It seems that Western civilization requires an other; an outside enemy which is then identified to be implacably evil. Nowadays, that role is served by Muslims. Not only are Muslims and Islam in general under attack in a lot of circles, various aspects of a Muslim lifestyle are also under attack. For example, what exactly is so terrible about the niqab that the French (and other European countries) tremble in fear for their civilization? Or take the whole issue of building mosques. What is so terrible about a mosque that people are up in arms against their construction? Are they afraid that these mosques will serve as bastions of terrorism?
The current flavour of the month as far as fear of Islam goes seems to be the Sharia. Many people and organizations in Western countries see a sinister agenda that Muslims have of imposing Sharia law over their countries through force and deception. For many Westerners, Sharia is the proverbial big bad wolf out to impose harsh, punitive punishments for the slightest transgression. Most people in the West react in a visceral fashion regarding Sharia. The fact of the matter is that by definition, Sharia law is only applicable to Muslims. It is not, indeed cannot be applied to non-Muslims. In this respect, Sharia law is perhaps more liberal than secular law. The latter insists on its universal applicability; everyone must perforce submit to it. Sharia law on the other hand affects only Muslims. Other religious groups are governed by their own set of laws. So perhaps instead of non-Muslims being afraid of Sharia, it should be the other way round. Perhaps Muslims should be afraid of arbitrary imposition of secular law.
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