As a regular Average Joe American, I was uninformed about Islam. Didn't help that 9/11 happened when I was 3 and grew up during a post 9/11 America. Most people didn't fully understand the whole conflict and ended up blaming Islam for being the main cause and for years I just ended up hearing many negative things about the faith.
During my teen years however although my opinion never changed I heard interesting things that I never knew before like how Islam actually believes in figures that are also in the Bible. You'd be surprised how many people actually don't know that, like only 1/10(maybe less) of the people I talked to actually knew that. I think most people including myself back then pretty much thought Islam is like Hinduism but with 1 God(silly I know).
These things I learned throughout the years planted a seed in my mind. Like to me it was crazy that we pretty much worship the same God but just have different views of God's holy book and history. Made me wonder why there is even any conflict today.
Skip to me now I have been an adult for a few years. There were a few big things in the past few months that eventually led to my research of the Islamic faith. First off I was watching the 9/11 memorial service on the 20th anniversary and learned some Muslim men were killed by the attacks too which honestly shocked me.
Many things in the past months made me curious:
- Israel has most of the land and has taken much of Palestine. Why do the right and left who disagree on everything actually bipartisanly agree on this one thing that Israel is the victim.
I am not saying the extremists were right but Israel was killing many and we are supposed to pretend this is a one sided issue and that Israel is the only victim.
- The Afghanistan exit was a mess and why was the war going on for so long?
Seriously it had been going on most of my life, even after Osama Bin Laden died for some reason. It was really weird to me.
- I learned some Muslim workers died in the WTC on 9/11's anniversary.
Confused me why a Muslim would risk killing a fellow Muslim like that.
I was so resistant to learn more about Islam for years because of politicians who would excuse the radicals and not handle it well. Rather than blame the politicians for allowing extremism, I blamed the Islam faith.
Well very recently I saw an old picture of Afghanistan in the 1970s. I was shocked. It was a very civilized society and different from all the things I hear about Afghanistan being 100% desert. Of course my first thought was that Islam was what ruined it but then I watched a few documentaries and realized I was dumb. Islam didn't just spring up out of nowhere, it was still there, but why did it really get bad?
I now realize that it was pretty much Communism and the CIA that turned Afghanistan into what it is today. It made a lot of sense and answered my question about how there was like no Islam extremism pre Cold War and pre WW2.
I now know that extremism is a result of oppressive governments threatening the rights of God fearing citizens. And honestly, I can easily see something like this happening to Christianity if the government keeps stripping our religious rights like they have been for Covid and homosexuality.
I do not agree with any type of extremism but realize this was the result of the government pushing them and the scab has not healed from it. No wonder the government and media blames Islam or even if they are too afraid to say Islam, they still say it was religiously motivated. Most of it has been political bit of course if more people knew that it was the government's fault then more people would hate the government.
I look at Dubai and how wealthy and successful it is. This could have been other Islamic countries as well. It's a shame how things happened. Learning more about you guys' faith I have a lot of respect for it now and find it based too.
Almost everyone I meet who is a Muslim has always been very nice too which should have been an early indicator for me.
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