Kampf and Jihad

[BaalChatzaf]

One of the central concepts of the Nazi ideology was Kampf which does not mean war. It means struggle. Central to Islamic thought is Jihad which also means struggle. Both the Nazis and the Islamists see the world as a struggle between the forces of Light and the forces of Darkness. This idea of Struggle between Light/Dark, Good/Evil, Order/Chaos is very ancient and predates both Islam and Nazi-ism. It goes back at least to the Zoroaster religion. Even Christianity has a notion of struggle between the forces of God and the forces of Satan. Fortunately this is not a mainstream view in the English speaking part of the world. Christian jihad lead to the Crusades. I assume we are past that now.

I point this out to show a definite resemblance between extreme Nazi philosophy and extreme Islamic thought. The term Islamofascist is not so far-fetched. Both systems are all embracing. The include every aspect of living. How to dress, how to eat, how to mate and above all how to think. It is no coincidence that the most dangerous anti-human ideologies are integrated all encompassing package-deals.

What I have a hard time grasping is why we could (at one time) identify the Nazis and Fascists as our enemies. We even understood that the Japanese cult of the Emperor was a variant of extreme Fascism. And the Japanese had in addition to Kampf (struggle) the idea of self-sacrifice and Bushido. The Japanese and the extreme Islamists both embrace martyrdom for the sake of the kingdom/domain/ummah. We had no trouble identifying the Japanese as enemy. Fortunately the Japanese had no notion of world domination. They just wanted the Pacific Ocean all the way down to Australia.

Why oh why can we not identify Islamic fanatics as our blood enemies? They are out to get us. To either kill or subjugate us. Is our commitment to religious tolerance so extreme that we permit it to render us defenseless before our mortal enemy? I always thought it admirable that our Constitution does not permit the establishment of a religion as the official or cult religion of our nation. But to carry this toleration and moderation to the point of pretending our enemies are not our enemies is positively suicidal. Enough of this madness!

Ba'al Chatzaf

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Bob,

I started to read this with a sense of dread since you often make it extremely difficult to support Israel. It usually goes like this. (I am talking gist, not words.)

Me: Hamas needs to be taken out because it is hell-bent on wiping out Israel and has been bombing civilians.

You: We need to nuke all Mulsims off the face of the earth. The Jews are the master race.

This makes it embarrassing for me to make any statement supporting Israel. I don't want to be associated with a sentiment like that. So I often don't even say anything other than stop the crap.

But your above commentary is spot on and reasonable. Radical Islamism is leftovers from Nazism mixed with fundamentalist Islam. That lethal combination is the manifest enemy at this point in history. It should be taken out for once and for all.

I still don't believe the stupidity of the West (specifically the USA and England), which employed the Islamic Nazis after WWII to spy on the Communists. We are now paying the price for that blunder.

Michael

[James Heaps-Nelson]

Bob,

I started to read this with a sense of dread since you often make it extremely difficult to support Israel. It usually goes like this. (I am talking gist, not words.)

Me: Hamas needs to be taken out because it is hell-bent on wiping out Israel and has been bombing civilians.

You: We need to nuke all Mulsims off the face of the earth. The Jews are the master race.

This makes it embarrassing for me to make any statement supporting Israel. I don't want to be associated with a sentiment like that. So I often don't even say anything other than stop the crap.

But your above commentary is spot on and reasonable. Radical Islamism is leftovers from Nazism mixed with fundamentalist Islam. That lethal combination is the manifest enemy at this point in history. It should be taken out for once and for all.

I still don't believe the stupidity of the West (specifically the USA and England), which employed the Islamic Nazis after WWII to spy on the Communists. We are now paying the price for that blunder.

Michael

Michael, it is the same kind of alliance that we had with Stalin during WW2. Just as Roosevelt's fondness for socialism made possible an alliance with Stalin, the biases of western leaders towards Abrahamic religions allowed an alliance with Islamofascists. Now, our academic liberal canon advocates the tolerance of religions that advocate violence and intolerance. As soon as we get done winning the battle against radical Islamism, moderates will radicalize under some new banner with some new fig leaf of justification. It is the Islamic religion that is the enemy just as Christianity was a force for darkness in the Middle Ages. Islam needs a reformation and until we see individual rights respected on some basic level in Islamic countries, it is not safe to grant Islam any quarter. We will know Islam has gone through a reformation when women have equal rights and adult video stores can operate openly in Islamic countries. Until such time, tolerance of Islam as a religion is appeasement.

During WW2 we knew we were at war with the Germans and the Japanese, not just Nazism and militant Shintoism. Radical Islamism's enormous strength is that it knows it can rely on the aid and comfort of moderates. It is precisely the fact that the moderate Islamic population is so large that means we should be terrified.

Jim

Edited January 12, 2009 by James Heaps-Nelson

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

James,

In intellectual terms, Peikoff is more on the mark than you are here. The intellectual enemy is organized religion in general, not one faith more than others. There is an intellectual war to be waged against Islam, but it has to be waged against all bodies of thought that place faith over reason as their cornerstone.

The real sneaky and deadly ones were systems of thought that claimed they were based on reason, but as Rand never tired of pointing out, they merely replaced faith in God with faith in society, or faith in others, or a faith in a Fuhrer, etc.

When I mentioned the real enemy to be stamped out above, I was speaking about military measures, i.e., force. Just like Nazism was supposedly stamped out. Moderate Muslims and Sufis are not violent and do not preach bigotry. Radical Islamists engage in both.

But here is the acid test. You speak knowingly of moderate Muslims, which is close to a billion people. How many violent moderate Mulsims do you personally know, or at least how many do you personally know who provide quarter to terrorists, or have give you evidence through acts you personally observed them committing that they would be capable of that?

It's OK to think in principles, but you have to check those principles against reality and modify them if they do not align. That means direct observation. We derive principles from reality. All too often I see Objectivists trying to impose principles on reality. This is the error I see with your thinking here, and this is, underneath, the error of faith.

For peaceful coexistence, contrary to appeasement, I claim that intolerance of Islam in the USA is a clear violation of the First Amendment of the Constitution in the Bill of Rights.

Amendment I

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

The proper battlefield for an intellectual war is on the free market, not with guns. Those who resort to guns to enforce their ideas or religion on others should be put down with guns. Those who do not resort to guns need to be swayed by persuasion, not violence. It doesn't matter how much you disagree with them. Your wishes that they think differently and poor opinion of their religion are not limitations on their rights.

This is Objectivism as I understand it. And, frankly, I want no other.

Why not become good at persuasion instead of preaching a fuzzy kind of intolerance that borders on bigotry? That is the path I am on. You can start here to learn some principles and techniques if you are interested: Robert Cialdini, Persuasion: Science and Practice.

Michael

[ginny]

I believe it's dangerous to dwell too much on the difference between "fanatics" and "moderates" of ANY regime. Fanatics couldn't survive without moderates who tolerate them and won't speak out. I know. I'm German-born. As far as I know, two of my uncles were fervent nazis. The average German (or Muslim) wasn't /isn't bad or evil. The adult Germans I knew as a child did not like Hitler. But they didn't think he was bad enough to fight. I suspect it's the same with today's "average" Muslims. Sure, the fanatics get carried away ... shouldn't really be doing that .... but they are still a part of Allah's children, so they deserve respect.

It's the moderate average Muslims that support stoning a teenage girl for the sake of family honor. Hell, she should have been more obedient in the first place. Punishing a mere girl isn't the same as being a fanatic. Is it? Just like the moderate average German didn't oppose it when his jewish neighbor was being first being forbidden to work and then sent away heaven only knows where. It was only a Jew. He probably should have behaved better in the first place.

I firmly believe the moderate ones allow the fanatics to flourish.

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Ginny,

What would you have done to stop Nazism in Germany as it rose?

What would you have done with the "moderate German"?

And how about the moderate Germans today? Are they different? If so, how and what changed them?

EDIT: The only remedy I can think of in a free society is to hold strong to individual rights and use persuasion. I wager that your average German is just as non-intellectual today as he was back when Nazism was rising.

Michael

[James Heaps-Nelson]

James,

In intellectual terms, Peikoff is more on the mark than you are here. The intellectual enemy is organized religion in general, not one faith more than others. There is an intellectual war to be waged against Islam, but it has to be waged against all bodies of thought that place faith over reason as their cornerstone.

The real sneaky and deadly ones were systems of thought that claimed they were based on reason, but as Rand never tired of pointing out, they merely replaced faith in God with faith in society, or faith in others, or a faith in a Fuhrer, etc.

When I mentioned the real enemy to be stamped out above, I was speaking about military measures, i.e., force. Just like Nazism was supposedly stamped out. Moderate Muslims and Sufis are not violent and do not preach bigotry. Radical Islamists engage in both.

But here is the acid test. You speak knowingly of moderate Muslims, which is close to a billion people. How many violent moderate Mulsims do you personally know, or at least how many do you personally know who provide quarter to terrorists, or have give you evidence through acts you personally observed them committing that they would be capable of that?

It's OK to think in principles, but you have to check those principles against reality and modify them if they do not align. That means direct observation. We derive principles from reality. All too often I see Objectivists trying to impose principles on reality. This is the error I see with your thinking here, and this is, underneath, the error of faith.

For peaceful coexistence, contrary to appeasement, I claim that intolerance of Islam in the USA is a clear violation of the First Amendment of the Constitution in the Bill of Rights.

Amendment I

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

The proper battlefield for an intellectual war is on the free market, not with guns. Those who resort to guns to enforce their ideas or religion on others should be put down with guns. Those who do not resort to guns need to be swayed by persuasion, not violence. It doesn't matter how much you disagree with them. Your wishes that they think differently and poor opinion of their religion are not limitations on their rights.

This is Objectivism as I understand it. And, frankly, I want no other.

Why not become good at persuasion instead of preaching a fuzzy kind of intolerance that borders on bigotry? That is the path I am on. You can start here to learn some principles and techniques if you are interested: Robert Cialdini, Persuasion: Science and Practice.

Michael

Michael,

I agree that the moderate Muslims are not military targets, but they have a choice to make just like the "good" Germans did during WW2. At some point the ramifications of your ideology become increasingly clear. Where are they really in the battle between the West and radical Islam?

It isn't that I don't think other organized religions are capable of the same types of abuses, it's that I think Islam's embrace of jihad puts it in a special category.

I do believe in intolerance, but with engagement. You can't wall yourself off like ARI and expect to convince rather than convert and I don't want converts. Kelley was exactly right on sanction, but he was wrong on judgment and it has certain consequences. Your adversaries know you are wimpy in a delimited, important respect, they know you won't go to the mat when push comes to shove and they know you'd rather avoid offending them than pushing the argument to its logical conclusion. Rand understood this in the scene where Rearden is talking to Floyd Ferris. Rearden knows that Ferris would rather leave the unnamed, unnamed because it gives him moral cover.

Jim

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

James,

Are you interested in engaging in intellectual discussions with moderate Muslims?

You couldn't possibly believe that one billion people are identical and immune to ideas.

Michael

[ginny]

Ginny,

What would you have done to stop Nazism in Germany as it rose?

What would you have done with the "moderate German"?

And how about the moderate Germans today? Are they different? If so, how and what changed them?

EDIT: The only remedy I can think of in a free society is to hold strong to individual rights and use persuasion. I wager that your average German is just as non-intellectual today as he was back when Nazism was rising.

Michael

Michael, that's the scary part. I'm a damned good person. But how do I know what I would do if I'd been brainwashed from day one? Would I have understood the issues? Maybe not. The hell that German's today have to bear is that they can't say for certain how, as individuals, they would have acted. In my case, I happen to know that my family (no, I've never met them) were fanatics. Would I have seen them as family or evil? O

Of course, on the other hand, I do know that when we moved to American (the south, of all places), I went to a school where there were separate buses for whites/blacks. On my bus route, there was only one black girl so she had to ride with us. Of course, she sat by herself. No self-respecting white person could sit next to her. I didn't speak English very well, but I watched this. I was european and didn't know about civil rights and slavery and such crap.

I just didn't think Eva was being treated nicely. That's all I knew. I wasn't trying to be a hero. But I sat next to her. To say that I earned the scored, ridicule and hostility of others is an understatement. But at the age of twelve, I knew I was right. (Ironically, when I mentioned this to Mama Dearest, she had a hissy fit and forbid me to sit next to such a one as Eva. I still didn't obey her and continued sitting where I wanted.)

So maybe i would have stood up to crap in Germany. I think about it, and sure hope so. I can dream, can't I?

Oh - yeah, you're right about German's being largely non-intellectual. Can't rule thinking people. My mother never did know how to read and write. Wasn't a priority in her family. Building a good sound body for the state was.

Goodness, I was such a disappointment to her.

Edited January 12, 2009 by ginny

[tjohnson]

I firmly believe the moderate ones allow the fanatics to flourish.

Right, so we should nuke them all! Seriously though, this is an excellent observation and all the more reason we should mind our own business. We have no business telling muslims how to raise their children and the more we interfere with other cultures the more we risk pissing off the lunatic fringe. Maybe in 100 years muslim women will be equals in their society, who knows? If we are so smart how come our own countries are so screwed up? Why don't we fix are own problems before we go around telling other people how to live?

[James Heaps-Nelson]

James,

Are you interested in engaging in intellectual discussions with moderate Muslims?

You couldn't possibly believe that one billion people are identical and immune to ideas.

Michael

I am, but unless I limited myself to 40,000 books, I couldn't do it in Arabic. I'm not sure what the number is in Farsi. Unless people step out of those languages, they are almost unreachable.

Jim

Edited January 12, 2009 by James Heaps-Nelson

[kiaer.ts]

Bob, I think you go too far in your first post equating Kampf in the title of Hitler's book with jihad. Yes, the two words can serve as translations for each other. But Hitler's book was Mein Kampf. Just a catchy title for an autobiographical work.

Also, the given reason for the first Crusade was the closing of the religious pilgrimage by the Turks. The Arabs had allowed Christians to go to Jerusalem after they conquered it. It was the Turks, when they took over from the Arabs, who stopped this right of pilgrimage. Keep in mind Jerusalem had been under Arab control for four centuries before the Crusades began.

That being said, there is certainly undeniable influence from Hitler to the Ba'athists, and Hitler and the jihadis share influences.

[James Heaps-Nelson]

To get back to an earlier point that Michael made. There is a reason why moderate and extreme Muslims have 1st amendment rights in the United States. It is not tolerance, it is a recognition of rights. We grant those same rights to Neo-Nazis. If we do come to the point where we tolerate Islam in this country like is done in Europe, we will be in real trouble.

Jim

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

... I think Islam's embrace of jihad puts it in a special category.

James,

Not really. Christianity has missionary work as a fundamental premise and it never went away. The barbarism Christians have spread over the centuries in the name of that missionary work is a black stain on humanity.

Jihad will not go away from Islam, ever. It is part of the fundamental doctrine and it is an intellectual mistake to presume that eliminating it from the religion is possible. Looking at the issue from the eyes of Muslims, the problem with modern jihad is that it is being practiced by radical Islamists in an ancient manner.

What is possible is to do to jihad what was done to Christian missionary work: pull the teeth from it. No violence.

The argument that violence is in the Islamic text, so this is impossible, falls flat when you examine Christian texts:

Exodus 22:18

Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live.

Mark 9:47

And if thine eye offend thee, pluck it out: it is better for thee to enter into the kingdom of God with one eye, than having two eyes to be cast into hell fire:

John 11:50

Nor consider that it is expedient for us, that one man should die for the people, and that the whole nation perish not.

(A better translation to make this meaning clear: You do not see that it is in your interest for one man to be put to death for the people, so that all the nation may not come to destruction.)

How about the words of Jesus, the lamb?

Luke 19:27

But those mine enemies, which would not that I should reign over them, bring hither, and slay them before me.

And on and on. All of the arguments against the Qur'an can be raised against the Bible.

Getting Muslims to adopt the universal right to life as an inalienable right is the real intellectual starting point. The way to do this is that they must be convinced that the violent sections of their religious texts were pertinent for another time in history, but not today when nations are built on individual rights.

Once that crack opens, the teeth come out, and jihad will become something like present-day Christian missionary work.

Michael

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

I am, but unless I limited myself to 40,000 books, I couldn't do it in Arabic. I'm not sure what the number is in Farsi. Unless people step out of those languages, they are almost unreachable.

James,

That is a pretty complicated approach. Traveling to another country. Learning a foreign language.

Why not simplify? Don't you know any moderate Muslims, say, in the USA, who speak English?

Michael

[kiaer.ts]

Freedom is not "doing whatever you want." It is action without coercion, either as agent or as patient. A criminal using force is not acting freely in a civil sense, even if he is doing what he wants.

I repeat, when force is involved, neither the victim nor the aggressor is acting freely.

Hence, there is no such thing as the freedom to practice sharia or jihad. Religious freedom allows people to engage only in religious activities which do not include the use of force.

The First Ammendment does not protect criminal conspiracy, which is what mainstream isl@m is. We need to stop allowing immigration of those who do not abjure jihad and sharia. I would simply stop all immigration from m^slims and from all m^slim countries except on a case by case exception. The proper policy is debatable so long as the principle is accepted.

It is because we have freedom of religion that such people should be excluded from the country.

I am sure I will hear that there are many nice m^slims. Good for them. Let them be nice elsewhere. Let them actually mean their oath of citizenship when they pledge to protect and defend the Constitution. Again, freedom of assembly does not mean freedom to assemble to preach sharia and jihad. Those who preach this should be prosecuted, those would-be citizens who patronize such preachers should pay the proper price, exclusion from free society.

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Ted,

You contradict yourself. By your standard, we do not have the freedom to practice Christianity.

The truth is that you also stated the proper standard" giving up coercion. You have the freedom to practice sharia or jihad or anything else you want if you give up initiating force.

I keep repeating that, as a general approach, force needs to be met with force and ideas with ideas. Anything else short of genocide doesn't work.

If you prefer to force others because of their ideas, who would you set up to judge their ideas? You?

We can force others because of their violent acts. Now that I can agree with. I also hold that it should be without mercy for repeat offenders.

Michael

[James Heaps-Nelson]

... I think Islam's embrace of jihad puts it in a special category.

James,

Not really. Christianity has missionary work as a fundamental premise and it never went away. The barbarism Christians have spread over the centuries in the name of that missionary work is a black stain on humanity.

Jihad will not go away from Islam, ever. It is part of the fundamental doctrine and it is an intellectual mistake to presume that eliminating it from the religion is possible. Looking at the issue from the eyes of Muslims, the problem with modern jihad is that it is being practiced by radical Islamists in an ancient manner.

What is possible is to do to jihad what was done to Christian missionary work: pull the teeth from it. No violence.

The argument that violence is in the Islamic text, so this is impossible, falls flat when you examine Christian texts:

Exodus 22:18

Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live.

Mark 9:47

And if thine eye offend thee, pluck it out: it is better for thee to enter into the kingdom of God with one eye, than having two eyes to be cast into hell fire:

John 11:50

Nor consider that it is expedient for us, that one man should die for the people, and that the whole nation perish not.

(A better translation to make this meaning clear: You do not see that it is in your interest for one man to be put to death for the people, so that all the nation may not come to destruction.)

How about the words of Jesus, the lamb?

Luke 19:27

But those mine enemies, which would not that I should reign over them, bring hither, and slay them before me.

And on and on. All of the arguments against the Qur'an can be raised against the Bible.

Getting Muslims to adopt the universal right to life as an inalienable right is the real intellectual starting point. The way to do this is that they must be convinced that the violent sections of their religious texts were pertinent for another time in history, but not today when nations are built on individual rights.

Once that crack opens, the teeth come out, and jihad will become something like present-day Christian missionary work.

Michael

There is a difference in kind even here though. The passages you've quoted from the Bible are not included as one of the pillars of the faith.

In any case, there are ways in which institutional authorities in the United States violate the rights of practitioners of other religions in the United States and those are a question of which rights take precedence. Christian Scientists are forced to give their diabetic children insulin. Jack Mormons can't marry 14 year old girls to 50 year men. Catholics aren't allowed to give sanctuary to illegal immigrants from foreign countries. And on and on.

Jim

[kiaer.ts]

I said:

Freedom is not "doing whatever you want." It is action without coercion, either as agent or as patient. A criminal using force is not acting freely in a civil sense, even if he is doing what he wants.

I repeat, when force is involved, neither the victim nor the aggressor is acting freely.

Hence, there is no such thing as the freedom to practice sharia or jihad. Religious freedom allows people to engage only in religious activities which do not include the use of force.

The First Ammendment does not protect criminal conspiracy, which is what mainstream isl@m is. We need to stop allowing immigration of those who do not abjure jihad and sharia. I would simply stop all immigration from m^slims and from all m^slim countries except on a case by case exception. The proper policy is debatable so long as the principle is accepted.

It is because we have freedom of religion that such people should be excluded from the country.

I am sure I will hear that there are many nice m^slims. Good for them. Let them be nice elsewhere. Let them actually mean their oath of citizenship when they pledge to protect and defend the Constitution. Again, freedom of assembly does not mean freedom to assemble to preach sharia and jihad. Those who preach this should be prosecuted, those would-be citizens who patronize such preachers should pay the proper price, exclusion from free society.

Ted,

You contradict yourself. By your standard, we do not have the freedom to practice Christianity.

The truth is that you also stated the proper standard" giving up coercion. You have the freedom to practice sharia or jihad or anything else you want if you give up initiating force.

I keep repeating that, as a general approach, force needs to be met with force and ideas with ideas. Anything else short of genocide doesn't work.

If you prefer to force others because of their ideas, who would you set up to judge their ideas? You?

We can force others because of their violent acts. Now that I can agree with. I also hold that it should be without mercy for repeat offenders.

Michael

Michael you say that I contradict myself, but where in any mainstream Christian faith is there the admonition to initiate force? You simply assert that I have contradicted myself, but offer no evidence from either my own words or facts in the field.

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

There is a difference in kind even here though. The passages you've quoted from the Bible are not included as one of the pillars of the faith.

James,

Not today.

You need to read history if you don't believe these things were not organizing principles and justifications of prior brutality, i.e., "pillars of faith."

Michael

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

... there is no such thing as the freedom to practice sharia or jihad. Religious freedom allows people to engage only in religious activities which do not include the use of force.

Ted,

If sharia and jihad are practiced without violence, there is such a thing as freedom to practice them. (It's in the constitution.)

Claiming this freedom does not exist and does exist at the same time is the contradiction.

NOTE: Sharia cannot replace the nation's laws, but so long as it is practiced as subordinate to USA law, there is the freedom to practice it.

Michael

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

... but where in any mainstream Christian faith is there the admonition to initiate force?

Ted,

Thank goodness there no longer isn't (except for some fringe kooks). But there has been. And it has been "mainstream."

To my understanding, the fact that it no longer exists in today's mainstream means both the military war and the intellectual war have been won on this one point against Christianity.

I believe the same must happen with Islam.

You do not win an intellectual war by abandoning your principles and walking off the battlefield. We stand for something. And we stand against something. Both are important.

Michael

[kiaer.ts]

... there is no such thing as the freedom to practice sharia or jihad. Religious freedom allows people to engage only in religious activities which do not include the use of force.

Ted,

If sharia and jihad are practiced without violence, there is such a thing as freedom to practice them. (It's in the constitution.)

Claiming this freedom does not exist and does exist at the same time is the contradiction.

Okay Mike, I understand. By that reasoning, murder and rape are also protected acts, so long as no force is involved. See - no contradiction.

If you want to redefine sharia and jihad to mean something other than religious dictatorship based on the Qur'an and religious war, feel free.

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

If you want to redefine sharia and jihad to mean something other than religious dictatorship based on the Qur'an and religious war, feel free.

Ted,

You seem to employ this same process in defining Christianity.

But no, I don't "define" sharia and jihad one way or another. That is for Muslims to do. (Just like Christians.) I do define individual rights and so long as a foreign people want to live in my country, I demand they observe these rights. The rest is the rest.

Michael

[James Heaps-Nelson]

I am, but unless I limited myself to 40,000 books, I couldn't do it in Arabic. I'm not sure what the number is in Farsi. Unless people step out of those languages, they are almost unreachable.

James,

That is a pretty complicated approach. Traveling to another country. Learning a foreign language.

Why not simplify? Don't you know any moderate Muslims, say, in the USA, who speak English?

Michael

Sure I do, but not outside of work. Also, why the presumption?

In any case, I've had plenty of opportunity to discuss middle Eastern affairs with moderate Islamic Arabs from foreign countries in graduate school (having gotten a chemical engineering and petroleum refining graduate degree did have some ancillary benefits). I also learned a lot. I had a Kuwaiti friend and asked him why Americans are so disliked in the Middle East. He said it goes way beyond the Palestinian conflict with Israel. He said that Americans value Arab lives less and are willing to use Arab countries as geopolitical chess pieces. His main point and it is a valid one was the Iran/Iraq war. The US supplied armaments through various channels to both sides of the conflict and a million people died.

Going further back in foreign policy, Indonesians are rightfully bitter at the United States for the CIA propping up the Suharto dictatorship in the 1960's which killed another million people.

Your presumption that I have not done exactly as you suggest is incorrect.

Jim