Western press accounts are focusing on the violence, but Juan Cole says that shouldn’t be allowed to overshadow the significance of
…a coordinated series of peace marches in 53 cities of Pakistan by civil society organization protesting both Taliban bombings, especially the attack on Shiites in Karachi on Monday, and the American drone strikes.
Interesting conversation I was having with another moderate Muslim.
Her point: Mainstream/moderate American Muslims deserve the suspicion of our fellow Americans for having allowed this thing to grow among us that resulted in the violence at Fort Hood and other recent expressions of extremism, for shrinking back from mosque boards and private school committees when those of the puritanical strain among us take them over, for allowing ourselves to be put on the spot at mosque functions and social events instead of turning it around and not putting them on the spot.
Agree or disagree?
that resulted in the violence at Fort Hood
that is quite insane.
something happened to Dr. Nidal Hasan that caused him violate his two great oaths….to medicine, and to al-Islam.
As a doctor, he took life instead of saving it….as a muslim he killed the innocent instead of the guilty.
Something turned him into a reaver…..and it wasn’t islamic fundamentalism.
it wasn’t islamic fundamentalism
Agreed. Probably mental instability more than anything.
Evasive and changing the subject… the guy wasn’t yelling “God is great” because his religious ideas told him he was far from God in what he was doing…
But you’d have to be some kind of nutter to even gravitate towards religious ideas like that.
The puritanical or extreme world view potentiates violence. Now whether it does so only among fragile egos or misleads otherwise wealthy minds, is further down my list of concerns.
That’s without even getting into the question of whether we’re talking about something far deviant from the deen – which we are.
You have the option of walking away from interpretations you don’t like. And in fact, this is what most reasonable Muslims – and most reasonable people in general – do.
What I’m saying is this: What else besides being in a very strange mental state could make someone who hears “all Muslims are required to have weapons training” (or something similarly idiotic) decide that it sounds like a good idea? They decide that just because it has an “Islamic” label on it and that it’s spoken by a person of authority that it’s probably right? Normal people have a BS filter and seem quite capable of utilizing it.
But in any case – continually walking away or ignoring the fact that you do have these (few) bad apples preaching such nonsense is doing us as a community no favors. No, we don’t have to listen to them. But we’d be doing ourselves a huge favor if we, as you seem to be suggesting, take an active role in removing people like this from positions of authority, especially in mosques and Islamic centers in the US. Because then you don’t have to worry as much about the weak-minded, mentally ill, or the maladjusted acting based on some nonsense interpretation of Islam and doing something stupid (like shooting up an army base).
He could have been yelling “I am a Doctor!” for all I care.
It doesnt matter what he was yelling.
Some environmental trigger tipped Hasan into madness, and it wasn’t Islam.
Hasan repudiated his calling as a doctor by taking life instead of saving it.
He repudiated his calling as a muslim by taking innocent life instead of defending it against injustice.
Tag overload.
Anyway…she might be right.
“She” referring to John’s friend in this case, not Shams.
Are there really people in the Muslim communities saying that its okay to start shooting up an army base? To run over your daughter for having a boyfriend? Even hinting at the possibility that this kind of vigilante violence is okay? Condoned by the wider community? Really?
Okay, I’ll probably be flamed from this, because it seems like everything in his post is hinting towards ‘Agree’ being the correct answer, but no, unless the answer to the above questions are in the affirmative, I Disagree.
Every person is accountable for their own actions.
Dr. Zuhdi Jasser thinks there are “muslim” elements to these crimes.
Granted, he is the Irshad Manji o Muslim Civil groups.
I’m just saying that before we ask the larger community to take some blame for the crimes of these individuals, perhaps we should find out how involved these people were in the Muslim community to begin with.
Was the man who ran over his daughter a practicing Muslim, who prayed and fasted and didn’t drink, gamble etc? Or are we hinging his Muslim identify on his manslaughter of his “western” daughter?
How many parts Muslim was Maj. Hassan’s crime, and how many parts political, and how parts brain-snap? 2:2:4 ratio? I don’t know. How do we measure these things?
I think all anyone wants is condemnation. Americans (stoked by conservative right) have asked why won’t any muslims condemn these actions. Indeed, I started a thread where CAIR chose not to comment on honor killings. I think that is a mistake.
For now, tiresome an exercise though it may be, I think national muslim orgs should ALWAYS put out a condemnation statement and reaffirm the basic teachings of Islam.
That atleast will keep JAFIs on their heels a little.
What ‘anyone’ wants is beside the point. I don’t want to spend the rest of my life apologizing for and explaining how Hasan et al’s violence isn’t the true deen.
Not an apology. It is a distancing of the righteous path of Islam from the actions of people who claim to be Muslims.
At this juncture in history, it is the right thing to do. Even CAIR knows that now.
I agree with you buzz, because there’s no other way.
But it’s a kind of a damned if you do, damned if you don’t scenario.
The Jafi’s will either say
And restating to Muslims who don’t go on killing sprees, that this is not our religion. It’s kind of like preaching to the choir. And it’s insulting.
No question. I agree. “Lesser of two evils.”
Distance and reaffirm. Distance and reaffirm.
Use each statement to say not what is right with Islam.
But why Islam is right.
People are people. Even whitey 
By the way down, these orgs don’t need to get down on their knees and place these statements at the feet of the american public. I can be a strong, even arrogant statement (after all – Islam is Great). We don’t need to apologise to anybody.
You condemn all forms of injustice and the crimes of disturbed individuals, Columbine, Oklahoma City, the Viginia Tech Massacre, and the tragedy at fort hood.
All these actions actions are shocking and indicate problems of violence in our collective culture which need to be addressed.
Islam teaches us that ………………….
Dude you’re from Sydney, why are you so surprised? Remember the idiot Hilaly from Lakemba and what he said about rape victims? And yet there are some Muslims in Sydney who will still err to his defence? When I lived there I encountered a lot of idiots who are such backward tools in the western suburbs.
null is a dudette
I’m not from the western suburbs.
I know, but a lot of Muslims live in those areas of Sydney.
Every person is accountable for their own actions.
I’m right there with you, and I’ve been saying that for the longest time.
But when (true story) a couple of devout Muslims I know went out and all bought air rifles without any previous interest or life experience with weapons and starting shooting up their backyards, are they doing that because they all spontaneously got interested in air rifles, or are they doing it because some cleric under extremist influence in the Mideast said it’s the religious duty of all Muslims to get weapons training. I think its the latter.
This behavior in and of itself isn’t going to kill anybody – but it’s moving these Muslims in the wrong direction.
null, if you go on IslamicAwakening and MuslimVillage, such sentiments are proudly displayed on there.
Link please.
Here’s one on MuslimVillage
Here’s another on IslamicAwakening
Crazy stuff. It’s interesting that on the MuslimVillage thread its all politics about how evil America is and this is their comeuppance.
Halfway through the thread someone asked “Is this Islamic justifiable?”, and the answer was a frank “I don’t know”. (And I don’t care?)
Amazing.
wow #1: their views.
wow #2: posting said views on a public forum.
Little wonder why people look at us with suspicion.
A public forum is best. These things need to be said, rebuked, debated and finally, god willing, vanquished.
wow #3: that on a Muslim forum, no one seems to care about the Islamic position on the murders.
John, if you really think that this is a serious discussion then I think it would help if you were a little more serious about how you engage it. I’ve been around a lot of very conservative and even radical Muslims and have never heard anything like the example you mention. Is that your imaginative fantasy of what radical/puritan/wahhabi Muslims are like?
And what does such social conservatism or bad manners or whatever it is you are accusing Muslim leadership with have to do with violence.
It smells like you trying to latch onto something horrific about which we know very little as somehow evidence for why you should push your own agenda harder. Again, if you really think there is a serious issue, I would encourage you to address it in a serious manner.
Allah Knows Best.
I haven’t accused “Muslim leadership” of anything – you should be more serious than to assert that such a monolithic entity exists.
You’re self-deluded if you think my friend and I are the only two Muslims who have had or are having some version of that conversation, Abu Noor. You should engage it, rather than dismiss it with red herring anecdotes (well-adjusted conservatives? No kidding…)
I just think you have to be a little more careful with how you state this.
Fostering an environment where orthodoxy is encouraged and fostering an environment conducive to extremist/violent interpretations of Islam are not necessarily the same thing. One can be quite orthodox without harboring hatred and violence. When you say “puritanical”, it’s not clear if you’re referring to only these odd, violent interpretations. And I think this is what Abu Noor is getting at.
The occurrence of the word “puritan” in my vocabulary has to do with having recently started rereading Khaled Abou El Fadl’s “The Great Theft,” a book I actually read awhile ago but lost somewhere along the way. I’ll be under the influence of his star the next few weeks.
Here’s El Fadl expanding on the concept of a puritan/moderate schism:
Although the schism between moderate and puritan Muslims has become distinct, pronounced, and real, this division is not explicitly recognized in the Muslim world. The dichotomy between the two groups is a lived and felt reality, but there has been no attempt to recognize the systemic differences between the two contending parties. In fact, many Muslims have been reluctant to speak openly of two primary orientations juxtaposed against each other within modern Islam. The failure to acknowledge the existence of such a division has contributed to the confusion about who in Islam believes in what, and it may also be responsible for the widespread misconceptions about the teachings and doctrines of the religion.
As El Fadl writes, the difference between each other is “lived and felt,” and nowhere near exhaustively understood. It’s an unreasonable expectation that at my level as a blogger I’m going to delineate where conservatism slips into radicalization and becomes extermism/puritanism in some comprehensive and final way (though I’ll keep biting off chunks) – and perhaps that would be the point of such a request, to silence the conversation.
I do know this and therefore I think it is a good place to start: The deviance and violence arises entirely from the conservative-puritan orientation, and I lay that at the conservatives’ feet and say ‘clean your own house.’
In the meantime, for the majority of Muslims who also ‘live and feel’ the wrongness but also lack the precision and scholarship to sort the conservative-puritan’s house for them, the safe-for-your-soul thing to do is to move into the moderate orientation.
The deviance and violence arises entirely from the conservative-puritan orientation, and I lay that at the conservatives’ feet and say ‘clean your own house.’
Some numbers or other evidence?
Here’s a MI5 report:
Some numbers or other evidence?
There are 44 entries under the ‘Muslim-on-Muslim violence’ tag here at Talk Islam. I estimate just from a quick glance through them that between 30 and 35 arise directly from forms of religious conservatism, albeit mostly puritanical and extreme.
The remaining entries involve crime and social disorder – a serial killer, gang violence, street crime, honor killings, etc.
The MI5 report is irrelevant and it’s unclear to me what you think it says. I gather from the context though that you think it’s provocative and contradictory – and the only way it could be is if you equate conservative with “knows his religion” and moderate with ‘religious illiteracy.’
Is that the point you were trying to make? If so, that’s more an expression of prejudice than a response to El Fadl’s points or my own.
Religious illiterates and religious savants exist on all sides of the spectrum.
It means they say they are religious conservatives when in fact, they don’t know too much about Islam at all.
Religious conservatives can know a ton about religion…most of them do. Religious zealots often cling to one issue as their reason for even being associated with the religion (eg…abortion..christian conservatives).
Again, religious illiterates and wisemen are in both ‘orientations.’
And don’t forget about class in Britain either. Muslims have been held down as an underclass in the UK, and hence a keen sense of disimpowerment and alienation undergirds UK extremism. The MI5 report is more relevant to a discussion of class and discrimination in the UK than a vindication of religious conservatism shot through with puritanism in the larger conversation.
El Fadl though does speak to this population too:
Puritanism is not represented by formal institutions; it is a theological orientation, not a structured school of thought. Therefore, one finds a broad range of ideological variations and tendencies within it. But the consistent characteristic of puritanism is a supremacist ideology that compensates for feelings of defeatism, disimpowerment, and alienation with a distinct sense of self-righteous arrogance vis-a-vis the nondescript “other” – whether that “other” is the West, nonbelievers in general, so-called heretical Muslims, or even Muslim women.
John,
I don’t understand much of your response. It is you with the red-herring anecdote, there are no anecdotes in my post.
Believe me, I am aware that such discussions go on. I have been a part of many. But just like discussions on the Black Muslim/Immigrant Muslim divide, discussions on the “conservative”/progressive Muslim divide often consist of the same tired type of anecdotes which are either completely imaginary or not representative of the real issues (as far as I can tell). I have no doubt that these make people feel good when they reinforce their own stereotyped views of the other (and of themselves) but it is my firm belief that they are not helpful to solving real problems. Which is why I encourage people like yourselves who are obviously intelligent and as far as I can tell well meaning to engage in the discussion more seriously, using real non-exaggerated, non imagined stereotype realities and discussing how we should respond to them.
That is why your Eid prayer thing quite problematic and to me, why it was not serious.
Allaah knows best.
New York-based Human Rights Watch on Thursday condemned this month’s slaying by an alleged insurgent of Laila Paaitae Doah, a prominent peace advocate and Muslim women’s rights activist in Thailand’s violence-torn deep South. Laila was shot by a suspected Muslim militant in broad daylight on March 12 in Krongpenang district, Yala province, 750 kilometres south of Bangkok. She died of her wounds in hospital on March 13.
“Laila’s brutal murder is part of ongoing efforts by insurgents to intimidate and attack Muslims who oppose insurgency or have supported Thai authorities,” said Brad Adams, Asia director at Human Rights Watch. “Her death is a serious loss for those trying to find a peaceful solution to the conflict in the South.”
Abu Noor Al-Irlandee, 
johnpi, 
Buzz, and 5 others are discussing.
Example: The imam chooses to use the Eid khutbah to harangue the non-hijabis for being uncovered immoral temptresses in front of their children and their entire families.
Solution: Start a campaign to fire the imam.