“I Worry About Muslims” by Mohammed Hanif portrays the problem that the Muslim world has which is the lack of strong authority in it. Hanif tries to focus on the issue of what Muslims must do to try and defend themselves and their religion from others criticizing it. While he does talk about what others say the point of the article is to discuss the issue of the weak authority of the Muslim community, which he feels has weak responses to all the issues Muslims face. The article expresses the lack of authority as a weakness that should be considered more by other Muslims and I think it is an interesting point to make that I have never thought of myself.
In response to my classmate who wrote about “Lesson on Islam Shuts Down Virginia School District” saying that the parents represented authoritarianism and the superintendent represented authority I have to say that while I do agree that the parents reacted in the wrong way to the assignment the teacher should have also been more careful in assigning the assignment as she should have expected some backlash for her actions yet still carried them out which is something that was not addressed by my classmates response.
Gary Bryanskiy
Unfortunately for Muslims, as the perception of their religion continues to be harmed, their authority and ability to stand up for their rights in turn suffers. More and more people are associating Islam with evil and the ability Muslims have to assert their religion as peaceful is falling on deaf ears. Criticism from other groups of people and religions will never end and it’s hard to say what the next step for Muslims should be to show ill-informed people that Islam is no different than any other religion.
Matthew Epstein