[swarthyguy]

The real root cause of problems of the West is its adoption of Godless secularism that, along with its associated atheism, has led to its crass materialism, hedonism and moral and environmental decay. It has produced grave problems in its society, causing its disintegration, which is also very evident in its basic institution of the family. It is because of the absence of ethical and moral education that Western society is suffering from decadence, with constant increase in daily occurrences of crime and drug use, juvenile delinquency, violence, sex exploitation and abuse, along with rampant racism.

The above is the really tricky sneaky part of the argument. I have not doubt that many would agree with all or some of the criticisms expressed above, but none would advocate a heavy handed theocratic solution, least of all the one offered by the writer.

Admittedly, Muslim societies suffer from grave problems of economic and political leadership, but their family institutions are strong and they possess a long tradition of firmly established values emanating from their mosques and religious schools.

Strong enough to tolerate losing one out of a every few kids to "firmly established values emanating....."
Emanating is right!

[Dialup Llama]

>but their family institutions are strong and they possess a long tradition of firmly established values emanating from their mosques and religious schools.

Would those family values include sending out a daughter with a bomb belt on and profiting from her death no less?

[JRandomFreeper]

, with constant increase in daily occurrences of crime and drug use, juvenile delinquency, violence, sex exploitation and abuse, along with rampant racism.

Except that this sentence is factually incorrect. Crime is dropping. Things are getting better, as evidenced by uniform crime statistics. The left and the arabs have a reputation as liars.

/john

[Post Toasties]

The problem with what Dr. Siraj Islam Mufti has to say here is that he has only part of an argument. Besides ignoring the parts of Islam which advocate violence and discrimination against non-Muslims, his sweeping indictment of secularization is misdirected, since he can show no example of a Muslim society with a remotely comparable standard of living to that of the West which doesn't show most, if not all, of the same characteristics he arbitrarily ascribes to 'secularism'.

However, there may be a middle course satisfactory to most. Islam is probably unique in being the only major religion which has numerous and repeated passages in the Quran and other holy texts which specifically enjoin Muslims to perpetrate acts of violence and discrimination against non-Muslims. If laws (in the US and elsewhere) were passed which defined any such passages (in whatever religion's books) as being not religious or divinely inspired teachings by nature of their inherent injustice to others, only versions of the Quran and other religious texts with those passages expunged could be allowed to be used for any religious or teaching purpose, and the use of texts which include the inciteful passages could result in criminal prosecution and closing of mosques and schools which refuse to comply with the law.

The really advantageous part of this is that it would leave judeo/christian teachings untouched for the most part. With this approach, we could keep the best of Islam and reject the worst of it. It would not amount to censorship, since unexpurgated Islamic texts could be accessed in libraries, for instance. It would just be illegal to use such texts for religious purposes which include passages which incite unlawful or discriminatory actions. And if Muslims don't like it, they can suck sand, IMO.