Quote:
Originally Posted by flstf
People who want to stay the course are probably of the opinion that Islamic minds will embrace and actually want a democratic society once they get a taste of western style freedom. I fear that what most Islamic people want is a restrictive Islamic regime and they will impose one soon after we leave. The only question is which Islamic sect will control the country.
Perhaps western style democracy is not suited for people of this faith and freedom to them means the freedom to only allow one religion and laws based on it.
|
I believe that most Islamic people want to preserve their varied cultures within a more democratic political framework than exists in the ME today. This already exists in various limited forms throughout the region. As far as freedom of religion goes, most ME nations already have many Christians and Jews living in them freely.
I see where you're coming from though, and among the radical elements in Islamic society it is certainly true, but I think it's a mistake to paint the desires of the Islamic world with such broad strokes. No doubt many of our media outlets have been in the practice of doing this since 9/11, but if you start to delve deeper into the facts about life in ME nations you begin to see not only how they are truly alike in some ways but also how surprisingly different they are in others. We have become ennured to the images of radicalized Islam in the streets and have consistently ignored the finer, more subtle, qualities of Islamic society that we could be appealing to. This frustrates me to no end. I can only imagine what it would be like if the roles were reversed and half the world was judging us all based on the activities of our own militant elements. As a person who basically wants to live peacefully without causing harm to anyone, I think I'd be pretty frustrated and resentful. Facts are, if the majority of the Islamic world really did want to kill us all and/or take over the world we would be majorly screwed. Nevertheless, we have largely been advised to see the conflict in this way. But it's not necessary. It's entirely possible to see the dangers clearly without condemning the whole society. BUT, it does make it easier to consider bombing them. Hmmm, how 'bout that?