The proposed Mosque and Muslim Community Center to be built in Lower Manhattan has stirred up an unbelievable amount of controversy. Although no American can deny that 9/11 and Ground Zero are still, almost ten years later, sensitive issues, they should also not be used as fuel for an already racist fire.
In the past nine years following the tragic day that no American will ever forget, America has developed a serious case of ‘islamophobia’, defined as “an irrational fear or prejudice towards Islam or Muslims.” As if it wasn’t enough that many Muslim Americans feel socially unaccepted, now they have to deal with the backlash concerning the planned mosque created by the American Society for Muslim Advancement.
The plan includes a Muslim worship center on the bottom of a thirteen story "cultural center’” that will even include a swimming pool. The center will be named “Cordoba House,” which makes it clear the motives behind it are pure and simple: to unite all religions and end the tension between many Americans and the Islamic community, especially in Lower Manhattan. Cordoba was an 8th century Spanish city that was controlled by Muslims but also where Christianity and Judaism flourished. Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf, the imam of the future mosque, says he has only one goal, to “promote harmony.” not to create any more debate or ill feelings.
Media coverage has put a repulsive spin on the mosque, using cruel words and images to promote their anti-mosque agendas. Slogans like “  monster mosque,” “mosques are monuments of terrorism,” and “this mosque celebrates murders” are insulting, malicious, and just unfair.
Other media portrayals have shown the “9/11 body map” to demonstrate reasons the mosque should not be built so close to Ground Zero, since thousands of bodies and remains were found all over that area. If a few blocks away from Ground Zero is “too close” for Muslims to worship and try to mend relations with the community, then what is an acceptable distance? Should they be kept out of Lower Manhattan completely? The whole city was affected by 9/11, so should Muslims lose their rights to freedom of religion in the entire metropolitan area? The answer is no. As Florida Governor, Charlie Crist said, “We’re a country that in my view stands for freedom of religion and respect for others.”
The idea that the building of the Mosque is disrespectful to people who lost loved ones in 9/11 is also unreasonable. People fail to remember that there were Muslims who died that day too.
Every American knows the heartbreak and devastation that this tragic day brought us, but to classify an entire religion based on the actions of an extremist terrorist group is ludicrous. Adolf Hitler, a Catholic, brutally murdered millions of Jews in the Holocaust, but no one limits the religious rights that Catholics have in Germany.
The proposed building is planned to be built on the site of an old Burlington Coat Factory and is expected to cost an estimated 100 million dollars. Where the funding will be coming from is still unclear. However, the accusations that the funding may be coming from Al Queda supporters are just absurd since Feisal Abdul Rauf has clearly stated he will be monitoring where the money comes from closely.
Likewise, the “fear” many people claim to have, that the mosque will become a recruitment station for terrorists is just as insane. That is like saying that any group of Muslims together is most definitely doing something wrong. The plans for the mosque and the name itself clearly imply that it only has one purpose, and that is to take us one more step further into a religiously harmonized society.
The opposition to the idea itself shows us just how needed this step really is. In a country that preaches religious tolerance and freedom, there needs to be changes made. With pastors planning ‘Koran burning protests’ and open declarations of war made on Islam in the media, something needs to be done to reconnect this hated religion with the rest of the country.
Community Board 1, which represents the Lower Manhattan area in question, gave the proposal a thumbs-up, but the truth of the matter is that they have no legal say in religious institutions. Both Mayor Bloomberg and President Obama have also been open supporters of the mosque and urge the country to back the plan to benefit our future.
The proposal is to open the center on September 11, 2011, the same day the 9/11 Memorial will finally be unveiled. It would be a fitting way to commemorate the ten-year anniversary of the terrible event, trying to unite our country in remembrance of all that everyone lost that day.