The Paris killers are identified but still at large. But the wanton and savage attack upsets me and I cannot avoid that this post has become a bit of a rant.
It is a short step from a rational detestation of barbarous, young, bigoted and intolerant killers of any kind becoming Islampohobia, when the killers are all, once again, self-confessed followers of radical Islam. The radicalisation of young Muslims in Europe nearly always includes three factors:
- A rabid, supposedly religious, imam or mullah or self-anointed preacher, and
- an impressionable, immature young person (usually male), and
- a failure of parenting
Right now there are radical preachers revelling in the Paris attacks and congratulating the killers. These radicalised young Muslims in Europe are not poverty-stricken. Very often they come from fairly prosperous families. They are not uneducated or unintelligent but they are warped and twisted and brain-washed. When they are unemployed it is because they wish to be unemployed. (They differ from some of the right-wing fanatics of Europe who are often unemployable).
But if Islam is not to be represented by its killers then it is first the Islamic communities of Europe which have to drive out the rabid preachers and improve their own parenting to stop the conversion of their children into these murderous, hate-filled, savages. Merely wringing their hands and condemning these actions after the event is not enough. It is behaviour that counts.
The face of Islam today is the very real behaviour of ISIS, Al Shabab, Boko Haram, the Taliban and a host of similar jihadists together with the absence of actions (not just voices) from the Islamic community to prevent or eradicate the disease. It is high time that the moderate Islamic community realised that – like it or not – they are being defined by their most extreme, warped, fanatics. The demonisation of Islam will not stop as long as Islam does not rid itself of its demons.
Is it any wonder that Pegida is gaining strength in Germany?
I don’t care for any organised religions where preachers take it upon themselves to tell others what they are to believe. But right now I find organised Islam (Shia and Sunni and Sufi and every jihadist faction) the easiest to despise.
Caroline Wyatt, BBC Religious affairs correspondent has just posted this:
The killings at Charlie Hebdo are a deeply unwelcome reminder to the west that for some, mainly young radicalised men, their fundamentalist interpretation of their religion matters enough to kill those who offend it.
As a result, across western Europe, liberally-minded societies are beginning to divide over how best to deal with radical Islamism and its impact on their countries, while governments agonise over the potential for a backlash against Muslims living in Europe.
Today, mainstream Muslim organisations in the UK and France have unequivocally condemned the killings, saying that terrorism is an affront to Islam.
But the potential backlash, including support for far right parties and groups, may well hurt ordinary Muslims more than anyone else, leaving the authorities and religious leaders in western Europe wondering how to confront violence in the name of religion without victimizing minorities or being accused of “Islamophobia”.
The k2p blog 