Monday, February 02, 2004

Open Letter to Islamic Fundamentalists Who Are Bent on Trying to Kill Me:

I was disturbed in reading some Militant Hamas literature firstly it said that they desired to spread Islam to all corners of the world. I really have no problem with this statement. I like learning about other cultures furthermore Christians and Buddhists have spread their gospels for many years. However, the statement continued saying that if I didn't convert I would be slaughtered. Now I am a somewhat-intelligent guy and I know this statement is not followed by even a small fraction of Muslims, but its still disturbing. I only have this small question and maybe a Islamic cleric can answer it for me; but what are do they plan to do once they have converted the entire world? I would hazard to guess they would hopefully settle down, raise a family, visit friends and enjoy Allah's blessings. (Maybe people could start to debate the deeper social issues of the world such as capital punishment and euthanasia without the irony that we're just letting people starve.) So what I propose is just skip the world domination part and I will work my best getting this machine call "constitutional democracy" to work properly and fairly. They should just simplify their lives and I promise to try and get W. Bush tried for war crimes.

Personally I think we should celebrate our differences. I have been fortunate to have traveled to many places around the world and I see that while places far away are completely different, they are still people, with family and sad times and good times and are people I can call friends. I totally respect Islam, I wish no harm to even Islamic Fundamentalists. I must confess that I think you should not force people to be Muslim, isn't the whole process that much more powerful if the person freely chooses to follow Mohammad? I can totally see why western culture seems so scary. And there's no reason why you have to allow banks, Starbucks and reality TV into your culture as hard as ad-agency would try, even I agree there's no reason to be capitalist, even though that system does let you believe whatever you like and still run a business. (I would though like to see more women's rights and an end to ruling by fear, but these are really nit picks of mine) There nothing more beautiful that hearing the Muslim call to prayer. Call me an idealist but I would be honored if a Muslim family and my family could sit down at the same table. Of course I would research all the proper foods, called halal, and server them with flourish, it would not be a chore. The dinner would be a celebration and we could be closer and wiser people because of it. Email me to set the date.

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