DESPICABLE TO WHIP UP BIGOTRY OVER MOSQUE

The people who started the furor over the "Mosque" (actually an Islamic cultural center with a Mosque inside it) are either incredibly stupid or so morally despicable that they don't care whether they spark off mob action and a witchhunt against the Muslim minority in this country. The majority of Muslims still don't support, in fact deplore, the terroristic actions of the 19 Al Qaida members who allegedly crashed planes into buildings on 9/11. (It is unclear how the U.S. government was able to identify the hijackers within hours of 9/11 and a number of the alleged hijackers have since turned up alive.) But leaving all that aside, there were 19 alleged hijackers, Osama bin Laden, and a few other Al Qaida leaders who knew about the planned action in advance and helped organize it. That adds up to 25 to 50 people. It is a no brainer that you cannot conclude that all of the estimated one billion to one and a half billion Muslims in the world are responsible for the actions of 25 to 50.

Some who would inflict authoritarian restrictions on all Muslims, and even a few Uncle Tom Muslims, argue that because of the crisis brought about by 9/11, the Muslim community should understand the need for heightened security measures and restrictions on them. We should only need to remind ourselves of the numbers involved to reject that argument. Consider -- if an individual security officer, or an entire government agency, is watching out for terrorists, is singling out a person solely because he or she is a Muslim really the best stategy for success when the probability of catching a terrorist is only 25 to 50 divided by one to one and a half billion?

The actual number of Muslims supporting Al Qaida is probably in the thousands or tens of thousands. (The numbers are likely to become considerably larger if demogogues of the ilk of Palin and Gingrich continue to whip up anti Muslim bigotry!) So the probability of an individual Muslim being a terrorist is still only ten thousand divided by a billion, or one in one hundred thousand -- a target that is hardly the most productive for law enforcement or security attention.

And since the Constitution of the United States guarantees freedom of religion to its citizens, Americans are prohibited by the constitution that they profess to hallow from singling out a particular religion for heightened discrimination because of something done by one one hundred thousandth of their members.

When those who are opposing the Mosque near Ground Zero are told all this, many retreat one step back and protest that while Muslims have the right to build a Mosque near Ground Zero, one should not necessarily do something merely because they have a right to do so, and that Muslims should be "sensitive" to the feelings of those victimized by 9/11. Excuse me! As we have seen, the majority of Muslims are no more responsible for or guilty of 9/11 than the rest of us. Hence they have no special obligation to be extra "sensitive" to the feelings of the victims of 9/11. And the most rational course for the victims of 9/11 is to find out who is actually responsible for what they suffered from 9/11 before directing their retaliation against them and not strike out blindly against any target that bears the most superficial resemblance to the perpetrators of 9/11. If they want to strike out against those who did 9/11 to them, they had best find out who actually did it to them before striking out.

And demagogues such as Palin and Gingrich are either incredibly stupid or so morally despicable that there are literally no words to convey the depth of their despicability for playing with fire when they whip up anti Muslim bigotry over the location of a Mosque!









al Qaida