"We Have Become The Barbarians Of The Modern World"

I've stumbled across a pretty good blog post by a moderate Muslim, who is responded to by moderate Muslim commenters.

excerpt:

We cannot afford to be silent anymore. True, our protests have succeeded in getting the Pope to apologize and recant, and before that, we did manage to punish the Danes over the cartoon controversy, but that is not because we manage to earn any understanding or appreciation for our point of view, but because we have found a way to terrify the world. We have become the barbarians of the modern world. People will fear us, but they will never respect us, or accept us as equals, or appreciate the legitimacy of many of our grievances, no matter how far and wide we spread our terror.

Moreover, our barbarism will give the civilized peoples of the world more excuses to dabble in our lives, ignore our just demands and needs, and impose their will upon us. For, as history has repeatedly shown, when barbarians are not able to be the destroyers of civilizations, either because they are not powerful enough yet or civilization weak enough yet to allow for that to happen, as indeed is the case at this point in time, then, they become the ultimate and unsympathetic victims thereof. Indeed, there is a high price to pay for the foolish pride we continue to harbor within us, because we have nothing to show for it anymore.

Read the whole piece. Just based on the text of the conclusion quoted above, it seems that perhaps this moderate would be okay with things if his barbarian compatriots were able to "be the destroyers of civilizations...at this point in time".