NatGeo has been running a special, "Inside alQaeda" which chronicles the rise of the group, and how it came to be. They go into great detail about the relationship with Pakistan and Saudi Arabia, as well as the Taliban, and how they all got to where we are today. It also details American involvement with the Northern Alliance, etc.
What I find interesting is, the nature of radical Islamic extremists, which dominate that part of the world. These are religious fanatics of the worst order, they make Southern Baptists look liberal. Hell, they make Christians look liberal!
Some of the stuff they believe in just blows my mind. To think that some people, quite a few actually, believe this stuff in the 21st century, is amazing! For one thing, they do not believe in 'personal freedom' at all, you are beholden to Allah completely. They do not believe in 'women's rights' at all, women are treated as sub-human, along with anyone else who doesn't live and breathe their particular brand of Islamic faith.
As Western culture has infiltrated their region, they have begun an ongoing battle against the west, which they call "Jihad" and their religious leaders have endorsed the killing of innocent people by any means to promote this agenda. This isn't some isolated group of poor minorities just looking for understanding and tolerance. It isn't some downtrodden group of people who have been discriminated against, who need defending by liberals. It is a fairly large group of very bigoted racist and sexist authoritarians, who wish to impose their religious will on the rest of the world.
When you look at the sheer humanitarian atrocities they have committed, along with the consistent discrimination against women and others who don't share their religious views, how can a rational human being defend them? Homosexuality is punishable by death, women who are guilty of disobedience are executed, anyone suspected of violating the religious edicts, are killed. They have zero tolerance for anything not in compliance with the strict code of Islam, and they have no problem with denying the right to live. In short, these people are maniacal monsters who believe they are ordained by their God to do what they are doing! And it's not just a few of them, it's MILLIONS!
We live in a world that is largely insulated from this extremism, so it is logical that some people may be complacent and just fail to realize the magnitude of the situation here. Some of us are just plain selfish, we don't see why it should compel us to do anything about it, we feel like it's a problem for someone else to have to deal with and we shouldn't get involved. We sit comfortably in a country that guarantees our freedom and rights, and we don't see why we should take action to oppose this sort of thing on behalf of others. It's not our place to intervene, or to try and combat this insanity.
Is this who we are as human beings? Should we sit idly by and watch this injustice happen, and not act? Should we simply refuse to open our eyes to the problem, and pretend it doesn't exist? I feel like there are many on the left who would do just that, and proclaim it is these people's right to live that way, if that's what they want to do. But the thing is, many of them don't want to live that way, they have no other viable alternative. Either you subscribe to radical Islam, or you die and your family dies as well. Should we just shrug and say, it's not my problem? What kind of people are we, if that is the approach we are taking? That is what I don't understand.
