Originally Posted by lackluster

It's almost pavolovian, isn't it?

Usually this brand of knee-jerk apologia utilizes one of three main logical falacies. The first is one is a matter of degree -- in response to a beheadings or suicide bombings, for instance, just find something a bit annoying -- "well, yeah, they may be beheading people and blowing them up, but , but by golly, how about that Pat Robertson, huh?"

The second falacy has to do with prevelence. If 37% of British Muslims think Jews are a legitimate target for murder or if the vast majority of British muslims want to throw somebody in jail if they so much as breathe a word against them, just find some incredibly tiny sect of Christians or Jews with similarly arch beiefs -- "well, sure the large majority British Muslims want you in jail if you diss them, but just lookie what I found -- seven Jews in Hebron and 14 Christians in Little Rock who think the same thing about their religion/culture!"

The third main fallacy has to do with time. Muslims running amok and harboring barbaric beliefs? Hey, no problem if you use the Star Trek excuse (I chose that just for you because I know how you love the program) by creating your own private little temporal anomaly. "But cap'n, those a Christians be doing all sorts of wicked things 5oo years ago, and without new dilithium crystals, I just don a know how much longer she's going to hold!" Oh, and make sure you throw in the de rigueur bit about how Islam is a "New" religion and Christianity has a head start on it yada yada yada.

I'm convinced that a good many people say things just because other people say things. That's how they earn their card into the club, you know. "I'm a liberal/leftist/multiculturalist/politically correct European", and all the other little so and sos are saying this, so I will say it too. Politics acts in terms of memes to a great degree, and in discussing Islam or Islamists, too often the discussion devolves into simple platutudes and in very predictable ways. Especially when these platitudes are based in denial and in the sorts of logical falacies I've outlined, they sure don't serve any of us particulary well.