Religious Intolerance Transcends Nations and Boundaries
Dmitri July 15th, 2007
The attempted firebombing in Glasgow airport by radical Islamists on July 1 held the the attention of the world for the last few weeks. There were debates and then even more debates about what could have led educated doctors and engineers to an act of terrorism, though it is agreed that their religious inclination had a lot to do with it. Such religious hate and extremism is however, not limited to Islam. If trends in the last few centuries are to be seen, radicalism and intolerance exist in almost all religions be it Islam, Judaism, Christianity or Hinduism. The Islamic radicals of today, in their religious and nationalistic fervour are acting out their religiously intolerant hate against non-Muslims; much like Christians did during the Crusades and Inquisition era. A recent case of a non-Islamic religious intolerance is the protest in the US Senate by Operation Save America against a Hindu priest delivering a prayer.
An news video showing an example of religious intolerance in the US Senate (Click video to play)
One of the most significant reasons of such religious intolerance is the sense of common identity, created by a religious faith, shared by a large group of people. A strong sense of religious identity and faith has time and again been successful in grouping people to a common religious ideology, leading to violent intolerance and bloodsheds in the name of God. It does not matter to religious fanatics that the ‘others’ are human beings with common blood running through them all. All that matters is their religious difference and prescribed hate for others. Radical Islamists, Zionists and Christian extremists were grouped on a common ideology - a lack of understanding of the others’ points of view and an extremist sense of ‘identity’ associated to their religion. In such a case, their education or lack of it holds no influence on whether they become religious extremists or not - it is their faith and religious identity which rules such outcomes.
To attempt to contain religious fanaticism by ideologically attacking a particular religion is as effective as trying to contain fire by putting more fuel. Such a move gives a cause to the religionists, making them regroup in hate filled violence against the people(s) who seemingly insulted their religion. A stark reality of this was the global violent protests against publication of Muhammad’s cartoons in the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten (followed up by other European newspapers defending free speech). An attempt to repel radical Islamic terrorism by a newspaper using satire, unified Muslims all over the world under the common goal of ‘Islam’ irrespective of the cultural or national sides of their personal self. The radicalised Muslims then went on a rampage against the Western European secularism to avenge the ‘insult’ to their religious leader by a small Danish newspaper.
Whether it is Christian fanaticism or Islamic extremism - humanity or compassion for other human beings become irrelevant when religious identity gains supreme in an extremist way. As long as religions and blind faiths exist, religious intolerance and violence will remain a part of dark reality, whether in the secular Europe, conservative America or extremist Israel and Iran.
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