hopscotch ramble - family, religion, politics, self-discovery
Well,
it's a first for me, but I had an intelectual and interesting conversation with my grandmother tonight.
She and I disagree on most things. Politics, religion, family life, etc. See, she's a conservative Methodist republican and well, I'm not.
As a general rule, I bunch all the things we disagree about into the "don't ask don't tell" policy, and tend to just try to keep the peace. I'm a good southern girl after all, and family is important. and for my family, peace is hard to keep sometimes. or most times.
See, I've never talked about my political, religious, social views with anyone really. until tonight.
Nana made a comment about all those muslims being crazy and hoping that that silly religion would go away soon. to which I responded that not everyone belonging to the muslim religion was crazy or trying to kill people.
She said she'd read the Koran and it really did say " 'death to the infadels', and who do you think the infadels are?"
So, I proceeded to point out that the bible had several references that incite death for numerous things, and that several passages in the bible have been used to justify: the crusaides which killed thousands of "infadels", slavery, racism, & sexism.
We went back and forth about interpretation of religous texts, and I pointed out to her that the Koran was a religious text and open to interpretation by people just like the bible. and grouping suicidal fascists with normal people who don't try to kill others for disagreeing with them, is like grouping the KKK, and the baptists, and the methodists, and the mormons, and the penecostals, and the catholics together and saying they are all the same.
the conversation did have a decent point on her side. She said that the muslim community needs to come out and openly and publicly say they don't want to be associated with these extremists who are killing people in their name. I did mention that leaders have been saying that, but she said that one person will come forward, and then will back down later. She also thinks that leaders shouldn't be openly criticizing our presedent. She heard a talk-radio interview with the leader of the muslim religion sayin that he voted for Bush the first time, but now he has lost respect for the president because he continues to support a war that is killing innocent people. She says he shouldn't be saying that since he's a muslim. And I asked her if it was right to limit his freedom of speach because of his religion. She think in this time, religous leaders need to be more prominent about their belief in peace, and their diaproval and distance from the extremist groups.
Truthfully, I'm not certain whether or not this is happening, or has happened. I don't follow the news overly much. But she's right, and it might be necessary.
She mentioned that a time may come when all muslims are grouped together without regard for differing opinions. And I think she's right. And it scares me.
The thought scared me after 9/11. We had a solid muslim community on campus, and I was worried about a possible backlash against them, just for belonging to the same religion as the supposed terroists who crashed planes into the trade towers. I didn't see anything on campus, but I know that in the world at large it did happen. Things got under control, but it started. and I don't think it's over, and I see it building again.
I drew her attention to the Japanese in WWII and the 'camps" that they were sent to. She said they were free to leave if they wanted, and they could do what ever they liked. but no one wanted to leave because they were in the middle of the desert, and needed to stay where there was water, and food, etc. My response? "pretty good idea for a prison, don't you think?" That and they lost their jobs, and their homes, and their belongings.
History tends to repeat itself. I can see this coming back. and I'm not the only one. I'm just not sure that there are enough of us who know what to do to keep it from happening again. I don't know what to do. I just hate the idea of watching this happen. And I think that maybe the muslim community might be able to prevent it with a little pro-active action. What I'm not sure, but something. To keep the discrimination at bay.
eventually she dropped the conversation and completely changed the subject. Then she said she'd had a really wonderful discussion with me. Which caught me off guard a little considering that we were debating about things, the whole time. I don't know. My family is surprising me these days. I'm not sure how or why, but I think I'm slowly, finally getting to know them, and scarily enough, letting them get to know me. I'm sorry it's taken me 25 years to do this.
Maybe now I can stop being afraid of myself and start letting me accept myself. Maybe that's what's slowly happening. And I think that's always a good thing.