[sworkhard]

Originally Posted by Crumpy-Gunt

Do you think it is possible that people are as you say less open to criticism about Islam because they feel it could be a danger in the sense it can, depending on how it is done, serve as fantastic propaganda for terrorists to turn around and use and say look - people in the west cant stand you. So in a sense maybe the regressive leftists whoever they are - perhaps agree with the criticism of the religion but feel like it may be inflammatory depending on how it is done.

I think as a society we have forced Christians to swallow their pride and kind of realize they arent getting around some things like for example teaching evolution in schools or same sex marriage. Whereas Muslims generally speaking still feel that a criticism of their religion is an attack on their religion. I think it comes from pride or ego. If I could use a term for horses without people taking it the wrong way - I think Christians have by and large been broken to secular life where as Muslims are still mustangs in that sense. They've never had - in their own societies - any tolerance for moderate secularists never mind 'heretics' who denounce religious ideologies wholesale. I think while people get upset at those who say that Islam and Muslim nations are in the dark ages - it is a surprisingly good analogy although it may bruise some egos. In the dark ages you couldn't challenge religion. In the dark ages nothing was secular and everything was very directly influenced by religion. I think extremists within Islamic societies are a by product of the lack of secularism. If these people werent so religious I believe they would still be angry but had they a population of moderate secularists they wouldn't necessarily use Islam to justify or motivate their resistance to neo-colonialism but they would do it through some political medium like socialism or nationalism etc. But since Islam in many Muslim societies is deeply involved in everything from banking to entertainment to fashion to law - it means people view things though a religious scope. Us vs them, believers vs disbelievers.

In more secular nations people see it in different terms which dont push people to be as fundamentalist or dangerous. Terms like colonialism, west, communism, proxy, foreign influence. But currently the only terms they have to express their view that an injustice is being commited against them are terms like infidel, kafir, jew etc.

I think there are 4 very powerful factors influencing things. Foreign influence > religion that lends its self to self-sacrifice and violent resistance when people are occupied / threatened > The fact that Islamic societies are hardly ever secular to begin with nevermind when the people feel like the whole world is against them > Large amounts increasingly radicalized people, turning to increasingly radicalized preachers and looking in their quran and basically looking to manufacture a religious context for what is happening politically.

I think these people are less open for a variety of reasons including the ones you mention, but I think it's primarily a matter of focus and conflation between race and religion. In many ways the current fear of Islam manifests itself in ways that look like racism. People are scared of Muslims, and therefore discriminate against them. By and large, you can't tell a Muslim from a non-Muslim just by looking at them, so it's those that wear head scarves, turbans, particularly large and full beards, or have brown or olive skin that are targeted for harassment and abuse, even if they aren't Muslims. As a result, criticism of Islam has, in the minds of some, become a form of racism, and since it's racism, they think it needs to be called out, which often ends up derailing the conversation or ending it.