From the New York Times:
"The original report, posted on the online version of Insight, a magazine owned by The Washington Times, said that as a child in Indonesia, Mr. Obama had attended a madrassa, a type of school that has been known to teach a radical version of the Muslim faith." Fox News then discussed the report on two of its programs.
On his show, Fox News' John Gibson discussed rumors that Sen. Obama had attended a madrassa in Indonesia as a child. Fox News later said the rumors were false.
It's bad enough that The Washington Times and Fox News did not do their research to learn that Barack Obama DID NOT attend a radical Muslim madrassa in Indonesia, but, it really just reflects on their ignorance and/or divisiveness that they would automatically make this claim since Indonesia is the largest Muslim country.
However, for anyone who has really spent time in the country and developed communities of friends there, it is well known that the vast majority of the Islam faith that is practiced in Indonesia is not radical or fundamentalist. Overall, the country is very peaceful and much more humane and respectful than the United States. In my experiences there with many different groups of people, no one has ever "preached" to me about Islam, nor been discrediting of any other religion. Rather, they're happy to share information about the religion to me if I ask, but it's never been in a way that's arrogant. I've also always noticed that communities and groups of friends are made up of people from different religions, mostly Christian and Hindu, with a few Budhhist and all are respectful of each other.
A good description from Wikipedia:
Like other religions in Indonesia, Islam has blended with local traditional beliefs such as those practiced by the Abangan Muslims on Java and with other belief systems in northern Sumatra and Kalimantan. Such syncretic practises draw on distinctly Indonesian customs and typically differ from more Orthodox Islam by favoring local customs over Islamic law. One notable difference includes a generally greater level of freedom and higher social status for women. The majority of Indonesian Muslims are generally accepting of differing religious practices and interpretations within their own faith. Although the form of worship may differ, Muslims in Indonesia are typically devout; many have made the pilgrimage to Mecca, for example.
They're all looking at the Jakarta Post because we made it into the paper
Just to give an idea of what Indonesian school kids are like, these are some pics from a few years ago when I painted a mural in Jogjakarta. These kids would come by every day (Monday - Saturday), giggling, and saying "Hi Missy" and then motion that they were holding a camera and say "click click" as a sign to me that they wanted their pictures taken, which I did. This daily ritual is one of the fondest experiences I have during that trip.
