
Shaquille O'Neal is Muslim, Hedo Turkoglu, Tony Shaloub (of Monk fame), Paula Abdul, Shakira, Hakeen Alajawon, are all Muslim and they look nothing alike. Most of my Muslim friend dress in jeans and sneakers, wear make up have ipods etc. But some of their more extremist friends do wear the hijab, chador and keep themselves and are unfriendly.
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Originally Posted by willravel
No, it confirms that the Iranian government is having growing pains. It's a strong government that is still very religious, possibly one of the last theocracies. When it eventually changes over to a democracy-esque system, and it will assuming it isn't destroyed by the west, these types of things will continue to be less common.
What one should be paying attention to, though, is that there are protestors in Iran. Tehran is a hotbed for protest and forward thinking. Many may not be aware of it, but there are tons of underground clubs in Tehran, drinking and drug use. These kids, though, will be adults soon. These liberal Muslim kids will be running Iran.
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Will, this is interesting. We should totally open up another thread for this. You know the largest (or maybe second largest) group of bloggers is Iranians. I would say it's moderate educated Iranians that will have a chance at running Iran someday. We missed a great chance during the Clinton years when Khatami was in power. Clinton definitley messed that up, then paved the way for George Bush to totally mess it up.
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Originally Posted by abaya
Yeah, no kidding... I'm giving the screen a big fat  at the moment.  |
Why? Why is it so surprising that people have a diversity of thought and opinion?