How 'bout building a Quaker meeting house near a Womans clinic whos' doctor was killed by a pro-lifer, would you be offended?

45 Park Place in Manhattan, the former Burling...Image via Wikipedia
Do to the nature of the issue I don't think there is a distance that would make difference to most that oppose the Cordoba center. The local community had no problem with the building. It made it past the local zoning process.It is with attention it has been given by those outside of Manhattan that has made this a flash point.



Sinclair Louis commented that he saw fascism coming to the US wrapped in the flag and carrying a cross. I'm afraid this is what is happening. Lets look at the language being used. The common thread is that the community that will be using the Cordoba house will be not 'us' that it is being built for 'them'. That 'they' are insulting 'our' memory. This is the language of exclusion. 'They' who are building this community center are 'us'. They are Americans.

There is a general demonizing of Islam and those who attempt it's following. It is language like: 'you can take your "Islam affirmatively protects" language and shove it.' that stops debate. It is inflammatory and aggressive. In the face of that, it takes a strong and practiced response not to posture or fight. Most of us have not mastered this restraint. I was raised in in Islam. I was taught Islam is submission to the most high, to mercy, and compassion. The way it was practiced in my house, and community many things where 'affirmatively protected', freedom from compulsions in religion, the weak and innocent, the rights of all people regardless of race, ethnicity, gender, or sexual orientation. Why don't more 'progressive' and 'moderate' practitioners of Islam speak up? Because no one wants them to. When they do they are told to 'shove it'; or that they are spreading 'mis/disinformation'. Having Islam and by extension it's followers as anything other than hateful, evil and destructive does not suit the currently plot line.

This is problem of all of us.

There is hatred, fear and chauvinism in every culture. This triad is used to motivate people to do things they normally wouldn't. It's most often used to justify the most horrendous act of violence and cruelty. It doesn't take much of a survey of history to see this. In this country it is reflected in the way various minority groups have been treated in the past; from the Natives, the Africans,
the Irish, Jews and the various groups/families of a given town or region. It extends to the treatment of anyone called criminal.

The issue of whether or not the Cordoba Center can be built in the old Burlington Coat Factory is up to those who live in the neighbor hood. The demonizing of a billion+ people is a problem for all of us.


This is cross posted here on google buzz Questions-for-the-people-who-dont-want-a-new-mosque
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