kosta50 said: "Also, you can't outlaw a religion! Christianity was outlawed and persecuted for 300 years and all it did was grow and grow until it finally took over."
And I agree completely. Oppression (real or imagined) has only helped Christianity to grow and spread. Islam is really much the same in that respect. If you oppress, cruelly, harshly and unfairly it will only spread. Unfortunately "perceived" oppression - made up sometimes by Muslims or just misunderstood has the same effect. That's why we in the West have to stick to our values of civil liberty, democracy, tolerance (including freedom to worship) and openness. If people behave badly, come down on 'em like a ton of bricks - but do it openly and fairly.
There's a lot of talk about Islamaphobia in the UK - that's the "irrational fear or hatred of Muslims". At first I thought the "Muslim community" were completely making it up - but reading some of the posts in this forum I see there is a lot irrational fear and misunderstanding about Islam (and I have already posted that I don't care for Islam one jot).
Irrational fear isn't constructive. But understanding and discourse is. There are a lot of bad Muslims out there and that they are dangerous (this seems well understood), but folks also have to understand that there are in fact a lot of decent Muslims out there who could take a lead in their religion and culture being more tolerant - and dare I say it - more Westernised.
And please believe me, I do understand what some Mullahs are preaching. I've worked with a guy who was a full-on Nut-case Islamic fundamentalist who I have no doubt would have happily killed me if he thought it would promote the spread of Islam (and who, by the way, was actually very pleasant to work with, I learned a lot from him) But squashing this guy, when he hadn't actually done anything and hadn't said anything either (my earlier description of him is just MY perception) would have only enraged his Muslim brothers - and rightly so.