A commenter on my previous post about Fort Hood and prejudice against Muslims asked a very good question: what do I think of Thomas Friedman's recent column over at the NY Times, "America vs. The Narrative"? The column basically posits that hatred of America in the Middle East is driven by a false narrative of American oppression and imperialism concocted by terrorists and completely contradictory to reality. According to Friedman, it is this false narrative that drives men like Major Hasan to shoot innocent people, even when they should know better than to believe it.

As it turns out, yours truly wrote a long-ish response to Friedman's piece in the NY Times comments section, and will reproduce it here, with minor changes, for your reading pleasure.

First off, I want to say that you are correct in your assertment that many of the problems Muslim and Arab societies experience are compounded by, if not the direct result of, their leaders' irresponsibility and authoritarian tendencies. Dictators such as Ayatollah Khameni in Iran and President Assad in Syria use "The Narrative" of an evil and meddling America to excuse their poor leadership and justify authoritarianism, and it is unacceptable.

However, your article is hampered by a world view that doesn't transcend American jingoism. Essentially, you argue that terrorists and their ideological brethren are fueled by an image of America that is completely false. There is no room for an interpretation of America's role in the Middle East that takes into account the obstruction of democratic developments and the oppression of Arabs and Muslims resulting directly from American policies.

You say that American policy in the Middle East has been marked by humanitarianism for the past two decades, but this is a half-truth. American policy has been equally marked by cynical diplomacy and a calculated willingness to look the other way when anti-democratic governments aid American interests. It's funny that you completely ignored Egypt and Saudi Arabia in your assessment of Middle Eastern policy. Is this because it contradicts your interpretation of history? If you had included these two nations in your list of entities America has been involved with in the last two decades, you would have had to acknowledge that America has directly aided authoritarian regimes that brutally oppress their people. Our tax dollars have bought weapons that the Egyptian government uses to terrorize its own people. Our willingness to look the other way when it comes to Saudi Arabia's blatant anti-democratic tendencies has given tacit endorsement to a nation that couldn't be further from our ideals, or your interpretation of history.

Policies such as these (and I didn't even bother to mention the mess that is America's heretofore biased approach to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict) are partially responsible for the motivation of terrorism against America. These are not part of a fictional narrative that portrays America as an implacable villain. These are real policies that hurt real people, and spur terrorism in the process by providing fuel for the demented ideologies that compose the radical Islamic community. We cannot dispel the specter of terrorism until we're willing to acknowledge that America has a direct hand in the oppression of millions of people, and is therefore partially responsible for the hatred represented by radical Islam.

Also, I feel that you place an inordinate amount of blame for the evils of terrorism upon the Arab and Muslim communities. The Middle East is a region haunted by the legacy of colonialism and the disruptive effect it had upon society there. The people of the Middle East are still struggling to reconcile their brusque encounter with Western civilization with their own interpretations of civilization and society. Forgive them if this often takes the form of confused and muddled violence. In any case, the blame should be placed upon the culprits who inaugurated the current state of chaos in the Middle East - the imperial powers who threw stones through the windows of the Middle East and then hid their hands. It's important to recognize that America has a prominent place among these imperial powers.

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This assessment of Friedman's condescending approach to the Middle East does not answer the question he poses at the end of his column, the question that the aforementioned Cub Pub commenter asked me to respond to. Friedman demands that Muslims put forth a positive interpretation of Islam, an interpretation that we can assume must dovetail with Western liberalism. Instead of telling us what Islam is not, Friedman believes that Muslims should tell Americans what Islam is - and it had better be sufficiently liberal. What's more, Muslims should put aside the issues that concern them - for example, the infamous and offensive Danish cartoon drawing of the prophet Muhammad - in favor of conformity to Western standards.

Firstly, one has to laugh at Friedman's naive demand that Muslims come up with a coherent vision that compresses Islam's various interpretations and ideologies into one Western friendly religion/political ideology. Not even Christians have been able to do that, and Christianity is a much older religion that Islam. Why should Muslims be put under pressure come up with a monolithic religion that not even Christians have achieved? Friedman's demand is not only culturally ignorant, but asinine.

Secondly, it is not the responsibility of the Muslim community to be apologists for Islam. There is nothing to apologize for, certainly not when it comes to Islam's relationship with America. The turbulent history between the West and Islam has certainly become more turbulent in the past decade, but this is not solely the fault of Muslims. It is also the fault of Western leaders who have exploited, oppressed, and disrespected Islamic communities around the world since the end of World War I.

Better relations between the West and Islam, therefore, will not be achieved through a one-sided attempt by Muslims to prove their worth to the West. They will be achieved when both Muslims and Westerners understand that distorted images of the other exists on both sides. They will be achieved when both sides attempt to correct these distortions and heal the wounds of history. One thing is for certain - better relations will not come about through Friedman's jingoistic and inaccurate understanding of Islamic-Western relations.