[Jamie89]

She doesn't strike me as being racist at all, she has good intent, and the video certainly made me appreciate the value of having an open dialogue about Islam without people being afraid of being dismissed as islamophobic.

I think though that the main reason conversations often turn into arguments about racism is because a lot of the time it's all Muslims that are generalised. We see and hear so often Muslims being demonised that it's sort of instinctive for a lot of people to recoil away from that and therefore dismiss the possible merits in what's being said. So there's fault on both sides here. Yes there are many people who aren't being fully open in their dialogue, but I think a lot of the time that is a reaction to some of the people on the other side who go too far in their attacks on Muslim people.

Raheel does a great job here of avoiding the usual generalisations and she puts her points across very well and it's a very powerful video as a result which made me think a lot. But honestly, when these conversations arise it's very rare that they start from the same kind of reasoned mentality that Raheen presents. That's not a comment about anyone on the forum by the way, but generally in the media and the usual portrayal of Muslim people.

There's a couple of things that I think are important to consider though. The stats that are often presented about how many Muslims believe certain things (e.g. 53% in favour of sharia law to be the law of the land), I think it's just as important to consider how these figures are changing. That's not to dismiss the problem that exists, but if figures like this are reducing then it shows that it's not the incurable danger that a lot of people suggest it is. Figures like this often get presented alongside information like 'the number of Muslims are growing rapidly' and so by associating those facts, it suggests a new fact of 'the number of Muslims who believe sharia law should be the law of the land, is growing rapidly'. But it's very possible that although the number of Muslims is growing, at the same time the number of Muslims who hold extreme views is reducing. I don't know if that's true/how true that is/what the stats on it are, though, because that information is rarely presented. The reason I bring this up is because rather than just discussing the problem that exists, it's also important to look at the solutions, and another reason a lot of people recoil at these discussions and possibly aren't frank about the issues, is because too often suggested it's that the solution is to reject Muslims completely, which of course a lot of people aren't comfortable with so it automatically starts the conversation off at a place of attack and defense.

As Raheel said at the start of the video, 'This is not a conversation about Islam, it's a conversation about the growing threat of radical Islam'. So like I said before, there's probably guilt on both sides here, the side that sometimes generalises all of Islam, and the side that perhaps doesn't always show full appreciation for the problems that exist.