If you give them the keys too soon …
A while back I explored the notion that Islam and democracy are not compatible; that humanrights supporting institutions must supercede Islamic institutions if democracy is to survive where Muslims dominate. In fact, I suggested that Islam and democracy are an almost impossible fit and that as such, the Canadian mission in Afghanistan has a difficult task …
[…]
Of all the cures commonly proposed for the many ailments afflicting the Middle East, there is one tonic nearly everyone seems to agree on: boosting moderate Islam.
[…]
But this belief is dead wrong. Not only is it impossible to agree on a working definition of the word “moderate,” but there is scant evidence that extremists really do moderate once they assume power.
… read more.
If Islam is not compatible with democracy then explain Turkey.
If Islam is not compatible with democracy then explain Turkey.
______________________________________
Turkey is democratic for only as long as the secular military that controls real power permits it to be.
The fact that Europe is right next door and exerts major economic influence is not a minor factor too.
Still, there are growing tensions in Turkey precisely because of the rise of Islamism. I wonder how long Turkey will remain a “democracy”.
http://tinyurl.com/3gcuql
I predict the once proudly secular army will be increasingly infiltrated by Islamists, much as has happened in Pakistan. People used to point to Pakistan as a model of an Islamic nation with democracy, but that too was only the legacy of the British colonial rule. Over a couple of generations it has eroded to the point we have reached now. It takes time for religious dogma and demographic to erode democratic institutions, but they always do in the end.
Turkey is sliding into darkness. It’s not a phenomenon, but a short-lived abomination.
Islam is not a religion, as it cannot be simply practiced at home or at a place of worship. Islam requires a government, and global one no less, to consider itself wholesome. On top of that, it requires subjugation of every non-muslim.
The only solution is to strip Islam from it’s religious status and treat it just like other political doctrines: communism, nazism, zionism, capitalism. They can be studied, advocated for, but not protected by the government or not allocated grants.
The best way to deal with radical Islam is to eliminate the western world reliance on mid east oil. Starve the Saudi royalty of the billions we send them only to have them fund radical imams and armies and violla – they will only be blowing each other up, while I change channels on my Sirius radio tooling down the highway in my gas guzzling motorhome.
I am still trying to figure out that to which is being referred when I hear the words “Allah, the Merciful, the Compassionate”.
Maybe I just need to work harder on my concepts of mercy, and compassion, because frankly, I am not seeing terribly outstanding illustrations thereof. Could it be simply be that I need my optometric prescription updated?
It’s quite simple. Allah is merciful and compassionate to Muslims. It’s the infidels who must be converted by the word, or by the sword. Not much of a choice is it?
Exactly right CJunk! The West’s Mission Impossiblistan is the only thing giving Afghan citizens a taste of western freedom.
Afghanistan will need an instrument of their own to survive as a free nation: a Declaration of Independence! It’s got to be something that empowers individuals (i.e. read: “Islam doctrine free”) such that ordinary Afghans will lay their lives down to defend it’s ideals…once they have that, no tyrant power will ever prevail within those borders again!
Lori – spot on concerning Turkey and Pakistan. I also believe Aaron makes a very valid point in that Islam is clearly not a religion in the same sense as Judaism, Christianity or even Buddhism to-day. When we insist in viewing and treating it as just another religion we commit a big mistake. It is an all encompassing ideology which has more in common with communism or totalitarianism than modern day religions. As for any possible reform, it can only come from within. If the West were wise, then Muslims seeking reform would be encouraged and given protection. Sadly we continue to fund and aid the Islamists one way or another.
Secular liberals are deluded in thinking that Islam will become moderate in any significant way. This is like wishing the the Roman Catholic Church will one day be like the United Church of Canada and ordain women and gays. IT AIN’T GUNNA HAPPEN!
No, we need to look at religions in a realistic way. Christianity has shown that it can co-exist mostly peacefully in a secular democratic society. Islam however does not have as good a track record. Indonesia, Malaysia, and Turkey are held up as examples, however there we see wanton disregard for religious minorities and increasingly a move towards Sharia Law (ie tyrannical theocracies).
Secular liberals envision that Muslims will become like Little Mosque on the Prairie, however all the evidence points to Muslims become increasingly radicalized by Wahabbism. A theology akin to the KKK!
Why isn’t the West asking why a KKK style Islamic theology is mainstream in Islam? I can only chalk it up to ignorance, but it is the kind of ignorance that eventually will lead to hundreds of millions of people dying. Consider that 100 million died under Communism until the world woke up and realized what was happening.
kevinf – no, ‘allah is not merciful’ only to Muslims. Kindly note the thousands of Muslims being slaughtered by Muslims in Africa and the ME.
Islam is primarily a socioeconomic mode of life developed in the 7th century within a tribal subsistence economy. It developed, in my view, as a militant reaction to the threat of its land base being overrun by the expanding Byzantine (Christian) economy. As it stands, it is totally, completely, dysfunctional in a modern industrial economy.
As far as its religious statements, Islam really says very little; it is primarily a straight copy from the Judaic texts. All it does is define its social and political modes of life as outside of dispute by declaring them as a revealed religion, with Mohammed as the agent of god’s revelation.
That puts Muslims in a bind, for declaring that the entire way of life is outside of questions and dissent, by stating that it’s a religion – makes it hard to change.
But, since all religions were created by human beings, then, human beings can change them. Islam has to change simply because, as it reads now, its axioms prevent the operation of an industrial economy.
You aren’t allowed to think, to reason. Men and women are unequal. You aren’t allowed to collaborate or network with other people; they must be conquered and enslaved. Now, in a modern world, with our electronic communication and economy, such isolation and imperialism can’t be achieved. Except by totalitarian Taliban and SA style rule. But, totalitarianism is unstable; it always collapses.
So, a repressive govt can’t keep a population bound hand and foot within its strictures.
What will emerge? Democracy. It’s the only mode of governance possible in an economy that operates within change, flexibility, collaborations. So, Islam will have to be radically altered – how they’ll do it – who knows. But, Muslims have no choice.
And we have no choice; we must stand up for democracy and freedom of thought and speech and insist on their role in the modern world.
Presumably “moderate Islam” refers to those not wearing the exploding vests.
Democracy is no great thing guys; it is a mindless machine that can be programmed to serve any master. When democracy serves liberty, all is well. When democracy serves tyranny (and it has in the past), then you just have tyranny.
The Nazis in Germany used the democratic process to seize control, Hamas is Gaza did the same. Putin is Russia is attempting it.
Liberty is what you need to strive for and protect, democracy is just a means towards the end, which hopefully is liberty.
Give me liberty or give me death. — Patrick Henry
kevin, democracy can’t serve tyranny. Once Hitler was in power, he removed the infrastructure of democracy. If it had been left in place, he’d have lost the next election.
Same thing with Hamas. The electorate rejected Fatah because of its corruption. Hamas had been helping the people while Fatah had been incredibly corrupt.
Democracy is accountable; it sets up checks and balances to power, such as limits on terms of office, limits on spending to obtain power, regular accountability to the electorate, definition of the electorate and so on. Nothing else operates that way.
Turkey and Pakistan are very different examples.
Turkey has some lengthy history as a country. It has an identity seperate from that of being Islamic. Then you have a secularist as its national hero, Kemal Ataturk.
Pakistan however was created to be a home for Muslims. I do not believe it has a pre history as a country. The PAK, I believe, stands for Pashtun, Afghani, Kurd (I might have the K wrong)
Its founding identity was Islamic. It had a significant middle class that was and is relatively Wetsernized. The issue is that religon is a part of its identity and gets used by the military and others in its conflict with its large Hindu majority neighbour, India.
Pakistan is a good example of a stage where the conflict between the secular and the religous play out. The military play both sides off against the other to stay in power.
In Turkey, the military is a respected institution and has had a history of intervention but has always handed power back. It is unfortunate that there is a threat to Turkey’s secular nature that sees to come from rural and Eastern Turkey.
The two countries are very different. As for the larger question. Can an Islamic country be democratic, sure. England was and is a “Christian” country, it has an official church. But over time the power of the chgurch was severely curtailed. Over time, if church power and priveledge ran up against secular institutions and thought then the church lost. But this was a decision that the society made.
If “Islamic” societies decide to follow a similar path, kind of like Turkey, then it will happen. The worst case is Iran where it is embedded in the state structure. However, this may ultimately be a good thing, because when change comes it will definitely not include Mosque Power.
Afghanistan and Iraq (former Sunni traingle) show the reaction when the uber religous run things. You get a reaction against them. There is no pre condition against democracy. But if the religously animated are the only ones providing guidance, services and funding (like Hamas) then the religous will run things. You need effective secular government.
Interestingly, why do you think the Catholic Church held such sway in Latin America. It was the only effective organization outside the big cities for decades….another example is the Phillipines.
Non corrupt basic service delivery is the only way you will ultiumately win. Military power can only hold the door open, so to speak.
Words by: Aaron, June 18, 2008 11:50 AM
** The only solution is to strip Islam from it’s religious status and treat it just like other political doctrines: communism, nazism, zionism, capitalism. **
NOW yer talkin*, Aaron . .
We were asleep at the wheel. Ya can*t just *leave it to Beaver* or Karzai.
Any prison holding Taliban must be surrounded with bullards to prevent any bomb laden vehicle from hitting the walls.
As it is in *Red-Zones* Iraq, so too it must be in Afghanistan. = TG
Political Islam and it’s legal system, shariah, although primitive and savage, are still competitive to our system because of the sheer number of Muslims and economic power. Therefore it is not compatible, no more than communism is compatible.
Interesting article I found at ghostofaflea:
“The pope, the president and politics of faith”
By Spengler http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/JF17Ak01.html
“Islam is in danger for the first time since its founding. The evangelical Christianity to which George W Bush adheres and the emerging Asian church are competitors with whom it never had to reckon in the past. The European Church may be weak, but no weaker, perhaps, than in the 8th century after the depopulation of Europe and the fall of Rome. An evangelizing European Church might yet repopulate Europe with new Christians as it did more than a millennium ago.”
Muslims in the west, not protected by shariah, are sitting ducks for conversion out of Islam. Once, they’ve converted out, they could act as religious or secular missionairies in Islamic regimes, eventually snuffing out the Islamic ideology.
I think this is what their leaders fear most, proven by their concerted attacks on freedom of speech and death threats against those exposing Islam. Not to mention death for apostates.
I think the point is being missed here.
Anybody recall the Holy Roman Empire? The Dark Ages. The church ruled a large part of the world and its rule wasn’t exactly heaven on earth. Thousands of people were killed in the name of Christ: Muslims, Jews, other Christians, etc. It wasn’t the religion of redemption and tolerance.
Islam is absolutely no different, except we have the experience of the Catholic Church to rely upon as the indicator of how a world Muslim government would play out. Even today the Roman Catholic Church has a world-wide governance structure – the problem being that we aren’t the true uncritical believers we used to be.
For what its worth…
“Islam is absolutely no different,”
Geoff
Well, except that the Catholic Church wasn’t acting according to it’s holy text or following the example of Christ while the brutal nature of Islam is embedded in the core of it’s holy texts and it’s prophet was, by the standard of his own day, a very nasty and immoral individual.
When Christianity reformed it had something harmless to return to, Islam is reforming right now and that isn’t a good thing.
“Thousands of people were killed in the name of Christ”
Uh, Christians do do that now, do they? Can you name any recent campaigns in the name of Christ? Muslims do, in the name of Islam by Allah’s command. How about visiting this site: Religion Of Peace
Over 11000 Islamic deadly terrorist attacks since 9/11 alone.
Geoff & Oz:
The error of today is to judge the church of the 4th – 8th century with 21st century eyes.
What most moderns don’t keep in mind is that Europe was being overrun by the Goths, Franks, Huns, Visigoths, Vandals whose modus operandi was distinctly harsher than any Christian knights by comparison.
The Vandal conquest of North Africa is considered as a strategic move. The Vandals took North Africa as a base for raiding the Mediterranean Sea, much like the Vikings.[6] They settled mainly in the lands corresponding to modern Tunisia and northeastern Algeria.[7] It was under the reign of king Geiseric (Genseric, Gaiseric), Gunderic’s half brother, when Vandals started building a Vandal fleet, to plunder the Mediterranean.
In 429, political maneuvering in Rome was to change the landscape forever. Rome was ruled by the boy emperor Valentinian III (who rose to power at the age of 8), and his mother Galla Placidia. However, the Roman General Flavius Aëtius, in vying for power, convinced Galla Placidia that her General Boniface was plotting to kill her and her son to claim the throne for himself. As proof, he implored her to write him a letter asking him to come to Rome and she would see that Boniface would refuse. At the same time Aëtius sent Boniface a letter stating that he should disregard letters from Rome asking him to return for they were plotting to kill him. When Boniface saw the letter from Rome, and believed there was a plot to kill him, he enlisted the help of the Vandal King Geiseric. He promised the Vandals land in North Africa in exchange for their help. However, once it was known that the whole thing was a plot, and Boniface was once again in Rome’s favour, it was too late to turn back the Vandal invasion.
Geiseric crossed the Strait of Gibraltar with the entire tribe of 80,000 and moved east, pillaging and looting as they drove more and more refugees toward the walled city of Hippo Regius. Geiseric realized that they wouldn’t be able to take the city in a direct assault, so began a months long siege on the walls of Hippo Regius. Inside Saint Augustine and his priests prayed for relief from the Arian invaders, knowing full well that the fall of the city would spell conversion or death for many Christians. On 28 August 430, three months into the siege, St. Augustine died, perhaps from hunger or stress, as the wheat fields outside the city lay dormant and unharvested. After 14 months, hunger and the inevitable diseases were ravaging both the city inhabitants and the Vandals outside the city walls.
Peace was made between the Romans, who in 435 granted them some territory in Northern Africa, but it was broken by Geiseric, who in 439 took Carthage and made it his capital. The Vandals took and plundered the city without a fight, entering the city while most of the inhabitants were attending the races at the hippodrome. Geiseric then built the Kingdom of the Vandals and Alans into a powerful state with the capital at Saldae; he conquered Sicily, Sardinia, Corsica and the Balearic Islands.
Sack of Rome (455)
During the next thirty-five years, with a large fleet, Geiseric looted the coasts of the Eastern and Western Empires. After Attila the Hun’s death, however, the Romans could afford to turn their attention back to the Vandals, who were in control of some of the richest lands of their former empire.
In an effort to bring the Vandals into the fold of the Empire, Valentinian III offered his daughter’s hand in marriage to Geiseric’s son. Before this “treaty” could be carried out, however, politics again played a crucial part in the blunders of Rome. Petronius Maximus, the usurper, killed Valentinian III in an effort to control the Empire. Diplomacy between the two factions broke down, and in 455 with a letter from the Empress Licinia Eudoxia, begging Geiseric’s son to rescue her, the Vandals took Rome, along with the Empress Licinia Eudoxia and her daughters Eudocia and Placidia.
The chronicler Prosper of Aquitaine[8] offers the only fifth-century report that on 2 June 455, Pope Leo the Great received Geiseric and implored him to abstain from murder and destruction by fire, and to be satisfied with pillage. Whether the pope’s influence saved Rome is, however, questioned. The Vandals departed with countless valuables, including the spoils of the Temple in Jerusalem booty brought to Rome by Titus.
[edit] Consolidation
In 468 the Vandals destroyed an enormous East Roman fleet sent against them. Following up the attack, the Vandals tried to invade the Peloponnese but were driven back by the Maniots at Kenipolis with heavy losses.[9] In retaliation, the Vandals took 500 hostages at Zakynthos, hacked them to pieces and threw the pieces overboard on the way to Carthage.[9] Nevertheless, after Geiseric was able to conclude a “perpetual peace” with Constantinople in 476, relations between the two states assumed a veneer of normality.[10]
Hardly the rosy ‘peace in the valley’ rubbish that 21st century lenses conveniently ignore.
Cheers
Hans-Christian Georg Rupprecht, Commander in Chief
Frankenstein Battalion
2nd Squadron: Ulanen-(Lancers) Regiment Großherzog Friedrich von Baden(Rheinisches) Nr.7(Saarbrucken)
Knecht Rupprecht Division
Hans Corps
1st Saint Nicolaas Army
Army Group “True North”
Who is this wacko “Hans-Christian Georg Rupprecht, Commander in Chief”
Can somebody give me a heads up on this loon?
Canuck Guy,
Thanks for today*s best humour spazaam, * cough*. = TG
Shaken: I am still trying to figure out that to which is being referred when I hear the words “Allah, the Merciful, the Compassionate”.
It’s really very simple. Since Allah is the merciful, the compassionate, individual Muslims do not have to be.
Geoff: “Anybody recall the Holy Roman Empire? The Dark Ages…”
We gave up that sort of thing about 800 years ago (the last Crusade was in the year 1200 or so).
Islam has yet to give up the slaughter.
Herr Commandant Ruprecht is an excellent cut-and-paster. The footnotes identify the plagarism (“… Tunisia and northeastern Algeria.[7] It was …”). Any teacher can easily identify the source. (Hint: it’s the usual first place to look for term paper material.)
It wouldn’t have been plagiarism if Hans-Christian had just given the URL.
Not too many of us think of the Early years of the 1st millennium as “peace in the valley”.
The lesson for us moderns is that the Pax Romana was built on, and depended on, military force, which it could project anywhere in that area.
When the citizenry grew soft and decadent, they were easy (or maybe not so easy) pickings from the Vandals and other barbarians.
I hope he takes more care in school, in submitting papers.
Hey, I think Spurwing Plover gets the loon award, he does the bird stuff. Besides the loon is very Canadian.
maz2 is a better cutter and paster
otherwise the cultural analogues hold and I wasn’t trying to put the paste at SDA through for a thesis paper. Thanks for the commentary all the same.
Hans,
If I may be so bold as to translate what Canuckguy was trying to say….
What’s the deal with all that shit you write after your name?
ie:
Eskimo
Baby seal clubber/Malamut musher
Permanent ice pack
North of 60
Nunavut
Canada
Western Hemisphere
Planet Earth
Mily Way
The problem is a bit more deep-rooted than what’s being talked about here, although Lori alludes to the real issue when she writes: “People used to point to Pakistan as a model of an Islamic nation with democracy, but that too was only the legacy of the British colonial rule“.
In simple terms, the real legacy of British colonial rule was British Common Law–and British Common Law (as became evident with the American Revolution) emerged through classical liberalism to contain quite clear restrictions on the power of kings but also the power of so-called “popular movements” to willy-nilly and quickly change the rule of law through legislation/popular whim.
In other words, common law increasingly contained protections of privacy, or limitations on democracy, that quite rightly protected any number of human values and aspirations that ought never to be matters requiring majority permission or popular approval.
In recent times, as common law protections for individual rights/personal choice/privacy are more and more thrown aside (especially popular with statists of most descriptions–left and right–because it slows their grand legislative plans down) areas of human action are again returned to government/State overview.
It then becomes much easier for any and all “interest groups” to manipulate the ever-stronger State to their group ends.
In short: to a great degree the problem is democracy itself, the problem of democracy being well illustrated by the example of two wolves and a sheep deciding what’s for dinner.
Over the years, for example, any number of people have “grouped up” to manipulate the government to control the maybe offensive but ultimately non-coercive personal behaviour of folks they didn’t like. Whether the control target was Zundel, the Georgia Straight, porn merchants, smokers in bars, gun owners, bigoted employers, polygamists, gay would-be “wives” or whatever…makes no difference. The result of this increasing busy-bodyism was/is a weakening of the ability of people to just peacefully make their own decisions without fear of jail or worse.
Sure, the radical Islamists use this weakening to their ends, but when they do, it’s good to remember they were given the tools, the ability, by many others who came before them. Maybe even you.
It’s been said before, but I’ll say it again because its true – there is no moderate Quran. If a ‘moderate’ Muslim has a child who is precisely instructed in Islam, inculcated directly from the Islamic trilogy and grows to do exactly as commanded and rewarded by Allah/Mohammad, that child will be a terrorist.
Quran-9:111: Allah hath purchased of the believers their persons and their goods; for theirs (in return) is the garden (of Paradise): they fight in His cause, and slay and are slain: a promise binding on Him in truth, through the Law, the Gospel, and the Qur’an
“I have been made victorious through terror.” – Mohammad
The Islamic problem is and will continue to be the ideology taught from the trilogy.