Originally posted by Jaguar:
From my experience with Muslims, I've found that, very generally speaking, there are two types. 1) The type that Mankie speaks of who believe that everyone outside of their beliefs should be destroyed. 2) Those who have chosen the Muslim way and respect all others as individuals who just think differently but deserve to be respected and treated as they wish themselves to be treated. Like any other group, the bad apples cast a bad shadow over the whole.
I know where you were going with this, and it's a respectable stance (especially on this board these days), however, I think you do the female gender a disservice by forgetting about the part of that second group you described that treat women as second class citizens compared to their male counterparts.
Even in Turkey (perhaps the most modern of Islamist countries), they are struggling to end Honor Killings (where men of the family are asked to kill female members of the family who are said to have dishonored the family by virtue of getting pregnant out of wedlock, wearing revealing clothing, or not agreeing to an arranged marraige). I don't think we can turn a blind eye to the women of Islam because we should respect others who wish to think differently.
