Can someone explain to me why Muslim Cambodians can’t ask Muslim scholars and funds from neighbouring countries (Indonesia, which has the world’s largest Muslim population, Malaysia, Thailand) to teach Islam, instead of asking the Gulf states or Saudi Arabia; countries which are unfamiliar with their culture and history?

It would be a mistake for Cambodian Muslims to seek funds from the Gulf or even the Subcontinent under the illusion of pan-Islamic brotherhood.

If Western (American) cultural imperialism is a Bad Thing with its Starbucks coffee shops and Golden Arches on every street corner which infiltrates communities under the guise of ‘development’ and economic progress, then so is oil-funded Gulf Arab cultural imperialism which often infiltrates communities under the guise of spreading True Islam.

“I appreciate we live in a multi-cultural society but what gives him the right to impose his beliefs onto me?” she added.

uh, because it is part of some cultures’ beliefs that it is best that their beliefs are imposed on you for your own good. in fact, to a great extent it is part of ALL CULTURES’ belief! ask the egyptian who tries to get his daughter circumcised because he believes it is in keeping with his ideas about islam. that crosses the bounds of tolerance of western culture (ask somali immigrants in seattle who requested a nominal incision into the clitoris in lieu of the more extreme practices who were refused angrily). OTOH, since some westerners (mostly conservative christians of various stripes) would also share the same objection as the muslim re: birth control dispensation it is “tolerated” as part of the multicultural program

[granted, sometimes this model of tolerance being simply a function of the 'normal' variation within a society does not apply, and there is a dispensation to let minority groups do things that would be objectionable in the majority context because it would be perceived as barbaric, but that isn't the case here]

possible case in britain of religious segregation in public pools.