Being religious and being moderate

I watched the short movie Fitna (search it on Youtube) yesterday. Two immediate opinions of mine include; (1) Islam and the Koran has the propensity to fuel extremism, really because there are excerpts in the Koran that are extreme and (2) most Muslims are however, moderate and not as extreme as Muslims depicted in the video.

The question now is, are the moderate Muslims moderate because of Islam?

In which my theory is: People, at least most of us, are moderate not because of religion, but because we simply can feel sympathy and empathy for the guy beside us. Religion has little to no effect in dis-promoting extremism.

Why do I say this? Either way, you interpret religion according to what your world-view already is. Basically, there are parts that tell you to be kind, then there are parts that tell you to not be kind. The net effect is zero, and you're back at your original belief before embracing a religion.

You can't claim and be sure that terrorists did not interpret the Koran correctly when at the same time you have these verses saying that killing is allowed and that dying for Islam grants you 99 virgins in heaven.

What is scary about Muslims isn't too much about the violence depicted in films like Fitna. Rather, it is how Muslims have reacted to it, the death threats and all.