Muslims in America

These were my posts to the now-defunct New York Times reader forum titled "Muslims in America." When I entered this forum I'd found that many of the forum participants advocated religious apartheidt. And one participant from Australia was focused on bashing Indonesia in toto due to some recent court cases in Indonesia featuring Aussies accused of drug running.

ehkzu - 11:18 PM ET March 21, 2007 (#3450 of 3631)

Is Islam in Indonesia a model?

My spouse and I have been to Indonesia three times since 1999, visiting Hindu, Moslem, and Christian islands, and went scuba diving on liveaboard boats with mixed Christian/Hindu/Moslem crews.

Our experiences were uniformly positive. I'm not thumping the tub for Islamic fundamentalism, which is probably the most bloodthirsty religion on Earth today that has a large following. However, most Indonesian Moslems practice a moderate form of Islam.

We'd all be a lot better off if every Moslem on Earth was as moderate as the average Indonesian Moslem. I realize the Indonesian government tends to kowtow to Islamists, executing Christian terrorists while giving their Islamic equvalents wristslap sentences. OTOH I'd hate to be judged by my government either. The average Moslem on the street that we encountered on our travels in Indonesia treated us just fine--and my spouse and I definitely stick out in an Indonesian crowd.

However, I do remember once waiting in a long line in Manila's international airport and having an encounter with an angry Islamist. He and his pal were trying to cut into the front of the line. A Jewish antizionist lawyer traveling with us challenged the guy--mildly. The Arab turned on the Jew (and our friend looks Jewish and is short) and barked at him You shut up! You just shut up! with such fury I was glad he wasn't packing. He didn't realize that our small friend was traveling with a bunch of guys mostly over 6' tall. We turned to the Arab making the ruckus and he suddenly found himself surrounded by a bunch of Americans towering over him. He quieted down then but you could still see the blind hatred in his eyes. It was chilling to see the face of a Jihadi (or Jihadi wannabe maybe).

Then again, I had a friendly conversation with a Pakistani Moslem on a ferry going to Hong Kong. And the nice doctor who treated me in Cairns, Australia was a Pakistani Moslem.

Just some personal experiences with Moslems abroad.

---------------------------------------------------

ehkzu - 2:12 PM ET March 22, 2007 (#3456 of 3631)

Treating all Muslims as Islamofascists is exactly what the Islamofascists want

Most Muslims in Indonesia are moderates, but they don't make headlines. The radicals are beyond evil.

You should see what the Balinese (mostly Hindu) think about Islamic radicals, whose bombings in Bali plunged that island into economic ruin that it's only just starting to recover from.

Bambi [the Aussie Indonesia-basher on this forum] wants us to punish all of Indonesia for the actions of a small minority of Islamofascists--who, I'll admit, have undue influence over a vacillatory and deeply corrupt government.

But Bali is Hindu. Why punish Bali for the crimes committed against Bali? Flores, West Timor, Sumba and a number of other islands are Christian. Why punish them for offenses committed against their fellow Christians in other parts of Indonesia?

On our last trip to Indonesia our boat captain--a Hindu commanding a mixed Muslim/Hindu/Christian crew--often wore a T-shirt emblazoned with these words: F*** TERRORISM ..only without the asterisks. He spoke for all the crew with this sentiment.

On a per capita basis Islamofascists have harmed the Balinese even more than they harmed America on 9/11. The way most Americans feel about Islamofascists...you'd have to take it to the next level to see how the Balinese feel.

Really, you could argue that the more prosperous we make Bali through tourism the more we strengthen its moderating influence on Indonesian politics. Another point--Indonesian public opinion in general went strongly against America after the Iraq invasion. However, when they saw how quickly and effectively we responded to the tsunami in Aceh many realized they'd been wrong about us, and it showed in subsequent polls. Especially after it got out that some local Indonesian officials had been stealing donated relief goods.

Acts of kindness like our rescue mission to Aceh are repaid way out of scale to what they actually cost us. And they give us more leverage with the government. When my spouse & I go to Indonesia we never get tapped for bribes or get the stink eye. I believe it's partly because we've taken the trouble to learn a few dozen words of Indonesian--especially the words for please and thank you and various greetings (plus Indonesians use a soft handshake).

Consquently wherever we go we do our little bit to improve Indonesians' opinions of Americans, because we're friendly and respectful (and we don't look like either billionaires or bums). I'm not advocating letting up in our battle with Islamofascism. I am advocating making that campaign vastly more effective.

One part is by helping all the Muslim moderates who currently don't dare say anything for fear of being accued of being pro-American. It will take decades to undo the damage the fool in the White House has done to our struggle with Islamofascism, which should be 1/3 military, 1/3 diplomacy, 1/3 police--instead of 90% military and everything else an afterthought.

A good start would be making your next vacation Bali... (no, I'm not working for the Bali Tourist Board...:)

-----------------------------------

ehkzu - 3:40 AM ET March 23, 2007 (#3459 of 3631)

The Islamofascists want to kill off Western tourism to Bali

[This post responds to a post by the forum's Aussie Indonsia-basher. He asserted that the recent trial of an Aussie accused of drug running was conducted in Bali, with a Balinese crowd outside calling for severe punishment of the Aussie.]

Recently I watched a documentary about the race for mayor of Newark, New Jersey, here in the States. The incumbent mayor, as crooked as they come, was campaigning as a champion of Newark's poor blacks (poor in part because the mayor, also black, ripped off his constituents every way he could). Cheering throngs greeted this incumbent mayor wherever he went.

But some investigative reporters found out the "cheering throngs" were poor people bussed in from surrounding areas, paid by the good mayor to root for him. It was all a setup.

I strongly suspect the same is true for the [recent] trial in Bali. Remember, the Balinese are NOT Muslim--they're Hindu. They make their living off tourists--Western and Asian. I bet the crowds were shipped in from Java in the service of politicians trying to make anti-Western hay.

The Balinese are not anti-Western. I've been there repeatedly, as I've said. Heck, we were also treated well by the Muslims we encountered in Bali (there are a few) and in Muslim areas like Sumbawa Island and the Wakatobi archipelago and Batu Ata, a remote island in the Flores Sea that we visited.

In the remoter areas crowds of friendly kids would trail us around. In the cities they were all--all--perfectly civil to us. And we didn't avoid the locals like some tourists do. We mixed with them everywhere we went, chatting up shopkeepers, folks on the street, bus drivers. If Indonesia as a whole were anti-Western we would have experienced it.

Among Indonesia's 270,000,000 people there certainly are virulently anti-Western people, and because of that there are areas I wouldn't go to, including Jakarta, the capitol (of course I wouldn't wander around our capitol at night either, for that matter).

Bali is not one of those areas. Everywhere we went in Bali people would thank us for coming to their island and beg us to tell our friends to come. I've been to a lot of non-Western countries around the world, and in some of them they act like they're doing you a favor to give you the time of day. Bali in my experience is the most welcoming of them all.

Now you want to know who hates Bali? Islamofascists. They hate Bali more than Bambi [the Aussie Indonesia-basher on the forum]. In the Islamofascist Wide World of Hate, the most hate (apart from America and Jews) is reserved for polytheists. That would be Hindus. If the Islamofascists had their way the Balinese would be murdered en masse and replaced with Muslims. And the Balinese are acutely aware of this.

Failing that goal, the Islamofascists would love to see Bali's tourist-generated economy ruined (the Balinese are generally better off than other Indonesians). So I wouldn't be at all surprised to find that part of that circus trial's motivation was just that.

Try learn a little from people like me with real experience of these places. Your vision of Indonesia is exactly what the Islamofascists want you to have, and you're playing into their evil machinations when you diss it. The Islamofascists want total apartheid between Moslem countries and Western ones, because when a lot of us show up it messes with their attempts to demonize us and blame us for all their self-inflicted problems. And they're not above setting up a phony show trial to achieve their ends.

------------------------------------

ehkzu - 3:27 AM ET March 24, 2007 (#3466 of 3631)

European Muslims vs. American Muslims vs. Indonesian Muslims

Let me try to connect all this talk about Indonesia to the main focus of this forum.

Fact: Europe's Muslims tend to not be socially or economically integrated, and live in ghettos where their mores are practiced and enforced by their own. This is partly their fault but it's also the fault of their host countries, which tend to be ethnically homogeneous and generally reject outsiders. Ask the Jews, who lived in their midst for over a millenium and were never accepted.

Fact: America's Muslims mostly live mixed in with everyone else, and are socially and economically integrated with America as a whole. In America a guy with a first name like Muhammad on his resume can get a job, rent an apartment, marry a girl whose ancestors came from Sweden. All fine with us as long as he respects our culture and is a productive member of society. Because America is one of the very few countries on Earth where anyone from anywhere can become American if he makes the effort to really join our society.

Fact: A majority of Europe's Muslims say they hate the country they live in. 9/11 was tactically planned in Germany, and was carried out by foreign Muslims--many of whom didn't even speak English. OTOH the mass murder/bombings in England and Spain and the murderous mass riots in France and the murder of Theo Van Gogh were all carried out by residents of those countries.

Fact: Nothing like any of that has come from American Muslims. America didn't bring in Muslims as guest workers and park them in ghettos and never integrate them into our society. America is world's leading expert on assimilating diverse people into your culture.

The only group that isn't assimilating is the Mexicans/Guatemalans/Salvadoreans etc. because so many are entering--mostly illegally--and living together in such large numbers that they're not integrating—not even learning English...

My guess is that Australia's formerly homogeneous society is having problems with its Muslims because Australia's more like Europe than America. It's nobody's fault. It's just history. But it's going to take a serious, conscious effort by Australian authorities and citizens to try to apply the American model and reject the European one.

As for Indonesia...as other posters have said, Al Qaeda regards Indonesia's government as corrupt, apostate heretics, and are trying to build a radical Islamofascist movement there to eventually topple that government. So the current government—the least corrupt in Indonesia’s history, FWIW—is trying to appease Islamofascists without alienating everyone else. Prosecuting whites harshly for drugs is an easy way for them. So’s wrist-slapping Islamofascist terrorists while executing Christian ones.

But Australia may have to choose between justice and the future. Boycotting Indonesia might be just, but it is also just what Al Qaeda wants Australia to do. As with Muslims in America, the more Indonesia becomes integrated into Western civilization the better it will be for the average Indonesian, the average Aussie, and the average American. And the more it’ll grind Osama’s grits.

But also, as is true across most of the third world, aid money won’t reach the needy unless you put it in their hands directly. In Indonesia government jobs are often for sale—they don’t pay a salary, you pay to get the job. Your “salary” is what you extort. NGOs have learned this the hard way all around the world. They only give where they can be absolutely sure they aren’t just lining the pockets of some human tick.

But for heaven’s sake don’t make the average Indonesian think the only one he can turn to is Jamiah Islamiya (Al Qaeda in Indonesia), which loves to get rid of Western aid so it can say “We’re the only ones who care about you.”

--------------------------------------------------

ehkzu - 6:55 PM ET March 24, 2007 (#3470 of 3631)

What to do with Moslems in America

To [the Moslem-bashers on this forum] -- my bottom line: you can’t wish them away, and in fact we desperately need America’s Muslims to be on our side.

There’s a huge battle going on within Islam, between the fundamentalists and the moderates, and thus far Bush and his cronies might as well have been jihadis themselves for all they’ve done to support wahhabist goals.

I advocate playing this game way smarter—-being better friends to our friends and worse foes to our foes. To McGuyver [another poster]--Yes, "murderous" was hyperbolic vis a vis the French riots--though the level of coercion applied to individuals within the ghettos is sometimes murderous. Ask any young woman who dares venture out without a hijab on her head.

McGuyver mentions the disconnect between generations in Europe's Moslem communities. The fine Brit movie "My son the fanatic" describes this incisively. I still maintain that the hostile attitude most Euros have shown towards their resident Moslems has contributed greatly to the problem there. It's a self-fulfilling prophecy.

And yes, wahhabism is innately anti-Western and anti-democratic. I believe any noncitizen preaching wahhabism should be deported immediately. Ditto the closely related salafism. And any citizen preaching wahhabism should be tracked like a mafia don. And also yes, the wahhabists/salafists have made a concerted effort to take over America's mosques.

But since the FBI regards most all Arab-Americans as traitors unless proven otherwise (I guess they make an exception for Genral Abizaid), we don't know what's going on in most mosques.

And since our current administration knows nothing--NOTHING--about Von Clausewitz, our almost psychotically inept campaign for hearts and minds in the Moslem world has made it difficult for Moslem moderates to openly side with America. Even though many still want desperately to move here. Check out the long article in the current New Yorker, "Betrayed" (you can download it for free), detailing how we've screwed over the Iraqis who have most helped us over the last four years.

My position is probably identical to Tom Friedman's on the issue of Moslems in America. Look at what we need for a second. We need spies in our large and growing Moslem community, to put it simply. Spies who are Moslem themselves and look it, who speak a variety of Arab dialects (and Arabic is a primitively complex language), Urdu, Pashtun, Farsi, Bahasa Indonesia, Bahasa Malaya and more, who can penetrate communities and cells here and abroad.

Where do you suppose we'll get them? One thing the Iraq war has shown is that our smart munitions aren't worth squat if we don't know where to aim them. I'm all for going after Moslem bad guys efficiently and brutally everywhere. But. But. We don't have a prayer of doing so effectively without loyal Moslem Americans in the FBI, in the CIA, in the military intelligence services.

And yes of course the wahhabists will do everything in their power to "turn" such people. It's our challenge to find and extirpate those who try and those who helped those who try.

One more thing we have to do is recruit an army of hackers who speak all the languages I listed above and work ceaselessly to kill every Islamist Website that shows up on the Net. We should have literally 30K people doing this 24x7. Kill the useless missle intercept project to fund it. At the same time we need to help promote moderate Islamic websites that show the wahhabists for the anti-Moslems they are.

We can't exterminate a billion Moslems, folks. So we have to live with them. And they've got the oil we need, so we have to deal with them. And hard power is as ineffective as a tank without troops around it. We need hard and soft power to accomplish this. And a military capable of dealing with the "distributed battlefield" of not the future but today.