Reza Aslan on Islam, civil rights and violence

(function(d, s, id) { var js, fjs = d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0]; if (d.getElementById(id)) return; js = d.createElement(s); js.id = id; js.src = "//connect.facebook.net/en_US/all.js#xfbml=1"; fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js, fjs); }(document, 'script', 'facebook-jssdk')); Post by Media Matters for America.This is an excellent take down from Reza Aslan on the topic of Islam and civil rights. His response to the pernicious and lazy association between genital mutilation and Islam is particularly welcome, although he is arguably guilty of generalizing himself in referring to it broadly as an "African problem" (we all, myself included, really have to work on  relieving ourselves of the colonial-era quirk of referring to that continent as if its one homogeneous whole).The media has a tendency to conflate differences in values between "Muslim countries" and the West with what are really differences in values between secular and sectarian states, and/or differences in values between educated and non-educated classes. Aslan touches on this in his comparison between Turkey and Saudi Arabia, but doesn't explicitly make the point. The question is, would a Christian state be anymore progressive than a Muslim one? In aggregate almost certainly not although, as Aslan correctly points out, the chief determinant of this will be the people and their existing cultural norms rather than the overlying faith they share. If a culture of violence exists, or a state/societal motive to act viole...
Source: Across the Bilayer - Category: Research Source Type: blogs