1. 1
   oman Said:
   August:20:2010 - 21:18 
   

   The moderate might address not only the extremists but also the extraordinary punishment and control system http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-11045848 http://saudiwoman.wordpress.com/2010/07/24/posting-from-rome/
   used to control those of a different nationality , gender and socioeconomic status

2. 2
   John Burgess Said:
   August:20:2010 - 21:30 
   

   I agree, but they can’t be arguing about everything at once. Picking targets is, I think, more productive.

3. 3
   ‘the Holy Alliance’: Another Chapter in European Hypocrisy Pinged With:
   August:21:2010 - 07:05 
   

   [...] Speaking out against Extremist Islam | Crossroads Arabia [...]

4. 4
   Andrew Said:
   August:22:2010 - 08:49 
   

   I suspect that Westerners have such a shallow understanding of Islam that the question that they pose concerns the distribution curve of moderation vs. extremism amongst professing Muslims.

   In other words, Westerners have a very weak sense of what proportion of all Muslims are extremists, and what that means, and what proportion are not Muslims and what that means.

   And, to be fair, Western media have done virtually no work to explore and describe this. This is, of course, compounded by the tyrannical nature of many of our nations.

   Finally, there is the overlay of Arab vs. non-Arab Muslims, as Westerners are clearly most terrified of Arab Muslims.

   So, the distribution curve of such extremism vs. moderation amongst Arab Muslims deserves to be explored for Western audiences.

   Finally, my observation is that Westerners believe that Muslim moderates are essentially irrelevant in their societies, in that only ardent extremist Muslims have the ability to influence actions. That too merits an analysis by Westerners.

   So, I think that these statements by moderates are essentially meaningless with regard to quelling those fears among Westerners, because Westerners generally believe that such moderate Muslims, even if numerous in absolute terms, are a small portion of all Muslims.

   We have a great deal of effort to explain ourselves to Westerners.

5. 5
   oby Said:
   August:22:2010 - 18:51 
   

   @Andrew…

   I think you wrote a very thoughtful and IMO accurate analysis. The one thing I would disagree with is:

   “So, I think that these statements by moderates are essentially meaningless with regard to quelling those fears among Westerners, because Westerners generally believe that such moderate Muslims, even if numerous in absolute terms, are a small portion of all Muslims.”

   I am not sure that non Muslims think moderates are in the minority. Where I think the problem comes in is that non Muslims think that moderates’ voices are not loud enough to drown out the extremist voices, who even though are small in number, tend to get most of the attention/cause problems. Therefore moderate Muslims SEEM to be sitting on the sidelines not doing enough to counteract all the extremist noise and that confuses non Muslims. Not fair to those moderates either. IMO anyway.

6. 6
   Andrew Said:
   August:23:2010 - 05:46 
   

   oby.

   I agree that we Muslims moderates are not in the minority.

   To be clear, Westerners generally believe (regardless of whether that belief be correct) that moderate Muslims, even if numerous in absolute terms, are a small portion of all Muslims.

   And, it is not a matter of the loudness of our voice.

   Rather, because of a variety of political and social factors, the view among Westerners is that we are not powerful, when compared with the more ardent extremists.

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