What Is An "Acceptable" Number of Terrorists?
Whenever the oddly controversial topic of Islam and terrorism comes up, Moslem apologists are quick to point out that not all Moslems are terrorists, and not all terrorists are Moslems. Big revelation there. Why is this point even argued anymore? Any rational person involved in the discussion already knows this, in his head and in his heart. Anyone who doesn't understand this is not worthy of inclusion in this discussion.
But few people ever stop to consider the widespread nature of the Islamic terrorist beast. Apologists typically argue that terrorists and their sympathizers are a minority in the faith. But think about that. That's not necessarily something to be proud of. "Minority" simply means one unit less than half. 49.999999% of a given population still constitutes a minority. Would a Moslem apologist brag about the non-violent nature of his religion if just under half of the world Islamic population consisted of terrorists and sympathizers? I certainly hope not.
For the record, I don't think most Moslems fall into this group. I don't know if fifty percent, or forty percent, or even one-third of Moslems worldwide are terrorists and sympathizers (T/S's). I don't know the exact numbers; no one does and no one will exactly know. Obviously the latter group is exponentially larger. But for the sake of argument, let's just play with the numbers. With a worldwide Moslem population of about one billion, give or take a couple hundred million, even a small percentage can total a very large absolute number of T/S's. What if five percent of Moslems were T/S's? That would be a total of fifty million people! If 2.5% fell into this category, that would total twenty-five million, roughly the population of Iraq or Afghanistan. And suppose just one percent of that population has the chilling desire to kill tens of thousands of Americans or Britons. We're still left with 250,000 from Morocco to Mindanao, from Turkey to Indonesia, and across the various Moslem immigrant communities in the West. As a side note, from what I've read, well over half of the Palestinians support the suicide bombing campaign against the Israelis.
My point is that arguing about what percentage of Moslems are actually terrorists and sympathizers of terrorism is less relevant to our well-being than one would think. When dealing with an enormous population, even the most minute of percentages proves to be significant. In my above mathematics 250,000 T/S's represent just .025% of all Moslems. What kind of damage do you think a force that size could cause? In all honesty, I believe it would be foolish to assume that only one out of every four thousand Moslems harbors a deep desire to destroy the West, and the US in particular. I could hope it's less, but that would make me as illogical as someone who thinks "all dem ragheads is terrorists." So to all apologists, does this mathematical surgery reassure you?