There is Only One World

Submitted by Duane F (Canada), Jan 27, 2008 at 14:16

As Ron T has essentially noted, we are reading from the same playbook. My point was that Islam was never intended to transcend the problems of Tribalism but to channel them outwards. Islam is a function of Tribalism and would make no sense to a non-tribal cultural paradigm. In fact the conflicts between the West and Islam and "solutions" to them demonstrate such a lack of comprehension of that paradigm by the leaders of the West.

I was pleased to read that one of the other commenters made some of the points that I had but then I read an article by Philip Salzmann in Middle East Quarterly (www.meforum.org/article/1813) that reinforced my belief that original thought, like original sin, occurred long ago to someone that I could not have possibly known. The fundamentally Arabic Tribal nature of Islam is a key point of Salzmann's book, though it was not that well illustrated by DP's article.

I think that a common misperception about monotheistic religions, intolerance, and violence. The root cause of the violence is the quest for Power. Intolerance is tool to focus that Power and religion, because it involves passionate belief that can be perverted, is used to generate the intolerance. If the religion is taken out of the equation it will be replaced by a secular passion (like Fascist nationalism or Communism). People accumulating Power will always find something to pervert to their means.

I strongly recommend reading the MEQ article as it shows why you will never see protests from the Islamic World about Muslim on Muslim violence and why it is always our fault when it happens.

I liked Ralph Whaley's comments on Individualism and Collectivism though I have read much better illustrations of Objectivist thought - in itself just a rewording of the American Dream.

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