Daveed makes a good point in his recent critique of Jessica Stern's Washington Post op-ed:
Stern also writes that in Europe, "second- and third-generation Muslim youths are rebelling against what they consider the culturally contaminated Islam that their parents practice" -- but claims that this is not evidence of their religious zealotry because "the form of Islam they turn to is often highly unorthodox." Yet this is a terrible metric to use to assess religious zealotry, for two reasons. First, "Islamic orthodoxy" is not a meaningful distinguishing factor for those (like Stern) who lack a background in studying Islamic law and thus cannot define what Islamic orthodoxy is. Second, a person's religious zealotry is not related to whether his religious interpretation is orthodox. One can be zealous about an unorthodox interpretation of a faith.
Read more: http://www.longwarjournal.org/threat-matrix/archives/2010/01/is_the_importance_of_terrorist.php#ixzz0d1VNu0qL
