We were discussing an Australian Muslim calling for the violent overthrow of the government to install Shariah law. An article from The Australian suggested that 'moderate' Muslims are hesitant to criticise these people because they have varying levels of support within the Islamic community. Islamic leaders risk alienating many Muslims if they criticise lunatics.
Abu responded by suggesting that it is part of Australian culture to not speak out against extremists and that mainstream Muslims need have no interest at all in condemning extremist Muslims unless they break the law, and that even then it is the job of the police to look into it:
abu_rashid wrote on Jan 22
nd, 2011 at 10:03pm:
Quote:Islamic groups and leaders have frequently been criticised for failing to take on these groups, and for not being sufficiently vocal in rejecting their message.
As I've told you many times before fd, and neither should we be taking them on. They are exercising their rights within Australian law, if _you_ don't like it, then you're the one who has to change, because that's part of Australia's way of life. Like it or leave it (as the old saying goes).
If they break the law, then it's up to the authorities to deal with them (not us).
Not satisfied with this excuse, Abu then went on to equate speaking out against lunatics with lynching them. Not sure why he thought of lynching as it was pretty much out of context:
abu_rashid wrote on Jan 22
nd, 2011 at 10:34pm:
Muslims are supposed to form their own vigilante groups, and spend their time hunting down anyone who says something that fd doesn't agree with? Seriously, you're a whacko.
Abu then went on to justify the unwillingness of Muslims to publicly criticise lunatics by suggesting there are no movements in Australia against Nazism and racism.
abu_rashid wrote on Jan 24
th, 2011 at 7:11am:
Fact is the vast majority of Aussies are completely ignorant and apathetic to their very existence. In fact I don't even think we have an anti-Nazi/Racism movement here. And in most countries where there is one, it's usually the socialists who are behind it, and they are certainly not the mainstream of society.
But wait, there's more!
Abu then came up with an interesting alternative theory about why Muslims don't criticse lunatics. It seems to be an unexpected result of taqiyya (deception of non-Muslims). Basically, Muslim leaders do not publicly speak out against these lunatics because 'moderate' Muslims then assume that they are simply lying for the benefit of western media and that they actually support them.
Abu actually said this.
abu_rashid wrote on Jan 24
th, 2011 at 7:11am:
Btw, condemning something publicly is a load of garbage. It's nothing but an empty attempt to showboat. And people can quite easily publicly condemn something, that privately they support. In fact I'm pretty sure that most of those who do these very public condemnations actually are the biggest supporters of the things they condemn. Best cover isn't it?
This may seem like absurdly convoluted mental gymnastics to make excuses for the behaviour of Muslims, especially to those not familiar with Islam and who expect people to simply say what they mean, (particularly spiritual leaders). However, Abu's theory does appear to have some basis in reality. The British documentary 'Undercover Mosque' uncovered some rather chilling examples of Muslim leaders publicly saying one thing to non-Muslims and the opposite to fellow Muslims.
http://www.abc.net.au/rn/religionreport/stories/2008/2360820.htm#transcript
Quote:Stephen Crittenden: I think we see that al taqiyya happening in front of our eyes in this program, in particular it's when there's a visit to the mosque of a group of non-Muslims, an inter-faith meeting. They're all very nice to their faces and the moment they leave we see what happens.
David Henshaw: Yes. It's a sequence in the program that most people have talked about. Regent's Park Mosque is officially committed to inter-faith dialogue which we all believe in, and at one stage our undercover reporter films a group of Christians visiting the mosque and the preacher and the Women's Circle treat them kindly and talk about 'We're all people of the book and we all come from the same history'. Just as soon as that group of visitors leaves, the language changes completely. 'Christianity is vile', the preacher says. 'It's disgusting going past their churches and seeing what they do in there.' So yes, pretty two-faced, and I understand what you're talking about. You know, the traditional idea that you can lie to the unbeliever, that's not a sin.
Not sure why Muslims would look to someone like that for spiritual guidance, especially in an 'enlightened' western country. Perhaps Abu can shed some light on it.