Monday, March 7, 2011

Islam should not be singled out.

"Our religion has been hijacked by the extremists"
Daisy Khan, in an interview with Margot Adler of NPR, July 15, 2010

Islam should not be singled out for scrutiny by Peter King or anyone else.

Any ideology, religious or otherwise, that receives funding from totalitarian governments, like those in Iran and Saudi Arabia, should be investigated. For that matter, any ideological group operating in the United States that receives funding from any foreign government deserves scrutiny. In fact, these are known as "foreign agents" and are already supposed to be subject to close scrutiny.

Any group or movement whose headquarters (or "community centers" or whatever one wishes to call them) are known to be used as meeting places for people planning terrorist attacks in the United States should be investigated.

Any place where sympathizers of Al Qaeda gather should be investigated. This also goes for sympathizers of any other terrorist group that openly declares itself at war with the United States and has successfully carried out terrorist attacks in the United States.

Any group, religious or otherwise, whose own adherents loudly proclaim that they have been "hijacked by terrorists" should, obviously, be subject to ongoing investigations. The more we know about all groups that have been "hijacked by terrorists", the better.

For more information, see the report released last month by the Triangle Center on Terrorism and Homeland Security: Muslim American Terrorism Since 9/11: An Accounting. The following table is from that report:

1 comment:

Unknown said...

People don’t need a GOOD reason to hate or commit violence. Once they get into the right frame of mind, almost any old excuse will do.

Religion – especially judgmental revealed religions – tend to be a fairly easy excuse.

My main problem with Peter King and these hearings is that, at bottom, it’s about proponents of one violent revealed religion trying to throw proponents of a different violent revealed religion under the bus.