I understand that you think they should feel that, but I'm not getting any closer to understanding what you're basing that on.
Let's return to my neighbour, let's call him Ali. I'm pretty sure he doesn't approve of Sharia as practised in Sudan. Other things he doesn't approve of include parking fines, me playing loud music, the war in Iraq, and identity cards. He's also got a job with long hours, young kids, a nagging mother-in-law. What exactly would you have him do?
If he happens to be on the internet and happens to read a thread such as this, then expressing that this is a misinterpretation of Islam (in his view) and deserving of condemnation does not take too much effort.
It would be of greater help if Muslim authority figures (who they are is a matter of debate) make it explicitly clear what is acceptable in their eyes and what is not. Is the issuing of Fatwas against people acceptable (in my view it is both immoral and illegal)? Is the unequal treatment of women fair (in my view it is immoral)? Is the condemnation of homosexuality right (in my view it is immoral)? These kinds of questions could do with a lot more clarity and straight answers, rather than accusing the people asking the questions of being unfair.
When David Koresh set fire to himself and fifty other people, did you demand that moderate Christians distance themselves from him? What about when that nut shot Rabin? Should I - or let's say my mother, who vaguely believes in the religion in a wishy-washy CofE type way - have publicly disassociated herself from his group? Why? She's from fecking Yorkshire, it was sod all to do with her.
If I remember rightly the various Church leaders roundly condemned Koresh and his actions. But there is a difference in this situation: Koresh's cult was tiny, with very few followers. Islamic extremism has many many followers in the world today, so you can forgive people for wanting to ask "Are their actions representative of true Islam? What exactly is the belief system here? What is actually written in the Qur'an?"
I've heard worse, but the common implication that all religious believers are fools is Dawkinsesque silliness, which clearly doesn't accord with the reality that many of our finest minds have been and are religious.
I think this may be a matter of semantics. I think of someone as 'sensible' if they reject all beliefs and opinions that are clearly incorrect. That of course does not make everyone who is not sensible a fool.
Many of the great thinkers and scientists in our past have been religious, Isaac Newton is commonly cited as the leading one of these. However, he wasted much of his life trying to find scientific 'clues' in the bible. A great mind yes, but I would hardly describe him as 'sensible'.
"Newton also wrote on Judaeo-Christian prophecy, whose decipherment was essential, he thought, to the understanding of God. His book on the subject, which was reprinted well into the Victorian Age, represented lifelong study. Its message was that Christianity went astray in the 4th century AD, when the first Council of Nicaea propounded erroneous doctrines of the nature of Christ. The full extent of Newton's unorthodoxy was recognized only in the present century: but although a critic of accepted Trinitarian dogmas and the Council of Nicaea, he possessed a deep religious sense, venerated the Bible and accepted its account of creation. In late editions of his scientific works he expressed a strong sense of God's providential role in nature."
Its not a big issue to me who considers who to be sensible though, it's highly subjective. I'd prefer if people who hold ludicrous beliefs had now part in making the laws though (Newton's Laws of motion apart
).
I think it depends on the context. In the current climate, it's very tricky. We're currently at war with two Muslim states, the Iraq one in particular on pretty dubious grounds.. A lot of Muslims are inevitably going to feel split identity, and will feel that being asked to condemn Muslim regimes abroad as barbaric is implicitly being asked to support the so-called War on Terror. Now they might be wrong about that, but in the circumstances a little sensitivity might not do any harm, and not doing any harm seems a wise ambition in the current climate.
If the 'moderate' Muslims feel that the actions of some 'Muslim states' are immoral or indefensible, and they try to dissociate themselves from them, then they should similarly NOT feel it an attack on them personally when these countries actions are attacked verbally or physically? I don't think you can have it both ways.
You can't say that the actions of a 'Muslim state' are nothing to do with 'your faith', but then turn around and claim it to be an assault on 'your faith' if they are attacked surely?
