Liberals and Progressives defend Islam, offend Christianity

There was a Rasmussen telephone and online pole earlier this year that revealed 56% of democrat and 22% republican voters believe Muslims are treated unfairly in the United States. In the same pole 47% of democrats and 76% of republicans believe Christians are treated unfairly in Muslim countries. What is the reason for this disparity?

Many have wondered and some have publicly written and questioned why it is that a majority of those on the left give greater latitude and show all due deference to Muslims, than they do Christians both here and abroad. Some might ask, "Why should it matter?' Is it not the right of certain of the American people to be more acceptable, perhaps even acquiescent, to one religion over the others.  

America was founded on the Judeo-Christian ethic, and many believe this is a Christian country. But at some point in the post modern culture, Christianity for the liberal establishment became a pariah, the cause of all our ills. Christians were devout, not only in their faith in God but in their country. They waved the flag, and espoused religious and traditional values, which on many social issues were counter and antithetical to what liberals believed.

What is most perplexing however about liberal’s supportive attitude toward Islam is that the same social issues that have created a divide and estranged liberals from Christians are completely reviled and prohibited in Islamic countries. Abortion is outlawed, homosexuality can lead to imprisonment, even death, same-sex marriage is looked upon as an abomination, and women are treated as second-class citizens and subject to harsh punishment for the least cultural infraction. It just doesn’t make any sense.

The Islamic faith, of over one billion followers, is the religion practiced by what has become known as fundamentalist radical Islamic terrorists. This is not to say that all Muslims are part of this extremist element that has spread death and destruction throughout the known world. But even a small percentage can realize a significant number of adherents.

Radical Islamic terrorists do not, in most cases, discriminate against who will suffer under their brutal, murderous acts. Most of their victims are Muslim, but a large percentage are Christian minorities. Finally, last year at the behest and constant urging of Christian groups and republicans in the congress, the Obama administration reluctantly defined the attack and deaths of thousands of Christians at the hands of Islamic terrorists, as genocide.

There is little doubt that liberal acceptance of Islam over Christianity arrived at its nexus during the Obama administration.  After multiple attacks - Fort Hood, Orlando, Boston, Paris, San Bernardino, to name a few - the president could not bring himself to label these massacres as being committed by radical Islamic terrorism. Instead,the administration and its president on numerous occasions made excuses and came to the defense of Muslims. Recall the term “Work place violence” employed as a motive for the Fort Hood massacre.

On a talk show, one of the panelists stated ”Radical Christianity is just as threatening as radical Islam." There was also a CBS poll that found 66% of democrats considered Islam no greater a threat than any other religion in encouraging violence. Perhaps it’s because Muslims are a minority group in America, and that bleeding heart liberal compassion and do good attitude we hold toward the oppressed and marginalized holds sway.

After some introspection, and an analysis of this dilemma, I have arrived at several possible explanations, and in each case the one overriding factor that underpins and is the basis of liberal attitudes toward Muslims is fear.

Firstly, liberals might be suffering from the effects of Stockholm syndrome. They embrace Muslims because deep down they fear Muslims, especially the terror-makers; and that fear manifests itself in attempts to placate and defend the religion so as to avoid being victims of the radical faction that infests it, in other words, getting on their ‘good side.' But what makes this so delusional is that Islamic terrorists, when they set about to destroy and kill, do not ask who among you understand the reasons for our abhorrent behavior. They just kill.

It could also be what that old idiom warns us about keeping your friends close and enemies closer; or it could also be somewhat of a textbook case of cognitive dissonance. You abhor something, but yet you embrace it to create in your mind a sense of comity with the object of your fear. The same fear of something that normal people would consider reason to be wary of, and denounce by name when appropriate, is for liberals a reason to justify for some inane reason their behavior. Or it could be what Ralph Waldo Emerson once wrote, “Fear always springs from ignorance," and let’s face it folks, liberals have time and time again shown us what ignorance is.