Religious fear

Someone reputable made the observation that a Google search on the word "Christianity" will throw up results such as "Is Christianity Absurd?" and "Christianity is Stupid" on the first page of the search results. On the other hand, when 'Islam' is searched, no such negative search results are returned. He speculated that Google might be filtering the results in the fear of offending Muslims.

The sad thing is that everyone is afraid of offending Muslims and Islam. In Singapore, for example, McDonalds' ongoing promotion campaign has replaced the pig in the Chinese Zodiac with an angel (Cupid) for fear of offending Muslims. Muslims consider pigs as unclean and forbids its consumption. Another potentially fatal example is the firebombing of churches in Malaysia - all because the Malaysia High Court ruled that religions other than Islam (i.e. Christianity) have the rights to use the word 'Allah' to refer to God. This is Malaysian Law. Apparently, Muslims in Malaysia do not believe in their own laws. And examples in other lands abound, where people are afraid of offending Muslims in any slight way because of the possibility of reprisals, which may include the loss of innocent lives  and limps. The only people who are not cowed are Danish cartoonist who dare to defy the disciples of Muhammad and are paying for their stance, just as Salman Rushdie did many many years ago.

It is really really sad, that terrorism is now synonymous with Islam. And it is really really sad that an angel had to step in to protect McDonalds. After all McDonalds is a major American institution. Its fear would appear to be well founded given that anything American, wherever it is, is a favourite target of Muslim extremist terrorists. Sure Singapore is pretty ok as far as security goes. We book anyone breaking the law and protect the innocent. For that matter, we throw highly suspicious people behind bars anyway, without due process. And our secret service is usually tip top identifying threats and putting would-be perpetrators behind bars. But there is no stopping people bombing McDonalds elsewhere because of what McDonalds Singapore does, or does not do.

It is really really sad.