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blog posts on immigration at The Truth Laid Bear

What if the Truth is Offensive?

At the Uof Wisconsin, Prof. Kaplan made some remarks that described some negative characteristics of immigrants, relative to native-born Americans.  He illustrated his talk with some notes about the Hmong. This was considered offensive to some.

But what if the description IS accurate, yet also DOES offend people?

Dean Esmay (Dean's World) has put out new rules for his anti-Islamophobe blog:

1) Islam does not represent the forces of Satan or the Anti-Christ bent upon destruction of the Christian world.

2) There is no 1,400 year old "war with the West/Christianity" being waged by "The Muslims" or anyone else.

3) Islam as a religion is no more inherently incompatible with modernity, minority rights, women's rights, or democratic pluralism than most ancient religions.

4) Medieval, anachronistic, obscure terms like "dhimmitude" or "taqiyya" are suitable for intellectual discussion & analysis. They are not and never will be appropriate to slap in the face of everyday Muslims or their friends.

5) Muslims have no more need to prove that they can be good Americans, loyal citizens, decent people, or enemies of terrorism than anyone else does.

That is our stated editorial position. You--and this includes commenters--will work from respect for that, or you just need to leave.

Dean (Dean, Dean...)

I hate those bastards in Iran too -- which is why I like you, and your attempt to be fair to Islam.

But I ask you -- can you site a 20 year (one generation) "peace" where no group of Muslims were killed by a non-Muslim group, nor did a Muslim group kill a non-Muslim group, because of their religion?  If not, than how does one tell the "truth" of #2 (1400 year war). (I suspect there are some few generations of peace; but not well known.) 

There has been a 2000 year disagreement between Christians believing in Jesus Christ (a circumsized Jew) as the son of God, and Jews not believing.  At times this has been almost a (usually one-sided) war -- certainly many pogroms because of Jewish faith.

But it has not always been a "war".  I think describing Islam's relationship to modern Europe as "war" up until WW I (Ottoman/Muslim Empire defeat) is not inaccurate.

Comparing the Jesus "render under Ceasar what is Ceasar's" with respect to money and taxes, and basically against tax revolt, with my limited understanding of Islamic no-separation of state & church in Sharia makes me doubt that #3 is actually true.  I think there are aspects of every religion that make it more, or less, compatible with democracy, with women's rights, with gay rights, with universal human rights; with dictatorship or democracy.
I think assuming there is no difference is the same kind of "Political Correctness" anti-truth that those who believe blacks do NOT have lower scores on "fair" IQ tests.
Races are different; religions are different; sexes are different -- and even sexual orientation groups are different.  But in virtually all group comparisions, some non-average members of the group are far "better" than the average members of  the "most compared with" group.


I fear Iran getting a nuke.
I fear Muslim fanatics getting a nuke from Iran (and also, though less so, from Pakistan).
I fear Tel Aviv going mushroom.
Because of Islam. (and nationalism, and power hungry leaders, and bad economics, etc etc -- but importantly because of Islam)

-- If this happens, would you admit you were wrong?
-- If it doesn't happen, I wouldn't admit I am wrong to fear it.  There IS an asymetry to fears and probabilities and results.

-- If Israel nukes Tehran, I wouldn't admit I was wrong to fear Tehran's suppot for nukeing Tel Aviv , because of their words.  The Tel Aviv words against Iran seem much more reasonable and rational than the (Muslim inspired? Muslim targeted?) anti-Jew words of hate coming from Tehran.  With Shia Tehran seeming to struggle, through anti-Jew radicalism, against Sunni dominance in Muslim culture.


If Catholics were competing with Protestants for "purity" or Christian leadership based on Jew-hate, I wouldn't claim there is no inherent difference between Christians and others with respect to Jewish minority rights.

(Sorry I haven't been much lately -- too busy. This really is important though.  What if the actual truth really IS Islamophobic?  Like I consider the actual truth about AIDS and promiscuity being homophobic; and black IQ score differences being racist.)

Posted by: TomGrey at 03/09/07 23:01 | link | comments (1)