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BlahBlah:
Where do you meet the muslims you talk about? Because I can tell you that most of the muslims in Europe or the United States are reasonable, moderate people who wouldn't be there otherwise.
Of course, you have the same reasonable, moderate people elsewhere, but the prevalance of extremism and the views they hold elsewhere in the world is really astonishing. I have watched Arabic TV shows that air over Dubai, and Saudi state run TV depicting Jews as people who drink the blood of children for their religious rituals (they went so far as to act out the sacrifice). I talk to the poor people here in Afghanistan, away from the cities, who have never seen an american before, or even a christian. The beliefs they hold are truly astonishing. It is from this pool that the people who would do us harm come from, not from the moderate, educated, rational people that have been raised around western culture.
I have an Interpreter who is afraid his wife's family is going to kill him...For being so audacious as to marry her when she asked him to. They were forcing her to marry a cousin whom she had never met nor wanted to marry.
I know guys who have burned down girls schools, and killed teachers. Local people (not your typical extremists) will kill a village member if they think he has converted to christianity.
Honor killings are accepted. If a daughter has sex outside of marriage her own family will kill her. If she is pregnant, they will kill the baby also.
Girls can't ride bikes here, or drive cars, etc. To do so will earn them a beating or worse. If a woman walks around without a Burkha (in the rural areas) or with a non-relative male, they may both be killed.
A wife usually never meets her husband before their wedding. Which leaves her with no options because if she divorces him (somethign allowed in Islam) she becomes a beggar on the street. However, her husband can take another wife if he doesn't like the first one, and his original wife has absolutely no say in the issue.
Almost all the propaganda I have read (and which supposedly written in such a way as to resonate with the intended audience) focuses almost exclusively on religion and how evil christianity and Judiasm are, rather than us simply being an occupying force that needs to be expelled. I don't think I have read one that doesn't at least mention the inevitable victory of Islam over all other religions and global Sharia law.
I can understand a desire to get along with everybody, and a valid desire for people to realize that most muslims are good people (they are), but don't think for a minute that what you see back at home in any way reflects the degree of extremism found in parts of the muslim world.
It is not possible to have a church (at least one that isn't held in secret), or religous icons from other religions, historical artifacts with religious significance other than islam (the stone Buddhas, for instance), or anything that would indicate any degree of religious tolerance on behalf of Muslims in this country. Walk around Jewish, Christian, Buddhist, Hindu areas and old temples to other religions are allowed to stand, Mosques are built in plain sight, etc. There is only one religion right now that will not tolerate any of the others, and it is Islam.
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"Socialism is a philosophy of failure, the creed of ignorance, and the gospel of envy, its inherent virtue is the equal sharing of misery." - Winston Churchill
"All men dream: but not equally. Those who dream by night in the dusty recesses of their minds wake in the day to find that it was vanity: but the dreamers of the day are dangerous men, for they may act out their dream with open eyes, to make it possible." Seven Pillars of Wisdom, T.E. Lawrence
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