Was there a matching survey on Christian views? Somehow (apart of course from the most scurrilous finding, that Muslims are predominately -gasp- Democrats) I can't see that being much different there save for the suicide bombing conclusion.

But I guess we've been over this already. Unless you know of something neither of us has any evidence to suggest these muslim results are in any way unusual for people in general.

My only other question is what possible purpose are you serving in bringing them up again?

maybe you should have looked at the link there are compariasions in it to christians and all americans

Why is that relevent? We're talking about Americans here; I don't think any Americans have successfully committed an act of terrorism in the name of anyone since 9/11, have they? There've been suspects and convictions for planning, but I don't think there's been any successful attacks by US citizens.



There was a zogby poll in 2006 that found 42% of Americans in general believed the US government was covering up something about 9/11. It's not quite the same question, but let's remember that only 28% of that Muslim 60% believed non-Arabs were actually involved in the attack.



Not on all questions and not on what I would consider were the key questions - those on terrorism and on conspiracy theories about Israeli/US gov involvement.

Oh, and one interesting thing - 43% of Muslims think new Muslims in America should adopt American customs, with another 16% saying they should adopt US customs and keep their own. I'm not sure if that's unusual for an American immigrant group but it would be for an Australian one (from my recollection a survey of the Serbian community in Oz returned around a 30% adopt local rate on a similar question).



I should have read the report first, I admit that now, but this is made problematic in the report when it says that Christians do exactly the same thing - 42% of Christians think of themselves as Christians first, Americans second. When 54% of Muslims think gov policies on terrorism are an attempt to single out the Muslim population I think that's actually a surprisingly high pro-America figure.

Was there a matching survey on Christian views? Somehow (apart of course from the most scurrilous finding, that Muslims are predominately -gasp- Democrats) I can't see that being much different there save for the suicide bombing conclusion. But I guess we've been over this already. Unless you know of something neither of us has any evidence to suggest these muslim results are in any way unusual for people in general.

You'd almost think I didn't link to the actual survey so you could look these up yourself. But oh, wait, yes, I did link to it where this data is.  Why not look it up for yourself.  I obviously posted it because yes, the Muslim differences were different.

My only other question is what possible purpose are you serving in bringing them up again?

Again? This is the first survey of American muslims I know of.  Last time we talked about it, it was about European Muslims and the excuse given was that sure, European Muslims are extremists and what not but not American which "proved" (to them) that the issue isn't related to the religion.

I think at this point, we can say that yes, Islam is an ideology beyond just a religion. That those who belief in this "religion" seem to have dramatically different world views than people of other religions.

Why is that relevent? We're talking about Americans here; I don't think any Americans have successfully committed an act of terrorism in the name of anyone since 9/11, have they? There've been suspects and convictions for planning, but I don't think there's been any successful attacks by US citizens.

Then "why", was it relevant enough for YOU to bring it up in the first place? I refer you to reply #1.

#1 by cactoblasta Fri, May 25, 2007 11:59 PM Was there a matching survey on Christian views? Somehow (apart of course from the most scurrilous finding, that Muslims are predominately -gasp- Democrats) I can't see that being much different there save for the suicide bombing conclusion. But I guess we've been over this already. Unless you know of something neither of us has any evidence to suggest these muslim results are in any way unusual for people in general. My only other question is what possible purpose are you serving in bringing them up again?

26% of American Muslims say that homicide bombings against civilians is justified.

Not Egyptian Muslims, American muslims.

I defy anyone here to tell me that if Christians were polled that there wouldn't be AT LEAST as many who said they were Christians first and Americans second. Country before God? What planet do you live on? Christians, especially evangelicals, have a martyr syndrome. Go read the "Left Behind" crap.

They believe that their governments will turn against them and they'll all have to oppose the government and refuse the mark of the beast, etc. The "black UN helicopter" militia crowd in the US is crammed full of Christians ready to fight the evil antichrist government ATF agents in the "end times". Can you really sit there and pretend that Christians intend to sit quietly, accept their little tattoo and do what the supposed antichrist says in their "end times" myth?

I grew up around NRA, pentacostal and evangelical Christians always murmuring about the ATF and how they were going to come for your guns and make you give up your bibles and make your daughters have abortions. I've lived near the communities, in the chruches, in the same part of the country as Eric Rudolph, and I've heard people openly support such acts, over and over. I've heard the sniper that killed abortion doctors praised FROM THE PULPIT.

Now, do we go out and do it? Hell no. We're fat and happy. So are Muslim Americans. They're fat and happy, too, and they don't blow people up, either. If the ones in the Middle East were fat an happy they wouldn't care, either. Instead, they are brainwashed by POLITICAL propaganda, scapegoating Israel and the US for their problems, the problems in their societies, and more often than not sitting around with nothing to do except believe in evil Zionist plots.

The next time you hear the old recording of Charlton Heston giving the "cold dead fingers" speech, ask yourself what he is saying. Ever go to gun shows? Heh, sometimes I think Nascar and beer are the only thing that keeps a good portion of the US from becoming militant. The material, the expertise, and the opportunity are there for Muslim Americans to wreak havoc here, and they don't. Do they get any credit for it? Nope.

---

Re: a 108 page survey. The first thing that sprang to mind was the psycological makeup of anyone who would sit for a 108 page survey. How did we react to the poll a couple of years ago that said like 70% of Americans believed that Hussein was responsible for 9/11? Or...



Here's one that says Scientific Poll: 84% of Americans Reject Official 9/11 Story. After all, where is the real spearhead of the 9/11 conspiracy quacks located, Qatar? Nope. "Prison Planet" ain't an Arab site.

Celebrities?



Actually, according to this poll, a smaller percent of Muslims believe 9/11 was a government conspiracy. If you can believe any of these polls. Imagine people speaking with candor to a stranger about this stuff. It isn't going to happen. Christians ain't going to tell you that they support abortion bombings.

We need to get beyond this and just look at reality. American Muslims have the means, material, opportunity, and excuses to commit attacks here. They don't, counter to all the outrage and reason they might have. That is pretty odd, really, in terms of cold statistics. Given the American love of rampage shooting, serial killing, etc., you'd think that eventually we'd find even a half-hearted Muslim looking for an excuse to get his name on the bigtime infamy list.

Like we dealt with the Chinese, Irish, 50's socialists, etc., we're willing to overlook the good and dwell upon the POSSIBILITY of bad. That would be bad enough if this environment of bias and anger didn't PROVOKE Muslims to start behaving in a more anti-social, paranoid way. This will be a self-fulfilling prophesy, if we aren't careful.

P.S. I'm not going back and forth over it. I let this insipidness ruin JU for me, and I'm not going to let it bother me anymore. Believe what you want.


A guy killed a woman and her two daughters here in KY here the other day. Burned one of them alive. We've had a rash of home invasions, rapes, etc. People want to be worried about Muslims, when there are probably dozens of registered sex offenders, child-predators, bent-out-of-shape businessmen ready to pop, etc., in your zip code.

Why? It makes you feel safe, believe it or not. It is us and them. You can tag something on them to watch for. There's a reason. In reality, you're more likely to have some white 40-something cutting your daughter's screen and dragging her out of the house while you are blogging about Muslims.

So, whatever gets you through the day. A villain is always more tolerable than random, nonsensical evil. Muslims beheading people on the other side of the world is easier to cope with than people finding their wives cut up into little pieces by some generic WASP, whose neighbors describe as "quiet, didn't bother anyone..." Its a lot more tolerable than some crazy guy shooting you to pieces in McDonald's, or stalking through your kids dorm.

Like I say, whatever gets you through the day. Lemme know when the polls of American "Christians" who admit to wanting to rape children comes out. Given the fact that Dateline can drag dozens out, in any city, in any given weekend, I think terrorism is the least of our worries. In the end, Muslims aren't nearly as scary as your kids' scout troop leader.

In 2001 we lost less than 3k people on 9/11. There were over 15k murders that year. Since, the murders have continued, up to 16k something last year if I recall. The terrorist thing doesn't really worry me much. 3k verses, what, almost 100k from 2001-2007 in terms of murder? Heh.

For those who did not actually look at the data presented (especially if you chose to comment anyway) you really missed a comprehensive source of information. First, the summary and analysis presented by Pew was 108 pages, not the actual poll. (That is in response to BakerStreet's comment above.) There is a ton of detail on how the data was collected, the multiple languages that the poll was conducted in, the experts on the board that wrote the questions, etc. More information about the poll itself than anyone can easily assimilate in one sitting. It is clear that Pew took significant effort to gather impartial and comprehensive data.

The findings are very interesting. Three quarters of the respondents say that they have never personally experienced discrimination in the US as a result of being Muslim, while almost one third say that someone has expressed support for them. (The likelihood of having been discriminated against goes up if you were born elsewhere and down if you were born here, I am just citing the summary.) The American experience for Muslim's has been much more positive than otherwise.

There are comparisons between Muslims here and abroad that are interesting. There are some interesting comments on society in general. (For example, almost 60% of American Muslims think that the government should do more to protect morality in society.)

To reject a wealth of data like this because you don't like some of the findings or, even worse, because you think that someone might draw conclusions that you don't like from the findings is sad. Poll data is DATA and dismissing any type of fact because we don't like it hurts us in the end.

There is also a Pew Survey on religious tolerance at Link According to that survey 55% of Americans viewed Muslims favorably, which is very close to how they viewed Evangelical Christians. So the sense that Muslims are singled out in American society is probably a misperception, too. Ironically (and really surprising to me) is that Jews are the religious group most favorably viewed in the US. 77%!!!! We're number 1, we're number 1!

Sorry...I was having a moment there.

My focus was based upon the focus of the blog, and the conclusions drawn, obvious by the sarcastic continuance of the "Religion of Peace" junk. I don't doubt that there is good information in the survey, I'm answering the blog, not the survey. My suspicious nature about surveys in general is an attempt not to be a hypocrite, since I, as others here, scoff at them when they make Americans out to be stupid, brainwashed, or bloodthirsty.

I agree that most Americans aren't anti-Muslim on the whole. I'm proud of that fact. What troubles me the most is how conclusions like this are so welcome among the "names" here at JU, even when they are plagiarized. It bothers me that we can glorify bronze age genocide, racism, and militant religious domination in our churches and feel that we are somehow better than people who glorify it now.

Genocide and murder is a cornerstone of all three major religions. Israel didn't settle an empty nation. Christians happily "amen" the liquidation of whole populations in the old testament, and look happily forward to the destruction or eternal torture of people who believe differently than they in terms of the "end times" spoken of in Revelation.

People with bias against religions or ethnicities have always homed in on universal flaws but limited their attention to their occurence in those they dislike. Brad will probably be enraged by being associated with such, but given that's where the focus seems always to be, how else can you take it? The symptoms of the hatefulness are there, and Muslims kill us less here than the rest, yet we're most concerned with Muslims.




I discuss religion here, all religion, but some only seem to discuss one of them. When I see those people down in the religious section asking why the inquisition is still referred to as "holy", or why the slaughter of Philistines is "God's Work", or why Phelps is bad but God slaying every firstborn in Egypt for the Pharaoh's acts is somehow understandable... well, then I might see this as less slanted. I don't think a lot of people have a clue about the "Christian" world view.

I see people say "Well, Christians don't blow people up", but they never take the next step and ask why Muslims not tainted by the political problems of the Middle East don't, either. You'd have to be an idiot to think our religion doesn't rejoice in killing, suffering, etc. Our religion could easily be made hateful; Judaism can easily be made so, too. Yet, Muslims, Christians, Jews, all in America are benign.

But, we ignore all but the one, because half a world a way a complex problem is easily reduced to religion, when in reality it is far more complex, and religion is just an excuse.

I like Brad, you know that, but you can't be blind to the TITLE of the article, or, again, the line:



To me, this is like sitting in a quiet restaurant, talking about "Muslims" with no regard to anyone else in the place. Brad wouldn't do that, but this is reaches a wider audience, search-engine enabled. I mean, what are we really arguing here?

Are we arguing that American Muslims are a threat? Anyone willing to say that based upon decades of SURPRISING lack of threat as compared to other places in the world, and how hated we are in some of them? Are we arguing that American Muslims are somehow less peaceful? How does that play statistics-wise?

I challenged others here to tell me what the HELL kind of use this stuff is. No one replied, though I think in private they probably have a lot of suggestions. How should this way of thinking about Islam effect us? Should we be more distrustful of Muslims? Shadowwar suggested he was gonna start packing heat to the mall, lol.

Brad isn't like that, but somehow he's played into it. Never mind that his life is far more negatively effected by ignorant Christians than "political" Muslims. I just want to know that if all this "Religion of Peace" stuff doesn't translate to a threat, or a functional warning that can be used in some way or another, what is the purpose? Why are we openly ragging on the religion of people who are almost always good neighbors and coworkers?

Wait, are we talking about Arabs or Muslims? If you want to talk about the SOCIOLOGY of the Arab world, heck, you might find more fertile ground with me. If you want to talk about the POLITICAL beast that is wahabbism, sure, even that will be fine.

If this is about Arabs as a race, or Islam as a religion, then you're going to have to place it side by side with their despicable counterparts in other, non-Muslim, sh*thole parts of the world who are just as brutal, sick and twisted. Pol Pot, or Rwandans, or untold others didn't need a religion to start slaughtering hundreds of thousands of people.

I'd be willing to be CASH money that there are just as many Christians in America that would be happy to live in a Christian theocracy as Muslims who long for a caliphate. Far more, imho.

So, if this doesn't translate to real threat, and there isn't really any difference in terms of how we react to Muslims in our day to day life... why are we constantly mulling over their religion in grave tones?

As a Chaote, I'd think you'd know what it is like to be on the side of WASP America's hypocrisy in terms of the bogyman and witch hunts. With Brad, it doesn't even constitute a witch hunt, it's just nitpicking to be nitpicking. If it were a witch hunt, at least there'd be a purpose...

Yeah, now I'm going back and forth. Never mind, break time.

It bothers me that we can glorify bronze age genocide, racism, and militant religious domination in our churches and feel that we are somehow better than people who glorify it now.

That is moral inconsistency for you. Their stands are not based on principles but on selfishness attitudes. They have the right to do things but others dont. simple. they are entitled and privileged ... dont you know that? what is your problem?

It has always been that way baker, .... dont let it bother you. it is sad though, since it really hurts them AND us in the end. Sooner or later, nothing goes unpaid.

Baker - I resent the implication that I'm somehow a "bigot" because I view Islam as an ideology as well as religion.

To me, I think the evidence is pretty clear that Islam is different from other religions.  It is not just a form of faith but a recipe for government and civil life along with policies towards the rest of the world.

There is, in my opinion, more than enough evidence to show that adherents of Islam are much more prone to behavior that we consider deplorable than that of other religions. 

I've said this in the past and I think it's apt still - there were plenty of friendly, kind, generous and peaceful Nazis in Europe.  I would even go as far as to say that the average Nazi was probably a decent human being.  But that doesn't mean that Nazism wasn't a scourge that needed to be eradicated as a movement.

If you really think thta 47% of American Christians see themselves as Christians first and Americans second or that nearly 1 in 10 American Christians thinks it's okay to murder people in the name of their religion then I don't know what to say to you.

Baker, you act like you are so certain you are right and others are merely a bunch of narrow minded bigoted xenophobes that you let it taint your actual impressions of JU.   I don't go around arguing that you're a naive apologist or whatever I would expect the same respect in return. 

You can't possibly deny that I'm educated on history as well as have researched this issue pretty thoroughly at this point.  I feel my conclusions are based thorough research and analysis.  I don't have any pre-existing prejudices against Muslims (no more than against any other religion).  I simply call it like I see it.