[BRIEF NOTE] Good Sense from a Warblogger
Aug. 11th, 2004 01:37 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rfmcdonaldThe Norwegian warblogger Bjørn Stærk has recently commented on the growing trend of equating Islam with Islamism as a first step towards the proscription of the Islamic religion and of Muslim individuals:
He concludes that
His post's comments section is more-than-usually depressing to read. Still, at least someone's who has credibility with the warblogger crowd is commenting on this. A clash of civilizations that would not only be horrifically destructive on all sides but which is quite evitable isn't a good thing to pencil in for the 21st century.
We have to build our moral judgments on a solid foundation. You can't say if terrorism is good or evil without knowing what terrorism is. You can't say if Islam is good or evil without knowing what Islam is. And unfortunately, unlike a political method used by a small number of people, it is very difficult to know what a 1400 year old religion with 1.3 billion believers really "is".
You certainly won't find the answer in a few quotes from the Koran, or in the statements of a few Muslims. To describe something big and complex, you need a big and complex description, supported by a huge number of carefully assembled facts. Impossible? Historians do this all the time. There's an interesting parallel here: Good historians embrace the complexity of their subject. They approach the mountain of evidence they base their work on with humility and a sense of duty towards the truth. And they will be honest with you about the limits of their craft. Bad historians treat the mountain of historical evidence as a catalog they can pick and choose facts from, to back up sensational and simplistic theories.
He concludes that
Something has gone rotten. We can't blame it on the "left", the "relativists", the "PC crowd" or the "multiculturalists", (and don't anybody dare blame it on the Muslims). It's gone rotten here, among people who on 9/11 woke up to the danger of Islamism. The ban Islam meme and all its relatives (Islam is Islamism, Islam is war) must be confronted here, now, before it spreads.
His post's comments section is more-than-usually depressing to read. Still, at least someone's who has credibility with the warblogger crowd is commenting on this. A clash of civilizations that would not only be horrifically destructive on all sides but which is quite evitable isn't a good thing to pencil in for the 21st century.
