I spent some years with Greeks, became Greek Orthodox Christian, andlearned to speak Greek, but never felt accepted. I spent some years among Russian Orthodox, learned to speak some Russian, but never felt accepted. I spent some years with Guyanese Hindus, learned to sing hymns in Hindi, but never felt accepted. I am searching for the proper word to use for my next statement. "Xenophobia" omes to mind and, though it seems like there might be a more suitable word, xenophobia will do. Xenophobia seems to be a universal human trait, or shortcoming.

If you watch old Western movies, you will hear people say describe something as "outlandish", meaning ridiculous, I suppose. The King James translation of the Old Testament uses the word outlandish to denote people who are foreign, and therefore seem to do things in a ridiculous or improper manner.  All they really mean

is that something is slightly different.

I did some on line thesaurus searches and came up with words related to 

xenophobic:

http://www.webster-dictionary.org/definition/Snobbish

affected, aloof, arrogant, clannish, cliquish, complacent, condescending, contemptuous, contumelious, disdainful, egotistical, elect, ethnocentric, exceptional, excluding, exclusive, exclusory, haughty, high and mighty, high-flown, high-hat, highfalutin, hoity-toity, inadmissible, insecure, insular, lofty, lordly, narrow, parochial, patronizing, pompous, potty, preclusive, prescriptive, pretentious, preventive, priggish, prohibitive, putting on airs, remote, restrictive, ritzy, scornful, seclusive, segregative, select, selective, self-important, self-satisfied, separative, smug, sneering, sniffy, snippy, snotty, stuck-up, supercilious, superior, toploftical, toplofty, uncertain, unconfident, unsure, uppish, vain, withering, xenophobic.

Omar, I hear you. I’m heartily sick of Arabs trying to teach me the shahadah, or demanding that I recite al-Fatihah to them to “prove” that I am Muslim, and then offering me to “teach” me about Islam, when the guys who offer know less than I do. I’m learning to love my black, Muslim self, and assert that I am no more or less Muslim than anyone with an Arab heritage.

But instead of going on about the Arab jerks I’ve met, I seek to establish an American Islam, one that is fully American, and fully Islamic. Omar, see if you can create halal versions of Italian fare, and share it with the Muslims you know and like. Serve cannoli on Eid (invite me if you do). Celebrate all that you are, welcome others to share in the celebration, and welcome all xenophobes to kiss your Italian American Muslim bum.

Because there is nothing more infuriating, and frustrating, to a petty person than to see a source of joy they can’t control.

Let’s talk this through.

1- Resentment. Strong word. What does it mean to you specifically?
It is all about exclusion. You’ve done everything but in the end
you still cannot be good enough, you don’t quite make it into the
the authentic Muslim category, kinda of like Turkey trying to get
into the European Union. One confronts the myriad glass ceilings.
You recognize you don’t belong to the tribe. then you quit. One
of the most moving accounts I have read about quitting is by
Randall Robinson, an African American who recognizes that he
will never penetrate the tribe and goes to live in st.Kitts that he
may retrieve a modicum of happiness. people end up rejecting in
various ways.

2- But then you discover your own roots, a place perhaps of
comfort where you can belong and so there should be no easy
assumption that you have escaped the tribe or this need to
affirm your Italian heritage. But because the Arab heritage is
so entangled with what people call “ Authentic Muslim Master
Race’‘- ( what have you) the affirmation of an Arab heritage
arouses much resentment. That has been my subjective
experience. So how we rediscover/create our hybrid Arab
American may have very little to do Muslimness.

3- As for your depiction of Bosnians and Pakistanis I beg to differ.
I am half Bosnian and worked with refugees during the crisis
there. I will tell that they may not lord it over others in their
sense of being Muslims but it is not too long before they start
reminding their darker coreligionists that they are Europeans. I
have heard grown men refer to African Americans as ‘‘Monkeys’‘
On one occasion a university professor disrupted an exhibition
because because how dare they depict Modern Europeans like
third world refugees. the guy had to be escorted out of the
public library. The Pakistanis hardly treat African Americans as
equals. Tarek Fatah has some interesting stories to tell about
how Asians tend to move out of neighborhoods that aren’t white
enough.

4- Moreover, there is often a jarring disconnect between how
intra-communally Arabs are constantly being constructed as
the master race, the authentic Muslim but in the larger culture
they experience various kinds of racial discrimination and are
hardly unaware of the discourse that depicts them as vermin,
a cancerous presence, rag heads, sand niggers, are tortured
in places like Abu Ghraib.Try checking out some of Ann
Coulter’s quotes on Arabs. My favorite is one that says security
is not good enough at the white house because Helen Thomas
a Lebanese Christian American veteran journalist, got in.
Because Arab Americans- like all other Americans- have
multiple levels of belonging projecting the authentic Muslim
dynamic into every issue may obscure the complex ways in
which Arab Americans experience racial discrimination.

5- There is a conflation here between Arabs and the chosen
people of Islam. For a start, many Arab Americans in this country
are Christians. They consituted the first wave of immigrants.
Some Jews like professor Ella Shohat identify as Arabs. So Arabs
are a religiously diverse group. It is patronizing to flatten this
plurality, to say nothing of mainstream Muslim Arabs in this country who basically just want to live the American life, fast during
Ramadan and bellydance the rest of the year, to say nothing of a
silent but perhaps not insignificant minority likemyself who are secular anSome Arab Americans are either wholly secular
and wholly uninterested in Islam authentic or otherwise and
some are just mainstream suburban dwellers who want to get
their kids to college fast but go belly dancing the rest of the year.

6- of course the failed nationalism trope never fails to come up.
How do you suggest people fight for their collective aspirations
when they are living under autocratic regimes and protracted
occupation? Yesterday al-Qaeda’s second man al-Zawahiri
announced the whole world will become an open battlefield.
Juan Cole thinks its a historic about face, the significance of
which remains to be seen. There was a shift in policy, marked
by al-Qaeda’s willingness to work with heretical Shiites and
al-Zawahiri’s appeal to the downtrodden of the earth. So these
guys are now trying to appeal to the vast majority of human
beings who are bitterly resentful at being excluded. These
are populist movements. a professor in Lebanon who appeared
on democracy now yesterday noted that Hizbullah enjoys the
support of 87% of Lebanese, including 80% of non-Shiites and
Christians. These are alarming trends. I for one don’t want to
see a virulent pan Islam polarize and endanger the world further.
We may mourn the day when alternative secular alternatives
Mossadegeh in Iran for instance- which sought to address the
needs of the majority were consistently undermined. Read Robert
Dreyfuss on the history of that. That is what the destruction of
a city like Beirut may herald. So in Israel they went after Fatah,
humiliated the leader who had many faults but what did we get?
Hamas. be careful what you wish for.

Not all the Arabs want to own Islam. Many of them, like the one in
the letter I printed want to lead normal lives just like you. but
Snap out of your resentments. We cannot constantly frame this
unfolding crisis in narrow terms like Arab Muslim supremacy. We
are talking about the violation of international law, the criminal
tageting of civilians both in Lebanon and Hizbullah, the possiblity
that American and European troops may be sent into the border,
ect ect. Snap out of your resentments.

I meant the targeting of civilians both in Lebanon and by
Hizbullah in Israel.

Here is another thought regarding the reluctance to accept others based upon superficial differences.

There is a group in Africa who look every bit African, but claim to be Jewish by ancestry, and trace themselves back to the original twelve tribes. Some of them came to Israel and sought citizenship. The Israeli authorities were reluctant to accept their claim, and requested that they undergo ritual immersian in water (mikvah) to remove any doubt. The Africans refused ritual immersion.

Now, with the aid of genetic testing, it has been demonstrated that those Africans are without a doubt what they claim to be, namely descendents of the twelve tribes of Israel.

Genetic testing has also been performed upon those Jewish males who claim to be Cohanim, or descendents of the priestly tribe of Levi, on both the matrilineal and patrilineal side. The studies revealed that all the cohanim tested were indeed cohanim.

dear Sitaram,

Now that would be an interesting parallel. How for instance
Sephardic Jewish communities or the Mizrahim, the Falasha
experienced exclusion in the State of Israel.

Nakia, I’ve already delved deeply into the food aspect. This has been a 15 year process: on Eid in Hawaii, I used to broaden peoples’ horizons by paying for massive Eid dinners at an Italian restaurant. Thankfully, everyone seemed appreciative on the surface and never commented about “kafir” food; but then again, it was free to them… Even nowadays, when I have fellow Muslim students and professors over our house, we cook Italian feasts which merit appreciation. You all are welcome anytime, Eid or not. Holler if of you’re in Tucson.

Ginan, its resentment as in, “I hate this, I wish they would stop. Can’t we all just smoke a hooka and be done with it?” And, I swear to you if I heard any Bosnian call a Blackamerican a monkey, I’d throw them into the trunk and toss ‘em out in the back of a Serbian Orthodox Church. I’ve long heard the European boast, mostly when Saudi guys were telling them they were wrong to do…well, pretty much everything under the sun: take the gravestones away from the mosques, write thier language in Arabic script, use more “authentic” Arabic words instead of Slavicized Turkish words, stop wearing berets like the kuffar, etc. However, outside of that context, it would be inappropriate. Snapping out of my resentments is easier said than done. When I ignore it, it reinforces thier sense of me as thier follower; one would think that they might reassess thier views, but I’ve not seen it happen. For full disclosure, I don’t often see the bias from Muslims of Arab descent who were born here. Different socializations can make all the difference.

Sitaram, I hear you, brother!

- A Salafi in worship, a Sufi in society, a Secularist in government.

If we stand back and consider the phenomenon of alienation in its broadest possible abstraction, whether it be on the basis of religion, ethnicity, gender, or some other basis, then our inquiry leads naturally to the construction of orthodoxy and heresy, which is dealt with in great depth by John B. Henderson:

[By the way, with regard to ostracism on the basis of doubted virtue, someone has written regarding the similar accounts of a virtuous woman slandered in Hinduism (Sita), Christianity (Mary), and Islam (Ayeshia). ]

JBHenderson- Constructing Orthodoxy&Heresy
“The Construction of Orthodoxy and Heresy”

By John B. Henderson – SUNY press

ISBN 0-7914-3759-0

I stumbled across this slim volume by accident in a used book store.

I am certain it is still in print, but will have to check.

This book is very helpful in discussing Elaine Pagels books on the Gnostics and the Nag Hammadi manuscripts.

This book is a real eye-opener, for it takes as its topic the fundamental and ubiquitous process of heresiography in four very different religions; neo-Confuscian Taoism, Judaism, Islam and Christianity.

Here are two excerpts which demonstrate how valuable this book can be in understanding current events.

From Ch. 1, Preliminary Overview of Heresy and Heresiography, Page 10

Despite its undeserved reputation for monolithicity and conformity, Islam is among the most fractious of the world’s great religions. According to the great Islamic heresiographer, al-Baghdadi (d. 1037), the Kharijite sect alone split into twenty different sub-groups. Nor were the various Islamic sects reluctant to enter into theological conflict with one another. Thus “polemic is one of the most widely represented genres in the history of Islamic religious literature,” to the extent that “Theology in Islam, more perhaps than in other religions, is a contentious science.”

Not only was Islamic theology often quite contentious, but much of it was formulated in the first place in the process of refuting or rejecting heresies. (i.e. it is the HERESY which appears first, and THEN the ORTHODOX view is formulated to combat the heresy.) According to al-Ghazali’s (d. 1111) account of the origin of theology in Islam, “God brought into being the class of theologians and moved them to support traditional orthodoxy with the weapon of systematic argument, by laying bare the confused doctrines invented by the heretics, at variance with traditional orthodoxy.” But theologians were not the only heresiographers in Islam. As the great modern student of Islamic heresiography, Henri Laoust, has remarked, “All Muslim thinkers, whether they belong to the category of canon lawyer, dogmatic theologian, traditionist, or philosopher, are also in their own way and to some degree heresiographers.”

By Islamic lights, the heresiographical roles was by no means a mean one unworthy of a great philosopher or theologian. For the heresiographer was the heir of the holy warrior of yore, though he might conduct jihad “more against heresy inside the world of Islam than against the infidels outside its territories.” In Ghazali’s words, heresiographers were the “protectors of religion through proof and demonstration, just as warriors were through sword and lance.” In medieval Islam, where sectarian identification, as opposed to ethnic, cultural, or even political associations, provided the chief means of understanding human differences, the heresiographers who determined and explained these differences played a vital social role. Their presence in each region and locale was so important that “if such a person comes to be lacking in a region, the inhabitants ought to all clamor for one just as they would if they lacked a doctor or a lawyer.”

Dogma in Islam, as enshrined in creeds and doctrines, did not occupy such a central place as it did in Christianity. Nor in Islam did there exist any time-honored central ecclesiastical authority for determining and enforcing such dogmatic orthodoxy. In comparison with early Christianity, Islam was more a religion of practice than belief, of law more than theology, of orthopraxy more than orthodoxy, as illustrated by the fact that only one of the five pillars of Islam focuses on matters of belief.

As in early Christianity, the most general and abstract Islamic heresiographical schematizations were numerological. In fact, the leit-motif of the heresiographical genre as a whole is the famous Tradition (or hadith) in which the Prophet predicts a division of the Islamic community into seventy-three sects, seventy-two of which are destined for Hell and only one for salvation. As the pioneering Western Islamicist, Ignaz Goldziher, remarked, this hadith "formed the basis for the history of religion and of sects in Muhammadan literature." Most of the Sunni heresiographers, including al-Shahrastani (1086-1153) and al-Baghdadi (d. 1037), deployed the seventy-three-sect schema in their heresiographical works. The Ash'arite theologian Adud al-Din al-Iji (c. 1281-1355) went so far as to identify the one "salvation-giving sect" as the Ash'arite. This schema, however, appears not only in Ash'arite literature, but also in Hanbalite creeds and professions of faith, such as that if Ibn Batta (d.997).

Having declared their allegiance to the seventy-three-sect enumeration revealed by the Prophet, the heresiographers were left with the daunting task of dividing the world of Islamic heresy into precisely seventy-two units. In some cases, they made "convulsive endeavors to squeeze ouf the required number," particularly by "cutting, inserting, and combining, till they reach the number of 73." Among the more curious devices used by Baghdadi for arriving at the canonical number is "regarding each of the more important Mu'tazilites as head of a sect and, when he had too many sects, stating that some were so heretical that they had ceased to be Muslims. The procedure of ash-Shahrastani is somewhat similar." The noted Hanbalite traditionist and theologian, al_Jili (d. 1166), adopted the more economical strategy of simply counting some sects twice, under two different rubrics, in order to produce the canonical seventy-two. Such heresiographical manipulations were facilitated, and even perhaps partly justified, by the fact that some Islamic sects were neither very discrete nor stable. In fact, the Arabic term "firqa" is used to refer not only to a sect proper, but to doctrinal tendencies within sects and even to lone individuals."

Omar:

your response still fails to explain how the affirmation of
an Italian American heritage is any less tribal than the
affirmation of an Arab American identity, particurly at
junctures where the authentic Muslim master race is nowhere
in evidence.

I also think there is another issue here; namely, what does it mean
to have an insular American identity during a time of American
hegemony and a well documented historical record of intervention?
Do we all have to sit back and smoke hookas? Would you tell an
American like Cindy Sheehen enough already about your son or are
there perhaps multiple ways of being American? What makes you
think Arab American activism is merely a function of being Arab and
not of constructing a hybrid Arab American ethnic identity?

The difference, Ginan, is that my Italian-ness belongs to me, for me, by me. I will never assert that Italian-ness is in any way “Islamic”. I will never force it on others. I will never use it to put others in thier “place”. I will use it as the basis of my ethnic identity, mostly to ground myself with a narrative of origin. Most other Italian-Americans don’t give me crap for not being Catholic, but I have to hear crap all the time from Arabs about how messed up my country is. But, despite my ethnic identity, I’m not going to claim I should handle security just because my ancestors were Sicilians; I’m not going to cheer on the mafia just because they’re also Italians. I’m not going to make excuses for Mafiosi who say they’re just giving pay back to the Britishers for ill-treatment of Italian-Americans.

I do not argue for the end of ethnicity, only that ethnicity should not be used something to bludgeon people with. In the mosques I’ve been to and the communities I’ve lived in, Arab-ness has been used as a tool to justify attitudes of superiority and arrogation of leadership. In the city I grew up in, a suburban mosque had a 99% South Asian congregation. The sole Arab family was headed by a Syrian doctor, who insisted on being the imam, since he said that the prayers had to be pronounced perfectly.

As for American power: I think only that it must be tempered with virtue. There will always be superpowers; I hardly see any reason for us not to be one, too and I don’t at all see any reason for us to simply cede power to other states. As for Mrs Sheehan, a mother of a fallen soldier, sailor, airman or Marine can say whatever the hell she wants, in my book.

- A Salafi in worship, a Sufi in society, a Secularist in government.

Gee- maybe it has escaped your attention that Arab countries aren't just being told how to live, they areliterally having the crap bombed out of them to enforce democracy from the air. Condi called it the new middle east. painful painful birth pangs. do you think a culturally specific form of democracy should be used to bludgeon other ethnicities? Condi is calling it the new middle east. I would imagine your travails at the mosque are mild by comparison. Funny how you show selective tolerance for different kinds of coercion. And who says Arabs or Arab Americans don't critique their own cowardly governments all the time. You must be kidding me. Have you read the opposition papers in Arabic lately? who says there is not internal critique? and how do you recommend that the power of a superpower be tempered by virtue when international law is constantly being flaunted by the wanton exercise of power? and in case you haven't noticed we may be a superpower now but we are hardly omnipotent. you might want to check out an excellent article by John Murtha on how we are stretching ourselves too thin. I think it is on commondreams- or just google it. Such delusions of grandeur and imperial arrogance are making us increasingly blind and insensitive to the suffering inflicted upon others. The madness of thinking we can subdue the entire Middle East by firepower is a mad delusion. I am an American too and a fan of the republic not the empire a la Gore Vidal. I grow rather weary of this notion that as an American who loves her country I cannot question policies that I feel undermine our national self-nterest in the long run. thought it was as American as apple pie. 

I don’t give one hoot for Arab governments or, for that matter, anyone’s government other than my own. You consistently conflate Arab-American interests with Muslim ones a la my detested phrase, “Arab-Islamic”. Arab-American interests, Arab interests, Pakistani interests are not mine. But, if any of them live here, then by default American interests should be theirs as well.

>>I would imagine your travails at the mosque are mild
by comparison.

Why, but why must you use the eternal conflagurations in the Middle East to belittle my concerns with the communities I live my life in? I don’t live my life in the Middle East, and increasingly, neither do alot of Middle Easterners. For you to ask me to put those sorrows above my immediate ones is tantamount to never addressing them. Israel or no Israel, Crusaders or no Crusaders, British imperialism or no British imperialism, the Middle East has seen conflict after conflict. So, when, do tell me, shall we turn to addressing the immediate concerns. I call people who want to ignore the immediate reckless and you’re asking me be reckless and put a certain ethnic group’s interests above my own. Surely, if there was no violence in Palestine these days, surely you would still find something sorrowful to divert me and other Muslims, surely there’a always something!

Lastly, being a superpower is not the same as an emprire; and since when has the word ‘emppire’ become a dirty word? Want to tell me how Egypt became Arab in the first place…yup, let’s squeeze it out…ahhh…empire! So, when you roll back Egypt’s Arabness and speak Coptic and help the Syrians speak Aramaic again, maybe I’ll go and roll up the Western empires’ effects…

- A Salafi in worship, a Sufi in society, a Secularist in government.

I for one do not care about becoming an Arab, but I notice that becoming a Muslim means acquiring cultural traits are alien and foreign to me. When a non-Christian converts to Christianity, they is no dress up for the masjid, wearing clothing styles not native to the society and culture. But to be a Muslim is to engage in masquerade, to change one’s name, and acquire a new language both in its liturgical and modern spoken form.

I’m learning Arabic for the soul purpose of learning the Qur’an, nothing more and nothing less.

So Omar, you’re a Salafi? Errrr . . . (shaking head)

If you recall you were the one who stated I am not going
to cheer the mafia just because it is Italian. So I thought
I would point out that I/we don’t cheer Arab governments
just because they are Arab.

Our government’s involvement in Iraq. how many American soldiers
killed so far for a war based on err, to say nothing of the maimed,
lies. More on the way in Lebanon. minor distraction. Let’s get back
to our hookahs. No connections like the un-American ones made
by Martin Luther King who wanted money from military spending
diverted to err distracting matters like social spending right here
at home.

Ginan,

You have to agree that Arabs seem defensive in terms of their loyalty to the watan.

I find it ironic that Omar would mention that he has no desire to be a mawlaa (Persians in Iraq basically becoming Arabs culturally and identity-wise) but I wonder if all that will change with the renewing cross-border ties between Iran and Iraq.

Dear Gustavo:

Let me ask you a question. Do you think that they are, for instance,
less defensive than Jewish people are in relation to the defense
of Israel? Than Americans were in the aftermath of 9/11? I certainly
became very defensive and incensed when those towers were bombed, to say nothing of my outrage at the loss of innocent human
lives. When African refugees were brutally murdered in Egypt I
was incensed because of the innocent loss of life and the blatant
racism.

NOw look at recent events. A modern country like Lebanon,
occuppied by Israel from 1982 until 2000. about 18,000
civilians died. Gaza- strangulation of an already impoverished
population, left with no power in the heat of summer. The
bombardment of Iraq in the first Gulf war. How many years
of sanctions. The current invasion with reports telling us that
a hundred people dying per day, to say nothing of the maimed.
Who knows how many hundreds of thousands killed. Lebanon
in a matter of 12 days with infrastructure destroyed, who
knows how many injured. Reports are an usually high number
of injured are dying. How many dead so far.at least 4oo. Just
today oil spill on the shore. So the enviornmental fallout adds to
the woes. Don’t you think that would make people defensive? for
some pretty good historical reasons?

I’m drifting from Islam, I don’t find it satisfying anymore. Many of the reasons that make OmarG mad, upset, and sick are forcing me from Islam.

well Gustavo what can I say? most of these things have to do
with politics and power. who can shelter us from that?

Oh Gustavo, what Islam are you being forced from? Whose?

>>I would point out that I/we don’t cheer Arab governments just because they are Arab.

OK, I understand. I would have made the analogy to be more towards Hezbollah and Hamas rather than the governments. So, people protest and petition and donate money, fine. Many people think that unity will produce power for Muslims in America. However, if we ignore these very real social and cultural problems here, we will never have the cultural understandings and social contracts needed to operate as a super-community. Instead, we’ll be comdemned to be scattered, innefectual pieces. Perhaps that’s not so bad. At our current stage of misdevelopment, I shudder to think what would happen to my county and Islam in it, given the juevenille khutbas, the abuse of human rights as legal cover for funding militant overseas organizations, the ghettoization of the mosques, etc.

Oh, and be sure that my localistic philosophy also means that if I were staying in Lebanon I’d be fighting, too, to repel the assaults or providing first aid, or letting people stay with me…I think; if only to save my own house. But, then again, I might have to fight against the Hezbis who would want to use my house to launch rockets from… And I lived in Malaysia, the last thing on my mind would be what ISNA was up to.

Gustavo, no need to leave Islam. We’ll fix this over time!

- A Salafi in worship, a Sufi in society, a Secularist in government.

I think Muslims need to interject themselves into mainstream society, and that means getting involved past the ABC organizations like CAIR, ICNA, ISNA, MSA, and MAS.

I think they serve a wonderful purpose, but they do have a tendency of perpetuating ghettoization.

Omar,

As much as leaving Islam seems tempting, I can’t. I guess Truth is hard to leave once found, even if the people who also acknowledge Truth sometimes annoy you.

Gustavo, leave it. If you are searching for your own satisfaction, then it is not good for you. At the same, Muslims would have a better gene pool of people who understand what it means. Alternatively, if you are searching for the truth, then you may reconsider your whole attitude and approach to religious questions. Life is tough my dear.

>I guess Truth is hard to leave once found, even if the >people who also acknowledge Truth sometimes annoy you.

That’s a step man. You do not want all your action to be reaction…OKay..so you are doing fine…But do not be a slave to ANYONE..Either arrogant ignorant stupid Muslims or the dominant culture…The freedom of la ilaha ila goes beyond all these Second Creators…Be consistent in your attitude.

Just finished with the original post…OmarG you are a racist bigot…Not even a smart one…There are MANY real problems but you focus on those who may be as, if not more, oppressed than you. You ignore the elehant and ogle its shadow…

Look Omar,

This is how I view things. It may explain some of our fundamental
differences. I view myself as a global citizen. For me everything is
connected and interdependent. I don’t believe in the afterlife. So
for me the experience of transcendence, of that which is bigger
than my life as an individual is human survival and continuity.
My only connection to the faith is affiliation with the community.
Obviously the closer the community the more visceral the sense
of connection. I think we can both safely agree on that, at least
I hope so. But at the same time I think- as do many people- that
our survival may be at stake. The big problems that confront us
as a species- regardless of ethnicity or faith- require deep levels
of cooperation. Global warming is one of them. It impacts us all
regardless of how we feel about focusing on our immediate lives.
The proliferation and escalation of conflicts that can lead to
the use of nuclear weapons is another possibility that shouldn’t
be discounted. The fact of the matter is that war creates refugees
who spill over into other countries. Situations of chaos and failed
states create the conditions that foster the terrorism you and I
both abhor. How much more of this can the planet sustain? Just
today, for instance, I learned that there this an oil spill in Lebanon.
A power plant was hit. According to an article I read a hundred
kilometers of shore line were black. public beaches ruined. Well
there are fishermen in Lebanon who depend on the ocean for their
livelihood. the oceans are a global common. You said in one of
your blogs that actions need to be evaluated in accordance with
how many people they impact. well fish/crabs are covered in
oil. who knows what kinds of weapons are being used. How many
people they will impact, for how many generations to come in
terms of cancer rates. We are killing off other species. This is
being reported as one of the worst environmental disaster in
Lebanon’s history. Why are we all so complacent? Can we afford to
be insular, to not work on every front for peace? Can urban
centers continue to absorb displaced people. Don’t they become
breeding grounds for jihadis in failed states where people like
Hamas and Hizbullah provide badly needed social services?
Is saving your own house/children possible in isolation from
others? Can we afford to remain distracted? in my view we do have
a grave moral responsibility. You may not think about what is
on ISNA’s mind but that doesn’t necessarily mean you won’t be
impacted by something it does. I shudder to think what might
happen to the planet. Do you see any leaders on the horizon who
look like they can handle the challenges facing us? This is way
beyond unity for Muslims. Don’t our unsustainable patterns of
consumption have a teeny weeny bit to do with our adventures
in the Middle East? The oceans are a global common. Do we have
a right to deplete the supplies for future generations? Isn’t there
a religious obligation to be decent custodians of the earth? I talk
to friends who fish locally. They notice a difference and so forth.
In fact, our government did fund those fundies over in Afghanistan
in their fight against godless communism. It’s called blowback.

I guess food was a bad example, but what I meant was to express Italian

American culture as a Muslim culture. Arab and South Asian cultures didn't

become Islamic by divine decree; they became "Islamic" by being Muslim

, being who they are and daring anybody to say that their culture wasn't

"Islamic". Do the same for Italian American culture. Be your Italian 

American Muslim self.  

OK, Ginan. I understand your points much better. I think what you say is perfectly rational given your assumptions and views. I think the global citizen concept can be a good one. For global issues such as the environmental problems you mentioned, I consider it an appropriate concept. However, dealing with the environment and the associated cultural (the most important from which other changes flow), economic and political changes necessary seems quite easy compared to dealing with human-made conflicts. In such situations, there are numerous individuals whose needs directly conflict. I don’t think I as an individual can affect that, at least not as joe scmoe citizen. Here’s why: think of all the parties to a conflict. They include the leadership, opportunists, fellow-travelers, professional warriors and so forth which make the conflict actually multi-lateral, and few if any will act out of good faith. Any peace activism relies on feelings of humanity that most of these actors will ignore, at least until they are loosing. Thus, this tells me that the most practical way to end a conflict is to take a side and decimate the other; case closed. Ugly, but it works…usually.

In this case, I can’t take Israel’s side because of my deep disagreement with thier tactics, although I support the goal of destroying Hezbollah’s missle capabilities. I would like to take the side of the Lebanese people because they’re caught in the middle. However, the logical way of taking thier side means by default halting Israeli military ops, which leaves Hezbollah’s offensive capabilities intact. So, since I can’t choose a side to be on, I have to opt out and pretend not to watch. It may not be logical, but thus it is anywyay.

- A Salafi in worship, a Sufi in society, a Secularist in government.

Nakia, you’re right, and I like your suggestion of making Italian-American culture as a Muslim culture, too. Nice.

- Italian culture is a Muslim culture, too.

Ginan,

if this therapy you have given OmarG does not rearrange the noodles in his head, we should borrow Laury’s grandmother’ seasoned skillet.

i am not sure that Omarg understands the humanity you are projecting.

I think a person who writes like you did and thinks people who disagree with you are mentaly deficient, is the one who needs therapy…good luck to you on that!

- A Salafi in worship, a Sufi in society, a Secularist in government.

.....people who disagree with you are mentaly deficient…...Omarg wrote.

not necessarily mentally deficient, some need therapy because of acting on thinking errors and making inappropriate behavior choices. some need therapy because of low self esteem due to being rejected by different groups in the community.

ps: i hear an imam saying the following dua in the mosque of the Internet: Oh, god, please, a3iz (make aziz) islam and muslimeen. the congregation answers: amen…except for an angry voice muttering: .... .. . of the arabs,,,,,, only my in-laws.

Omarg, if you were standing close by, what would you say to this person?

I know what i would say, (not putting words into your mouth): allah yahdeek.

Center – you give me far too much credit. Perhaps I speak too much.
But I refuse to remain silent in the face of injustice even as I look
back with grief on the heyday of the multiple critique.

Oh, I get it center. Here's an analogy: you're like one of those people whose spouse cheats on them because he/she was taking care of everyone else but left those closest to him/her high and dry. I can understand why Ginan takes the global citizen concept, but you, I think you're one of the people whose attitude is the origin of a certain resentment. Ginan and I write alot about ourselves and what we think. You, on the otherhand, we know nothing about. If you're Arab like your transcription seems to imply, I understand why its hard to see the daylight, really I do.

Oh, and the whole a9izz al-islama wa-l-muslimeen thing is nothing more than the same old supremacist and triumphalist exhortations that belie any bullshit we give to non-Muslims about being tolerant; we're only tolerant until we're in charge, just like some members of a certain group I've been talking about. Since you surely don't take the word of this non-Arab for it, see the economist Mahmud El-Gamal who criticizes this concept: elgamal.blogspot.com/2006/06/tolerant-or-still-separatist-and.html With more people like him from your side of the house, it could easily heal the rift…take a lesson from him.

- A Salafi in worship, a Sufi in society, a Secularist in government.

PS, I'd like to explain this to center since he before said he doesn't get it, but its one of those things, that because of his tone, make me say, "if you have to ask…"

You say that you would say “Allah guide you” and that’s insufficient; you may see that as a pious thing to say by relying on God and I say that’s one of our problems: we can’t or won’t engage the people. Its blithe and doesn’t change a god darn thing. You see, the guy probably won’t change his mind; he’ll only suppress it in public or at least only around you to avoid conflict. What he really needs is a talking-to so he understands why its not going to work in America and that such an idea has to die out in a multi-ethnic community. Otherwise, people with resentments like mine, who seem to be quite numerous these days, will only grow. Action is needed to nip it in the bud, and just hoping that God will guide him is just a device for avoiding action.

- A Salafi in worship, a Sufi in society, a Secularist in government.

Oh, and the whole a9izz al-islama wa-l-muslimeen thing is nothing more than the same old supremacist and triumphalist exhortations that belie any bullshit we give to non-Muslims about being tolerant; we’re only tolerant until we’re in charge, just like some members of a certain group I’ve been talking about. omarG

Omar, you are showing a skin deep understanding of Islam. based on your unhappy experiences, you are generalizing much too much. 3izz of islam is not a zero sum; ..3izz of islam is when muslims do not have to worry about their basic needs, when ta3awun (cooperation/alliances) are based on taqwa. in other wrods, 3izz of islam is the fulfillment of (human) potential. do you see the word human; the zenith of arab/muslim culture was a fulfillment of human potential of groups (indians, jews, christians, and many more groups added to making this achievement.)

Omarg: you are too pissed to think straight….either that or you are a muslim neo-con! {nah, there is a contradiction here, or is there?}

you bark at lack of tolerance, yet your statement above is an outright violation of the golden rule!!!...it is the epitome of intolerance. by the way, i do not have to go far to understand tolerance; all i need is to look no further than one of your posts to understand intolerance.

when are you going to stop referring to yourself as: this non-arab, or this white muslim.

Action is needed to nip it [intolerance, hate] in the bud, and just hoping that God will guide him is just a device for avoiding action. Omarg

can you explain this statement in light of your nonchalant stand or INaction vis-a-vis the loss of lives and the destruction of property in lebanon?

Responses in next blog entry…enjoy. - A Salafi in worship, a Sufi in society, a Secularist in government.