Reply to Debby

Submitted by Tim Burton (United Kingdom), Apr 28, 2006 at 15:16

Writing from Staffordshire, East Midlands, England.

It may well be true that mainstream American education (and British education, come to that) has serious shortcomings with regard to discipline, with drugs and knives being regularly brought to school. Students at Islamic teaching establishments may well be safer - physically at least.

However, this should not be a license for Islamic schools to teach hatred and intolerance of non-Muslims and the non-Muslim host countries that have been so good as to grant them traditional Western freedoms such as freedom of speech and freedom of religion.

Physical safety is important, but more important is that young minds should not be crippled by an arrogant, supremacist and intolerant doctrine of hate towards non-Muslims.

It should never be forgotten that in Muslim lands there would be no such tolerance for non-Muslims to teach hatred of Muslims or to promote such Western values of freedom.

The sooner that Islam reforms to reject such hypocrisy, the better. Otherwise we are on course for the clash of civilisations predicted by Samuel Huntingdon.

To summarise, Islam needs to adapt to the West and to the 21st century. The West does not need to adapt to Islam and an outdated 7th century point of view.

Tim

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