There is very much a danger when you pit one religion against another religion, which is exactly what is happening. Bush's crusading attitude simply fuels the fire of extremism.... By demonizing the enemy, by polarizing a situation into only 2 possibilities, i.e. you are either us, or you are with the terrorists...there is automatically an extremist situation. They are bad, and in a black and white world, that would mean that we are automatically good and justified in all that we do. Very dangerous thinking, which leads to rationalization of actions that are themselves not really good actions....
Yes, yes, we agree it is a clash of civilzations, but that is why we need always to act like the civilized and secularly driven...which we don't. We cannot evaluate our actions as good, just because we are not as bad as they are.....
How do we translate this idea pre 9/11? I would say those actions were extreme, and came before the war on terrorism. You say Bush is fueling the fire, but it has already been burning out of control. Many people are adding fuel to the fire, and it did not begin with this president. The Middle East's anger with the West mainly stems from our support of Israel. As long as Israel is our ally, the Middle East will continue to hate us. So what do we do at this point? We are not going to turn our backs on the Israelis. They have proven to be a greater friend to the U.S. than any other country in that region.
How do you reason with someone who has no desire to reason with you? How do you reason with a person who is willing to sacrifice his/her life for their religion? How do you reason with an idealogy that sees yours as an abomination to be destroyed? How do you reason with someone who knows no reason. How do you reason with someone who would kil you for not following their ideaalogy? How do you reason with somone calling for a sentence of death for a cartoon?
You question is totally irrelevant since neither me, my spouse or my children have any desire or inclination to kill, or inflict pain upon the other over our idealogical differences. Is this the best you can come up with regarding how to answer any of the questions I posed?
I see. I think the thing is is that I'm reading it as if I'm looking over the shoulder of the author,( think detached observer) whereas you seem to be reading the same thing as an entertained reader. ( think participant)