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The roots of anti-Muslim bigotry (Boston Globe)
Boston Globe ^ | April 4, 2011 | James Carroll

Posted on 04/04/2011 8:57:53 AM PDT by reaganaut1

... [P]ervasive negative attitudes toward Islam go far deeper into the American psyche even than these manifestations suggest, for contempt toward the religion of Mohammed is a foundational pillar of Western civilization. That it is unacknowledged only makes it more pernicious.

European Christian imagination jelled — as European, as Christian, and as imagination — around the mythic 732 triumph of Charles Martel over “infidel’’ Muslim forces in a battle near Poitiers, France. That may seem like an eternity ago and a world away, but still-powerful attitudes that show up in suspicions of widespread Muslim “radicalization’’ were generated then. In epoch-shaping chansons de geste celebrating Charles Martel, Islam was portrayed as nothing less than the anti-Christ. So resonant was its defeat, that Charles Martel was empowered as the effective founder of cohesive European social structures, with his lineage (through his grandson Charlemagne) extending even to present-day royalty.

Edward Gibbon famously shuddered at the thought that, but for Charles Martel, the Koran would be taught to the “circumcised’’ at Oxford instead of the New Testament. (It seems not to have occurred to Gibbon that, had the Poitiers battle gone the other way, Oxford, which dates to 1167, might have been founded years earlier — by, say, disciples of the great Muslim scholar Avicenna, who died in 1037.) From early on, Western civilization understood itself positively against the negative foil of Islam, a polarity that was institutionalized during the decisive centuries of the Crusades. That Christendom failed to liberate the Holy Land from infidel control only made permanent the fear and hatred of Islam.

Meanwhile, as is always true of bigotry, Europeans knew very little about actual Muslims.

(Excerpt) Read more at boston.com ...


TOPICS: Culture/Society
KEYWORDS: beheading; crusades; islam; jamescarroll
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I look forward to Freepers' debunking of this article.
1 posted on 04/04/2011 8:57:56 AM PDT by reaganaut1
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To: reaganaut1
Christendom failed to liberate the Holy Land

Christians failed to read the Bible and tried to do the job Jesus will do all by himself.

2 posted on 04/04/2011 8:59:49 AM PDT by bmwcyle (It is Satan's fault)
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To: All

We Learned all we need to know about Muslims and Islam on 9-11.


3 posted on 04/04/2011 9:00:02 AM PDT by troy McClure
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To: reaganaut1

Well, I am a little bit down on them for 9/11, beheadings and stonings, but maybe that is just me? LOL


4 posted on 04/04/2011 9:00:02 AM PDT by NEBO (Hitler, Che, and Stalin would be so jealous of Obama!)
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To: reaganaut1
The so called bigotry of Izzlum is 9-1-1. There is nothing else. Except maybe all those other bombings, head cutting offs, murder, rape, garbage that their gutter religion claims is soooooooooooooooo peaceful! Bull. It is a religion of utter murder. Written by a known pedophile. Yeah, what a guy to follow.
5 posted on 04/04/2011 9:00:09 AM PDT by RetiredArmy (Read: Ecclesiastes 10:2. You will be amazed!)
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To: reaganaut1

And here I thought the muslims showed their true colors as a result of the Crusades.


6 posted on 04/04/2011 9:00:27 AM PDT by ABQHispConservative (Oh hell no to islamic law. This is a Christian nation!)
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To: reaganaut1

All I know is that since the fall of the NAZIs, Islam is the Biggest Crazy on the planet.


7 posted on 04/04/2011 9:00:27 AM PDT by Psycho_Bunny (Public employee unions are the barbarian hordes of our time.)
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To: reaganaut1

The roots, so to speak, are embedded in their civilization destroying past!


8 posted on 04/04/2011 9:01:27 AM PDT by Red_Devil 232 (VietVet - USMC All Ready On The Right? All Ready On The Left? All Ready On The Firing Line!)
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To: reaganaut1

Funny, but I was never taught much about Islam. But in later years I observed their vicious treatment of others and the hideous treatment of their own women. So if you call a rational decision to oppose viciousness, cruelty and stone-age ignorance “bigotry” then so be it. I still oppose it.


9 posted on 04/04/2011 9:01:29 AM PDT by Seruzawa (Hokey religions and ancient weapons are no match for good a blaster kid.)
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To: reaganaut1
Bigotry is an opinion held in the absence of evidence.



Given the overwhelming amount evidence the world has collected about the nature of Islam over the past 1400 years, negative opinions of Islam are not bigotry.

http://www.prophetofdoom.net/
10 posted on 04/04/2011 9:01:48 AM PDT by Yet_Again
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To: reaganaut1

Survival instinct?


11 posted on 04/04/2011 9:02:23 AM PDT by USNBandit (sarcasm engaged at all times)
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To: reaganaut1

This is an apologists puff-peace and just another chance for a Boston metrosexual to simply cry “Racist!” and “bigot!”


12 posted on 04/04/2011 9:05:17 AM PDT by PGR88 (I'm so open-minded my brains fell out)
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To: Seruzawa

We surveyed Islam in Catholic high school religion class, in 1964. My impression was that is was presented as just another religion, that claimed to complete Christianity. In other words, Islam stood in relation to Christianity approximately were Christianity stood with respect to Judaism. It was not presented as in the least negative, simply another false religion like Hinduism or Lutherans, who needed to become Catholics.


13 posted on 04/04/2011 9:05:47 AM PDT by Lonesome in Massachussets (Somewhere in Kenya a village is missing its idiot)
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To: reaganaut1

Really, thsi is the best line...

“(The power of such individual dignity can be seen in Arab streets today.)”


14 posted on 04/04/2011 9:05:51 AM PDT by PetroniusMaximus
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To: reaganaut1
See, this is why I disagree with FReepers who say that liberals are stupid. Obviously not. I'm impressed by the mental machinations and academic gymnastics required to come to any sort of conclusion this individual has.

To be willfully blind of the type of “civilization” the satanic suicide cult of mad mo has created especially in contrast to that of the civilized world, is impressive in it's very difficulty.

I, and many of us, are unable to ignore reality to this extent. And it's not just some parlor trick either- this takes amazing effort, training (in universities of course), and determination.

Bravo! Jim Carrol, you're a more skilled (self)-illusionist than most of us could ever hope to be!!!

15 posted on 04/04/2011 9:05:51 AM PDT by End Times Sentinel (In Memory of my Dear Friend Henry Lee II)
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To: reaganaut1

James Carroll is an embittered former Catholic priest who is a radical leftist.


16 posted on 04/04/2011 9:05:59 AM PDT by Gumdrop
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To: Yet_Again
And a 'phobia' is an irrational fear. Given what happened on 9/11, the term 'Islamphobia' is completely meaningless.
17 posted on 04/04/2011 9:07:08 AM PDT by bassmaner (Hey commies: I am a white male, and I am guilty of NOTHING! Sell your 'white guilt' elsewhere.)
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To: reaganaut1

World Trade Center attack


London Bus attack


Spanish train attack


American embassy attack, Beirut


Beslan school attack


American Embassy attack, Tanzania

I could go on, literally with more pictures and events than FR has the bandwidth to include, but there is no need. The point is clear. The roots of Western caution have nothing to do with Charles Martel or with bigotry and everything to do with common sense and direct, personal experience.

18 posted on 04/04/2011 9:07:18 AM PDT by Pollster1 (Natural born citizen of the USA, with the birth certificate to prove it)
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To: reaganaut1

Boy, what a load of drek.


19 posted on 04/04/2011 9:07:27 AM PDT by tet68 ( " We would not die in that man's company, that fears his fellowship to die with us...." Henry V.)
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To: reaganaut1

The Boston Globe’s readers are doing a pretty fine job of debunking it themselves, in the comments section.


20 posted on 04/04/2011 9:07:28 AM PDT by kaylar (It's MARTIAL law. Not marshal(l) or marital! This has been a spelling PSA. PS Secede not succeed)
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