I haven't really updated this blog in about... 2 years because I lost interest in blogging after setting up the account. I never really had anything to blog about until I joined my university blog and ended up writing what I would write here, there. But since I can't really write about anything I want anymore there, I guess I'll be blogging here a bit more often now.
In any case, I've decided to blog about the controversy on the "ground-zero mosque" and the pastor who's threatening to burn Qu'rans on September 11th. The sheer ignorance and disrespect of the entire situation is something that just completely boggles my mind. First of all, let's go over a few things that I hope that we could all agree on:
1. Any large group or abstract body of people, whether it is a political party, religion or nation is NOT homogeneous.
I'm sure that most people will agree that despite the fact that they're in the same nation, New York and Kansas are very different cities. Or Beijing and Shenzhen. Or Yellowknife and Vancouver. The same thing could be said for Christianity in the U.S. There are American Christians who aren't too concerned with their religion and there are also Christian fundamentalists. Taking the example to another religion, there are Muslims who go to the mosque on Fridays and pray, some who barely observe religious holidays and practices despite labeling themselves as Muslims and there are Muslim fundamentalists who also happen to be in charge of countries and demand some pretty outrageous things as any fundamentalists from any religion would do.
2. The actions of one person or a small group of people do not necessarily represent the thoughts and ideology of the group(s) they belong to.
As an extreme example, Robert Pickton was a Canadian pig farmer who allegedly killed 49 women and then buried them in his farm. However, does that mean that all Canadian pig farmers are psychopath murderers who kill women? What about the people who lived in his community? Definitely not.
I once watched a documentary on Christian fundamentalists and at one point in the film, they featured a group called "Jesus dresses for success" which was a group that advocated that women should not wear provocative clothing because it would "tempt the men." Yet, does every Christian in the entire world advocate the same sexist ideology? I think not. In the same vein, just because Al-Quaeda thinks that they need to rid the Muslim world of American influence doesn't mean that every Muslim in the world - which is a huge number may I add - feels the need to go hijack a plane and run it into important buildings and kill people. I know the Muslims who I went to school with when the September 11th attacks happened were upset by the tragedy of the events that unfolded that day, as were the Muslim firefighters, healthcare workers and social workers who devoted their services to those affected by the attacks.
3. Contrary to Pastor Jones' belief, the Qu'ran is not "evil".
It's a religious text that probably encourages many similar moral beliefs as those espoused in the Bible. As well, according to the Qu'ran, it was transmitted to the prophet Allah by the angel Gabriel, who by the way, appears in Old and New Testament.
The point is, not all Muslims are terrorists. Allowing them to practice their religion about five blocks away from ground-zero does NOT support terrorism. I don't quite see how building a mosque nearby could somehow represent a "victory" of sorts for Al-Quaeda since, again, the terrorist group is not synonymous with Islam. As for burning Qu'rans, it is nothing but a destructive and disrespectful act that is absolutely unacceptable, especially in a society that believes in and is proud of their respect for everyone's differences. I suggest that perhaps instead of burning a text that is the sacred scripture for millions of people around the world, we should try and eliminate the stereotypes and negative images surrounding a religion that I'm sure not many of us are familiar with. There's nothing wrong with picking up a Qu'ran and reading it. You're not switching religions or anything, you're just trying to understand the world around you so that you don't incur dire consequences by misunderstanding the people around you.
