What is it, the water some of you drink???
What I hear some of you saying is that there is no need for the majority of Muslims to engage in self reflection and be concerned about Islamic terrorists beheading and slitting the throats of people around the world, blowing up civilian planes, kidanpping or killing children, and even killing other Muslims all in the name of Allah and in conformity with their religious duty as they interpret the holy scriptures because their actions are unIslamic according to your interpretation of the holy scriptures.
My ** PERCEPTION ** is that much of the disconnect between Muslims and the rest of the world stems from the need, desire, belief, etc. of Muslims to view Islam as a single, unified, homogenous, monotheistic religion. I don't view Christianity as such. There are Baptists, Presbyterians, Episcopalians, Southern Batists, Lutherans, Roman Catholics and a hole bunch more people who call themselves Christians. These divisions stem from different interpretations of the same holy scriptures.
The reality that so many seem to just want to ignore is that these same divisions exist in Islam. An Islamic terrorist who praises Allah and beheads people in conformity with Islamic fatwahs is a Muslim and is practicing Islam whether you wish to acknowledge it or not. That's what the non-Islamic world perceives and believes. It may not be the same Islam you are practicing, but it is Islam nonetheless. And the proclivity of so many to believe that an injury or action directed at anyone who happens to call themselves Muslim is an injury or action directed at everybody who happens to call themselves Muslim only feeds this perception.
If you think the rest of the world is discerning enough to understand that children being educted in Islamic religious schools in the most violent and virulent interpretation of Islam imaginable, who are taught that their religious duty to Allah is to strap a pound of dynamite around their waists and kill themselves and as many Americans and Jews as possible to obtain their afterlife rewards, and who act in conformity with what they are taught is their Islamic duty are not really Muslims or Islamic because they have done unIslamic acts, you are living in some kind of serious denial. It is your duty to fight our perceptions, not our duty. It is your duty to explain and educate us, in words and actions, as to why this is not Islam. And that is pretty hard to do when you won't even engage in debate amongst yourselves and recognize what the rest of the world is seeing.
And BTW, if you believe me to be anti-Islam because I try to discern the difference and distinction between what I view as different versions of Islam, so be it. It is the only way that I can keep the actions of the minority of Muslims from tainting my perception of what I hope and believe are the majority of Muslims. I believe that the Islam practiced by the majority of Muslims is a peaceful religion and from those Muslims who I have personally known, I believe they share the same morals, values and principles that I do although I claim adherence to a different religion.