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Religious ignorance is dangerous
Nov. 22nd, 2006 02:44 amOn the NBC national news tonight, there was an item about a group of Islamic clerics in the US who were handcuffed and taken off a plane because while waiting for the plane, the time came for the evening prayer, so they'd prayed in the waiting area. This led ignorant people to assume they had to be terrorists.
One of the viewer comments on the story(which apparently happened a day or two ago) that was repeated on the air was something along the lines of "I pray all the time on planes. There's no reason they can't pray silently like I do"
I wanted to scream at the viewer in question. And at the NBC news anchors for not explaining how wrong he was.
Muslims are *required* to pray five times a day. At specific times and in a very specific manner. They *cannot* do those prayers silently nor unobtrusively if they are caught in public at the time.
And the only excuses for skipping the prayers amount to "matter of life & death". I understand that scholars used to debate the extent to which one could skimp on such things *in battle*.
This is at least as important as Jews not eating pork.
I haven't made any great study of such things, but *I* knew about the daily prayers from things like movies and adventures stories I read as a kid.
The public *needs* to have it explained to them that not everyone prays the way they do, and that it's *not* something that said public gets to tell them to change.
Either the public learns it or they'll have to live with lawsuits against the ignorant and the people who listen to them.
Oh. That's right, the only reason for learning about those other religions would be if you thought there might be some truth in them. Or if you wanted to show respect for their beliefs that you want them to show for your beliefs.
But since [fitb] branch of Christianity is "obviously" true, then there's no need...
Pardon me while I go vomit.
One of the viewer comments on the story(which apparently happened a day or two ago) that was repeated on the air was something along the lines of "I pray all the time on planes. There's no reason they can't pray silently like I do"
I wanted to scream at the viewer in question. And at the NBC news anchors for not explaining how wrong he was.
Muslims are *required* to pray five times a day. At specific times and in a very specific manner. They *cannot* do those prayers silently nor unobtrusively if they are caught in public at the time.
And the only excuses for skipping the prayers amount to "matter of life & death". I understand that scholars used to debate the extent to which one could skimp on such things *in battle*.
This is at least as important as Jews not eating pork.
I haven't made any great study of such things, but *I* knew about the daily prayers from things like movies and adventures stories I read as a kid.
The public *needs* to have it explained to them that not everyone prays the way they do, and that it's *not* something that said public gets to tell them to change.
Either the public learns it or they'll have to live with lawsuits against the ignorant and the people who listen to them.
Oh. That's right, the only reason for learning about those other religions would be if you thought there might be some truth in them. Or if you wanted to show respect for their beliefs that you want them to show for your beliefs.
But since [fitb] branch of Christianity is "obviously" true, then there's no need...
Pardon me while I go vomit.
