Girl - I actually never went to ‘madrassah’ there. Neither did anyone in my family. We did go to school to learn a for apple etc and wrote a GCSE exam for Islamic Studies…apart from regular science/mathy stuff. The pigs and apes comment…I believe you’re referring to what the little girl was saying in the movie. Quite honestly, that’s just disgusting and unfair to the mold-able little child and if I personally heard someone teaching their kids that I won’t hesitate in telling them that they are idiots in having that sort of a mentality. Imams…the mosques I have been to and heard the Imams speak…I haven’t heard anyone hinting to the congregation to go out and kill the ‘infidels’. I did hear one imam present a very wrong factual information at some point…I think it had something to do with mosques in Switzerland…I went home and googled it up and indeed the imam was off. I admit I only shared the correct info with my family and we discussed how you can’t give wrong information to people who think you’re the all-knowing because it just creates more trouble. This other mosque had a weird Imam who liked to use strange TV show examples…it just didn’t make sense. We stopped going there and told other family members that the Imam was incompetent…no I didn’t go and question him (why, you will ask. I had to return to Waterloo and never returned to the mosque). People have walked out on that guy because really, he’s stupid and shouldn’t be an imam.

I have been threatened here, by a bunch of white girls haha. In high school actually which was a while ago. I’ll have to relate the story later though. Also, I have heard Iman Hirsi Ali and Wafa Sultan before…for now I will just say that they have had terrible experiences which is always unfortunate. But I need to go back and listen to what they said…another job for later.

BillyHW - Thanks for the suggestion. I really like the rye bread here, I think I will stay.

Well, as a fellow female, I’m, uh, glad you’ve got your clit. Don’t know what I’d do without mine.

Muslimah, I know what I’d like you to do. I won’t say give up Islam, because it would be like bashing my head against a wall. But how about pushing back? Has your Imam ever said anything stupid? Did you challenge him? What about these gawdawful anti-semitic Apartheid Weeks on campus? How about pushing back? You were schooled in Pakistan - I know you must have been in a madrassa at some point. If you were a boy (I would not expect this of a girl), I would have wanted you to question and argue the points about pigs and apes, and about conquest and dhimmitude and jihad. But now that you’re in a safe country, I want you to do it here. Where you’re safe.

And if you are ever threatened for it, I want you to tell me.

RG

PS - It’s earth hour… shouldn’t you have the computer off??

Alex, no I don’t have a blog, I can hardly get my school work done as it is!

Like what? The Bible?

I have no time for zealots, Bill, regardless of their religion.

Muslimah: good comments. I think you’re wrong about about being twisted and taken out of context - the words in the Quaran are pretty black and white. The Christian Bible is, likewise, full of misogyny, murder, and mayhem - the difference being that Christianity has over hundreds of years managed to become more civilized, while Islam is still a very violent and controlling religion. I’m glad that your family is normal, and that you presumably attend a Mosque which doesn’t preach hatred and violence, but that does very little to offset the horrid situation in much of the middle-east, where a person can be executed for the horrible crime of being a homosexual or for daring to convert away from Islam. Or where a woman can be jailed and beaten for daring to have a cup of coffee with a male coworker.

Also, if you take a look at this survey of American Muslims you might understand why I find your argument less-than-compelling.

As for why the York students weren’t given the opportunity to respond, that’s easy: because they demanded it. If they had mailed in a polite and thoughtful letter to the editor, it would have probably been published. If they had asked nicely, they might even have been given some space for a small column. Instead they acted like a bunch of idiots, throwing a temper-tantrum and demanding to be heard. My response to anyone making such demands would have been simple: “Go f*** yourself”.

I really enjoyed reading your thoughts, though. Do you have a blog of your own?

I know what you mean. We Catholics have wacko fantatics like Mother Teresa and Pope John Paul II. All Jesus, all the time.

And you Muslims have Osamba bin Laden and Moqtada al-Sadr. Mohammed this, Mohammed that.

It’s practically the same thing.

Kind of like how Christians invented airplanes and Muslims invented crashing airplanes into buildings. And how Jesus healed a 9-year old girl, and Mohammed bedded a nine-year old girl.

Two sides of the same exact coin.

Also, there are Muslims speaking against this craziness, I don’t think those things get publicized because they don’t fly. I still don’t understand why the York students were not given an opportunity to respond to Steyn’s article (yes I know the publishers have the right to choose their content and all that jazz, but still, why not?).

Violence is easy and highly destructive. It’s unfortunate (an understatement) that many so-called Muslims rely on it to fight for what they believe is right.

“Fitna” is provocative (as intended) and scary because the things shown in it are happening for real. Muslims all over are going to protest against it and in doing so do all kinds of crazy things which doesn’t help. I watched parts of it (time constraint) and I mostly just felt sad at the state of things. Not angry, not offended, just sad at the hopeless of the situation. To me it seems like a vicious cycle, Muslims react to what they believe is persecuting them (I am a part of “them” but I don’t think kidnapping “foreigner” or burning down KFCs is a great, then more provocation in any form comes along and then there’s more reaction to that…and it goes on. What started it? I don’t think I have an in-depth understanding of a lot of intertwined issues to answer that.

Islam - I really do think it has been grotesquely twisted and much of it has been taken entirely out of context. Don’t bother quoting the verses from the Quran; I’ve seen them all before. My giant family is very Islamic and I’ve never been taught to hate anyone or be intolerant or force anyone into adopting my way of life. We’re not “moderate” Muslims, we’re “practising” Muslims and yet I think we don’t like all this Islam-related violence any more than you do. We are frustrated, though. As if every day challenges (family, money, school, job security, health)aren’t enough, we’re (esp the younger generation) constantly struggling to deal with such sentiments. Most “normal” Muslims also just feel helpless (we need more Muslims writing in newspapers, blogs, whatnot) and therefore just carry on without taking any action.

I wasn’t planning to blow anything up or lodge any complaints; just wanted to know what people wanted to say to the “Devil” herself (bad joke?). I am broke because I’ve put myself through 5 years of University (5 years not because I failed, but because degree requirement was to work for 20 months) and I’m about 26 days away from being done undergrad and I am counting on tax-return money to pay rent for one more month, buy coffee and caraway seed rye bread. So, I am the regular kind of bankrupt. Also need to pay back OSAP money.

I don’t plan to give up my religion, I do hope I can make some sort of positive change…no, that doesn’t involve bombing the “infidels” or anything like that. I did go through a GCSE schooling system and I like to read a lot, plus English isn’t my mother tongue and knowing spellings was important when I was still learning it.

This has been fun. Thanks for the questions/comments.

But there’s a torrent on http://www.mininova.org

http://www.samizdata.net/blog have also got a live link that works.