Lessons from the whole Quran episode
(CNN) -- When Terry Jones, a Florida pastor, announced his plan to burn Qurans on 9/11 with a tweet and an "International Burn a Koran Day" page on Facebook, he ignited an international conflagration of outrage.
As news spread, worldwide condemnation and anxiety mounted. At least two people died in a demonstration in Afghanistan. It seemed this obscure self-proclaimed pastor in Gainesville, Florida, was determined to carry out an action of catastrophic global consequences.
U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates even called him. Jones finally changed his mind.
Now that the crisis is over, CNN asked contributors to write their observations of what happened, and what lessons the pastor's threat and the events that followed can teach us.
Akbar Ahmed is professor and Ibn Khaldun Chair of Islamic Studies at American University in Washington and the former high commissioner from Pakistan to the United Kingdom. He is author of "Journey Into America: The Challenge of Islam" (Brookings Press).
While the desire to humiliate or hurt those who are not like us may be played out on a local level, we learned in the case of Pastor Terry Jones how quickly it could be transported onto the global stage, dragging in the entire world in confrontation. Unfortunately, although Jones canceled his plans, we learned that the very idea was so offensive that it will continue to percolate all over the Muslim world. Several people have already lost their lives in demonstrations.
We learned how a great country, founded in some of the noblest ideals of human civilization embodied by its Founding Fathers -- civility and respect for knowledge -- could have its image abroad tarnished by the actions of an individual. And it was confirmed for us that the actions of small groups of people will continue to exacerbate the already complicated and often tense relationship between the United States and the Muslim world.
Finally, we also learned how Jews, Christians and people of other or no faiths all categorically rejected the idea of burning the Quran as disrespectful and even harmful. In that sense, Jones' story had a happy ending, showing that there is such a thing as reason and compassion in the hearts of the high and mighty and the ordinary folk, which trumped hatred and bigotry.
Arsalan Iftikhar is an international human rights lawyer, founder of TheMuslimGuy and legal fellow for the Institute for Social Policy and Understanding in Washington.
Usually in America, when a lone crackpot of any political or religious persuasion threatens to commit a publicity stunt that will needlessly enrage millions of other innocent people, our basic common sense tells us that our national media should not even give that person the time of day.
Sadly, not only did Terry Jones successfully receive media attention, but because of the overexposure of this one man, we are beginning to see other "copycat" Quran burnings around the country.
The consequences of the widespread media coverage of this possible event were so serious that both President Obama and Gen. David Petraeus warned that burning copies of the Quran would endanger the lives and well-being of American soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan. There have already been other copycat Quran burnings at mosques in Tennessee, Michigan and other states.
Sadly, because of our media's overexposure of Jones and his stupid anti-Muslim publicity stunt, we may have only seen the beginning of what might turn into a national trend of Quran burnings around the country.
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