The famous one-way street

Everywhere a Muslim deigns to grant the West his considered opinion on religion and history, it always seems to include a mention, however oblique, of what Christianity did to Islam several hundred years ago.

They have a long memory, it is said. But they always ignore the present while chewing on the past.

Here's a classic example; a column by a Muslim who cannot understand how Tony Blair could possibly become a Catholic. After all, he has said good things about Islam, and that mean old Catholic church has done some awful things.... how could Blair self-identify with pedophiles, anti-science Popes, gays in the priesthood, yada yada?

Here's my favorite paragraph--

Islam certainly stands for tolerance and demonstrates this by giving a special status (!?!?) to the Christians and Jews calling them people of the Book - Ahl al-Kitab. Christianity does not do the same. Blair reminded us that "the standard-bearers of tolerance in the early Middle Ages were far more likely to be found in Muslim lands than in Christian ones". Yes, but why has Mr Blair converted to Catholicism? Surely he stands for tolerance, progress and good governance.

If Christianity, anywhere, can be found to levy extra taxes on people for not being Christian, to officially call them second class citizens, I'd like to know where it is.

If Christian society is so intolerant, I'd like to know why so many Jews live here in the States, and why so few Jews still remain in those 'tolerant' Islamic countries. Remain there, remain alive, whichever.

If a Christian society can be found anywhere that is less tolerant of other religions, other cultures, homosexuality, adultery and public dancing than Islamic society is, I'd like to know.

If I may, the standard-bearers of tolerance NOW, unlike in the early Middle Ages (I grant this stipulation but it is arguable), are JUDEO-CHRISTIAN societies. And anywhere that Christianity is losing its influence, those societies are rapidly becoming ISLAMIC ones, so the tolerance question is nearing irrelevance.

Read the whole thing, and then imagine a public figure converting to Islam and a columnist writing that he cannot understand this, because Islam has so much baggage, so many wrongdoers, so much evil attached to its name.

The columnist would presently be living under an assumed name, fearing for his life and the lives of his family.

The old one-way street.....