Hi again Chris,

I’ve now written a post in response to the points you’ve made here. I hope you find it interesting and weigh-in in the comments.

https://www.heatherhastie.com/delusions-religion-follow/

Cheers
Heather

Hi Chris

Sorry it took me so long to approve your comment. I’ve been away from the computer since early yesterday afternoon.

I really appreciate the time you’ve taken to respond to my blog. It’s always interesting to get a direct response. Also, as you note I made an erroneous assumption and it’s good to get that sort of thing cleared up. It’s also a good reminder to me not to make assumptions!

Once I’ve had the chance to check out your links, I’m going to respond to your comments in a new blog post, separate from the initial post, though I will link the two posts. I’ll let you know when I’ve done that.

I have had a look at your other letter to the editor, and I agree with all of it – it’s very good imho. I’ve written a couple of posts on support of refugees – an old one about NZ, and a more recent one following the fracas in the US.

https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=146090479170676&set=a.146098329169891.1073741828.100013091740751&type=3&theater

While I said “nothing to do with religion”, I probably should have said “almost nothing to do with religion”. Because I believe that is the case. I think there are some strong parallels with Northern Ireland and the Middle East. The details are different, the scale of the problem is different, but there is a common theme. If you are wanting to bring down Western imperialism across the Middle East, and Western society in general, then DAESH has a winning formula, and the likes of Trump, Turnbull, etc. are playing into their hands. This whole thing is not about religion, it is about politics, power, control (just as when the Irish were/are trying to get rid of the English).
After I wrote the letter, I came across an opinion piece by the Archbishop of New York which expressed a similar sentiment. You might find it interesting:

http://www.catholicherald.co.uk/news/2015/03/05/isis-is-as-muslim-as-the-ira-was-catholic-says-new-york-cardinal/

Regarding your suggestion that “perhaps he is a Protestant himself”, I was christened in an Anglican church about 59 years ago, and have hardly been back in one since. I have both Irish Catholic and Protestant heritage, but I could probably be classified as somewhere between atheist and agnostic.
I absolutely disagree with your belief that globalization is good for people. Please take a look at some of the work by Helena Norberg-Hodge and Samuel Alexander, at the following links:

http://www.localfutures.org/

http://simplicityinstitute.org/

Best wishes
Chris

I agree, basically.

And I wouldn’t advocate “Westerners” trying to reform Islam, unless it’s by Western Muslims. What I do advocate is changing the position of religion in society. That gets push-back from the church. In Bavaria still allows crucifixes to be displayed in public buildings, but wants to ban head scarves and burqas. The very definition of bigotry.

Soon Germans will discover that Islamic schools teach creationism (which is viewed by German Christians as a form of insanity), but they won’t know how to deal with it, because it would open the door to debating the role of the church in state education.

Yakaru, sure, I’ve never said anything else. Whether true or not, it wouldn’t be outlandish for Muslims to conclude that, particularly when radical Islamic groups actively use religion to propagandise and recruit. But I can only say again that insisting in the West that our priority focus should be on encouraging reform in their religion is worse than useless, it is counterproductive. Because religion is one of the tools used to organise resistance to Western violence, targeting religion must just seem like more of the same programme to them. If we care to decrease the violence brought by terrorism, the overwhelmingly important first step is to stop our own terrorism in those communities. Until we get serious about this, there will be no decrease in violence in response, nor is any meaningful reform likely to occur.

Thanks for responding, Ken.

I didn’t mean to imply that you might think terrorism is justified.

But you did seem imply that “Muslims” are justified in seeing the Iraq war as an attack on *Muslims* en masse. I would agree they do see it like that, and surely that strongly indicates that religion indeed plays a distinct and strong role in all this.

Sorry this took so ling to un-spam (this and the other one ended up there because of all the links). I forgot to check the spam folder.

No wonder there’s such high anti-Muslim sentiment in Australia if they’re not vetting who they support for roles like the IFAA better. I might write about Muslims in Aus soon because of something that came over my Facebook feed from the anti-Muslim side.

I don’t think it reads that differently, though the nature of the response might be different depending on the people. The reaction we’re discussing is Islamic terrorism, so the premise that their actions are religion-based is not mine. You wouldn’t “also be justified” to respond with terrorism as I’ve never said anyone is justified to respond with terrorism.

That sentence reads quite differently if you replace “Muslims” with “people”. Do you notice you ascribe an automatic religion-based reaction from people? Would I also be justified in “responding” (as you put it) to the terror attacks by setting off bombs in Muslim communities, because I feel solidarity with Western victims of terror?