Why Islam sucks...

...It's not really to do with terrorism...


I've rarely commented upon Islam; since 9/11, I've written quite a bit about terrorism, but have not discussed any belief I may have about the general culpability of the religion itself, as being influential upon Islamist terrorists.


This is because I have only general knowledge of Islam, and no direct knowledge at all of its holy scriptures. More so, though, I think this issue is mostly irrelevant. Osama bin Laden and many others like him, believe they are good and true Muslims. I take their word for it. As for other Muslims who assert that they are not? That's between y'all. If the latter group truly believes that, they would encourage scholars and clerics of their faith to resoundingly condemn Islamic fascists.


However, the main activity of Islamic lobby groups seems to be taking umbrage at any hint or suggestion that any Muslim anywhere could be considered a terrorist; and desperate assertions that Muslims who do indeed carry out terrorist acts in no way could be motivated by religion — when they are obviously so motivated. And, continues the claim, locutions such as "Muslim terrorist" or "Islamic terrorism" are very offensive to us.


It doesn't take much curiosity to see how disingenuous these claims are. I am satisfied that the numerous lobbyists claiming to speak for all Muslims, are not front groups for terrorism. Yet, these same lobbies seem to take up a lot of time, when not performing grievance theatre, also failing to unequivocally condemn terrorism carried out by Islamic fascists. Any critical word against Islamic terrorism is mere throat-clearing, before the true agenda of anti-anti-terrorism comes into focus for the duration. This is altogether irritating, but scarcely reserved only for Islamic lobby groups. Indeed, politicians, academics, opinion-leaders of all kinds, are very keen to exonerate Muslims and the Islamic religion as a whole, from guilt in the actions of Islamic fascists.


The modern establishment is correct, but for false reasons, to conclude that terrorism is not the major threat from Islam. The more obvious point, that Islam itself, in its mainstream form, is problematical, is confused and confounded by the issue of terrorism. If all Islamic terrorists suddenly disappeared, still the Islamic religion itself, as it is practised in any country where it is pursued by the majority, is insufferable.


Usually, discussion of "mainstream" (ie. as opposed to terrorist) Islamic morals, revolves around the status of women. That's all for the good. In spite of talk about the veil being "feminist" or even "sexy", women in Islamic countries would be happy to become second-class citizens, instead of mere chattel. Or, if they were not so happy with that prospect, they are chattel even so. Whatever the Koran says, there is no doubt whatsoever that the suppression of women by men is validated by Islamic clerics. One European cleric, famed on that continent for his alleged efforts to modernize Islamic theology, was a few years ago challenged during a TV debate in France by Nicholas Sarkozy, then a government minister and now president of that country, to condemn outright the stoning of women in Islamic states. This fellow would only call for a "moratorium" on stoning, until the issue could be adequately addressed.


This is bad enough itself. But while Islam clearly permits men to bear so very heavily upon women, it scarcely grants men much in the way of volition or free will. Islam, as practised devoutly, without molestation or violence upon anyone else, nevertheless imposes a regime of behavioural and thought control that is an abomination to Enlightened liberty. This is precisely why I despise Islam. Anyone who believes in liberty, must respect others' freely-chosen decision to be unfree: this goes for the devoutly religious of any stripe. The totalism of the Islamic faith — again ignoring the issue of terrorism — seems inappropriate to a liberal-democratic ethos.


What's outrageous is how at least some of the same Islamic lobby groups mentioned above, have attempted to abuse the concept of religious accommodation (itself of dubious value, but nevertheless), to in effect force everyone else to behave as Muslims are supposed to. A recent case in Quebec highlighted this trend. A young Muslim student complained to the provincial human rights watchdog after she was expelled from a vocational college. While attending classes, this woman had reportedly demanded not only the right to wear a full Islamic headdress. She also did not want to speak any male, be it teacher or student. She said, too, it was her right to demand that all males in a classroom not look at her, at any time. This is outrageous enough, but is only one of many examples of strictly-religious Muslims attempting to impose their dogma on others.


A few years ago at Concordia university in Montreal, school administrators met with members of the student government around Christmas. A Muslim member of the latter group objected that alcohol was being served — against her religion — at the gathering. When she was told that she could not impose her religion on others, not only Muslim student groups, but the leftist student governors themselves, erupted in outrage. The complaint seemed to be that the administrator was "racist" for his remarks. Around that time, I saw a local multicultural lobbyist on a news report, insisting that "We need to have single-sex swimming time" at city pools, presumably in order to "accommodate" Muslim women who are forbidden to even partially disrobe in front of unrelated members of the opposite sex. I was myself astonished at the presumption of this individual, no Muslim himself, of the necessity of this measure, as though it were not a matter of controversy.


It's hard to understand the common ground that leftists and multiculturalists have apparently found with strictly-religious Muslim individuals and lobby groups. Multiculturalists and socialists are, as a matter of their core beliefs, completely against what mainstream Islam stands for. And, the reverse is true as well: what do Muslim groups have in common with the cultural left? These are allies of convenience, against a common foe: liberalism. That each comes at the job from "opposite" ends, is apparently no consequence to either.


I think Nick Cohen, writing in What's Left?, correctly described why it is that liberal-leftists at least, have become so simpatico with Muslim lobby groups. For thirty years, beginning in the 1970s, the left face defeat after defeat, big and small. The sixties student left was broadly repudiated by established democratic institutions: as in the United States with the election of Richard Nixon in 1968, or the success of President De Gaulle in rallying the French public against the insurrectionists of May and June that year. By the early ‘70s, what remained of the New Left cascading into "third-world" style terrorist revolutionism. At the same time, stagflation brought statism and welfare liberalism into disrepute long before the ascension of Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan. During the 1980s and ‘90s, mainstream leftist parties continued to see dramatic erosions in their support. In 1989, too, came the European velvet revolutions, which saw the peaceful transfer of power from Communism to democracy in Czechoslovakia (itself now divided between Slovakia and the Czech republic), Poland, East Germany, and Bulgaria (only Romania and the former Yugoslavia succumbed to violence during or following the overthrow of Communist party rulers). Even before 9/11, the political left in the West was tentatively reaching for alliance with mainstream Islamic groups. I think this started to happen during the second Gulf war, in 1991. After Sept. 11, the alliance was cemented. Like the alliance of some of the churches at least, and of industrialists with the National Socialist party of Germany. The former thought that they could `control' the latter; but we all know where that led to.