To All:
Thanks, Ted, for your comments. Like everyone, I've heard enough
"experts" in the last week to choke a horse, but yesterday I listened to
one on the radio on my way out of Dallas. Sorry I didn't get his name;
he was already speaking when I got in the car. He was clearly from the
Middle East. Anyway, he had the most interesting perspective. A
caller, genuinely interested in trying to reach out to our enemies,
asked the speaker what, if anything, the United States could do to stop
the hatred some folks have for us in the fundamentalist Islamic world.
He said, "There are two, and only two, things the United States can do.
The first is to die. The second is to move to another planet."
He then went on to explain that from the perspective of these particular
fundamentalists, it isn't so much a question of our society encroaching
on theirs. They have such tight control over their people that they can
effectively prohibit the distribution of our music, movies, clothes and
so on. He explained that it is much more a belief that we in the United
States simply do not deserve to live and absolutely cannot share this
planet with the fundamentalists. He said it is our EXISTENCE that brews
hatred from these people.
This is a pretty tall order and totally outside the mindset of the
average American who is steeped in a society that tries to respect all
religions and cultures. For the life of me (and indeed, it may be my
life at stake), I cannot think of a way to negotiate with such an
entrenched ideology.
Lucy
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