Holy Terror? (Cutting through the muddled thinking about Nidal Malik Hasan's faith...)

Boston Phoenix ^ | 11/12/09 | Adam Reilly

[steve-b]

On the afternoon of November 5, Army Major Nidal Malik Hasan walked into a building at Fort Hood, the sprawling military base in central Texas; sat briefly in solitary silence; and then opened fire with a semi-automatic pistol, shooting roughly a hundred rounds and killing 12 soldiers and one civilian. As soon as news of Hasan's spree started circulating, a debate began raging, which continues as of this writing — and which doubles as an argument over the place of Islam in America. That Hasan's faith and its impact on his actions were topics worthy of sober, nuanced analysis seemed to elude pundits on both sides. Instead, the question was framed in stark terms: did Hasan kill because he's a Muslim; or was linking Islam to last week's massacre a gratuitous move that reeked of religious bigotry?...

It's hard to know which of these disparate perspectives is less convincing....

[marron]

For much of the conservative commentariat, the answer was obvious from the outset: anyone seeking to explain the atrocity Hasan perpetrated, they claimed, can start and end with his faith.

Thats how Hasan himself explained it.

This article is really kind of mealy-mouthed. He has to admit that there is a connection, but he doesn't want to, and wants to make it look as if, if you notice the connection and say it out loud, you're a bigot.

Sorry. No sale. Hasan is the bigot.

If you can't say that out loud, then how do you distinguish between muslims who are our allies, muslims who are loyal, versus the jihadis in suits and blue jeans and army uniforms just waiting to go pop?

Guys like Hasan are bigots. They are at heart natural totalitarians. They are at heart natural psychopaths. If you refuse to notice that for fear that you will offend other muslims you've really lost the plot; in fact you've just besmirched the very muslims you think you're trying to protect.

We have to call out the muslim bigots, and get them out of the military. We have to point them out when they try to sell their wares on TV. We have to exclude them where ever we can because, why? because these are the ranks that the jihadis recruit from. These are the jihadist apologists. These are the people jihadis hide among, and at a certain point, these are the jihadis themselves. If a guy is pro-jihadi, he's the enemy. You'd better deal with him.

[andy58-in-nh]

Eventually, we are going to have to come to terms with the truth: Islam is a religion whose dominant radical incarnation is based on hatred, death, and revenge. Its primary values are not peace, love, freedom or tolerance, but obedience and conquest. As such, Islam is fundamentally incompatible with Western society and culture, reflecting the Judeo-Christian values that underlie them.

Any attempt at toleration on the part of a Western nation will not be accepted by the Muslim as an act of nobility or kindness, but as an invitation to demand, disrupt, and ultimately, to conquer. Wishing otherwise will not change that reality. In this world, there exist those who seek to use good peoples' virtue against them in the service of something much darker.