Fundamentalists

I've noticed something lately about our news media that concerns me.

When the Taliban first came on my radar screen, just about the time they destroyed the Bamiyan Buddhas, I thought to myself, "these folks are crazy, and are exhibiting behavior that is not gonna win them a bunch of friends!"
The passage of time has made my memory of the chain of events a little fuzzy, but shortly thereafter we heard/saw how Afghani women who "offended Islamic principles" in public were beaten with sticks until they got off the street.
About that same time, this story made headlines:

"The rules of behaviour and dress are draconian and enforced with barbaric cruelty. Last March in Mecca, a girls' school caught fire. Some of the students escaped. But they were without veils. Muttawa zealots herded the panicked girls back into the blazing building. Fourteen teenagers died and dozens more suffered horrific burns. The muttawa later said they hadn't realised the severity of the fire."
That news comes from this article.

I can only say I was horrified and confused.
I knew little about Islam. I was aware of Muslims mostly by encountering the women in the marketplace, wearing their traditional dress. These women were always quiet and unassuming. I had never felt threatened by them. But being aware of the above incidents, it was obvious there were things going on in the Islamic faith that didn't jibe with what I was seein' in the grocery store.

What spooks me a little is this:
The incidents I mention above were all openly reported by our media as things that happened because of fundamentalist Islamic beliefs.
Then came Denmark and the Mohammad cartoons. and it seems to me there has been a change in the way our news is being reported.

These guys,
and this guy,
and the 18 year old that committed this act of terror all have something in common, (and the MSNBC article is the only one that alludes to it...
they're all Muslims.)

A simple question for you-
If all these acts had been committed by fundamentalist Christians, would the fact that fundamentalist Christians were committing these crimes have been a SCREAMING HEADLINE?
Being a Christian, I'm not an objective judge,
but looking at the way news about James Dobson, Pat Robinson, and Jerry Falwell are handled, I think our media would have people all over the world fearful of "these crazy Christians".

I suspect there are many acts of Jihad happening
in the U.S. and the world that our media are not reporting
as acts of Islamic fundamentalist terror.
That troubles me a lot.
That's information I'd like to know.

But all this has served as a caution to me,
and should also cause my Christian brethren to pause and reflect:
If we want others to admire and emulate us, we must love and try to understand our fellow man, and be careful not to fall into "the Taliban" sect of Christianity.