What do Muslims think?

Coffee House readers sometimes complain that we do not talk enough about Muslims and Islam. I have certainly shied away from the subject, fearing that emotion and prejudice, rather than argumentation and empirical data, would dominate the debate. I don’t write about Christians, Jews or Buddhists, so why focus on Muslims? At any rate, I don’t like talking about collective groups, much as I prefer not to be talked about based solely on my heritage.

But now a new study called Muslims in Europe allows for an empirically-based debate about sentiments across a number of Muslim communities. Based on interviews and surveys in 11 European cities, it presents some interesting facts. It does not tell us what Muslims think, of course, but gives a statistically-relevant sample of views.