Group responsibility?

I want everyone to talk about the "elephant in the room" as that brave young Muslim woman said. "We" know "know the majority are as distressed as those of all faiths and no faith" - but who are "we"? The breaking down and polarising of communities is evidence that there are many who do not know.

The "elephant" is that some mosques are fostering a fundamentalist view of Islam - we are too frightened to say this, as the police in Rotherham were too frightened to tell it like it was.

The issues need to be confronted and I am full of admiration for those in the Muslim community who are brave enough to talk about it. They need our admiration and support.

Sackcloth and ashes do not come into it - those speaking out have nothing to apologise for - they are saying what needs to be said. You are confusing blame with a recognition that there are things that need to be in the open and thankfully those with the courage to say them - why would they be to blame for anything?

To turn this around annie - are you saying that decent Muslim folk who feel angry and upset about what is happening should not speak out? Or those who see corruption happening in their midst should just let it be and say nothing?

Well argued, lucky. Annie, I think that it's good that some Muslims speak out as the man and the young woman mentioned in this thread did if only to counter the so many non-Muslims who keep saying the jihadist terrorism the world is seeing has nothing to do with Islam. Essentially all that's happening is that many people with little knowledge of the Quran and Islamic history are making statements that, according to the Muslims who do speak out, are simply wrong.

And then there are the actual jihadists themselves. They keep telling us they are acting for Allah. Isn't it rather arrogant of us to tell them they aren't? We cannot claim to know for sure how another person's interpretations of scriptures influence them.

As a catholic and half Irish, I wonder why people keep demanding that muslims in this country go to great lengths to distance themselves from those who commit terrible crimes and publicly rent their clothes and scatter themselves with ashes (metaphorically) when I can never remember this being demanded of catholics in this country during the IRA bombing campaigns.

M0nica - see above - those are the reasons why, including the answer to the ludicrous idea that people are being asked to "rent their clothes" etc.

The Catholics I knew (family, friends and their families, school) did speak out against IRA terrorist crimes, m0nica. Even the ones, like my dad, who sympathised with the IRA's political goal of reuniting all of Ireland, condemned their methods of trying to achieve it.

I watched a recorded QT from Salford in which the programme was dedicated to last week's atrocity. There were several points thrown up by audience members. One man had been to, I think Didsbury Mosque on an open day and was handed a contetious piece of literature, can't remember the actual words but it was decrying the western way of life and values. A Muslim lady, responded that this was not an official piece of literature, quite possibly so, but it was being handed out in a place of worship. Later on in the programme another Muslim woman stated that in SOME mosques, anti western rhetoric was definitely a problem. She perceived these estbalishments to be Whahabist, financed by Saudi Arabia. I also remember a Channel 4 Dispatches programme a while back, shot under cover, where some preachers were advocating violence towards Jews, Christians and homosexuals. I would like to state that from news coverage the overwhelming feeling I got in the aftermath of the atrocity it's clear that the Muslim population were as appalled and horrified as the rest of us. There is nevertheless an underlying worry that a small percentage have malign intentions and these aspirations are sometimes fostered in places of worship and schools who should not be shaping young minds in such a harmful way.

I did say 'metaphorically'. Again continuing the catholic/muslim comparison. For na short period we had a a priest who supported the IRA. I went to church elsewhere. There were catholics who supported the IRA, but no-one saw us as having a collective responsibility for the behaviour of a small minority.

My daughter's boyfriend's father worships at Didsbury mosque. I hadn't heard it was "extreme".

Meanwhile, here's an article from the Sunday Times about an orthopaedic surgeon of Pakistani origin, who was born in Manchester. He was abused in his car on the way to work to continue treating the patients he'd treated from the Manchester bombing.

I hope the picture is big enough to read it. The full article is here,but it's behind a paywall: www.thetimes.co.uk/article/hero-surgeon-abused-after-48-hours-of-savinglives-5wnx0jtv8

I wonder if trauma surgeon Navid Yasin who had spent 48 hours operating on the bomb casualties and was called a "terrorist" by a van driver, as he drove back in to work, felt he had a "collective responsibility" to condemn the action of others who may share his faith.

Sorry Daphne, crossed post!

No problem. It's worth repeating anyway.

On the day after the attack, I wrote about my daughter's friend, who is a Muslim and junior doctor in Manchester Royal Infirmary's A & E. She worked for 18 hours and left work, totally traumatised. I expect there were others.

I hate to think how a young potential jihadist would have reacted to that kind of abuse. Recruiters use the attitude of "Westerners" as one of their methods of persuading young, alienated men (and they are mainly men) to join a group which will look after them.

Yes I have the Sunday Times and have read the article about the surgeon Naveen Yasin, his treatment of course is appalling. As I said, my perception in the aftermath of the terror attack is that the Muslim community were as shocked and horrified as anyone else, why wouldn't they be.

I, or any other lay person, will have no idea what goes on at The Didsbury Mosque or any other mosque, I was quoting a member of the QT audience who had been handed the leaflet referred to. Whenever such a point is made, there is always a counter claim but that won't necessarily negate the first person's experience.

The Sunday Times also has an interview with Iram Ramzan a young Muslim woman who states thankfully, "walking the streets, I find tolerance rather than hatred" She goes on to talk about a conversation she has with a Muslim friend this week when they exchanged stories of their childhood experiences at their mosque where they went to learn about the Koran and Islam They were instructed that going to concerts was "haram" forbidden. One of their mosque teachers told them that when a famous Sufi singer's corpse was exhumed, his tongue was found wrapped around his body, this was a punishment from Allah making a juddgement that singing was somehow wrong. Here is my Muslim counterpart being fed a similar sort of drivel to the Catholic equivalent I had to endure in my childhood. My classmates and I were told at age 7, by a batshit crazy nun, that, if during holy communion, our teeth made contact with the host, we would be biting Jesus' legs off.

Religion on the hoof made up to fit an agenda, the agenda of "controlling the masses to be compliant" and God forbid they should think for themselves, so we have nonsense such as music and singing are wrong. I remember Richard Dawkings saying on a programme that Catholocism and Islam were the worst in the way they like to manipulate young minds. How can you argue with that point when such irrational people are let loose with young children.

Going back to the argument, I don't think Muslims per se should have to apologise for atrocities carried out by the fanatical few any more than Catholics should have done for the IRA's bombing campaigns. However, when Muslims themselves point that there are problems and they know of sermons that demonise western lifestyles I'm sure they have a greater insight into that than a non Muslim.

We need to be able to discuss the fact that sometimes there is a covert agenda in some mosques and schools that undermine western values without people assuming that in doing so all Muslims are somehow culpable of wicked acts and share the same mindset as the fanatics.

M0nica - no-one on here is talking about "collective responsibility" - I do not know how many times I can say this!!! That is an extrapolation from what is actually being said! - and is a dangerous knee-jerk reaction that closes down proper discussion - as I said upthread, it is this sort of reaction that leaves us prey to the Rotherham debacle.

It goes entirely without saying, but I will say it (and have said it before!) that there are saintly dedicated people in every religious group and in every walk of life - like the surgeons and nurses cited above. I salute them and sympathise with the dreadful situation in which they find themselves. Just as I salute those members of the Muslim community whose contribution to community cohesion consists of speaking out about dangers that they see looming in some Muslim communities and saying Not In My Name very loudly.

Their words will help to educate the sort of people who abused the surgeon on his way to work. This can only be a good thing.

I'm an atheist and am always horrified by the drivel which is poured into people's minds in the name of religion. I wouldn't argue with Richard Dawkins, although I think some of the stuff American evangelicals come out with is close.

I've never been inside Didsbury mosque either, although my daughter's boyfriend was born and bred in Didsbury and attended every so often, just as some Christians go to church at Christmas or some other occasion. My impression is that it's a fairly relaxed place, although it is, of course, a meeting place and I guess anybody would be free to pass on more extremist literature or to arrange a meeting elsewhere. Apparently some members of the mosque did report concerns about the murderer to the police. I expect "lessons will be learnt" - ahem! Maybe it would be a good idea if the police and community services had more people on the ground.

My daughter's boyfriend's family left Aden before it became the independent Yemen. The family owns a successful business and the children went to private school. They're a typical "middle class" family, who happen to have brownish skin and be nominally Muslim. Talk of a "Muslim community" is not really helpful, because Muslims are as diverse as any other group. DD's boyfriend doesn't feel that he has to apologise for anything. He has experienced racist abuse.

I agree with you Luckygirl that people need to be educated not to abuse anybody because they have different coloured skin or follow a different religion. I also think we need to stop pretending that there aren't racists in the UK, who would stir up trouble for their own ends. Tommy Robinson (founder of the EDL) turned up in Manchester on the day after the attack, but was given short shrift by a group of Mancunians. Footage of the vigil also showed Nazi salutes.

There's an interesting article in the Guardian about the background of jihadists:

www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2017/may/27/who-are-first-generation-british-jihadis

This article is interesting too:

www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/may/28/islamism-separation-other-peoples-even-muslims

No-one on here is speaking of collective responsibility, but Gransnet represents a very small proportion of the population and many more people away from Granset do talk of collective responsibility, not in so many words, but in weasley comments about this mosque and that imam who said this or didn't do that and by implication extending the responsibility to those atending the mosques who did not act.

I think that to a certain extent religion is irrelevant to terrorism.

The one thing that these terrorist have in common is that they mainly attract young men, whose lives are falling apart. Nearly all have had fractured childhoods pulled between opposing cultures; they have histories of failed education, gang membership, drug and alcohol abuse and unemployment. These disciplinarian organisations, whether religious or just criminal gangs offer them certainty, status and a chance to cock a snook at the mainstream world that let them down.

It would be much more helpful if the time and money put into arguing about their religious beliefs could be put into enabling them to get their lives up and running so that these extreme organisations offer no attractions.

I think it is interesting that Brexit has, arguably done more for Irish unification than all the efforts of the IRA.

The article you quote daphnedill is interesting and there is a longer one by the same man, which thatbags posted earlier on this thread. This gives a wider perspective on why some, mainly young ones become terrorists, and is really worth reading as there are no simple explanations or solutions. He agrees with quite a lot, but not all, which you have said MOnica. Food for thought at any rate.

Manchester is my city. I'm away from the UK but have seen from Facebook numerous items, photographs of marches and commemorations organised by the Muslim community in solidarity with the pain and sorrow caused by the atrocity. Yesterday, a group of religious leaders from the Jewish, Christian and Muslim faiths walked together to St Anne's Square, which has become a focal pont for floral tributes. Footage showed crowds applauding them. I have the clear impression that 'ordinary Muslims' just like ordinary every other group share and are expressing their sorrow and anger.
What about the members of the White a British society hurling abuse as anyone the suspect may be a Muslims, do we share collective responsibility for that minority. Whilst not agreeing with the notion that the voice of Muslims hasn't been loud enough in condemning terrorism I do feel speaking out against bigotry and hatred is something most of us do, it's human.

I think people hurl abuse when they are frightened. It is only human - people defend themselves by attacking. Anything that can be done (and is being done) by any group to allay people's fears is to be welcomed. It is good to see many groups, including Muslims, now speaking out, sharing the sorrow and supporting each other, whilst at the same time getting an important message across which might hopefully allay the fears. The more of this the better for us all.

"They have histories of failed education, gang membership, drug and alchol abuse and unemployment" Not all, some have gone to Syria from the higher echelons of private education and the professions, such as doctors and engineers. Indeed the young murderer who took 22 innocent lives had dropped out of Salford University, which means that he had presumably passed 3 A levels, therefore he didn't leave education without any qualifications. His mother is a nuclear scientist, not employed in just some mundane job, which hardly made him, her son, a member of an under privileged demographic. I quote Iram Ramzan a young Muslim woman who wrote in yesterday's Sunday Times, "Sometimes we are told that jihadists and extremists are disenfranchised. Give me a break. Salman Abedi, the Manchester bomber, was not disenfranchised at all. He was born and brought up here, given all the rights and priveleges of every other British citizen. His family given shelter in the UK after fleeing Colonel Muammar Gaddaffi's regime in Libya. And this is how he repaid Britain". He allowed himself to be drawn into a gang culture, he could have finished his degree and got his life up and running but he chose not to. Perhaps a more logical explanation would be that he was simply evil, because nothing can mitigate the crime he committed. Taking drugs and alchol is a choice, both of which I would imagine would be deemed "haram" in Islam, but of course we know there is a selectivity in that mindset. Many of the terrorist have heavily indulged in all manner of "haram" which would be forbidden in the caliphate they aspire for us all to live under.

I don't think we've heard the full story about Salman Abedie yet, so I'm not going to jump to conclusions. Something you've missed out of his life story Terri is that his parents apparently went back to Libya in 2011, when he was 16. There are contradictory reports about his father's influence. Didsbury mosque is also claiming that he was banned for swearing at an imam, who spoke against extremism.

Nevertheless, a pattern is emerging. Newly arrived immigrants have made a choice and usually make efforts to integrate, knowing full well the problems they are likely to face in a new country. Second generation immigrants (which many who have committed atrocities in Europe are), born in a new country, didn't make a choice to become part of a minority group.

Not only do immigrants suffer racism, but they often have difficult relationships with their parents and their "traditional" church leaders, who might want to impose rules which are incompatible with a Western lifestyle. Many teenagers, even from more stable backgrounds, drift into gangs and/or take drugs without life seeming to have any meaning. Jihadist recruiters exploit that insecurity.

There is no easy answer, but I'm convinced it needs to be based more on psychology than on bombs. Even if Syria, Iraq and Libya were completely destroyed, the movement has already spread like a cancer.

Some Muslims have been speaking up for years, but it seems few have been listening. After all, many more Muslims have been killed by extremists than anybody else. Muslims don't make up a homogenous group. A Saudi, for example, will have been brought up with a very different culture from an Algerian. I don't feel that, as a group, Muslims should feel responsible, although I also feel that any solution must come from Muslims themselves. I don't think the West can act in a colonial fashion and impose a solution, although equally I do think we have a right to impose our own laws and expect all citizens to adhere to them.

Terribull

Good post Sunday 10.07.

Monica Sunday 20.40.

" I think that to a certain extent religion is irrelevant to terrorism.

The one thing that these terrorist have in common is that they mainly attract young men, whose lives are falling apart. Nearly all have had fractured childhoods pulled between opposing cultures; they have histories of failed education, gang membership, drug and alcohol abuse and unemployment. These disciplinarian organisations, whether religious or just criminal gangs offer them certainty, status and a chance to cock a snook at the mainstream world that let them down."

I think religion is totally ' relevant ' to terrorism.

As for your belief it is young men , lives falling apart, fractured child hoods, failed education etc. etc. it has been reported time and time again that this is NOT the case.

It is a fact those who have left the UK to fight for ISIS have usually had a good education, good family background and it it applies to young women and adults. Doctors have been reported as joining ISIS for heavens sake.

What is happening here in the UK is not isolated to the UK. There is a worldwide problem with the recruitment to the barbaric jihadist groups such as ISIS who have one thing in their medieval ideology , namely the destruction of the West.

It is up to 'everybody' not just the Muslim community to 'speak out' but it is obvious the Muslim community have the only cultural , credence for those of their faith to listen to . Why? Because those who are being radicalised hate with a vengeance everything we 'the Kafir' stands for and wants to see our destruction and it is not simply 'Cocking a Snoop' against a world that has let them down as you call it.

"I don't feel that, as a group, Muslims should feel responsible, although I also feel that any solution must come from Muslims themselves. I don't think the West can act in a colonial fashion and impose a solution, although equally I do think we have a right to impose our own laws and expect all citizens to adhere to them."

Good summary daphne, making the important distinction between responsibility for an action, and responsibilities to report when radicalisation is going on for the safety of all. We do have a right to impose the laws of the country on every citizen whatever their background.

The idea that it is second generation Muslim immigrants who seem to feature disproportionately in the terrorist ranks is interesting. I can only think that two things might be operating here: they do not have first hand experience of fundamentalist Islam as their parents have; and they are of an age when young men in particular are hard wired to be risk-takers and enjoy excitement.

"It is up to 'everybody' not just the Muslim community to 'speak out' but it is obvious the Muslim community have the only cultural , credence for those of their faith to listen to " - POGS I concur with that.

I am glad to see that this discussion has moved on and all aspects are being discussed without rancour and without labels being attached to those expressing opinions. That is what the free speech we treasure is all about.

Please could you quote your sources that it has been reported time and time again that this is not the case.

I haven't seen this evidence you quote - quite the opposite.

There is much evidence that neo-Nazis have the same kind of mindset and background. Of course, there are exceptions, but the facts are out there.