Some swell data
In a Pew Survey entitled Muslim Americans: Middle Class and Mostly Mainstream, there were a number of interesting findings:
– 65% were born outside the US (p.15);
– 69% thought women should pray separately from men or behind them at religious services (p.26);
– 63% are Democrat or lean Democrat (p.41);
– 43% think Muslims coming to the US should adopt American customs (p.33);
– 28% thought of themselves as Americans first, 47% Muslims first (p.31);
– only 40% thought Arabs carried out the 9-11 attacks (p.51).
But it was the 26% of young Muslim Americans who think suicide bombings can be justified (p.54) that really caught our eye (note that there is no breakdown by gender, when perhaps the most interesting number would be the support among young men):
Sounds pretty “middle class and mainstream” to us. The West has a heck of a problem on its hands.
UPDATE
In places in the report, it is quite amusing to see the liberal Pew organization tie itself into knots to avoid confronting the various bits of awful data. For example, in the question about praying at mosques, where 70% approved sexual segregation, the Pew spin was that there was “no gender gap” in the opinions of men and women. There are plenty of other funny-sad examples as well. More on the poll and its anodyne coverage available at Ace.