We all struggle with the fundamentalists among us, regardless of our religion or creed:
Kyai Haji Abdurrahman Wahid (Indonesia's first democratically elected president)
"While hostility towards Islam and Muslims is a legitimate and vital concern, we must recognize that a major cause of such hostility is the behavior of certain Muslims themselves, who propagate a harsh, repressive, supremacist, and often violent understanding of Islam, which tends to aggravate and confirm non-Muslims' worst fears and prejudices about Islam and Muslims in general.
Rather than legally stifle criticism and debate - which will only encourage Muslim fundamentalists in their efforts to impose a spiritually void, harsh and monolithic understanding of Islam upon the world - Western authorities should instead firmly defend freedom and of expression, not only in their own nations, but globally, as enshrined in Article 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.*
Those who are humble and strive to live in genuine submission to God (that is, islam) do not claim to be perfect in their understanding of the Truth. Rather, they are content to live in peace with others, whose paths and views may differ."
Excerpted with permission by LibForAll Foundation from the forthcoming Silenced: How Apostasy and Blasphemy Codes are Choking Freedom Worldwide, editors Nina Shea and Paul Marshall, Oxford University Press, Oct., 2011. Also Abraham's Children: Liberty and Tolerance in an Age of Religious Conflict (Yale University Press, forthcoming).
*Article 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights states that "Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers."
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