If you're asking why a Western country would vote like this, I'll give you a blunt answer: it's the secularism, stupid. As Kurdi notes above, it is the visibility of Islam that makes it so imposing in societies that have rejected any role for religion in the public square. To borrow a common American phrase, I would say that some Muslim immigrants have seen Europe's "naked public square" and are attempting to wrap it in a hijab.The French are considering a law to ban the wearing of the burqa in France and yet only a tiny minority of French Muslim women wear it. The Swiss have voted an amendment to change their constitution to ban the building of minarets and yet there are only a total of four minarets in the country.
This leads to at least two conclusions. First, it is the visibility of Islam that is at issue. A woman wearing a burqa stands out. She is immediately recognizable as Muslim. Similarly a minaret puts a Muslim stamp on the landscape. It states that in this land Muslims exist side by side with the Christian majority, that they are now part of the country’s cultural identity.
Partly this is a legacy of secularism. There is distaste not so much for Islam as for the idea of religion being visible and public.
Essentially the message sent by Swiss voters and now repeated across Europe is one that could be summed up by a French proverb: “To live well, live hidden”. In other words, you can practice your religion, but only privately and discreetly. Moreover, there is the idea that Muslims who choose to live in a European country should adopt the ways of the land. The onus is on them to adopt the local culture and the fear is that the opposite will happen.
Despite long-standing efforts to remake the US in the image of European secularism, America still has the "soul of a church." That matters. In the US religious dialog is ongoing, and generally free of government meddling (although that is changing). As a result, a mosque becomes just one religious house among many competing for souls, and a surprisingly ineffective one (but that's a topic for a later post). For more discussion see this July post from my fellow CI blogger Eric Randolph.
Here's a local example: if you drive down Route 7 in Northern Virginia, you will certainly notice the presence of Islam (and radical Islam). However, you will also see vibrant South American Catholic and emerging Protestant "eglise" communities. An hijab store sits next door to the small Romanian Orthodox Church. Not far from the Saudi-funded Dar al-Hijrah mosque is St Anthony of Padua Roman Catholic Church, which probably serves a larger congregation than the mosque. There's also an Orthodox church, a Chinese Protestant church, and a Disciples of Christ church along the same stretch of road.
The mosque on New Hampshire Avenue in Silver Spring, MD, once attended by Nidal Hasan, is neighbor to a Vietnamese Roman Catholic Church, numerous mainline and evangelical protestant churches, many catering to Korean and Spanish immigrants. I'm working from memory here, but I even think there are Buddhist and Hindu temples along the same stretch of road. When you drive along New Hampshire Avenue, you are glimpsing a cross-section of suburban immigrant America, and Islam is just one layer among many.
On a related note, I find it interesting that Sheikh Qaradhawi hasn't worked his global congregation up into the frenzy like he did after the "Cartoon" controversy in 2006. I can't precisely pin-point motivations here. Part of this could be the fact that the supposed insult was simply insignificant compared to the cartoons. But I also have a hunch that it may have something to do with ongoing dawah efforts in the West. After decades of projecting an image of Islam as a religion of reason into a mostly secular Europe, the cartoon frenzy pretty much destroyed that image, and set back dawah efforts in Europe. As a matter of fact, I'd guess that the cartoon frenzy may have played a significant role in motivating many average Swiss to vote to ban a public symbol of Islam.
