Muted Muslim Outrage about Mo, The Teddy Bear

We are told that muslim leaders from Britain are trying to win the release of Gillian Gibbons from the Sudanese jail where she has been imprisoned for insulting Islam. A nice gesture, probably as much defensive as anything, since shall we say there hasn't been a lot of support for Sudan in the UK over this. It's making Islam look stupid in civilized countries and British muslims know it.

But where are the voices from Arab countries? Nothing from Egypt, where they are probably afraid of the Islamists in their midst. Nothing from Saudi, where they probably agree. Complete silence from the "secular Shiites" in Iraq, or the Palestinians, or the Syrians, or ...

In fact, the only Muslim voices getting much play in the news are those of Britons. Probably this is because Muslims there think they have no choice, while those elsewhere are afraid of the imams who seriously think Sharia law is appropriate in Sudan and wouldn't mind having it everywhere.

Christianity has had a violent and intolerant past, as has Judaism much farther back, and there are certainly preachers still with us that I wouldn't like to see control the levers of governmental power. There are doubtless tolerant Muslims. In India, the ones I've met seem all to fall in that category. The problem for Westerners is that the ones who aren't control far more of the religious power in Islam than in Christianity and they also control governments, which is not the case with Christians.

That said, Bill O'Reilly and his ilk go far overboard in warning about the threat of militant Islam. There has never been a year when America's toll from Islamic terrorism has come close to the loss of life in auto accidents, and except in 2001, it has never reached the number who die from lightning strikes. The cost of the 9/11 attack is minuscule compared with the expense we've endured since then in response to it.

The lesson of Mo the Teddy should be that while Gilliam Gibbons can soon leave, almost all Sudanese are stuck there. Thankfully, the problems of Islam are almost entirely inflicted on Muslims in Muslim countries. And secondarily, on the rest of us by people who don't understand that.