But British born Indians have a totally different experience.
Here is a great article Times of UK by Aatish Taseer The reporter brings an intersting perspective being half-Indian and half-Pakistani born in Britain. Interesting ..Check it out guys !!!

The article is interesting, but does not address why this phenomenon is uniquely affecting the Muslim community as opposed to other non-Muslim immigrant communities. For example, Japanese-Americans, German-Americans, Italian Americans did not turn against the society into which they immigrated from their countries (which were at war with the American nation at the time). Also , the second group of bombers were not British born, and had immigrated there of their (apparently) own free will from Sudan etc. They came to Britain of their own free will and were not born into a culture which they perceived as alien. And if they saw elements in British society that they disapproved of, why didn't they target those specifically, rather than random attacks ? I think the article is incomplete in its analysis.
Though the article does reveal a disturbing trend in the minds of young Muslims.

Manish

The article is not about Muslims in the Midlands - it is about Muslims in Yorkshire and the North - Midlands is Birmingham, Leicester, Nottingham, Coventry etc

I grew up in an area with a good mixture of Indians and Pakistanis. There is one thing I want armchair theorists to give me an opinion on before I launch into a major discussion on this issue. In your opinion, why is it that Sikhs and Hindus who have faced in-your-face racism and violence have not resorted to fascism as a 'reaction' to the situation of disadvantage and marginalisation within British society in the way that SOME members of the British Pakistani community have?

Given that we too are discriminated against and are the descendants of factory working immigrants and have the same historical-colonial background and context?

I want to get your (and anybody elses) thoughts on this matter before I offer the rest of my perspective.

... it is about Muslims in Yorkshire and the North - Midlands is Birmingham, Leicester, Nottingham, Coventry etc

Thanks, fixed.

Here I a quoting Rajeev Srinivasan from the following blog entry http://rajeev2004.blogspot.com/

"In any case, British subcontinentals toiled away for years, but their destinies could not be more different. The Muslims tended to have far more babies, not to educate their children, and to easily become fundamentalists: for instance there is the curious case of British Pakistani Aurangazeb who 'innocently wandered over the Line of Control into India,' which is Orwellian doublespeak meaning 'terrorist infiltrator.' The Hindus and Sikhs, on the other hand, prospered and moved out of the ghettos in the grimy industrial towns. The obvious difference: religion."

This was written even before 9/11 ...

I urge people to not refer to me Indian as South Asian. Please Please don't do that. We have NOTHING in common with Pakistanis/Bangladeshis except that they were Hindus as well 60-700 years ago. By clubbing Indian with South Asian Identity, we are just implying that Indians share same values and ideas as terrorists on 7/7. Do you ever hear any Pakistani calling themselves South Asian???

Aatish Taseer's comments are spot on, note his Indian half is actually sikh and his fiancee is (HOT!!) British royalty --

As a half-Indian, half-Pakistani with British citizenship, I have observed the gulf between what it means to be British Pakistani and British Indian. To be Indian is to come from a safe, ancient country and, more recently, from an emerging power. In contrast, to be Pakistani is to begin with a depleted idea of nationhood. In the almost 58 years that Pakistan has been a country, it has been a dangerous, violent place defined by hatred of the other — India. Its national image has been tarnished

We have NOTHING in common with Pakistanis/Bangladeshis...

1. That isn't even factually correct on the face of it. It's especially wrong with the 2nd gen in the diaspora.

2. It's morally despicable to throw overboard all your Westernized/atheist Muslim professional friends who abhor the fundies. Or maybe you don't know any.

3. One uses South Asian to refer to shared culture, Indian to refer to nation-specific politics or culture. That is as it should be.

4. Just as I respect your right to label yourself, respect my right reciprocally.

This whole debate on whether Hindus and Sikhs want to be associated with Pakistanis any more misses the point - there are things that British-Indians like me can tell you about what has gone wrong with SOME British Pakistanis that can be very helpful for all to hear - and we can help Muslim Pakistanis if they are willing to listen (no matter how harsh the criticism might sound)

The question is, is anyone listening and is anyone willing to face up to some harsh criticism?

The first step is to listen up and stop making excuses for the fascist ideology that has latched onto British Pakistani Islam - no excuses for fascism, full stop.

Actually to be honest I think the rift might be too big - and so what I say is more in lament than in hope of changing anything, but if anyone is willing to listen, and not let the discussion veer away into another 'Dont-Call-Me-South Asian!' punch up, we could actually have a fruitful thread here - but you have to nip that in the bud (the debate was had on another thread earlier and it wont advance things if this spins out of control again)

Who is up for it?

Do you ever hear any Pakistani calling themselves South Asian???

Do you? or are you too busy crossing to walk on the other side of the street so nobody thinks you're one of *those* filthy types...

Abhimanyu, I realize it is the writer not necessarily you saying those things. Just representing the devil's advocate...

-my comment was not personally directed at you, same as you were quoting an article

If you want to have that debate it would mean firm referring by whoever controls the comment board to make sure that the discussion stays on topic and does not veer into the 'Dont Associate Me With Pakistanis' area that has been beathen like a dead horse on Sepia Mutiny in the past and very recently too.

Manish,

If you read the article you linked to, perhaps you too would be wary of asserting
cultural brotherhood with people who reject decency and humanity for their "extra-national" dream of an Islamic world. Nothing matters to these fanatics
other than "the Islamic nation and its Arab culture." Certainly, these guys have themselves rejected their Pakistani identity - not to mention any South Asian one.

And it is disgraceful to term this pathology as a "demanding of their rights".

I share the opinion that racism, by itself, cannot account for the trend towards violence by some Pakistani youth in the UK. There are other Muslims in the UK besides Pakistanis – Bangladeshis, Arabs, East Africans, etc. These other Muslims have probably faced discrimination, but have not resorted to criminality, with the exception of the four remarkably inept East Africans who attempted a copycat attack on the subway on 7/21. What must be particularly infuriating about that attack was that the Eritrean fellow collected nearly $60,000 in welfare benefits over 10 years. So it’s okay to take the infidels money, but feel free to blow them up if you disagree with their politicians.

The Taseer article does bring some useful insight, particularly this bit:

“As a half-Indian, half-Pakistani with British citizenship, I have observed the gulf between what it means to be British Pakistani and British Indian. To be Indian is to come from a safe, ancient country and, more recently, from an emerging power. In contrast, to be Pakistani is to begin with a depleted idea of nationhood. In the almost 58 years that Pakistan has been a country, it has been a dangerous, violent place defined by hatred of the other — India. Its national image has been tarnished “

That older Pakistanis living in Britain despair over the laziness of their British-born children means that national-origin is not a good enough explanation. There are two contributing factors. One is the increased Arabization of Pakistani youth, which we’ve discussed at length on different threads. The other is the role of women. Many young Pakistani women are sent back to Pakistan once they are teenagers, where they miss out on the educational opportunities that are available to their Indian and Afro-Carribean neighbors. Such women have more children than they can handle, and have no marketable skills. While Hindu and Sikh girls in the UK also experience family pressure in matters of dating and marriage, their families seem to push them as hard as their brothers to do well in school.

In other brown news, the current issue of Reason has an interview with Salman Rushdie. It does not seem to be available online. And noted Lahore-based journalist Ahmed Rashid has a piece in the Daily Telegraph”

“Why Tolerance is not on the curriculum in Pakistan”
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2005/08/01/wislam01.xml&sSheet=/news/2005/08/01/ixnewstop.html

Manish, On your comment No.7 - For good reasons, I dont agree with point 3 & 4. But am not going to get into it and change the focal point of the discussion. Fair enough to say that not all of us see eye to eye on that notion.
Having said that, Punjabi Boy - would love to hear your thoughts. I know that you have already written it up, and have your fingers on the 'POST' button :)

for the record, i'm not an 'atheist Muslim.' can there really be an 'atheist Muslim,' as there can be an 'atheist Jew' or 'atheist Hindu' (both these religions have a strong cultural-ethnic connotation).

I just linked that article as it was written by someone who can identify better with British Asians situation. (As opposed to other British reporters).
"South Asian" title debate is not relevant here.

I like what Fareed Zakaria said on ABC's "This Week" :
"There will always be some ideology that dis-affected youth gravitate to. Few decades ago it was Marxism, or Che. What we have to do is to dis-credit the ideology"

I met a young woman who grew up in West Yorkshire here in NYC and she told me that in her suburban community teens hung out within their separate groups, unlike when they were children.

Also, I have started to read Nadeem Aslam's "Maps for Lost Lovers" where the characters are Pakistani-Brits (1st and 2nd gen). He points out many problems, not w/ Islam itself, but with the way people in this small, poor town practice it. Girls are married off to their cousins in Pakistan, but it does not waork out all the time. The author notes that everyone is worried about what others will think of them. And also, not everyone has choices or feels as if they do, so they keeps repeating the same bad choices: arranged marriage, beating their children, rejecting anyone white the kids bring home, etc.

why is it that Sikhs and Hindus who have faced in-your-face racism and violence have not resorted to fascism as a 'reaction' to the situation of disadvantage and marginalisation within British society in the way that SOME members of the British Pakistani community have?

i think it's bcuz these religions allow for personal growth and exploration which filters down into our daily thinking. We don't just accept what is told to us, we question and reason with things until they make enough sense. We pay attn to our world and religion and try to find the balance we need.I think from that, many hindus/sikhs view the enemy not so much as being white people, muslims, etc, but the true enemy being poverty. It is to be avoided at all costs. The British did ransack india and there are many who hate the british to this day for it, but I think we internalized early that the biggest weakness they dealt us was poverty, and that education was the only way out.

Contrast that w/ the Pakistani situation, where Islam rules everyday thinking, life is dictated by the book. The book says the enemy is not poverty, but the enemy is british, hindu, christian, jew, all nonbelievers etc etc. Therefore, there is honor in being poor and in strongarming your way to bending ppl to your will. It's completely similar to gangster style behavior but w/ the caveat of a 'higher calling.'Plus it's a lot easier to control the masses when they're all following one line of thinking instead of having to deal w/ personal freedoms.

I'd like to hear Punjabi Boy's views on this topic as well.

"I'd like to hear Punjabi Boy's views on this topic as well."

I dont know if it is possible to talk frankly about this without giving ammunition to Pakistani-Haters - but there are some misconceptions about the root of it that have to be faced up to.

wow lovin, people who are hindus and sikh are so contemplative and spiritual! that's why india is so egalitarian socially compared to pakistan, right?

i want to hear PB's thoughts too. (nice pictures would be appreciated)

To break it down even more, it's not even Pakistani Muslims, but the Sunnis and the Wahhabis. My director (with whom I did a movie about a Pakistani Shia festival) is a Brit Pakistani who is constantly cussing non-Shia Muslims for being so intolerant. He's having to go on the radio constantly these days to defend Islam, but his fury is at the "backwards" Muslims. To be fair, he also has conflicts with his Middle Eastern Shia bosses because he thinks they ignore Sufi traditions and are too different from South Asians.

I read this Hanif Kureshi essay last week in some Granta compilation book, about him going to Pakistan, and this intellectual clinging to him, despairing about how all the educated and progessive Pakistanis flee, leaving only the radicals to take the country back to the 8th century, and how the older generation misses the dancing and freedom of '70s and '80s Pakistan. It was really depressing. People like my director, and his buddy Aki Nawaz are always going on and on about how great Pakistan is, but I notice no one seems to be rushing to move there.

why is it that Sikhs and Hindus who have faced in-your-face racism and violence have not resorted to fascism as a 'reaction' to the situation of disadvantage and marginalisation within British society in the way that SOME members of the British Pakistani community have?

Well, to start with, the extremists have created a framework where they can get the marginalized muslims into their thinking. It has a lot to do with the historial context of Islam today - The extremists in Political Islam hasn't come to grips with the powerless 500 years. To top that there is a clear aggression against Muslim states by the West as recently demonstrated in Iraq. In the extremist framework, they are treated equal, hailed as a hero, and dead in the end - at the end, it is about stupidity.

One uses South Asian to refer to shared culture, Indian to refer to nation-specific politics or culture. That is as it should be.

says who? I am one of those ppl who absolutely hates the term South Asian. It implies that I have to be classified as something so that some idiot w/o knowledge of the world can mentally comprehend my heritage.

My parents worked too hard in this country to be marginalized and lumped together so that they could lose their identity. I'm Indian, not South Asian. Unlike the USA, where each state culturally more or less mixes together, India is a true democracy seeing that it's a union of multiple states which in an of themselves are mini-nations. Thus to say we're South Asian is to get away from the pride and accomplishments of Indian heritage and world standing.

re: najeeb, the analogy with hindus and siks with muslims breaks down in part because islam is not analogous with the former religions in many ways. it is a transnational, confessional and universalistic religion with a long history of "interaction" (to put it mildly) with christendom. deracinated south asian muslims have many off-the-shelf motifs to select from because of their affinity with their middle eastern coreligionists. if, for example, england 'liberated' khalistan from india, but decided to run it as a puppet regime, how many british sikhs would remain as depoliticized as they are now? the fiasco with sikhs destroying theaters and protesting violently a few months back in relation to 'insults' to their religion suggests to me that monsters lurk within all human minds, though the structure and history of islam allow the expression of those monsters more frequently.

Looks like even younger recruits are now being targetted.

Youth wing of UK Muslim group calls for jihad

01.08.05

By Shiv Malik

Children as young as 11 are being targeted by radical Muslims who appear to have infiltrated a mainstream Muslim website, The Independent on Sunday can reveal. Literature aimed at children between 11 and 18 on the youth section of the Islamic Society of Britain (ISB) website calls on them to "boycott those who openly wage war against Allah".

The article containing that quote, entitled "Imam Hassan al-Banna on jihad", goes on to say: "Jihad is a powerful invigorating yearning for Islam's might and glory ... which makes you cry when looking at the weakness of Muslims today and the humiliating tragedies crushing him to death everywhere. "

Jihad is to be a soldier for Allah. When the bugle calls ... you should be the first to answer the call to join the ranks for jihad."

Other articles on atheism and secularism appear to be against integration. One article is entitled "Zionism, a black historical record", and another, "Israel simply has no right to exist". The ISB immediately disowned this content after being informed of it by the IoS, and promised to remove it.

In a statement, a spokesman said: "We were not aware of the material being on the website and it is not in agreement and consistency with the ethos and message of the organisation. We will immediately look at this and remove anything that is disagreeable and apologise for any offence that has been caused."

Nadeem Malik, a vice-president of the ISB, added that the literature was the responsibility of the organisation's youth wing, Young Muslims, which has a degree of autonomy. "Anything that is there is within the remit of the ISB," he said. "I'm not going to justify what is on there. But if it is on there it is a very small part of a much bigger structure that is very much against those views."

He added that the ISB and Young Muslims UK were merged in 1994, and internal debate has created a contradiction of views in the organisation. At the heart of that debate is whether Muslims interpret the Koran literally or within its historical context.

This has led to a situation where the mainstream of Muslims in the UK believe in integration, while a small, vocal minority is opposed to Muslims living within a non-Muslim structure of law and education. Hizb ut-Tahrir, which is non-violent, is one example of the radical groups.

It is made up of professionals - managers, academics and doctors - and has a membership of between 2,000 and 3,000. But its strict interpretation of the Koran leads it to instruct its members not to vote in a political system dominated by Kaffirs, or unbelievers. During this year's election, its members were told that to vote was forbidden by God.

- INDEPENDENT

The first thing is to recognise that the rise in Islamic militancy within British Pakistanis is a form of ideological fascism that has specific roots which have played on real difficulties that Pakistanis, in particular Mirpuris, have had with integrating or adapting to British society - and that we have to approach this problem with the aim of 'understanding' only in as much as you try to understand the very real feelings of marginalisation and dispossession a white working class Nazi skinhead who actively engages in violence and the propagation of his racist ideology.

The first thing is to say that the old paradigms we use to understand this phenomenon are busted - enough of the 'blame it on racism and poverty' mantra - you have to be brave and talk frankly - and I can, because I grew up with Mirpuris and can tell you how things have changed in England over the last 15 years and I have seen it all with my own eyes and I even predicted a while back that something like this would happen.

To start with, here is an article by Shiv Malik from the New Statesman that is helpful. I dont know how long it will be available online so I will paste some of it here:

External factors such as institutional racism, cultural ignorance and Islamophobia have placed great strains on community/ police relationships, but there are also factors internal to Britain's northern Pakistani Muslim community that aren't so obvious from London. Of these, the issue of honour is perhaps the most sensitive.

This concept goes to the heart of the conflict of values that affects almost all second- and third-generation Pakistani immigrants. It is also an issue that has been reinvented by these generations to maintain a sense of identity.

Here is the most important part of the article:

She says that this insularity is not just a problem of racism, Islamophobia, poverty and lack of education, but also a result of the baradari system, a system of brotherhood or closed families that is particular to the Mirpuri people. In the main, British Mirpuris come from the very rural and conservative parts of Pakistani-controlled Kashmir. The Mirpuri Development Project has estimated that Mirpuris make up around 70 per cent of the British Muslim population: the biggest concen- trations are in northern towns such as Bradford, Leeds, Derby and Huddersfield. The baradari system is integral to Mirpuri culture. A family unit will stick together, largely marry only close relations and will refuse to allow outsiders into the village. In Pakistan, it ensures that in very poor rural areas where little or no state provision exists, the villagers can provide themselves with the basic structures of a community, such as health, justice, childcare and security. But when Mirpuris have migrated, the system has migrated, too.

There's nothing sinister about this. It's just that in Britain the state provides health, justice and security services. Once the benefits of the baradari system are largely taken away, you are left with a lot of downsides, such as the code of honour and extreme social insularity.

This insularity has led such communities to permit the Islamists to twist their young people's sense of identity to such an extent that a boy from Leeds has more empathy with the dead and dying Muslims of Palestine than the dead and dying Muslims of London.When the four Yorkshire lads blew themselves up in London, they were also declaring a civil war between Britain's two versions of multiculturalism: that of the ghettoised north and that of integrated London.

Sir Ian Blair can suggest that shock and disbelief should be used to motivate Britain's northern Muslim communities into "active engagement" against terrorism, but shock and disbelief might not be enough.

wow lovin, people who are hindus and sikh are so contemplative and spiritual! that's why india is so egalitarian socially compared to pakistan, right?

you're confusing social issues w/ religious issues. If you want to talk social issues I could go on forever about how ridiculous indians/hindus can be to each other based on numerous things. The point here is why given these issues and others, hindus/sikhs abroad are not as fervent as Muslims to catch on to the extremist route.

And if we are going to talk society than we cannot ignore the marginalized/non-existent role of women in Pakistan when compared to the progress and freedom that Indian women have made. Surely this is a sign that empowering the population as a whole, not just one gender, could serve to improve the moral, economic and political state of things today

Unlike the USA, where each state culturally more or less mixes together, India is a true democracy seeing that it's a union of multiple states which in an of themselves are mini-nations. Thus to say we're South Asian is to get away from the pride and accomplishments of Indian heritage and world standing.

well, most of us here are american, and so the term 'south asian' does make a certain amount of sense in that light. identities are not static ideals, but in dynamic continuous flux. those who dissent from 'south asian' will have a role to play in its holding power, but for some the term has great salience already, it does exist. and it i suspect as inevitable as american pie when you add brown people + USA.

you're confusing social issues w/ religious issues. If you want to talk social issues I could go on forever about how ridiculous indians/hindus can be to each other based on numerous things. The point here is why given these issues and others, hindus/sikhs abroad are not as fervent as Muslims to catch on to the extremist route.

the assertions you make about the character of religions implies certain inferences about cultures which practice those religions. i am not against generalization, per se, but one should be cautious because they are often easy to falsify, or at least not particular rich in terms of the models with predictive power they generate. i'm not a marxist, but certainly the fact that half of british hindus are of east african origin, and so very well off and self-selected to begin with, play a role in the difference of hindus from muslims. similarly, the sikhs also tend to be middle class. one can not neglect the reality that the pakistanis are, as a whole, a village culture imported wholesale to work in factories. no matter that the bombers where affluent, that economic background of their zeitgeist is an important factor.

what i'm trying to say that there likely is some difference in the mentality of hindu/sikhs vs. muslims all other variables controlled for, but the other variables are very uncontrolled in england, so we should not neglect them.

Razib: I am not quite sure about the nature of Islam has much to do with this. For instance, the suicide bombing as a technique was mastered by Tamil Tigers, who were mostly hindus. All that we are talking about Islamic terrorists now: brutality, targeting innocents, brainwashing youth and children, etc.. can be said about Tamil Tigers too. But, It is the universal appeal of Islam that is lacking in revolts by other extremists.

monsters lurk within all human minds

I agree with you there!

similarly, the sikhs also tend to be middle class. one can not neglect the reality that the pakistanis are, as a whole, a village culture imported wholesale to work in factories.

No. The overwhelming majority of Sikhs in Britain are from village backgrounds and our grandparents - including mine - came to work the factories.

All that we are talking about Islamic terrorists now: brutality, targeting innocents, brainwashing youth and children, etc.. can be said about Tamil Tigers too. But, It is the universal appeal of Islam that is lacking in revolts by other extremists.

i would change universal to trans-post-national. tamil tigers won't be bombing london anytime soon because their goals are narrow and tight, and to a large extent intelligible outside their worldview (ie; one might disagree with the tamil tigers' methods, but one understands their anger at the way the sinhalese dominated gov. treats them). the salafi radicals who spread international terror are different becasue they start outside of the central orbit of axioms that are intelligible to moderns. ie; they have little national feeling, have more emotional affinity with muslims in mindanao than christians or hindus in london (if they are british) and start with a non-material set of axioms (the core of the islam religion as they see it) which results in a chain of "logic" which non-radicals can not understand or at least comprehend without disregarding their own axioms.

in other words, i think the 'why?' question is far more transparent in resolution for tamil tiger suicide bombings than the london suicide bombings. prejucide is not a sufficient answer, though it might be a necessary precondition.

No. The overwhelming majority of Sikhs in Britain are from village backgrounds and our grandparents - including mine - came to work the factories.

interesting. now, i'm waiting for more elaboration, because the sikhs and "pakistanis" are also genetically very similar. here is a case where many variables are controlled, and the social trajectories can tell us a lot about the importance of ideology/religion.

i'm not a marxist, but certainly the fact that half of british hindus are of east african origin

The total numbers of Ugandan Asian refugees that came into Britain was around 40,000 at the time of Idi Amin's temper tantrum - and they were mixed Hindu Muslim Sikh. The figure of 'half' the Hindus in Britain coming from middle class mercantile backgrounds is wrong.

The total numbers of Ugandan Asian refugees that came into Britain was around 40,000 at the time of Idi Amin's temper tantrum - and they were mixed Hindu Muslim Sikh. The figure of 'half' the Hindus in Britain coming from middle class mercantile backgrounds is wrong.

well, on second thought, half seems high, but, i'm not talking just about ugandans. most of kenya and tanzania's indians also left over time. and numerically the kenyans are i think the largest segment.

what i'm trying to say that there likely is some difference in the mentality of hindu/sikhs vs. muslims all other variables controlled for, but the other variables are very uncontrolled in england, so we should not neglect them.

yes, i agree. what do you propose are these variables? however, whereas i agree that many indians in england are from african descent, you still don't have the small town Indian going ballistic either there, so the point becomes again, why is it that Pakistani's have more crosses to bear than their desi counterparts of similar background?

For instance, the suicide bombing as a technique was mastered by Tamil Tigers, who were mostly hindus

Incorrect. The tigers suicide bombers are atheists. You can't make an argument that it was their hindu beliefs that lead them to suicide bombings. Again, typical muslim response to shift the topic to something else instead of confronting the issue. Just like perinneal topic shifting issues of war of Iraq or palestine now we can expect to spin around uselessely without an understanding of ISLAMIC TERRORISM.

interesting. now, i'm waiting for more elaboration, because the sikhs and "pakistanis" are also genetically very similar. here is a case where many variables are controlled, and the social trajectories can tell us a lot about the importance of ideology/religion.

Put two and two together Razib.

By 1981, there were more than 150,000 South Asians of East African origin living in Britain.

the 2001 UK census says there are 558,810 hindus. even if east african indians are say 20% non-hindu (this differs by nation, ie; my impression is muslims are more numerous in uganda, less in kenya), that suggests a substantial minority of those in 2001 are of east african origin.

p.s. any data on the sikh emigrants? articles on their socioeconomic origin?

Put two and two together Razib.

well, i want you to elaborate. saying "it's islam" isn't going to present any solution in the near term (since the UK isn't going to expel all muslims in the near future).

razib

My data on Sikh immigrants is that I am the grandson of one and I observe first hand with knowledge and intimacy the stories and aspects of the lives I see. I am offering qualitative opinion based on my life experience - life experience thick with reality and knowledge of England and the people we are talking about that you cannot glean from a set of numbers and scientific deductions about the proportion of Hindus who might have fallen into the bracket of what might be called working or middle class before they arrived in Britain - that is my eye, history, version and intuitive knowledge; accept its validity as you please.

Quoting Atish Taseer from his article :

"The kids I met in Beeston were not in the mood to ask questions. Their rage came first. They bandied around words such as Iraq and Palestine, but were often badly informed and felt no kinship with other non-Muslim Britons who were also angry about these issues. It suited them better to think of it as a unified attack on Islam linking unconnected conflicts ranging from Kashmir to Palestine. The version of Islam they had found did not allow for much questioning."

well, i want you to elaborate. saying "it's islam" isn't going to present any solution in the near term (since the UK isn't going to expel all muslims in the near future).

Did you read my posts razib? That usually helps.

accept its validity as you please.

well, i assume you are being sincere. but if i am going to blog on this topic (i've been asked on it before actually because GNXP readers are aware that british pakistanis and sikhs are genetically similar, but have responded 'differently' to british culture) i need to go with more than personal communication. i guess i'll do some digging if i have time.

Did you read my posts razib? That usually helps.

i didn't see anything there as far as what i'm looking for. but whatever, you aren't beholden to be any source of data. i'll go looking on my own.

razib, not sure what your pendantic inquiries about majority/minority or poor/mercantile or asia/african immgiration splits are going to achieve. You can slice and dice the demography many ways but you are still talking about several hundred thousands of people with similar controlled factors with the exception of religion. I'm with punjabi in that as a start you need to accept that it is islam that is responsible for this menace. Otherwise we descend into the quagmire of cultural relativism, secondary effects, historical debates etc which don't even come close to explaning the why's and all of know can be tremendous time wasters. The second step of finding the solution in terms of islamic reformation or killing the mullahs or topling hardline govts or supporting moderate mullahs etc follows the first. Just last week, we had Bag Daddy enthrall people with his 'umma is just another way' and 'eye-for-an-eye is OK' theories. Not surprisingly, nobody called bullshit on him. Liberalism is made to bite its own ass. Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar.

sorry razib - I meant did you see anything in my posts that could lead you to conclude that I offered up a simplistic - 'It is because of Islam and Islam alone' line of reasoning?

This is what I said earlier:

The first thing is to recognise that the rise in Islamic militancy within British Pakistanis is a form of ideological fascism that has specific roots which have played on real difficulties that Pakistanis, in particular Mirpuris, have had with integrating or adapting to British society -

As in, an ideology that has become a parasite on Pakistani Islam in Britain - one that might feed off certain feelings of disaffection, that might press all the right 'Ummah' and 'Jihad' buttons in its rhetoric and appeal and therefore leech off Islam - but cannot be ascribed simply by factoring in issues such as racism but must take into account certain cultural paradigms within the Mirpuri populace and cannot be blamed on external factors of racism and discrimination, which EVERY ethnic and religious minority faces to some degree - without recourse to the insularity and virulent militant extremism that has gripped SOME British Pakistanis.

Plus, I do not have the statistics but Indian Muslims in Britain perform on a par, or close to, Hindus and Sikhs.

I'm with punjabi in that as a start you need to accept that it is islam that is responsible for this menace.

I'm not quite saying that - please read my posts again carefully - cheers.

I'm with punjabi in that as a start you need to accept that it is islam that is responsible for this menace.

the public policy implications are contingent upon

1) your model the system
2) your framing of utilitarian costs and benefits

ie; imagine that the british gov. expels all muslims, or people of muslim origin. if you have no muslims, you don't have any muslim terrorism, right? well, actually since a number of afro-carribeans are always converting to the religion (as well as white brits), i suspect one near term effect is going to be retaliation from these people, who will slip through the 'net' of taking 'islam is a menace' seriously. this is a reductio ad absurdum, but to illustrate what i'm talking about.

also, context matters. the USA isn't having that many problems with native muslims. if islam-is-islam in a context free environment, one could say the USA faces the potentional of home-grown terrorism. but, if one notes that aside from black muslims, the muslim population of the USA is higher than median SES, one might reconsider this.

there is of course a final point, which is that even non-violent muslims will have issues with the islam-is-a-menace message. so, it might behoove non-muslims in society who know islam-is-a-menace to pretend that they don't know this while shaping public policy with the understanding that islam-is-a-menace.

As in, an ideology that has become a parasite on Pakistani Islam in Britain - one that might feed off certain feelings of disaffection, that might press all the right 'Ummah' and 'Jihad' buttons in its rhetoric and appeal and therefore leech off Islam

yes, it seems that people have a difficult time absorbing the importance of contingency. that is,

racism AND religion X AND personality type = violence

while racism AND religion !X AND personality type != violence

if i had to sum up my current idea, i would say islam is the problem, when intersected with several other variables. since i see no short-term expulsion of muslims in the offing, i suspect we'll have to focus on the other variables (which include perceptions and concepts of what islam exactly is). it also means we have to deal with the particular nature of religious memes, in that people privilege them and refuse to step back and analyze them rationally, and might tweak out if they knew you were doing that (a cognitive science friend of mine told me that one reason there is little specific research on the cognitive of specific religions is that religionists get enraged when they find out you are reducing their beliefs to scientifically characterized phenomena). so, among fellow atheists i tend to say certain things, but i know i'm not going to convince muslims of various propositions so i try to intellectual "tack" to get where i want to go....

Here is a picture of two shameless wenches with their breasts squashed together - we can all agree this is enough to drive a man wild and want to impose sharia.

Two Besharam Women - Stone Them!

That was an interlude - please carry on with the discussion in a serious and intense manner now.

I'm not quite saying that - please read my posts again carefully - cheers.

razib, notice your post deals with hypothetical alternatives in future. I could easily say the 'better' option would result if muslims were expelled for example. At this point, we have to go with data on the past behavior and unfortunately the situation IN BRITAIN is that islam is causing this menace. Sure, the factors might be different in the US but that doesn't change what might be a very good reason in BRITAIN.

also, on this point:

pendantic inquiries about majority/minority or poor/mercantile or asia/african immgiration splits are going to achieve

i know i'm a bit pedantic, this is a common complaint on my own blog. here is the issue i have though:

1) i feel liberals ignore the "islam issue"

2) while conservatives tend to react with rage as regards the "islam issue"

this is what i've experienced on other weblogs when i venture around. both responses have their place. muslims are now, at least for the time being, part of many western countries so even if they are a menace, to save face and not trigger civil war heads of state have to mouth platitudes of "islam means peace" while a subset of muslims are killing their fellow citizens. similarly, the killing of those citizens by muslims tends to falsify the "islam means peace" in terms of a simple reading, and explains the rage experienced by many.

but public policy is already too often dictated by emotional concerns. a long term, as opposed to short term, solution to a problem is achieved via rational and unemotive pedantry. starving people might elicit tears and temporary aid, but the long term solution is always is better agricultural science and engineering. starvation is a problem, but what solutions do you propose? well, you have to understand why people starve in the first place (climate, distribution networks, political violence, introduced pests, etc.).

not to be an asshole, but too many people everywhere accept their first blush preconceptions and ideas without subsequent analysis and critique. i do it too. to prevent this we need a system of rational discourse where we correct for each other.

otherwise, message boards become a game of "right on man! i agree!"

btw, brown chix squishing their breasts together. makes me reconsider my tastse in females for a second. ;)

Underneath Taseer's article in the print version of yesterday's Times was the counterpoint "...But Midwest Muslims share the American dream". It talks about all the Arabs who came to Detroit to work in Ford's factories, and how they're a large, peaceful, sucessful community now. In theory, Bradford and Detroit could be similar case studies -- Muslims flowing in to work in factories that later shut down. One group becomes insular, hating their host country, the other becomes American. Why?

I could easily say the 'better' option would result if muslims were expelled for example.

i don't think that should be off the table is islam is found to be congenitally a menacing religion. the moriscos of spain were expelled in 1600, so if you study that case you might find what some of the problems that entailed. though it did fix spain's muslim problem.

It talks about all the Arabs who came to Detroit to work in Ford's factories, and how they're a large, peaceful, sucessful community now.

90% of those arabs ("ford's factories") were christian. the majority of "arab americans" are christian to this day, though the new immigrants are mostly muslim, and christian arab identity is being eroded by deracination and intermarriage.

also, re: the "south asian vs. we-are-very-different" dispute has some similarities with the "muslim" vs. "muslim-groups-are-different" debates. i think in this case though (on this weblog) you have a situation where those who propose a catchall south asian label would assent to balkanization amongst muslims while those with disagree with a catchall south asian label would argue for a catchall identification for muslims (at least operationally in the way they speak of the group "muslim").

Here is a picture of two shameless wenches with their breasts squashed together - we can all agree this is enough to drive a man wild and want to impose sharia.

you would think so, but as Seinfeld once said, "cover anything up on a woman and a man will want to see it. If you cover her head, we're just going to go out and buy Playhead magazine"

therefore I think sharia in this case would make it worse...ok back to the thread, my bad

Ok razib, my point on your being pedantic wasn't about putting you down or sticking to first blush preconceptions. It was to stop what I seen happen time and again - rapid topic deflection. Very soon, I could see this topic degenerate into a poor vs mercantile or asian vs african immigration topic. Both of which I think don't explain the tube bombers. People on this blog are overly sensitive to the 'islam issue'. Look at punjabi boy dancing around the issue before he could even hint at what he feels. The issue of "what solutions to propose" obviously follows from what the problem is. I feel unless you correctly isolate the problem to islam you are bound to spin around uselessly - poverty, WOT, racism, deindustrialization etc. If we can come to the consensus on islam as the cause (at least in a broad sense), we can then proceed with how Islamic reformation (and its extent) can be acheived. Otherwise spending time on other topics is a waste of time. In my experience the majority first blush preconception is - Islam can't be the cause so lets talk about something else. Christianity has had its reformation, Hinduism is still having its reformation started over two hundred years back. It is time for Islam to fix itself up, or have someone from outside do it.

punjabi boy,

nevermind the noise. if i follow you right, you are making a sociological argument that is based in the fact (that i didn't know) that most british muslims are not so much pakistani as they are mirpuri. so there is a complex alchemy of mirpuri origins and cultural legacy plus emigration plus the geographical, class and occupation trends in their lives in britain, that has made them a particularly fertile breeding ground for jihadis -- or at least for a kind of disaffection and nihilism that jihadis can exploit.

am i following you right?

either way, i would like to hear the rest. keep making your argument and don't worry about all the sniping going on. you will not be confused for a pakistan-hater nor for any other kind of small-minded person.

peace

If we can come to the consensus on islam as the cause (at least in a broad sense), we can then proceed with how Islamic reformation (and its extent) can be acheived. Otherwise spending time on other topics is a waste of time. In my experience the majority first blush preconception is - Islam can't be the cause so lets talk about something else.

i take it the "islam problem" as a given. i know not everyone else here does (ie; "islam means peace, the radicals are just misguided"), so that confusion is understandable. the key for me is that within the subset of "muslims" some are wackos and some are not. taking the islam background as a given, we then have to, as you noted, move to other factors. at this point, the elucidation of the factors can lead to "solutions" to the islam problem as we might be able to peal back some of the other contingent variables with result in violence. and so forth.

Babloo, while I think all religions have caused enough problems in this world, I don't see anything in particular in Islam that is causing your assertion that this is an islamic issue. You are confusing Islam and Muslims. While it was muslims who commit these random acts of violence targetted at civilians, they are not considered islamic by the majority (well, we all believe majority knows the best, right?). last 20 or 25 years of violence (that too people know about it because it is primarily against white folks) is hardly enough to judge a 1400 year old religion. Like I said earlier, the extremists of course derive their inspiration from religion, but that is a small subset of 1.2 billion population, and the original doctrines of Islam do not condone such acts. If you read Islam's holybook, its message is not any more violent than any of its counterparts in other religions. The assertion that it is an Islamic problem would not solve anything - it is a muslim problem committed by a minority and they are finding a fertile ground in the prevailing political context.

Muslim terrorism has existed during most part of this century but in a very minimal, local scale and Doesn't anyone know that if U.S hadn't pumped billions of dollars to aid the mujahideen during the Afghan Russian war, this global menace would never have happened?

If you read Islam's holybook, its message is not any more violent than any of its counterparts in other religions.

this is false. i have read the the analects and translations of portions of the pali canon, and the koran and the hebrew bible are more rather blood-drenched in comparison. of course, the key point is that christians do not take the old testament (the hebrew bible) to heart, so texts are not determinative.

and the original doctrines of Islam do not condone such acts.

there are hindus who assert that the rig veda does not condone caste (or jati). this is irrelevant, a religion is judged not solely on axiomatic definitions (which everyone will dispute in any case, religion is not formal mathematics) but how it is lived. religionists of all sorts are masters of wordplay. there is "no compulsion in religion" in islam, but it is also generally agreed that apostates should be killed. how do muslims get around this? one interpretation i saw is that apostasy from islam is against natural law, so it is the depravity that is being punished. by the fruit of your works you shall be judged, and for example, the moppila muslims of kerala rose up against the british and their hindu overlords in the 1920s, driven partly by economic conditions, but in the process also forcibly converted hindus to islam. this tendency is part of the religion. remember, even if dhimmis are protected, polytheists are not brooked any protection by the "original doctrines" of the religion.

Siddhartha

Yes, you seem to be following what I am saying. And I can also talk about other things, just as personal observations - things like how I remember a time when relationships between Desis in England were simpler and there really was a sense of a South Asian community but this changed - and it has been driven to a large extent by Muslim leaders in Britain who have been playing communalist politics in Britain ever since The Satanic Verses affair - in which the Mirpuri community in Bradford (right next door to where the suicide-bombers came from) played an integral role - and since that time there has been a definite shift in identity politics in Britain - in that Pakistanis started priveliging their religious identity over and above all else.

This is the irony - that this priveliging neccessarily involved a distancing of themselves from Indians - Sikhs and Hindus were no longer to be considered as brothers-in-arms, but were to be distanced from and rejected in favour of Ummah politics. And so now when some Indians say we dont want to be associated with Pakistanis anymore - the fact is that this discourse has been legitimised already by British-Pakistanis to a certain degree who discarded our shared ethnic bonds in favour of the Ummah identity - some people have called this Arabization.

These are generalities and trends and not everyone fits into these categories - I have Pakistani friends who I love - and this is why I am wary of saying these things because it sounds harsh and people get offended by it - I realise that these broad brush strokes are crude because they do not take care of the individual life - but it has been a discernible politics and a real movement - to deny this is to not face reality.

I can tell you other things - about how an aggressive type of religiosity has become standard discourse amongst some sections of Pakistani youth - predicated on extreme anti-Semitism and conspiracy theories - other things like how ten, fifteen years ago you hardly saw women in burqa's - you go to desi areas now(including the one where I grew up) and every other woman is wearing a burqa - posters appearing in shops proclaiming the latest Hizb ut Tahrir conference or public meeting about the 'evil' of America and Israel - intermittent stories that come through about how Pakistani boys are taunting Sikh or Hindu children in parks and schools - Indians are moving away from the inner city districts as they become more prosperous - Pakistani ghettoes seem to grow in size and sprawl - a hundred different small things that indicate a turning inwards - a closing of the mind - a turn to religiosity and communalist politics.

So the ground becomes fertile to bring the Jihad home - when 'community leaders' and 'intellectuals' engage in a rhetoric and politics of grievance based on Ummah politics - and the 'intifada' is brought home - because every issue becomes a zero-sum game of us versus them - Muslims versus non Muslim - every disadvantage or issue becomes one of Muslims being persecuted - Pakistani boys perform poorly academically? - blame it on Palestine - blame it on 'Islamophobia' - blame, blame, blame but never take responsibility for your own welfare and well being.

Add in firebrand politics over Kashmir (a real issue - the Jihad in Kashmir is a reality to many Mirpuris here) - add unemployment and the resentment just breeds.

Look at the Muslim leadership who have petty sectarian minds when it comes to politics and they exacerbate the grievance culture of the youth so that they can gain leverage in British society themselves (really despicable) - add in a whole bunch of nebulous factors like the macho culture of Mirpuri izzat, rapacious fascistic political groups who offer solutions to all problems (which are not the problems boys in Leeds should really worry about, like getting a job, starting a family, but the real problems, like wiping Israel off the face of the Earth, and humiliating America, you know, the real priorities)

Add in these factors and other serious things like overcrowding and serious issues of family opression and a degree of social pressure regarding marriage that even Indians dont have to face (cousin marriage is the norm in many Mirpuri families) and you have circumstances ripe for a really crude type of religious identity politics and a type of communalism that is segragationist by instinct - you have a heady brew - resentment and anger on many different levels - and it is just not good enough to blame it on 'racism', 'colonialism', 'Zionism' - the time comes when some serious introspection has to take place, when some honest self examination needs to take place about a self-perpetuating culture of grievance and self-pity that manifests itself as hatred and nihilism in SOME Pakistani youth who are only too willing to fall into the apocalyptic clutches of religious fanatics.

I am sorry if I have said anything to offend anyone but you will have to take my word for it that I only speak out of a profound sense of sadness and honesty - that is how I see it - I grew up with Pakistanis, had Pakistani girlfriends who I loved - and when I see the turmoil my Pakistani friends are in after these attacks - I can only say it as I see it - the Mirpuri story in England is turning into a kind of tragedy. I hope it can be changed.

This is echoing some of what has been said and synthesizing it a bit but I think there are several reasons British Second Generation Pakistani Muslims have turned out to be more radical that other Muslims or than Muslims in America. First, I have noted from personal experience that Pakistani Muslims tend to be a lot more conservative than other Muslims (both in America and Britain) and hold their Muslim identity more closely than do Arabs and other Muslims. This is I think because their whole national identity revolves around religion, it was the only reason to create the country. So religious and national identity are the same. Whereas an Egyptian American may first identify as being Egyptian and American and then Muslim, a Pakistani American is more likely to identify as being a Muslim American first. The second reason for this is i think Pakistanis feel they have to prove they are real Muslims because they are not Arab so they tend to be even more conservative than their counterparts.
At least in America I've noted this makes second generation Pakistani Americans have severe identity crisis - on the one hand some of them don't want their parents to see them in sleeveless shirts and on the other hand they drink but then feel bad about it. I know all of us hypenated identities can be somewhat confused but never have I seen so much confusion as I have seen with my Pakistani American friends.
However, I think this confusion in America does not play out in a violent way because many of the Pakistanis who came here have integrated better and done well economically in comparasion to their British counterparts. In Britain my guess is this confusion is compounded by economic failure and lack of assimilation.

one interpretation i saw is that apostasy from islam is against natural law

in my opinion it's these beliefs and lines in holy texts such as the Quran and Bible that cause so much divisiveness in this world. The texts basically make it heroic to go out and do "God's work", and no one ever stops to realize that over the course of 1500-2000 yrs that religion was govt, so therfore, those who wrote the texts had a lot of political reason to throw statements in there that would control the masses and advance the cause. The question of why islam has stuck to this mantra more fervently than other religions (the christians are just as bad about conversions, except they use more psychological scare tactics) and has ppl willing to die for it is of the issue. I think a lot of times, psychologically, when you repeatedly tell ppl that they are being oppressed, abused and looked down upon, this is where the seeds are sown. This is why black americans have large chips on their shoulder to this day. Back that up w/ holy books ok'ing actions in the name of God, and you can see where ppl justify any craziness in this manner. At the end of the day, ti's still the same concept, an elite few using religion to gain wealth and power, just like it's always been.

Sorry I missed this, just a bit snowed under with revision. Razib and Punjabi Boy - your posts have been very interesting to read. Despite you disagreeing on things, I find myself agreeing with you quite frequently! I too have my theories on why the different communities here have followed different paths. The Mirpuri community theory was fascinating, but I'm not sure that explains it all. You made a key point PB when you said that Indian Muslims more or less perform on a par with Hindus and Sikhs.

We haven't examined the Bangladeshi community much, but they are a very sizeable chunk of the Asians in the UK. They are equally ghettoised - well perhaps not quite to the extent of Bradford - but there is the same recalcitrant streak, the same unwillingness to interact amongst many in the community. The differences were illustrated, in a somewhat arbitrary way, by A-level results (cf. High School Diploma). Sri Lankans and Indians performed the best, followed by Oriental students, then white, black, with Pakistani and Bangladeshi joint bottom.

Religion was not part of the equation; but of course, it is. It's a really complex issue and one not satisfactorily explained by the conditions when immigrants arrived here, nor by village politics transferred to Tower Hamlets or Oldham.

When I said that I had a theory, I realise now that that was a complete lie! But I just hope to illustrate how complex a problem this is and I certainly don't know what to do about it.

Footnote: Another important point not to look over is class. Asian immigrants to the UK come in working, middle and upper. The richer, middle/upper middle class Pakistani community do very well for themselves.

We haven't examined the Bangladeshi community much, but they are a very sizeable chunk of the Asians in the UK.

but they are far more 1st gen than 2nd gen. problems tend to show up in the 2nd gen.

The richer, middle/upper middle class Pakistani community do very well for themselves.

this is where the bombers came from though.

it is just not good enough to blame it on 'racism', 'colonialism', 'Zionism' - the time comes when some serious introspection has to take place, when some honest self examination needs to take place about a self-perpetuating culture of grievance and self-pity that manifests itself as hatred and nihilism.

couldnt have said it better

I know all of us hypenated identities can be somewhat confused but never have I seen so much confusion as I have seen with my Pakistani American friends.

for the record, i consider myself a full blooded CBCD/ABCD :D

i have seen exactly what SBR is talking about, but even then, there seems to be this 'us vs them' mentality that just pervades Muslim life in general, and takes a stronger hold in Pakistani's. I agree that national identity and religion go hand in hand in Pakistan, but I also think that it's bcuz Pakistan is usually discussed in the same dialogue as India, almost like a yin/yang scenario. For every story you hear about Pakistan, you probably hear a snippet about India as well, but not always the other way around. This may make them feel marginalized, as in they will always be in India/n shadows (though it's not true). I think Pakistani's turn inwards in order to separate from the stark reality that the 'infidels' have created better lives for themselves back home and abroad, and this could be one flash point for their anger.

The Mirpuri community theory was fascinating, but I'm not sure that explains it all.

I agree. Too much of the discussion on SM focuses on Islam and not nearly enough is said about the two nation theory that's the bedrock of Pakistani identity, at least in the context of this discussion about what sets apart Pakistani Brits from Indian Brits (Hindu, Muslim and Sikh)...if Savarkar's version of the two nation theory won the day in India and India became the Hindu equivalent of Pakistan, I think we'd see a lot more resistance to secularization by Hindus in the UK or US (similarly, I don't think it's an accident that a rise in religious extremism among Sikhs has accompanied the demand for Khalistan). Such sentiments, given the subcontinent's history of shared religious traditions, require a definitive break with the past. It's telling that 2nd gen Pakistani Brits claim "roots" in traditions that are often alien to their parents (noted in the Taseer article posted above)...it appears that the break with subcontinental traditions necessary to maintain the idea of Pakistan has been replaced by a pan-Islam-uber-alles identity...combine this with the current events of the day and the factors Punjabi Boy mentions above and you get 7/7...

if Savarkar's version of the two nation theory won the day in India and India became the Hindu equivalent of Pakistan, I think we'd see a lot more resistance to secularization by Hindus in the UK or US

It has won the day in Gujarat (lets hope temporarily) - Gujaratis are the most Hindutva minded Hindus in Britain - I know because I listen to friends openly support Modi - this contrasts with my Hindu Punjabi friends and relatives who couldnt give a damn about Hindutvaism.

I should have said that that is all relative and most of my Gujarati mates are more interested in protecting their sisters and cousins from lustful predatory Punjabi boys from Southall than the politics of Hindutva, but you get my drift, its all relative you see as SMR says that what happens 'back home' does have an effect in the diaspora.

I know because I listen to friends openly support Modi

Well, this is another interesting phenomenon. I have several hardline Gujju friends, one of whom was chair of the National Hindu Students Forum when she was at uni. I attended a few things as an interested outsider and realised they're just as zealous as the Muslims they condemn. Likewise with the pro-Khalistan Sikhs here and in Canada. All these groups actively support troublemakers 'back home', not realising they're woefully out of touch as they haven't spent any time 'back home' for 3 decades.

I think the chip-on-the-shoulder theory, about how British Pakistanis feel about Indians, has more credence than I originally thought. Some of them are deeply bitter about how the Indian community in the UK are more successful. The resentment for Indians is intense - on a par with their hatred for Jews, which is hard-wired.

About Bangladeshis razib - yes there are less 2nd gen, but there are a lot. Right now, I can see the seeds growing for them to follow in their West Pakistani colleagues' footsteps. The Indian restaurant industry, which their parents single-handedly created in the UK, has changed immensely, leaving many without a family business to occupy them and many 2nd gen Bangladeshi Muslims are treading a similar path to the 7/7 bombers. I can already see how the history of Bangladesh has been apparently rewritten; Bangladeshis I know would rather support Pakistan than India in the cricket. Their Muslim fraternity has erased the events of the early 70s. As a Bengali, I find this deeply upsetting.

How quickly the past becomes history.

The resentment for Indians is intense - on a par with their hatred for Jews, which is hard-wired.

I dont know about that - I have rarely seen hatred like the hatred some Pakistanis I have talked to have for Jews - even though they have never met a Jew in their life and dont know a thing about them. I have found that there is some kind of superiority-inferiority complex with SOME Pakistanis towards Indians (a recent example - police banned Pakistan flags from being taken to Eid celebrations in Southall because they started fights and started shoving it in the faces of Indians - now why do they want to do that?) but I still say that the majority of Pakistanis are cool with Indians. Of course there are hardcore people who think we are sub-human but hey what to do?

the key point is that christians do not take the old testament (the hebrew bible) to heart

Oh, they did at times: They derived all the inspiration for the crusades from their holibooks - much like radical islamists do now. The brutal oppression of minorities under the christian rule in northern europe and the fervour in which they conquered non-christian lands of course had the support of the religious eddict.

If you think, Islam should be judged by those who live it, that is fine, but then, you should look at 1400 years of history - not just last 25 years. I am no apologist for Imperial Islam, but, Islam's history of conquests never enslaved a whole class of people, to the same scale by Europeans, and they too had a fervour of religious spirit to their conquests. I remember seeing the first ever painting about the America's discovery in a church in Spain, where they depicted the local indians being blessed by their new found faith - enslavement and subsequent genocide of Indians didn't cause any reform in Christianity and that wasn't a Christian problem. Was it? What makes a religion more violent in comparison? If you are only looking at last 50 years, sure, more violence has been committed in the name of Islam, but that is not enough to point out Islam is the culprit here. Trust me, I am not a pracising muslim, but I know how the muslim world (or any other religion for that matter) works, if you go with the assertion that Islam is the problem, I can guarantee that there will not be a solution.

if you go with the assertion that Islam is the problem, I can guarantee that there will not be a solution.

I disagree - I think that if you go with the assertion that a certain form of Islam is not the problem then there will not be a solution. I dont think you can deny that an ultra-extreme interpretation of Islam is currently a significant part of the problem - it is just not credible to sustain that it is not so in the face of all the evidence before our eyes.

Note, a certain form of Islam - there are different forms of Islam that this particular form of Jihadism is inimical to. The key is to differentiate between them, isolate the extremist strain, and then discredit and break it.

I have rarely seen hatred like the hatred some Pakistanis I have talked to have for Jews - even though they have never met a Jew in their life and dont know a thing about them

'coz, somewhere in Qur'an it mentions that you can't be friends with jews. It talked to an audience of 1400 years ago - the key is in understanding that the book talked to the issues of the time, contrary to what some people might think about its 'forever-true' value. Most interpretations do recognize that, but the extremists sure have a knack to find the worst.

Oh, they did at times: They derived all the inspiration for the crusades from their holibooks - much like radical islamists do now.

no they didn't. part of it was clearly a mimicry of the religious wars of jihad which muslims engaged in between 700-100.

The brutal oppression of minorities under the christian rule in northern europe and the fervour in which they conquered non-christian lands of course had the support of the religious eddict.

some of this is true. but it is also true that the roman catholic church militated against the "jew burners" in the middle ages, who were more often rabble rousers intent on escaping debt and offloading anger at gentile elites who were untouchable.

If you think, Islam should be judged by those who live it, that is fine, but then, you should look at 1400 years of history - not just last 25 years.

no, we shouldn't judge it by 1400 years because for non-muslims the present is what is salient. i don't care what muslims believe, i only care how they impinge on my own life. some muslims may keep the crusades alive in their hearts, but non-muslims fix on the deaths of those near and dear to them today.

I am no apologist for Imperial Islam, but, Islam's history of conquests never enslaved a whole class of people, to the same scale by Europeans, and they too had a fervour of religious spirit to their conquests.

yes they did. how do you think there are large classes of "zanj" (blacks) in the middle east? the genetic data indicates that 30% of the mitochdonrial DNA of yemenis are sub-saharan african. the jews of yemen do not show this, rather, their mtDNA resembles the non-african ancestry of muslim yemenis. the jews of yemen date to the pre-islamic period, so the slavery of blacks in yemen is numerically preponderant in the islamic period. muslim slavers ventured into europe specifically because it was explicitly allowed to enslave kafirs (these enslavements caused a major demographic impact in places like iceland as late as the 1700s, as barbary corsairs ranged up the atlantic). the castration of blacks in africa prior to their entrance into muslim lands was specifically to evade islamic laws regarding castration.

I remember seeing the first ever painting about the America's discovery in a church in Spain, where they depicted the local indians being blessed by their new found faith - enslavement and subsequent genocide of Indians didn't cause any reform in Christianity and that wasn't a Christian problem.

1) most indigenous people died of disease rather than slavery or explicit genocide.

2) the roman catholic rulers of spain had a debate about the merits of slavery. see the debates of bartolome de casas. the nobility (charles V) and the clerisy tended argue for humanity, was the rank and file conquistidors who commited the atrocities. so one could argue that slavery occurred in spite of christianity humanity.

3) the abolition of the world wide slave trade was in large part due to the militancy of evangelical anglicans in england in the late 18th century. abolitionism was in large part justified on religious grounds (though christians were on both sides of course). the point is that the history of christianity is checked, but the arrow of morality as regards slavery points in one direction.

4) slavery was abolished in saudi arabia in 1962. slavery is a serious problem in sudan and mauritania. it is practiced by tauregs in the central sahara. what do these instances have in common?

What makes a religion more violent in comparison? If you are only looking at last 50 years, sure, more violence has been committed in the name of Islam, but that is not enough to point out Islam is the culprit here.

of course not, as i note above, it is a start.

Note, a certain form of Islam - there are different forms of Islam that this particular form of Jihadism is inimical to. The key is to differentiate between them, isolate the extremist strain, and then discredit and break it.

I am not sure what you are disagreeing to. This is exactly what I am talking about too. You don't create a better world by discrediting a religion completely, my point is that there are extremists who are the deviants of main stream Islam and they are the problem, not Islam itself. Most of 1.2 billion people go on with their normal lives and to say the problem is with their faith will instantly alienate them.

btw, no offense to najeeb, but a rendition of "facts" like the ones above, outside of historical context (ironic) is a serious problem. i have recently read a number of books by muslim writers who are western (tariq ramadan, reza aslan and feisal rauf) and they read like apologia of christian evangelicals, there are jukes, jives and historical misinterpretations. i understand some of this, but the lack of historical awareness that is normative among muslim intellectuals is more like stereotypical red-state jingoism than the self-critique that is the hallmark of the enlightenment tradition.

I am not sure what you are disagreeing to.

The bit where I thought you said it would be wrong to admit a religious component to the issue - but as it seems we are in accord - no problemo.

You don't create a better world by discrediting a religion completely, my point is that there are extremists who are the deviants of main stream Islam and they are the problem, not Islam itself.

islam can't be discredited, but it must be forced to change. the analogy i will use is that imagine that southern baptists were the liberal end of christianity. the median then is more conservative than southern baptists, and the very conservative range is extreme indeed. i believe that 'moderate muslims' are actually rathre like conservative christians in their outlook. conservative christians have moderate and liberal christians to balance them, and the number of radical conservatives (dominion christians, reconstructionists) is very small indeed because of the nature of the distribution. because the muslim median is way shifted over you have many more radicals.

razib,

Nobody [talks about] the Spanish Inquisition!

Btw, you can be a atheistic hindu.

Mean, back at ranch, while everybody with access to a keyboard is debating about the motivations of the bombers, the British police are circling the wagons preparing for a third attack. And I'm sure this comment about their un-pc techniques to not

"waste time searching old white ladies". will surely upset some people.

Nobody [talks about] the Spanish Inquisition!

Btw, you can be a atheistic hindu.

1) the body count of the spanish inquisition was actually minimal (hundreds) in comparison to the witch burnings (thousands, tends of thousands) of protestant europe (the anti-spanish demonology actually has its roots in "anti-papism" in anglican england).

2) yes, i know. that's why i left hinduism out of it. you can also be an atheist jain (technically, janism is not theistic). or atheist buddhist. different religions are different in the way they view memebership.

razib

Your breadth of knowledge is awesome - you tell it like it is too - wow.

Are you the cleverest Bangladeshi-American on Earth?

Future Nobel Prize winner I reckon.

Are you the cleverest Bangladeshi-American on Earth?

that's not saying much ;)

I was merely making a Monty Python reference. But your statement that only "hundreds" made me kind of curious. Wikipedia says the Inquisition in Goa alone resulted in thousands of people "executed and tortured". What source of information are you using?

no they didn't. part of it was clearly a mimicry of the religious wars of jihad which muslims engaged in between 700-100.

Ok. When was the last time you heard a religious eddict from the supreme head of a religion suggesting it is okay to kill non-christians to take away their lands and to spread their religion? To refresh your memory, it was year 1095, Pope Urban II.

no, we shouldn't judge it by 1400 years because for non-muslims the present is what is salient.

well, then, the view of course will be skewed. For everything, there is a context, without which, no discussion/argument can make sense.

I agree that there was large scale slave trading by Arabs, but I wasn't refering to Slaves per say. I was talking more about Indians in America.

1) most indigenous people died of disease rather than slavery or explicit genocide.

Data is mixed on this one, but there is generally accepted that many of them died of 'foreign' deseases, which makes the stories of inflicted deseases more believable. if you compare Indian population to that of in south american countries, you get the picture what happened.

2) the roman catholic rulers of spain had a debate about the merits of slavery. see the debates of bartolome de casas. the nobility (charles V) and the clerisy tended argue for humanity, was the rank and file conquistidors who commited the atrocities. so one could argue that slavery occurred in spite of christianity humanity.

This is news to me, I will look it up. but I remember standing the court room in Seville where Queen Izabella summoned Columbus before/After his voyage to America urging him to bring atleast slaves to cover the cost. They did exactly that it is not a veyr known thing that they took Indians back to Europe as slaves.

of course not, as i note above, it is a start.

In the course of making Islam the culprit, you fell into the same trouble that I am falling into - which is suddenly you sound like an apologist to European/Christian conquests, - I am not an apologist for any ideology either. Let me make this clear beofe I sign off for the day - I see numerous problems with Islam, like anyohter religion, but the solution to religious extremism is to encourage the moderate elements to fight the extremism and you get disconnected instantly with the muslim world when you go with the assertion that Islam itself is the problem.

I was merely making a Monty Python reference. But your statement that only "hundreds" made me kind of curious. Wikipedia says the Inquisition in Goa alone resulted in thousands of people "executed and tortured". What source of information are you using?

i was speaking of spain. the inquisition abroad might be more harsh-though my impression is that various political and military issues were conflated with that rubric. also, remember that goa was under spanish rule only for about a century (portuguese and all). anyway, the anglicans didn't care what happened in goa (or brazil, or macau). the inquisition demonology was fixed on spain, and the real specific seed was the reign of bloody mary in the mid 16th century (she actually killed fewer heretics than her protestant brother).

as for sources, see the reformation by diarmand mccollough.

btw, no offense to najeeb, but a rendition of "facts" like the ones above, outside of historical context (ironic) is a serious problem

Well, I see only opinions here, not facts. Historians are divided on a lot of issues. And to say that the crusaders didn't get inspiration from christianity would be a factual error in my opinion.

When was the last time you heard a religious eddict from the supreme head of a religion suggesting it is okay to kill non-christians to take away their lands and to spread their religion? To refresh your memory, it was year 1095, Pope Urban II.

uh, well, since islam technically doesn't have a "supreme head of a religion," you aren't going to get anything like that. but you can find plenty of fatwas by muftis and the like (the ottoman ghazis justified their european depredations on the grounds of holy war centuries later after urban). also, please note that the pope was the supreme head of western christendom, the eastern churches were separate by this point (schism was in 1056 i think).

Data is mixed on this one, but there is generally accepted that many of them died of 'foreign' deseases, which makes the stories of inflicted deseases more believable. if you compare Indian population to that of in south american countries, you get the picture what happened.

1) oregon was depopulated by the time settlers came. these were people who didn't encounter whites except for random trappers and traders. since germ theory is recent, you have to be careful about accounts of purposeful spread of contagion.

2) one reason there are many natives in south american countries like peru, ecuador and bolivia is that spanish women had a difficult time carrying to term in the highlands. even if plague deciminated them, the natives had time to rebound and resettle because europeans could not survive well in the andes.

In the course of making Islam the culprit, you fell into the same trouble that I am falling into - which is suddenly you sound like an apologist to European/Christian conquests, - I am not an apologist for any ideology either.

i'm not being an apologist, i'm just saying that the

islam was tolerant/christianity was intolerant meme is really propoganda. muslim tolerance was really dhimmititude. muslim mildness toward slaves has to be judged by the repeated rebellions of blacks in places like southern iraq. christian intolerance has to be judged in light of the fact that jews did survive in christian lands, and that on the eve of the holocaust 90% of the world's jews were ashkenazi (european) jews. the idea that the renaissance was triggered by translations from al-andalus (muslim spain) has to be mitigated by the reality that greeks from constantinople flooded the cities of italy after the turkish conquest of the queen of cities. or that the translators and redactors of many of the classical texts were aramaic and greek speaking christians in muslim lands.

we can argue details, but first, we need a clearer sense of the reality of what is out there before we can determine would should be out there.

in general, i don't think we disagree on policy prescriptions, but i'm not going to let causal historical errors pass because those are the seeds of future misunderstanding.

And to say that the crusaders didn't get inspiration from christianity would be a factual error in my opinion.

i didn't say they didn't get inspiration from christianity, i just asserted that there were many factors. to boil it down to christianity is simplistic, and too often apologists for modern muslims do this very thing so to as to assert a manichaean juxtaposition.

in any case, you make the assertion that we need to look at 1400 years of history. i think that's wrong, islam needs to move into 2005, soon!!! we aren't checking their credit for a home application, we want to see the money now. i don't care if they do stupid medieval shit in muslim countries, but i've had not so veiled threats from muslims because i'm an apostate. that's not acceptable. i don't give a shit what they think, they shouldn't forget what century they're coming into when they journey into the lands of voltaire and hume.

that's why the stuff about the crusades is irrelevant. christianity has been gelded, supine at the feel of secular society, dominant no power. the spirit of islam needs to be crushed, but hook or crook. PC platitudes are blocking this right now, because muslims are turning into a protected minority.

there is no shame in moving on to better things.

in general, i don't think we disagree on policy prescriptions, but i'm not going to let causal historical errors pass because those are the seeds of future misunderstanding.

A lot of times, experts are divided on facts, especially on issues like this. And I see only opinions for the most part: For example, your statement: islam was tolerant/christianity was intolerant meme is really propoganda, is no fact, it is just your opinion. There are various facts to be taken into consideration to come up with that assertion. It is an accepted fact that a good number of jews moved south to Spain during christian rule of northern spain to escape persecution. There are no cases that I know of where a muslim conquest has completely replaced indiginous population. While I agree that a lot of times information has been copied over from Indian/Greek sources, Muslim Spain had the most sophisticated scholars, artisans and critical thinkers of its times. Recently, my reading of Al-Muqaddimma re-iterated the kind of critical thinking that was prevailing at that time. I think the sophistication of one civilization is not only in inventing new things, but creating a framework where new ideas can be nurtured, and Muslim Spain did provide such an atmosphere. Finally, presently opinions as facts would benefit none.

It is an accepted fact that a good number of jews moved south to Spain during christian rule of northern spain to escape persecution.

no, i know my history. i can't prove it to you of course, but i can let other readers judge. that specific fact does not prove a generality. non-muslims were dhimmi, and maimonides left spain because of muslim persecution. the "golden age" of al-andalus is more myth than fact, and it is easy to play up because the standards were rather low. the almohads and almoravids both persecuted jews and christians, and even during the peak of the ummayyad caliphate of cordoba there were historical memories of pogroms against jews. there was variance within christianity, while france and england were expelling jews, poland-lithuanian were welcoming them. in the generality i would argue that before 1600 jews had it easier in the dar-al-islam than in christendom, and after 1600 it was reversed.

but this is the important point: the record of the two universalist monotheisms as regards jews is shameful. the empancipation of jews in european countries post 1800 has erased some of that shame (the holocaust has brought more shame), but the muslim countries have not expiated their own shame. the ottomans might have welcomed jews, but they welcomed them from forced conversion or death, and gave them protection as second class citizens. laudable in 1500, nothing to brag about now.

p.s. while christians and muslims were persecuting jews, the rajahs of cochin were welcoming. for all of the ills of hinduism (caste), i think it is important to point out the refuge that hindus gave to parsis, jews and nestorian christians who wanted to escape second class citizenship in the caliphate and post-caliphal states, and in the case of jews, pogroms in germany as late as the 1600s (yes, ashkenazi jews traveled to india to escape anti-semitism!).

we do not need to keep apologizing for modern barbarity by appealing to relative tolerance in the past, india shows that religious tolerance can be had even in the pre-modern age. muslims can practice barbarous sharia in muslim countries, i don't care, but the truths i hold dear as a citizen of the enlightenment must not be conceded. western muslims are attempting to roll back those truths, and the subjegation of the god of abraham, isaac and jacob to the goddess of reason is one of the unknowledged facts of the modern west which must be maintained.

Looks like the US authorities are getting more concerned over American born extremists. I wonder what new theories of "alienation" and "marginalization" of American Muslim youth the social experts will pontificate about when the inevitable happens, followed by the usual "They were such nice young men" comments.

WASHINGTON — When security cameras captured four young Britons sauntering into the London Underground before detonating their deadly backpacks last month, the chilling images raised questions about whether such homegrown sleeper terrorists could be plotting attacks in the United States.

Read all about it...

Fear Over U.S.-Born Extremists Is Brewing

Hmm.. I have been away, so you see I have a life outside reading blogs :=)

:It is an accepted fact that a good number of jews moved south to Spain during christian rule of northern spain to escape persecution.

razib: no, i know my history. i can't prove it to you of course, but i can let other readers judge.

Well, you sure know some things, but if you can prove my statement wrong, quote the sources. The following quote is from JewishVirtualLibrary - the fastest i could find on it. Not an islamic site that is promoting some 'propaganda'. These are accepted facts and even acknowledged by Catholic Church!

link: http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/Judaism/muslim_rabbis.html

"For over 500 years, the Jews of the Muslim Empire enjoyed stability, prosperity and religious autonomy. As opposed to the oppressive atmosphere in Northern Europe, the Jews lived, for the most part, in a tolerant civilization, one that valued excellence in the arts, the sciences and trade. In these fields the Jews were welcome participants. Thus Judaism developed as part of society, not as a secluded ghetto-culture as was the case in Christian Europe."

What happened in 1492 is parallel to what Nazis did. After the complete conquest, they expelled the muslims and jews - the only ones who were allowed to stay were the ones who converted to Christianity. Even the ones who converted were put to rigorous tests (making them eat pork..etc..) to make sure that they were indeed christians. This is NOT my version of history, this is acknowledged by even Spanish Government in their tourist literature. Of course there have been persecutions, but you have to look at everything with respect to its times. I was merely comparing with the christian counter parts and there is an overwhelming majority of historians who agree with what I am saying. I am curious to know which major historian suggests the history of Andalusia is like you say. Of course, they shouldn't be anyone with remotely muslim names - that takes out the credibility part completely, right?

we do not need to keep apologizing for modern barbarity by appealing to relative tolerance in the past, india shows that religious tolerance can be had even in the pre-modern age.

So, you really are saying there was relative tolerance in the past. Ok, thats all I was saying too.

I have no intention to be an apologist, but if you say well known facts are just myths, well, you just have to say it is not. If that makes me an apologist, be it that way.

christianity has been gelded, supine at the feel of secular society, dominant no power.

tell that to bush, ashcroft, or the alabama judiciary.

In god we trust.

in any case, you make the assertion that we need to look at 1400 years of history. i think that's wrong, islam needs to move into 2005, soon!!! we aren't checking their credit for a home application, we want to see the money now.

Funny. What is the span of history that you should look at? 10 years, 20 years, 2005? If you are blaming it all on Islam for the Al-Qaeda menace, you better know something more than Islam in 2005. If Islam can be peaceful (which I am not sure whether you agree, you have given conflicting statements) at some point, it can be peaceful now as well. But there are elements within Islam who for various reasons have found a fertile ground for extremism against the west. It is as simple as that.

i don't care if they do stupid medieval shit in muslim countries, but i've had not so veiled threats from muslims because i'm an apostate. that's not acceptable.

Well, there is a whole lot of anger here, but it is not wise to judge when I don't know what you are subjected to by muslims. condolences if anyone threatened you because you are an atheist or apostate or whatever.

the spirit of islam needs to be crushed, but hook or crook.

I would say this about Political Islam, but not about Islam, and not as far as crushing it. I'd have liberal muslims taking on the fight like the left leaning reform parties in various countries, they will get there sometime, as long as the west stays out of it.

i don't give a shit what they think, they shouldn't forget what century they're coming into when they journey into the lands of voltaire and hume.

the truths i hold dear as a citizen of the enlightenment must not be conceded.

You seem enmeshed in the myth of the "enlightenment" .... for an alternate perspective, consider one of the works by Adorno or Horkheimer.

One more thing:

muslims can practice barbarous sharia in muslim countries, i don't care, but the truths i hold dear as a citizen of the enlightenment must not be conceded.

I agree with you there.

razib is a dude

islam was tolerant/christianity was intolerant meme is really propoganda

they both were intolerant and both religions in past and present times are fixated on either 'saving' non-believers or 'converting by pressure/force/underhanded' tricks all in the name of God. Christian philosophy of 'holier than thou' attitudes is what primarily drove atrocities in previous times on a large scale and if Islamic thought isn't modified it will become the next flashpoint of this era. If these religions didn't approach non-believers w/ such fear, hatred, contempt and condescension, we probably wouldn't have half the issues we have these days. My .02

if u were blinf folded an stepped out of a aeroplane an then the blindfoles were removed u wouldnt b able 2 tell which was india or which was pakistan.unless of course u did a aids count.

yeah, i wouldn't be able to tell bcuz we all know hindu temples are everywhere in pakistan just as mosques are in india. Nor would I be able to diffrentiate modern corporate cities such as Bangalore, Gurgoan, Mumbai, Delhi from karachi and lahore. I'm sure I would be able to practice my religion of Hinduism in Pakistan w/o fear of getting harrassed or killed. And speaking of women's rights/roles, I'm sure I'd see a lot of women going to school in Pakistan and increasingly taking a larger role in the workforce of and politics of the nation and I'm sure in Pakistan of all places they'd have valid opinions and wouldn't be looked down upon if they chose to not wear a hijab or burqua.

Lovin,
To add to your last point ... Jewish Senagoges (not sure of spelling)!!!!! I remember when I was 10 years old, my father took a visiting US AID official to a Jewish Temple (as the US AID official was Jewish) in Ahmedabad. I was in the car.
On the other hand in Pakistan they killed Daniel Pearl for being Jewish.

i really don't get what gripes Pakistan has w/ Israel other than 'muslim brotherhood'...I just want to slap some Pakistani's when they go off on an anti-Israel tangent, it just makes no sense culturally or historically, outside of a mob mentality. I don't see Arab Muslim nations spewing venom at India.

"Why don't Sikhs and Hindus blow up the London Tube?" It seems kind of redundant to find the answers in Islam, we've been down that route so many times that it is flaccid category of analysis at this point. Somebody (Punjabi Boy? sorry for being vague and wrong, too many comments to go through again), suggested it might be more interesting to look at the specific histories of the South Asian countries and diaspora. Fundie Hindus and Sikhs can send money to the VHP and Khalistan folks, they don't have too blow up anything in their adopted countries. Perhaps Baluchis send money home to their separatist movements and its the Punjabis from Pakistan who are blowing stuff up. Second, the history of immigration in the US at least has been quite different for Indians, pakistanis and Bangladeshis vis a vis the class differences, might not that have something to do with what your experience is in the adopted coutnry? and what becomes available to you as an attractive ideology, be it Jihadism or Hindutva, both of these very modern phenomenon have ways of manifesting themselves in the diaspora in ways very specific to them. Third, has anyone seen, "My Son the Fanatic" ? I think writers and filmmakers were onto something way before anyone noticed.

Lovin,
You need some loving sista

Shahswati

I dont think that examining the specific nature of Islamic extremism and how it latches onto young minds as an ideology is a flaccid category of analysis at this point - I think it is vital and urgent to examine as a factor amongst many rather than just brush under the carpet.

Razib - I find your notions about Enlightenment and Modernity troubling but that's a discussion saved for another time...it's pointless to expect an Islamic version of the Englightenment since the Englightenment and Modernity arose in Christianity's image...the best way to reduce the threat to those in the West from Islamists is to stress the pluralism of Islam (an empirical reality though alas clearly not an aspiration) and to do our best to keep a Muslim from Dacca making common cause on Chechnya with a North African from Rabat...We can start small. Like by asking the Met to put their Indian Muslim art into the South Asian Art section rather than stick it in their "Islamic Art" section...Not to get all post-modernist here but modernism and its attendant notions of identity are to be blamed as much as Islamists for the pan-Islamist demon as it exists today...

shashwati and punjabi boy,

i see no disagreement between you. it's clear that islam is part of what we are talking about because we are discussing early 21st-century jihadi terrorism (as opposed to the many other terrorisms that are and have been out there), and jihadi terrorism makes reference to islam by definition.

having established that, i agree that discussing "why" people of other faiths don't commit terrorist acts is a complete red herring. not least because people of all faiths commit terrorist acts.

with respect to the question at hand, then, i think punjabi boy has made a big contribution by getting us to think about specific diasporic sub-communities (specific both by origin and by destination) and what might lead one to become more prone to jihadi terrorism and another less so. i don't think we've got the answers yet, but i appreciate the method. it's certainly made me think.

shashwati, you are right on with "my son the fanatic." (this was discussed somewhere here in the immediate wake of the london attack.) great film. i was disappointed by hanif kureishi's recent op-ed, though. very abstract, timid, taking refuge in some kind of vague intellectualism. the brother's definitely lost his edge.

peace

I'm sure I would be able to practice my religion of Hinduism in Pakistan w/o fear of getting harrassed or killed.

I met a Pakistani Hindu once, she acted as if it was the most natural thing in the world. (Probably a built up reaction to everyone's inevitable surprise and intrigue). But I wonder, to what extent is the above statement really true? Especially the "harassed" part...Would love to get some first-hand accounts (or links).

a few points

1) see infidels: a history of conflict between christendom and islam by andrew wheatcraft on the absolute vs. relative state of jews (as well as muslims and christians) in al-andalus/spain. wheatcraft is a scholar with a deep background in spain, and he focuses on jews as a third person in the narrative. the point is that al-andalus is often lionized as if it was analogous to the jewish haskalah ("enlightenment") of the 19th century. but the analogy is not particularly strong.

2) as for the quote from the jewish library, one tradition in historiagraphy asserts that the lionization of al-andalus by jews is due to two factors:

a) the singular trauma of the expulsion
b) it was a non-western example of tolerance that was used to criticize western anti-semitism in the modern period.

in other words, i think it can be understand within the intellectual context of the west like the sinophilia of the early 18th century, or the romanticization of the kingdom of prester john. this is not to say that jews did not have tolerance in al-andalus vs. many christian nations (where they were expelled), but one needs to keep perspective, as before 1500 it seems highly plausible that before 1700 more jews lived in the dar-al-islam than in europe in any case (there was a population explosion of ashkenazi jews between 1700-1800 of enormous magnitude).

3) as for the quibbling about the "enlightenment" and "modernity," there is simply a paradigm gap that won't be bridged here i suspect. i am not utopian idealist, i have spoken in other places of how enlightenment science was a necessary precondition of modern scientific racialism. i am aware of how the enlightenment was coupled with the civilizing mission to the barbarians and colored peoples of the world. nevertheless, it is a sui generis civilization in my opinion, to use sagan's phrase, it is a candle in a "demon haunted world." ultimately the self-critical and scientific values of the enlightnement are minoritarian even in the west, where most individuals are breeders. but i reject the hand-wringing contextualization of some, and the contention that the enlightenment is an outgrowth of "christianity" is a true, but substanceless contention in my opinion.

4) one of the issues that seems to crop up here is a concern for the whole world. i think i've made it clear my focus is on america, and in particular the west. i don't particularly care what other people do.

You need some loving sista

huh?

You need some loving sista

huh?

Because you seem to be very angry and bitter.

I met a Pakistani Hindu once, she acted as if it was the most natural thing in the world.

me too, i met a Pakistani Hindu and she was telling me that life in karachi was ok. That she could practice hinduism, HOWEVER, it couldn't be expressed strongly, nor would the locals tolerate any big celebrations of any type. Basically, pray and be quiet and don't piss them off....that's not religious freedom. In India, USA, UK, etc, where muslims have resided, they blatantly show their religious beliefs via women wearing hijabs/burquas, their behavior and prayers and celebrations, and it's ok. To suppress that would inflame the community. yet in their backyards it's a privelege to practice your own religion. Sadly, this girl had the same reaction your acquaintance did, that this was the way things are.

now before anyone jumps down my throat, realize that many of my family's dear friends are muslims and are great ppl, i was making a compare/contrast observation based on my experiences and encounters.

Because you seem to be very angry and bitter.

no, as usual most ppl take an honest opinion to mean anger. I'm in no way angry or resentful of Muslims or anything else, my life is wonderful, but I do voice my opinions on wrongdoings and inadequacies. I'm not PC by any means, which means these days if you don't sugarcoat something you say, you're a jerk. Some ppl can deal w/ it and some can't.

i really don't get what gripes Pakistan has w/ Israel other than 'muslim brotherhood'...I just want to slap some Pakistani's when they go off on an anti-Israel tangent, it just makes no sense culturally or historically, outside of a mob mentality. I don't see Arab Muslim nations spewing venom at India.

Utter lies and nonsense it makes perfect sense. Desi politics is clearly all about the Is vs the Ps. India vs Pakistan, Isreal vs Palestine, Insaf vs Politics, etc ...

Though you have to be careful it's not that simple anymore, the world is becoming more corrupt. Nowadays it is fashon for the sides to switch letters like the Islamic-wahabists vs Puritan-wannabees thats is so popular.

I blame Vestern influence.

In India, USA, UK, etc, where muslims have resided, they blatantly show their religious beliefs via women wearing hijabs/burquas, their behavior and prayers and celebrations, and it's ok.

I hope I don’t make this conversation stray of it's point (if that hasn’t already occurred) but to my knowledge more acts of violence have been perpetrated by Hindus on Indian Muslims than by Pakistanis on Pakistani Hindus (Gujarat, Kashmir etc). Acts of violence are committed by both countries on their minorities. Where people get this impression of India being a utopian magical place where minorities are completely equal and in no way suffer acts of violence or hostility I don’t know. Again I stress, minorities in BOTH countries suffer SPORADICALLY at the hands of the majority (Hindu or Muslim).

I hope I don’t make this conversation stray of it's point (if that hasn’t already occurred) but to my knowledge more acts of violence have been perpetrated by Hindus on Indian Muslims than by Pakistanis on Pakistani Hindus (Gujarat, Kashmir etc)

The percentage of Hindus going from 15% to about 1% in Pakistan is not a coincidence is it?