Time to Take On America’s Haters
Will anyone stand up to America’s fundamentalists?

NEWSWEEK

One of the most troubling realities of the Muslim world today is the cowardice of moderates. Mainstream Muslim leaders—political and religious—do not condemn religious extremism often enough and vigorously enough. As a result, fundamentalists gain courage and their poisonous views go unchallenged.

Unfortunately, the same phenomenon appears to be at work now with America’s own homegrown fundamentalists. Last week Jerry Falwell announced on CBS’s “60 Minutes” that Muhammad was “a terrorist.” His comments are part of a trend. At various points Pat Roberston has called Muhammad “a robber and a brigand” and described Islam as “a monumental scam.” Billy Graham’s son Franklin has chimed in as well, frequently calling Islam “a very evil and wicked religion.”

It's been all over the news for the last few days that the protests in India sparked by Falwell's comments have lead to at least 9 deaths so far.  Muslims, outraged over Falwell's comments, which have been taken by many Muslims as being representative of how the US as a whole feels, staged a strike in protest.  Hindus in the area confronted the protesters, and the protest became violent. Of the nine who have died thus far, some have been killed by police gunfire as they try to bring the riots to an end, and others were stabbed or beaten with stones.  The latest reports I am aware of indicate that the rioting is still underway, and officials have reimposed a curfew in hopes of bringing the unrest to an end.

And what is Falwell's response to this? In a statement released through the PR Newswire, he said:

LYNCHBURG, Va., Oct. 12 /PRNewswire/ -- I sincerely apologize that certain statements of mine made during an interview for the September 30 edition of CBS's "60 Minutes" were hurtful to the feelings of many Muslims. I intended no disrespect to any sincere, law abiding Muslim.

In my more than 50 years of Christian ministry, I have never preached a sermon on Islam. I have never written a book or booklet on the subject. I have always shown respect for other religions, faiths and denominations. Unfortunately, I answered one controversial and loaded question at the conclusion of an hour-long CBS interview which I should not have answered. That was a mistake and I apologize.

He's sorry that his statements were "hurtful to the feelings" of Muslims.  Note that he does not say that his statement was wrong, only that he's sorry if it was hurtful. Apparently, he still considers Mohammad to be a terrorist, but regrets this his having said so is upsetting to some. 

As for the rest of his his "statement of reconciliation" (the headline it was published under), he notes that he was asked a "controversial and loaded" question at the end of an "hour-long" interview, and that he shouldn't have answered it. If the problem is that he shouldn't have answered it, but lacked the judgement to do so, why is it necessary to point out that the question was controversial and loaded or that it came at the end of a long interview?  If he was truly accepting responsilbity for his comments, he could simply have said it was a question he shouldn't have answered.  By making a point of describing it in such negative terms and pointing out that it was asked at a time when he might be expected to be tired, he appears to be trying to shift the focus for the fall out away from himself.

Here's the problem I have with that. How many time has Jerry Falwell said something, and then later had to retract, apologize, restate, explain or otherwise backpedal from what he was saying?  Its probably one of the things he's most famous for, because it's usually how he gets his name in the papers. Given how long his career has been and how many time he's been in hot water for statements that have been upsetting, hurtful or, in this case, lethal, there is absolutely no excuse for him to keep making the same mistakes over and over.

Either Falwell is too much of an idiot to learn from his mistakes, or he knows exactly what he's doing, and most likely does it intentionally.  Obviously, I tend to think its the second of the two.  He says things that he know will be offensive, that he knows will be hurtful, and that he knows will be controversial with the expectation that there will be a flap over the comments and that he'll not only get another shot of publicity, but his views will be more widely circulated that they otherwise might have been. Then, after a day or two, he comes up with a non-apology apology - a statement intended to sound like he's being contrite without saying he's wrong or accepting any blame.

The thing that sickens me the most, however, is that he can release a statement like this, well after reports of the nine who died in the protests have been published, and not so much as even mention that his words did more than hurt anyone's feelings.  I'm sorry, but being stabbed, shot or bludgeoned to death is more than "hurt feelings", yet he won't even acknowledge that, were it not for his statement, the riots that killed those people would not have occured.

Another area of concern was also addressed by the Newsweek article:

While there have been scattered condemnations from editorials here and there, there has been silence from the White House and most mainstream political and religious leaders. Commentators who froth at the mouth when they read of one crackpot mullah in Egypt saying noxious things about Christians or Jews are now silent. Forget about Islamic moderates for a moment; where are America’s moderates?

It's a good question.

Reports have indicated that Muslims in the Arab world are pointing to Falwell's statement, saying it shows that America really does hate Islam and the Islamic world. Right now, especially with the war in Iraq looming on the horizon, we need to maintain the best relations we can with the Islamic countries in the Middle East. The more that the US is perceived as hostile to Islam as a faith, the more likely Islamic countries are to band together against us. And with President Bush so far silent on these comments - as he has been silent on most other occasions when one of our vaunted religious leaders has spoken against Islam or characterised it as a religion of violence - or outright evil - he appears to be tacitly agreeing with them.  This is not a good diplomatic strategy to be persuing.

In the immediate aftermath of the 9/11 attacks, Bush went out of his way to reach out to Muslims in America and offer them reassurance that we know what the terrorists did is not a true reflection of the Islamic faith.  Since then, however, as the rhetoric from the Religious Right has become hotter and more anti-Islamic, Bush has become quieter.  One might even think that he was afraid of offending religoius conservatives with an election just over the horizon. I suppose eventually he'll have to decide which would be the worst result: The Islamic world unified against us, believing that we hate them, or running the risk of losing Republican control of Congress and/or possibly losing his re-election bid in 2004?  That may well tell us whether he's more committed to his own career or the well-being of the United States.