Novelist McEvan has said that he hates militant Islam. He has also defended his friend Martin Amis who has also expressed his dislike for Islam. McEvan says anyone who says something against militant Islam is branded a racist. This is true. Governments the world over have become extra-sensitive in dealing with their Muslim populace. They want to avoid anything that hurts their sentiments. This is because Osama bin Laden’s brand of Islam has many takers.
Let us discuss what McEvan and Amis say about Islam. We deal with Amis first. He says the militants have won the war of dominance and the moderates amongst Muslims have lost. Though there are many takers for the militant brand of Islam, it would be too early to say that the moderates have lost. Though ‘Ladenism’ has appealed to many, most Muslims the world over subscribe to moderate Islam. It is only that the hardliners grab more headlines.
Amis said Muslims would suffer till they bring their house into order. This is true. Muslims the world over are looked upon with suspicion. The relations of Muslims with their neighbours of other religions have been gradually spoiled. But when Amis says things like, ’strip-searching people who look like they’re from the Middle East or from Pakistan’, it is going too far. This will only swell the ranks of Laden’s followers.
McEvan says he detests Islam because of the way women are not given freedom and its non-acceptance of homosexuality. McEvan should look at Turkey and Jordan. Both have Muslim populations but the status of women there is good. Iraqi women too enjoyed a free life till Saddma Hussain was deposed. As far as homosexuality is concerned, it is only recently gay marriages were legalized in ultra liberal California. Homosexuality remains taboo even today in most countries of the world.
Though McEvan has full rights to say he hates militant Islam, he offers no solutions. His friend Amis provides extreme measures that will prove counter-productive. It must be kept in mind that Ladenism is a freak strand of Islam, subscribed to by a minuscule minority of Muslims. Muslims are citizens of the world too and followers of other religions should show understanding. Just criticizing the weaknesses of Islam as followed by some will only alienate the entire community. Gandhi’s teachings are very relevant today. His principles of tolerance hold the key to today’s incipient clash between religions.
Source: Telegraph
Comments
By behaving in such an inrrepsonsible manner they are sidelining peace loving Muslims. There are considerable number of Muslims in the world who do not support and even hate terrorism in the name of Islam. Such Islamophobic stand on the contrary isolate peace loving Muslim main stream of the world.
I appeal to the people who create Islamophbia that be wise and reational and take balanced stand on your views against Islam and even the acts commited y Israel.
Can’t agree at all!!!....
Gandhism can’t save us at this moment.
I mean the ultra radical Islams are really dominating their societies. If you come to India, we are seriously at war. It’s not just any random attack but well planned attack on the democracy that keeps happening again and again.
With due respect to Gandhi, his ideologies are not applicable everywhere. I’m sure Gandhi would have failed against Hitler. Same analogy goes here. Moderate muslims are too afraid to speak up. This is not the time for sentimentalism. We need strong action.
Either you don’t know Islam or don’t wish to know it. Islam teaches only hatred towards non believers. You don’t have choice. Your toleration is cowardice.
See now....Delhi also...Mumbai in the offing...
Still vouching for tolerance?....we need ruthless butchering of those dickheads...& anyone who sympathizes...
Balbhadra Rana,
Your article is the right assessment of a terribly false situation created through media and the prophets of hate and animosity in the west.
I am a Muslim myself and feel, Islam nowhere teaches extremism or terrorism. Our prophet himself was a compassionate, kind and mellow hearted person. Neither in the Quran nor anywhere else is it stated that Muslims should straightaway start killing non Muslims and the common notion that every Muslim is carrying a Kalashnikov to rain bullets on a non Muslim as part of his religious duty.
Here in Pakistan majority of us are secular minded Muslims. Of course there is a tiny number of extremists here, in Afghanistan and elsewhere too, in as much as such a number of extremists and hardliners are found everywhere in the world. Extremists and terrorists have no religion; they use religion only as a mask to achieve their false, selfish motives and in this regard they do not differentiate between Muslims & non Muslims. Had this not been the case, there wouldn’t have been so many suicide bombers or terror attacks in Pakistan itself, in which not only law enforcing personnel but also innocent civilians got killed.
As everybody knows here in northern Pakistan such people started burning girls’ schools and forced barbers to shut down their shops. As a Muslim neither me nor any other Muslim anywhere would condone such stupid acts. This is a very tiny minority, who have their own whims on Islamic interpretations.
Though am not that knowledgeable about all the details of Islam (as am no scholar) but as far as I have read our holy book and all about the sunna of our Holy Prophet, I do not find such things as being done by these so called Jihadists of Islam.
People like McEvan are doing exactly what these extremists of Islam would wish them to do, i.e. to create more hate between Muslims and other religions, so that the gap widens to an extent when people don’t talk of reason and start listening to the bin Ladens and McEvans only.
This was one of the major reasons that I started a blog to clarify people around the world especially in the west to dispel the common notion that here in Pakistan everybody is carrying a gun to shoot at a non Muslim. And the notion that McEvan and his friend Martin Amis have of moderate Muslims having been defeated by extremists is also one sided. I do not find any substance in that.
Thanks and hats off to you Balbhadra Rana for your wonderful article in this regard.
Nayyar Hashmey
http://wondersofpakistan.wordpress.com/