The Western Viewpoint: NY Times Article
In this NY Times article, James C. McKinley discusses and informs the gerneal public about the controversy relating to Shariah law abd SQ 755. He starts by describing how this heated debate has become a critical political issue, which has affected the vote in many states, which could posibly have been a factor in the Rpublicans newly gained majority in both the Senate and the House. Although there are many other heated topcs that led to this occuring, the controversy surrounding Shariah law was definately the most culturally and ethnically involved. McKinley points out how Mr. Duncan a key supporter of SQ 755, points outs several instances in which Shariah law has been gaining power, such as in New Jersey and in England, and is beleives that any further allowance of Mulim influence could severely affect American society.
McKinley states how even many law professionals are re-thinking this new amendment, since it does pose unconstitutional ideals, such as banning certain law codes, while adhering to others. Yet not adhering to the other codes could be detrimental to many social, and business realted communications with international groups. Due to the deliberate targetnig of the Islamic law-code many predominant muslims in Oklahoma are rasing their voices believing that this action represents a public resentment of the Islamic community. McKinley partially backs up this claim due to the rise in hateful email being sent to mosques in Oklahoma City.
Islamic Viewpoint: Arab News Article
In Ali Khan's and Jasmine Abou Kassem's article they focus on pin-pointing the various implications that this law creates and the different unconstutional repercutions of such as law. Khan ans Kassemprovided multiple exaples wher this could b very detrimentyal to the life of muslims. For exmaple, many muslims that are in prison have received halal food because of their faith, but if muslims were to ask for halal food in Oklahoma it would be eined because to provide halal food would be following or pertaniing to the Shariah law. Shariah law can alos benefit non-muslim businessmen, because when dealing with foreign relations Americans can opt to follow Shariah law, which in many cases would be beneficial to them but under this law, even non-muislims ' lives would be tampered. Even the sacred threshod of marriage would be ibstructed since marriages that were created in foreign states such as Egypt, Palestine, and Pakistan would be nullified since their validity would not be recognized. The overall issue s that Muslims rights have been neglected and overlooked, ever since a radical bombing in 1995, and that many muslims hope that governemnt and law officials will realize that this law impairs many citizens rights, Muslim or not.
Compare and Contrast
This was actually somewhat surprising, I went into this reflection thinking that I would find very haeful, strong opinins of the other viewpoint. Yet, both articles rather used a more factual approach relying more on the actaul concrete evidence instead of developed emotions on the subject. It was clear that although they provided evidence for their debate that the arabd news article had a clear stance on the subject, that they wanted SQ 755 to be repealed. What surprised me was that their evidence and examples were spot on, and seemed to match those of the CNN article while proving their point. The CNN article was tough to deermine which side they were taking; the article overall seemed to just describe the situation and what ws going without providing their opinions on the subject (good journalism).This being said I still felt that at certain parts of the article, the American feelings towards Muslims showed a little. Due to CNN's policy of providing the cold hard information allowing thereader to form their own opinion, their approach to Islam was wwith respect but just as another critical part fo the new story. On the other hadn, it is clear that the Arab News chose this article to publish because it had a strong them of pursuit for equality for all muslims, and even though it was not as opinonateed as other article's it clearly felt that Islam was a sacred religion and that any ojection towards Islam would not be taken lightly. I feel as if the article had the right amount of compassion, mixed in with the right amount of facts that made the article so ompelling. The drive and emotion thatthe athors put into their articel, shows the Islamic pride for their relgion, and culture from the Koran, to Shariah law to the rest of their beliefs.
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