"Some groups say Muslims were monopolizing space," from the Flint Journal, with thanks to EPG:
FLINT - A room for peaceful reflection and prayer at the University of Michigan-Flint has become anything but.Instead, Room 386 at the University Center - known as the Meditation Room - is at the heart of a months-long religious dispute between Muslim and non-Muslim students.
The non-Muslims began complaining in November that Muslim students were monopolizing the room and filling the tiny space with religious paraphernalia and anti-Israel literature.
The Muslim students countered that they were being unfairly targeted and appealed to the university for religious tolerance.
"I do think that the current political climate does contribute to Islamophobia," said Bishr Aldabagh, a former UM-Flint Student Government Council president and student commencement speaker.
"The room serves the needs of students from different religions, but I do think that the reaction would have been different if the room was used predominantly by Christians or Jews."
UM-Flint student Zea Miller, 22 of Flint asked the university, in a written petition, to allow a more balanced use of the room, urging it to "whitewash" the walls and remove all religious items - a move that he said caused him to be stalked and harassed.
The university investigated Miller's claims about being harassed and said they were unfounded.
"There are people who feel offended and intimidated being in the Meditation Room or within the presence of artifacts representative of beliefs not their own," Miller said in his petition.
Miller said he was acting on his own, but others feel the same. Miller, a staff member of the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Center, doesn't belong to any of UM-Flint's four student religious organizations.
The walls of the room, about the size of a storage room, once held posters, Muslim Student Association awards and framed pictures. Prayer rugs and other books also were stored in the room. Muslim students use the space to perform religious practices, such as praying five times a day, as required by their faith.
"I took it upon myself to file the petition; I did this on behalf of others who were afraid to," Miller said. "It was not bigoted. I would have done this against any group who usurped the room. Now, at every move I'm being accused of anti-Muslim behavior. I am not anti-Muslim."
Join the club, Zea. I can tell you from long experience that anyone who speaks out about anything Muslims have said and done will swiftly be accused of being "anti-Muslim."
This is absolutely of a piece with my experience of the bullying and intimidation practised by Muslim groups on University campuses in England in which Christian, Hindu, Sikh and Jewish students are regularly intimidated, subjected to low level harassment, and in which Universities are treated as playing fields for the implementation of Islamic domination.
Join the dots, note the similar experience across oceans.
The greatest weapon Islam owns in the United States is the word, "Islamaphobia". Whenever they launch this word, most people in the United States turn into a deer caught in the headlights.
Something as simple as sharing a prayer room for the equal opportunity to worship, and out comes "the" word. It means nothing, it is simply an opinion and nothing more. However, after 9/11 everyone is scared to stand up because, and only because people are worried about the response from Muslims. THIS is how "moderate" Muslims use the despicable acts committed by Muslims in the name of Islam to their advantage, even if they say they disagree with them.
I have said this before, but the entire religion of Islam was encouraged by 9/11 because it gave them an act of such barbarism to use as a tool. This story would barely make the school newspaper if there was no 9/11, but since there was everyone believes that this kind of Muslim conflict is what caused 9/11. We must listen and be more nice so they won't go off and blow something up...
Moose
Every one of these acts of tolerance by muslims should be posted to Conyers blog.
This is a case study and a text book example of how Islam demands domination and special dispensation and when confronted over this screams discrimination.
This impulse to dominate and usurp is so hard wired that any protest against it becomes represented as being anti-Islamic. It is being almost a source of comedy. All that is being asked for is ecumenical respect and a neutral space for reflection.
Muslims view it as a space to be dominated, converted, displayed as territory of Islam. It shows how Islam finds it difficult to understand simple ideas like this, that it must resort to the idea of discrimination for simply being asked to comply with simple standards of decency tolerance and equality.
This is most telling: effectively they are admitting that they consider themselves to be superior to all others, and any denial of this superiority is anti-Islamic. In effect they are admitting that all that this neutral respect represents; peaceful co-existence, tolerance, ecumenical plural reflection, are inimical to Islam.
Sectarianism, bigotry, intolerance, all advancing itself under the rubric of Mulsticulturalist protest, 'Islamophobia', that chimera. That it takes place on the turf of a University, which should be rigorous in defying intolerance, and which finds itself nurturing intolerance by a group that viciously exploits liberal guilt, and sneers 'prejudice' when it is itself the persona of prejudice; it is a startling and eye opening irony. With luck, incidences like this will chip away at the ignorance of humble, fair and fundamentally decent people like Zea Miller, who are being exposed to some very rigourous anti-liberal tendencies.
This is how people wake up.
Zico: I'm all for respecting people, even those with whom I disagree, and there is surely a place for leaving the final judgment of all things to God. Yet, ultimately, the typical University authorities have a very hard time deciding what is intolerable until someone yawps very loudly. Without a commonly accepted morality save a vague notion of "tolerance", rights are to be had only by those who are organized, articulate, wealthy, and fervent enough to demand them.
Without a commonly accepted morality save a vague notion of "tolerance", rights are to be had only by those who are organized, articulate, wealthy, and fervent enough to demand them.
Yes, I agree.
File this "Prayer room at UM-Flint sparks clash" article under "G": Give islam an inch . . . . And acquire a large space to hold the file, as the file's only going to continue to expand.
The supporters on Conyer's blog brushed right over this article. I wonder who will be blamed when, not so many years down the road, they are being forced out by the increasing muslim population and rising lack of tolerance for non-muslims.
There will never be peace If all must fervently "organize and articulate" their demands to get tolerance.
If this "meditation room" is truly universal, then I recommend hanging roman numerals I through XII along the side walls, I through VI on one side and VII through XII on the other. Then let's see what the Muslims have to say about that.
Of course what the Muslims have done in this case and countless others around the country where these "prayer" rooms have been set aside, is to co-opt it as a de facto mosque (masjid) and thereby claiming the space as part of dar al-Islam. Once claimed as Islamic territory, the Muslims can use their canonical texts to "defend" this Muslim territory with violence of jihad if they so desire.
hulegu
ok i dont get the roman numeral can u explain
'jimmytheclaw', my guess would be the Roman numerals could represent the XII Stations of the Cross in Catholicism. But it's just a guess.
When it comes to accusations of "Islamophobia" just turn it around. Ask your accuser why they support the "Kaffirphobia" that is contained in the KKKoran. Ask them why they support a supremacist belief system that is akin to Jim Crow or apartheid in its treatment of "kaffirs."
Then watch them slink away, unable to counter your points.
Works every time.
Unfortunately, this story has gotten a lot of unnecessary press, leading it to be blown way out of proportion.
I am a recent graduate from the University of Michigan-Flint. As a student, I never had a problem with the Meditation Room. I did go into the room a few times as a student there. As a Christian, I never felt awkward and was never harassed. I won't deny that the room was predominately used by Muslim students.
Unfortunatley, Hulegu Khan's comments are completely unfounded. It is obvious you are not a student at UM-Flint, and you know nothing about the Muslim student body, or the entire student body for that matter.
The Muslims are guilty of only one thing, taking slight advantage. At UM-Flint, space is at a premium. Clubs do not have a lot of space to store any property they have. A fencing club tried to start, but folded, because there was no space to store their foils. After years of being the predominate users of the Meditation room, the Muslim Student Association (MSA) made the mistake of storing their clubs property in the closet-sized room. This probelm was brought to the attention of the Student Government, and unfortunately was not dealt with before this recent incident.
Just to clear up a misconception, the Muslims have never claimed the Meditation room as Islamic territory.