Beyond Bigotry

As most of you know, two of my blogs are completely up to date with all my posts. Those two had a long series of posts in regards to Islamophobia/bigotry, which sadly gave me quite a bit of hate mail on one of them. This post is not part of the series I am working on now, and not even written by me. But I felt it was so important, that I am doing a complete copy/paste from the blog I found it.

Italian politician parades pig on mosque site: press ROME, Nov 11 (AFP): Italy’s former deputy education minister has provoked a scandal by parading a pig on the site of a planned mosque in the country’s north, news reports said Sunday. “We have ‘blessed’ the ground that the Padua authorities want to transfer for the mosque,” said Mariella Mazzetto, a member of the populist right-wing Northern League party in the city. She walked the pig on a lead accompanied by about 10 party members, Italian daily newspapers reported. (Posted @ 16:54 PST) source

Talk about nasty, malicious and hateful. I’d like to see how Islamophobes try to justify this sort of blatant hatred - it’s not even a “point” the Italian politician is trying to make, nor a “self-defense” action etc. On second thought, I don’t think I could palate even a singl comment trying to justify this sort of thing. It’s purely to hurt Muslim sentiment and offend them. Very reminiscent of anti-antisemitism in Europe when other types of fascists paraded donkeys with Jewish symbols on them.

And yet not enough people notice this growing Islamophobia and of those who do, even less are alarmed by it enough to condemn it.

Stop hating Islam. It is as “great” a religion as Christianity and Judaism. It has its flaws like any other religion so look at your own faith’s transgressions against humanity first and then point fingers at others. Better yet, go take out your anger at a punching bag at the gym or something. Get offline and stop surfing right wing blogs. I thank you on behalf of humanity.

As you can see, this is not the kind of behavior which is acceptable under any stretch of imagination. It sounds more like a something a juvenile thug, than a grown adult who is suppose to be educated. You can find the original story here. We have been over this before, we all know that there are bad people out there, but please, try not blaming an entire religion for the acts of a few. Should we kill all the Jews because they were to ‘blame’ for the death of Jesus?? (no I don’t believe that) Below is part of a comment I left on one of my other blogs, it speaks for itself.

I have met Muslims from every sect, from conservative to liberal, and in my journey I have found a broad range of beliefs. Only the radicals are ridged. A lot of Muslims will tell you that they may be Muslim but they also have a brain. They are a joy to meet, and no different than you or I. They just worship God differently than what you may be accustomed too. The best way I can describe it is this; Have you ever met or been told about a Cop who was a complete and total jerk? Who used his position of authority to lord it over others?? Did it at first make you think that all Cops were aholes?? The, “one bad apple spoils the whole bushel” thing??

You have a powerful tool in your hands right now. You can use it to learn, and to grow. You can use it to change hearts and minds. Or you can use it to be condescending, hateful or hurtful. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying you are, I’m just saying the possiblities.

From my personal experience in the last 8 months or so, I have grown and learned. I have spent a great deal of time dealing with Islamist on their blogs (for material). But I have also met and became friends with a lot of good, God fearing, caring, and open minded Muslims. I have also met a fair share of close minded and bigoted non-Muslims.

It all goes to prove one thing… If we actually look below the surface, if Muslims in Muslim nations were given the freedom to live how they please… There wouldn’t be that much difference then in the West. There would be those who are devout, and those who are not. There would be those who choose to dress according to what they feel their scripture calls for, and those who don’t. You can go on from there.

We really aren’t that different when it comes right down to it. Most people just want to do their thing, free of strife. There are a lot of misconceptions about Muslims, and Muslims have a lot of misconceptions about Christians and the West. We can go on the attack, or we can go into explanations. Its all how you go about it in your heart. What is your true objective. Mine is to build brotherhood.