On 17/08/06, Sachin Phadte <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > In the valuable comments that Elisabeth offers, there is one that struck me > somewhat odd, which is: "It is perhaps the inherent religious chauvinism of > host countries that makes Muslims feel disenfranchised when they > emmigrate." > If this be correct, then surely other religious migrants like Buddhist, > Sikhs, Hindus, etc., should also feel disenfranchised. Has this happened?
It happens. But not on the scale that is visible when it comes to that self-fulfilling prophecy of a Clash of Civilisations between Islam and Christendom. For some reason (maybe closer contact, and rivalries in trade, etc), the Western/Christian suspicion of Islam runs far deeper. History records that the first who were slaughtered in Goa when the Portuguese landed here in 1510 and "rivers of blood" flowed in the streets were the Muslims. Maybe Hinduism, Buddhism and Sikhism (incidentally, and totally off-topic here, Sikhism is today's featured article on Wikipedia at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page ) are more remote geographically and numerically for the West to be obsessed by that. The clash over resources (including controlling the trade to Asia) goes back centuries. See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islam_in_Europe In some cases, relations between Europeans and Muslims are tense today, causing growing racism and xenophobia from both sides. During the half-century before World War II, religious persecution in Europe was chiefly Anti-Semitic. After the Holocaust and exodus of the Jews from Europe, some believe that these attitudes were replaced by anti-Islam tendencies..... Another reality is that some of those bigoted Clash of Civilisation types would like to imagine that they have junior allies in their battles. And the way Hindutva (the politicised reality, not Hinduism the religion) is warming up to Zionism and its militaristic approaches shows that both sides involved in this proposed marriage might be actually working to make it happen! Of course, building a feeling of community based on religious identity alone is FN -- ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Frederick Noronha http://fn.goa-india.org 9822122436 +91-832-240-9490 http://fredericknoronha.wordpress.com [EMAIL PROTECTED] _______________________________________________ Goanet mailing list Goanet@lists.goanet.org http://lists.goanet.org/listinfo.cgi/goanet-goanet.org