Why are Muslims annoyed with the West?
I’ve just gotten around to reading this good “Letter from Karachi” by freelance journalist Madiha Tahir published in Foreign Affairs in May. Occasioned by the embarrassing ban on Facebook in Pakistan, which in turn was occasioned by an ill-judged “Everybody Draw Mohammad Day” Facebook page set up by an artist right here in Seattle named Molly Norris, it offers a helpfully vivid glimpse of some of the fractures within Pakistani society. It also states the obvious about the larger global context succinctly and well:
“Like the defenders of the ban in Pakistan, many in the West also imagine a monolithic Islamic community. Incendiary Facebook pages, the French burka ban, and the anti-Islam advertisements placed on New York City buses by the right-wing blogger Pamela Geller and the Stop the Islamization of America campaign are just some of the West’s reactions to that community. All of this – combined with wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and drone attacks in Pakistan – has led many young Pakistanis to understand that they are being attacked because they are Muslims.”
