Ben Buckman.net

I had a discussion with a friend today about the proposed Muslim community center (including a mosque) to be built a few blocks from Ground Zero in lower Manhattan, that has caused so much national furor. This issue illuminates the fault lines in our culture. It brings out the best in people - including the best in our leaders, like Barack Obama and Michael Bloomberg, who deserve tremendous credit for taking the right stance against public opinion - and the worst in people, like (no surprise) Sarah Palin, who should be publicly shamed for bigotry. The opponents of the mosque, in my opinion, are playing on people's ignorance and fears in a vile way.

These are the arguments I've heard against building the mosque, and my response:

"They shouldn't be allowed to build it."

They own the property and have a legal right to build it. The only way the government could stop them (as far as I know, and I'm not a lawyer) is by seizing the land with eminent domain. There is no legal basis to do so. So this is a dead-end argument, and anyone who is opposing the mosque, should asked if they support such a seizure.

"Ground Zero is hallowed ground."

9/11 was a national catastrophe, not a religious one. It was a tragedy to Muslims in America or abroad who care about freedom as much as to people of other religious persuasions. Ground Zero should therefore be no more alien to a mosque than a church or synagogue, but turning the area into a religion-free zone is not what's on the table - instead this singles out a Muslim house of worship, on grounds unrelated to religion.

"Muslims caused 9/11, so there shouldn't be a Mosque near the site."

I consider this argument equivalent to, "the Ku Klux Klan committed a massacre here, so we shouldn't build a church." It's based on the ignorant premise that Islam is a monolithic religion of hatred and violence. It's ignorant and bigoted and writes off the human decency of a seventh of the world's population.

"They're hurting their own cause by causing so much furor."

This is something the mosque organizers need to figure out for themselves. If they decide their mission is best served by moving the planned building a few blocks away, then that's fine. If I were one of those organizers, though, I'd absolutely not back down from this.

"Public opinion is opposed to building it."

We have basic rights to religion and expression and private property in this country because public opinion shouldn't dictate what people do with their own selves and property. We don't put every construction project up for a community vote. We sure as hell don't put the legitimacy of individual's religious views up for a vote. Why should public opinion have any say here?

"The imam leading this mosque is a radical."

I'm not an expert on the man. He's apparently on a State Department tour now promoting the U.S. abroad, so they don't think he's so bad. What I've read suggests he's a pretty moderate fellow. But I also understand that what is moderate in a mosque (or any religion) can easily sound radical to atheists like myself or people of other persuasions, because we don't understand the context.

This situation is similar to the Jeremiah Wright controversy during the Obama campaign. His statements came from a history and a religious culture alien to most Americans, as Obama explained cogently at the time. It's too easy to take a sentence out of context and make someone look radical.

The whole purpose of this community center, by every legitimate account I've read, is to foster interfaith (and maybe also intra-faith) dialogue and community engagement. It's like a YMCA or a JCC for Muslims. This isn't an Al Qaida training base - if it were, there would be other legal means to shut it down.

This is also a red herring: if the mosque is going to be preaching radical jihadism, then it needs to be examined in the context of general policies toward radical jihadism, not a particular building proposed in lower Manhattan.

"The furor over the mosque is causing violence like the stabbing of a Muslim cab driver in NYC."

There are crazy people whose bigotry and anger at life causes them to commit violence. The 9/11 hijackers were such people. The killer yesterday was such a person. The national response to jihadist violence was, we need to stand taller, prouder, freer - why should the Muslim community back down when they're the victims?

"We need to be sensitive"

I might be more inclined to hear this idea if the opponents of the mosque seemed bothered for legitimate reasons. (Religious bigotry is not one of those reasons.) I don't see that here. I don't see any reason why building the community center or mosque hurts the memories of 9/11 victims, or diminishes the value of the site, in any way. None. So it's not about sensitivity, it's about caving in to crazies. We don't have to be sensitive to radicals, we need to deligitimize them - we need to delegitimize Sarah Palin's demagoguery just as we demand that Muslims delegitimize the jihadist radicals in their communities.

Also: what's the correct radius around Ground Zero at which it's no longer too sensitive? 3 blocks? 10? 100? The next state? Is there any rational reason for such an arbitrary "sensitivity barrier" (if it were legitimate in the first place)?

"The furor will only get worse if they build it."

I don't know about that. I think it's just as likely they'll break ground, the midterm elections will pass, and we'll never hear about it again. But maybe there will be protests outside the center forever. There are protests outside Planned Parenthood offices every day. Let them protest. That's the 1st Amendment too! Let the mosque organizers prove they're not radical with their actions and community involvement.

This country has a sad history of racism and ignorant bigotry, and in the long run we've done a decent job of overcoming it on the macro level. Every so often it rears its ugly head again and we need to think about it in the same context. The critics need to be interrogated: are they speaking from genuine sensitivity or do they gain from playing to people's ignorance and fear? Assuming fear of the "other" is innate in human nature to some degree, how much legitimacy do we need to give it? I take a strongly libertarian view: we don't need to give it any legitimacy at all, and it's at times like these that basic rights becomes so vital.