The Muslim World's Inferiority Complex

by Khaled Montaser
Hudson NY <http://www.hudson-ny.org/2111/muslim-world-inferiority-complex>
May 11, 2011

http://www.raymondibrahim.com/9584/the-muslim-world-inferiority-complex

A translation, abridged and introduced by Raymond Ibrahim

What if an entire civilization developed an inferiority complex? What
ramifications would that have on the rest of the world? How would such
paranoia play itself out in the interaction of civilizations?

An Arabic op-ed
<http://www.almasry-alyoum.com/article2.aspx?ArticleID=264894&IssueID=1852>
titled "The Broder Dilemma and Inferiority Complex," written by Muslim
intellectual Khaled Montaser <http://www.khaledmontaser.com/intro.php> late
last year portrays the Muslim world as suffering from just such an
inferiority complex. Because it is immensely frank and exposes an important
phenomenon, I have translated it below.

*****

We Muslims have an inferiority complex and are terribly sensitive to the
world, feeling that our Islamic religion needs constant, practically daily,
confirmation by way of Europeans and Americans converting to Islam. What
rapturous joy takes us when a European or American announces [their
conversion to] Islam-proof that we are in a constant state of fear, alarm,
and chronic anticipation for Western validation or American confirmation
that our religion is "okay." We are hostages of this anticipation, as if our
victory hinges on it-forgetting that true victory is for us to create or to
accomplish something, such as those [civilizations] that these converts to
our faith abandon.

And we pound our drums and blow our horns [in triumph] and drag the convert
to our backwardness, so that he may stand with us at the back of the world's
line of laziness, [in the Muslim world] wherein no new scientific inventions
have appeared in the last 500 years. Sometimes those who convert relocate to
our countries-only to get on a small boat and escape on the high seas back
to their own countries.

The dilemma which we Muslims imbibed from one end of the earth to the
other-by way of our sons, our intellectuals, our youth, our elders, our men
and our women-regards the German writer Henryk Broder. We celebrated him
through our media and Internet sites, saying that he had converted to Islam,
because he said "I have been saved from misguidance and have come to know
the truth, returning to my natural state [fitriti, i.e., Islam]." Our
writers and intellectuals portrayed Broder's statement as a slap to
Germany's face, since he was one of the most critical opponents of Islam,
but now he had announced his repentance.

Then the truth was immediately revealed and the embarrassing predicament
which we imbibed of our own free will: for Broder is not to blame; he merely
wrote a sarcastic article-but we are a people incapable of comprehending
sarcasm, since it requires a bit of thinking and intellectualizing. And we
read with great speed and a hopeful eye, not an eye for truth or reality.
Some of us are struck with blindness when we read things that go against our
hopes.

We actually imagined that the man was speaking truthfully and sincerely!
Thus we drank from the bitter cup of failure and shame, products of our
chronic ignorance and contemptuous feelings of inferiority and
detestability.

[Translator's note: despite the fact that it is now common knowledge that
Broder never converted, many popular Arabic/Muslim websites-including
Al-Islam Al-Youm <http://islamtoday.net/albasheer/artshow-12-137068.htm>
(Islam Today) Al-Sharuk News
<http://www.shorouknews.com/contentdata.aspx?id=274034> , Al-Moheet
<http://www.moheet.com/show_news.aspx?nid=398999&pg=1> -continue to gloat
under headlines like "Famous German embraces Islam after his long struggle
against it."]

How come the Buddhists don't hold the festivities we do for those who
convert to their religion? And some of these converts are much more famous
than Broder. Did you know that Richard Gere, Steven Seagal, Harrison
Ford-among Hollywood's most famous actors-converted to Buddhism? What did
the Buddhist countries of Asia do regarding these celebrities? What did the
Buddhists in China and Japan do?

Did they dance and sing praise and march out in the streets, or did they
accept these people's entrance into Buddhism as a mere matter of free
conviction? When Tiger Woods, the most famous golf player and richest
athlete in the world, discussed his acceptance of Buddhism, did China grant
him citizenship, or did Japan pour its wealth on him? No, being
self-confident, they treated him with equality, not servility.

It is sufficient for the Buddhists that these celebrities purchase their
nations' electronic goods-without any beggary or enticements.

[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

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