30 days
I watched 30 days, a tv show created by the guy who made the movie supersize me and the premise is that in 30 days you can do something or experience something you've never done or experienced before. In tonight's episode they took a white christian from West Virginia and he went to live with a muslim family from Dearborn, Michigan. As part of his participation he had to observe prayer, dress as if he were a muslim and observes their customs such as no beer or eating pork etc.
To be honest I think tonight's episode was excellent because it showed how racially divided the U.S. really is as a result of 9/11. In the beginning of the show the gentlemen who was to be a muslim for 30 days was told that he could not be in the house with the woman alone when her husband was at work; he took this sorta hard because he found it weird. The guy was sorta apprehensive about actually saying the prayers in arabic or saying them in english for fear that he would say something that went against his believes in christianity. One of the Imam's of the Mosque talked with him and said that Islam, Christianity, and Judaism are all the same; they are all a form of personal connection to G-d and the only difference who was is speaking. He went on to say that the only difference between the religions is that Judaism is still waiting for the messiah to come, that Christianity believes that Jesus was in fact the son of G-d and the messiah, and that Islam believes that Moses, Jesus etc are all prophets of G-d and the Mohammad was his messenger. To be quite honest I agree with this interpretation that religion for people should simply be a way to communicate with G-d in a personal way and that far too many people take differences that exists between the various religions and blow them out of proportion.
The episode talked about the various threats members of the Muslim community have received as a result of the attacks on 9/11. One thing I think we forget as Americans is that not everyone who calls themselve an American or claims to represent the American way of life is an "American". Do we forget that what we know as America today is a land of immigrants who confiscated this land from Native Americans who had been settled here for many centuries? We should not forget that the founding of our great nation was based on the fact that our ancestors were being religiously persecuted in England and to escape that they fled to the "New World" even though it had already been occupied. Many ignorant people simply classify Islam as a terrorist religion and as a result make false inferences about the religions and it believers. Do we classify christianity as a terrorist religion simply because Eric Rudolph goes around killing doctors that perform abortions? Did we classify Christianity as a terrorist religion when Tim McVeigh blew up the federal building in Oklahoma? No, because you know why? Because we were able to understand that the actions of a few bad apples shouldn't tarnish the image of the majority and I think that is what we need to see in this nation in relation to Islam. To be honest I could the types of actions we take in the U.S. to prevent terrorism taking place in Israel because of the rate at which attacks our there but I simply believe that the actions we take and allow to take place to prevent terrorism is a form of racial profiling and as a result creates intolerance amongst Americans.
I am quite glad that in the U.S. a President is limited to two terms because President Bush has done nothing to bring together our country, instead, he has allowed racial tensions and bigotry to tear our nation apart. Perhaps our next President will not allow his or her religions beliefs to influence their decisions as heavily as has our current President.
To be honest I think tonight's episode was excellent because it showed how racially divided the U.S. really is as a result of 9/11. In the beginning of the show the gentlemen who was to be a muslim for 30 days was told that he could not be in the house with the woman alone when her husband was at work; he took this sorta hard because he found it weird. The guy was sorta apprehensive about actually saying the prayers in arabic or saying them in english for fear that he would say something that went against his believes in christianity. One of the Imam's of the Mosque talked with him and said that Islam, Christianity, and Judaism are all the same; they are all a form of personal connection to G-d and the only difference who was is speaking. He went on to say that the only difference between the religions is that Judaism is still waiting for the messiah to come, that Christianity believes that Jesus was in fact the son of G-d and the messiah, and that Islam believes that Moses, Jesus etc are all prophets of G-d and the Mohammad was his messenger. To be quite honest I agree with this interpretation that religion for people should simply be a way to communicate with G-d in a personal way and that far too many people take differences that exists between the various religions and blow them out of proportion.
The episode talked about the various threats members of the Muslim community have received as a result of the attacks on 9/11. One thing I think we forget as Americans is that not everyone who calls themselve an American or claims to represent the American way of life is an "American". Do we forget that what we know as America today is a land of immigrants who confiscated this land from Native Americans who had been settled here for many centuries? We should not forget that the founding of our great nation was based on the fact that our ancestors were being religiously persecuted in England and to escape that they fled to the "New World" even though it had already been occupied. Many ignorant people simply classify Islam as a terrorist religion and as a result make false inferences about the religions and it believers. Do we classify christianity as a terrorist religion simply because Eric Rudolph goes around killing doctors that perform abortions? Did we classify Christianity as a terrorist religion when Tim McVeigh blew up the federal building in Oklahoma? No, because you know why? Because we were able to understand that the actions of a few bad apples shouldn't tarnish the image of the majority and I think that is what we need to see in this nation in relation to Islam. To be honest I could the types of actions we take in the U.S. to prevent terrorism taking place in Israel because of the rate at which attacks our there but I simply believe that the actions we take and allow to take place to prevent terrorism is a form of racial profiling and as a result creates intolerance amongst Americans.
I am quite glad that in the U.S. a President is limited to two terms because President Bush has done nothing to bring together our country, instead, he has allowed racial tensions and bigotry to tear our nation apart. Perhaps our next President will not allow his or her religions beliefs to influence their decisions as heavily as has our current President.