[jacquesm]

The answer to that question is simple: Christianity experienced enlightenment and Islam did not.

So they're effectively to be compared with pre-enlightenment Christianity and then the differences are much smaller. The world does not move in lockstep. Sooner or later Islam will also experience its enlightenment (hopefully sooner) and then we will see the end of this nonsense.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Age_of_Enlightenment

This guy had the right idea:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mustafa_Kemal_Atat%C3%BCrk

Sadly, missed opportunity and Turkey in spite of leading the way is currently in turmoil.

[dragontamer]

Erm... Islam was what kept most of the world out of the Dark Ages. They didn't need to experience enlightenment when they were busy experiencing Algebra and the number zero.

The Middle-east is such a hellhole because the Ottoman Empire got royally F'''ed up in World War 1. And its iddy-bitty pieces were redrawn by the Allies.

Whereas Germany remained strong and rebelled against the Allied rule by basically starting World War 2... the Ottomans were cut up piece by piece and distributed across the Allied powers. The clusterf'''ed map today was drawn by military commanders with no rhyme or reason to cultural unity, which leads us to how screwed up the Middle East is today.

Granted, the Ottomans were in decline by that point, which contributed to why they lost the Great War. But lets not forget the basis of history here. World War 1 screwed things up, quite severely, in this region.

In fact, the former map of the Ottoman Empire basically reads for where things are screwed up today.

http://www.zonu.com/images/0X0/2010-01-02-11578/The-Ottoman-...

Ignoring the major geo-political changes between 1850 through 1920 seems frankly insane. The current state of the Middle East can be easily explained by WW1 and the collapse of the Ottomans. Furthermore, the history and culture of the region _remembers_ when they were a great world power.

There's probably a bit of jealousy and pride in there, as the Persians / Ottomans were a great empire only ~150 years ago.

[jacquesm]

That certainly didn't help. But Islam still has to see its Erasmus and until then this madness will likely persist.

Religion is a personal thing.

[dragontamer]

Can you name an attack on the Western world in the last 30 years that didn't involve the Wahabist / Salafi extremist sect of Muslim?

There's one sect kinda-sorta preaching violence. And that is the Wahhabi Islam that followed Osama Bin Laden. Beyond that, your mainstream Shiite / Shia Muslims are rather peaceful folk within the Western World.

Frances 7%+ Muslim Population is a testament to that. Its pretty much those who get converted to the extremist violent sect that we have to worry about.

And as I stated in another thread: geo-political issues prevent the US from calling out the sect specifically. Saudi Arabia has a relatively large number of Salafists.

Even then... Wahhabi / Salafi aren't the same. But since they're more closely related (same geo-political area and a shared history)... I'll keep the terms close to each other. But honestly, these sorts of things are important to see.

You can't just paint Islam with a broad brush and make generalizations. At best, I'd say the attacks (Sept. 11, Anwar Al Awalki, Bin Laden, etc. etc.) are all derived from Wahhabi Islam at best.

The most accurate is probably "Violently Motivated Extremist Wahhabi Islam"... which is a rather small subset of Muslims. (Basically just ISIS and Al Qaeda)

[btilly]

Yes, I can. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hezbollah#Alleged_suicide_and_t... for a list of attacks attributed to Hezbollah, which is a Shi'ah organization.

Furthermore support of violence to suppress freedom of religion is by no means limited to a small splinter sect in the islamic world. For example in a Pew survey, 88% of muslims in Egypt support the death penalty for converting away from islam. When you consider that about 95% of Egyptians are muslim, that's a pretty mainstream view.

If you want to know more about muslim views, I highly recommend reading through http://www.pewforum.org/files/2013/04/worlds-muslims-religio... for perspective. Coming from a Western view you might encounter a lot of, "No, you think you are tolerant but what you think of as tolerance really isn't." And it is important to understand that.

The item I pointed to is kind of canonical. A muslim who lets others practice their religion believes that he is tolerant of those religions. And continues believing that even while saying that if a member of one of those religions convinces some other muslim that that religion is correct, then they need to be killed for the attack on the one TRUE religion, islam!

[kbutler]

> Can you name an attack on the Western world in the last 30 years that didn't involve the Wahabist / Salafi extremist sect of Muslim?

The first example that came to mind was the Unabomber - last attack was 1995, and he was explicitly opposing the technology-rich western world.

A simple google search for "terrorist attacks not muslim" brought up: http://www.loonwatch.com/2010/01/terrorism-in-europe/

"only 6% of terrorist attacks on U.S. soil from 1980 to 2005 were carried out by Islamic extremists."

"In fact, a whopping 99.6% of terrorist attacks in Europe were by non-Muslim groups; a good 84.8% of attacks were from separatist groups completely unrelated to Islam. Leftist groups accounted for over sixteen times as much terrorism as radical Islamic groups. Only a measly 0.4% of terrorist attacks from 2006 to 2008 could be attributed to extremist Muslims."

[jacquesm]

I think he meant attacks on the Western world by Islamists not Wahabist/Salafi affiliated.

[jacquesm]

Agreed with all you wrote, however that's the way the debate to date has been framed. Just like the anti-abortionists spoil it for the Christians, the ultra-orthodox Jews spoil it for Israel (and the rest of the Jews) and so on. So fanatics of all sects spoil it for Islam in the aggregate.

> And as I stated in another thread: geo-political issues prevent the US from calling out the sect specifically. Saudi Arabia has a relatively large number of Salafists.

We're in violent agreement here, as long as our dependency on oil continues this likely will not change. That's one of the factors holding back meaningful progress on a quite a large number of stages.

[Killah911]

Seriously jacquesm? I'm truly shocked at this coming from you. I have a lot of respect you & love reading your stuff, but really?

"Christianity experienced enlightenment and Islam did not"?

Surely you're not so ignorant as to dismiss the thousand years where the Islamic world was the abode of knowledge, science and civilization while Europe was in the dark ages.

Yes, shit sucks for them now. But to say they never experienced enlightenment (btw, the effects of the Islamic world on the "enlightenment" is well known). Part of the problem is that we're not over our colonial instincts. Just look down on the other cultures, we're obviously the best. Our country, our people, our skin color, right?

I've read about outwardly atheist and vocal scientists and philosophers from the 1100's in the Islamic world. And he was pretty revered (although today they wouldn't be able to walk down the streets of most Muslim countries with their head intact).

Many of our principles are borrowed from Islamic civilization that preceded us. It's the equivalent of dismissing Egyptians and saying their problem is that they never achieved civilization like us.

I still can't express how shocked I am at the shallowness of your comment. I really hope it is because you're upset.

EDIT: btilly was kind enough to point out where I misinterpreted what jacquesm was stating. I took his comment as a slight, whereas it was far better thought out observation.

[btilly]

No, he's right that Islam never experienced the Enlightenment. Nor was it in any way directly responsible for that.

Credit belongs to the Islamic world for keeping classical knowledge alive and reintroducing it to Europe at the beginning of the Renaissance. However the Enlightenment refers to a later period in European history where people came to terms with the result of decades of very nasty civil wars over Protestant vs Catholic, and came up with principles which allowed people of different beliefs to peacefully coexist within society.

That is the source of Western ideas like "freedom of religion" and "freedom of speech". Which very importantly say that while you can take offense at another's words or beliefs, you can't actually do anything about it. Like go over and kill them. And they have to reciprocate by not killing you in turn.

The Muslim world has nothing like this. Sure, they say that you're free to follow another religion of the book. But their teachings are very explicit that this only works so long as you don't do anything offensive to muslims. Like mock the prophet, convert muslims to your faith, and so on. Do that, and you die. Unless the Muslim world internalizes the Western version of that idea, we're going to continue having problems reconciling Islam and Western civilization.

Incidentally the golden age of Islam that you refer to traditionally ended with the sack of Baghdad in 1258. However contemporary scholars point to evidence that relative enlightenment continued until the great economic decline that resulted from Western countries establishing direct trade routes with the East, which reduced commerce along the Silk Road.

[Killah911]

You're right (I appreciate the thoughtful response). I see what you're saying. And I agree with you on the principles of being tolerance being a good thing. I'm reminded of the Hindu-Muslim riots in India or the more recent events in Burma. I think the enlightenment and the dark ages and lessons form them are parts of western history, not shared by other cultures. (Although the Serbian conflict doesn't reconcile with this view if they're to be considered western beneficiaries of the enlightenment). What they have experienced is western imperialism.

What I would argue is the viewpoint that the Muslim world or any other region that isn't us, needing to inherit or adhere to our viewpoint, as being short sighted.

I think I'm finally starting to see jacquesm was saying (I feel like a dumbass now). I just reread his original comment on the world not moving in lockstep. It will take time, hopefully some economic development, infrastructure & some super connected smart people who are part of the local & global community. I interpreted his comment to be a slight against an entire culture, which, thanks your comment I am able to see past now.

[jacquesm]

'Killah911' ? Right...

As for what the enlightenment was all about, maybe you should read up on that first before starting a rant like this:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Age_of_Enlightenment

So no, Islam did not experience enlightenment. The closest they came to that was http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mustafa_Kemal_Atat%C3%BCrk and his attempt to reduce the influence of religion on politics but it mostly failed outside of Turkey and recent events there should make you worried about whether or not his legacy will last.

The fact that there are anecdotes about atheists in the 1100's does nothing to contradict what I said.

[Killah911]

Nice, if you look at my profile, you'd see there's a reason I still stick on my hacker handle form the 90's. Sorry for the ranty nature of my comment. I saw your comment and was and was about to breeze past until I saw your handle. I can appreciate your view on Kemal Ataturk. But I humbly differ in my views of him.

What I was saying weren't just some anecdotes. May I humbly suggest you read up on the subject a little more before making such pronouncements. I don't care if some random person says something. But I think hope in the future rests in someone like you being informed and balanced in your views.

The internet is an amazing thing. It can help melt away prejudices and connect people who think from around the world. People who have the power to shape the future. We must be more sensible and informed. (It may sound elitist, but lets face it, this place in some way is a cafe that anyone from the US or Afghanistan can join in and discuss).

I'd argue that Ataturk was the wrong kind of leader. What the Muslim world needs is a Gandhi. Someone who doesn't force them to be this way or that way. All freedom need not look the same. I may be naive in thinking this, but maybe the world just needs better internet. There are people who destroy and people who build. If we could get the builders in the same community globally and get them communicating, there may be hope for a better yet.

(Advance apologies for the second rant)

[jacquesm]

Peace.

> What the Muslim world needs is a Gandhi.

That would be a good thing indeed.

What I meant with the Ataturk reference - in case that wasn't clear - is that it should be possible to have an enlightened muslim state, one where the trend to fanaticism can be stopped maybe even reversed, and that such a state could set an example for the rest of the muslim world.

Right now Turkey is once again in turmoil, it's not unlike former Yugoslavia in composition and I fear for how that will all turn out. You are right in that this directly links back to how the union was achieved in the first place (mostly by force, rather than by consensus).

[btilly]

My view is that Ataturk was trying to declare victory for western ideals while not actually holding them. His policies include fining people who speak languages other than Turkish, forcing people to have Turkish surnames, confiscating property from Armenians and so on. (I don't believe that he was directly responsible for the Armenian genocide, but there is nothing in his policies that would suggest he was opposed to it either.)

I agree that he was an improvement over the state of affairs in most muslim countries in the Middle East, but can't go so far as to say that he had the right idea.

[jacquesm]

He was far from perfect and the Armenian genocide will forever mar his legacy (and to this day can't be talked about in a reasonable way in Turkey, or even with quite a few Turks outside of Turkey).

But he did move Turkey from the state it was in to the next step. Keep in mind that most of the things that you add there were compromises, he was walking a very fine line between unification and all out civil war.

I doubt he could have done much more in one lifetime, I agree he probably could have done a better job but then again I wasn't in his shoes so it is hard to judge.

But putting Turkey ca. 1980 next to the countries surrounding it and you'd have to agree that his legacy had the potential to pay off.

[waps]

Kemal Ataturk is like a lot of other historical figures. What he accomplished is great. If he did 1/100th of that in America today, any state would reintroduce the death penalty just for him. He was a massacring bastard, created institutions that codified racism, attacked and stole from innocent people. He is a monster.

But he ended 1500 years of war between islam and

The wast

Christianity

India

China

Africa

...

But yeah today it seems maybe he didn't so much end it as interrupt it for 100 years.

[jacquesm]

I find the best person to compare him to historically is Tito.