Democracy and Islam are inherently incompatible

Submitted by David Campbell (United States), Apr 17, 2008 at 09:47

I believe it is a fallacious argument to compare Islam in the 21st century with that of Christianity in middle ages, or even the Renaissance era. Or, for that matter any other religion of the past. Why, because it denies the fact that that in the 21st century all religions come up against the modern information era, where all cultures are exposed to the Internet and Hollywood/Bollywood links. (Even totalitarian regimes like those in China, Iran, Afghanistan, Cuba, etc., have their pirate networks that are able to shed the light of reality on the true dictatorial nature of those regimes.)

Sadly, the poor of the world are growing increasingly poor, and in the face of radically rising prices for food and fuel, the appeal of radical Islam finds an equally rapid growing audience of receptive ears. It has always been easy for dictators to accuse the rich of cold hearts and selfishness, and to make ridiculous promises of any form of salvation if only those rich countries can be defeated and their respective caches of wealth redistributed.

And finally, unlike Christianity, especially reflected in the New Testament, Islam from its very inception - six centuries after Christ - has been expressed and expanded violently. Contrast the first centuries of Christianity, where Christians were harshly persecuted, with that of Islam, where Mohammad was leading armies against the non-believers, and within a century of his birth, Islamic armies were invading the Iberian peninsula (Spain), and continued making war on Europe as late as the 17th century.

Even our own history in the United States gives evidence of how long we have actually been in conflict with Islam, dating back to 1805 when Thomas Jefferson was compelled to send a fleet of frigates to the Barbary States that were attacking our merchant shipping, as well as those of the Europeans.

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