A journalist in Turkey

A journalist from Turkey visiting Skypeland claimed that the US was not trying to quell violence in the Middle East. She said she knew from her job at the newspaper that Americans were entering Turkish mosques with their shoes on and killing people in the Mosques while they were trying to pray to their God. She said, "American enemies disgrace poor Muslim girls," referring to the rape of an Iraqi girl by American soldiers:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/5253160.stm

She was told that the soldiers had been convicted by a military court and received 100 and 110 year prison sentences. She got upset and claimed that the man who described the jail sentences had proven that he was just a fantatic defending the US. He gave her websites to look at to verify his statements. She dismissed all of his explanations.

She said she got her information from Al Jazeera and CNN and BBC. She said she was objective. When her Al Jazeera source was questioned, she got upset and attacked CNN and BBC as Christian sources that were unreliable.

So I asked her if the 100 and 110 sentences were incorrect and a lie. She immediately retorted, "You killed a lot of Vietnam people." At this point, I decided she needed a blog entry.

She said she was not able to attend university in Turkey because she could not wear her hijab and go to university there. However, she said she still liked her country even though they kept her from going to university.

She asked the American what he thought about the Mohammed cartoons that had been published. The American tried to explain free speech to her. He said it was allowed to insult anyone, or burn the bible or the Koran in the USA. She said she did not offend anyone or any religion or say bad things about Jesus.

I asked if she had a camera or a television. She said she did. I pointed out that according to the Taliban, she was offending them by having a camera and a television. She became a bit upset. I said that with several thousand religions faiths on earth, and over 30,000 Christian sects alone, it was impossible to avoid offending anyone.

She asked, "Did you ever read a Koran?" I said I did, and I had gone to a Mosque and talked to the Imam. She did not think that talking to an Imam was particularly useful. She asked again, and again, "Did you read the Koran?" and suggested a few passages I should read.

I said I would give her some references to look at, showing that there is no proscription against depiction of Mohammed in the Hadiths, and this was a common form of art until 300 years ago or so:
http://www2.let.uu.nl/solis/anpt/EJOS/pdf4/07Ali.pdf
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aniconism_in_Islam
Who knows if she will read these, but I think that it is important for people to learn about the world so they can make more informed judgements.