shiv wrote:
What I am implying actually goes well beyond that.
There is an unspoken allegation that is insidiously pushed on BRF that Islam has such an addictive grip on its followers that it constitutes an unstoppable force with everyone lovin' it so much that they will do anything to stick on.
Without arguing against that allegation, I would like to know how a population of people who are basically being forced to follow idiotic rules by a system that reserves the best for an elite are feared to be an unstoppable force. At one time in history, when Islamic invaders were militarily superior and were overrunning lands, gathering enough loot and women for everyone to enjoy, the attraction of joining Islam and partaking of that loot would have been understandable.
No such situation exists today. Muslims are mostly pretending to enjoy the restrictions even as they use sexy movie/TV scenes and the internet to wank off and fantasize things disallowed to them in the name of Islam. The point I am making today is that calling Islam an unstoppable force of loyal people waiting to take over the world is a bogey. It is a run down force of people who are decidedly not enjoying themselves save for some pleasure a few get by killing kafirs. They are being held back by their own religion and cannot even complain. Many of the over hyped fears are bogus.
It bothers us little as to whether followers inside of Islam are getting their fair share of enjoyments or not. What matters is what are those enjoyments which are promised by the text? Whether one must take an obligatory ghusl after physical relations or not at the middle of the night could be a serious internal matter of Islam - or say whether to use a piece of rock to wipe off after urination or use something softer - and if you are going to zoom in on to that and say that the ordinary Muslim is forced to use a rock because of sharia and he doesn't enjoy it at all, there could be immense sociological significance in this.
But what is more significant is that over and above all that nitty-gritty - is there hope drilled into the common Muslim that if the qaffir can be conquered there will be more of the pleasures that really matter - material comforts and luxuries, power over slaves, and captive women to enjoy?
That hope - and the guaranteed freedom from guilt in muder, genocide, rape and loot - as sanctioned by divine authority, is the most powerful stimulant and attraction. You do not know then as to what motivates the movements of large groups of people if you say mere restrictions of the present prevents eventual convergence towards genocidic adventures. Islamism has ample ammunition in its core texts to free the Mumeen from guilt on issues of genocide, rape, slavery and loot - that is rarely matched if not entirely non-existent on all these issues simultaneously, in any other theology.
Islamists are a danger. Yes. Comparing them to an unstoppable Orc-like force is a bogus claim.
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As long as the texts are not deconstructed, delgimtimized, and the continuity of Islamic education and preaching is not broken - yes the potential generation for Orc-like forces cannot be ruled out. The problem is - denying the possibility works out as total loss by even rudimentary decision theory.
Consider a version of Pascal's Wager :
Non-Muslim approach \Islamism can be | future Orc | future non-Orc
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deny and dont prepare | -infinity[==destruction] | 0[== no loss no profit]
dont deny and prepare | infinity[no destruction] | infinite [== no destruction]
Only way this "wager" can be problemtaizes is if infinite value is not placed on existence by the particular non-Muslim culture, and/or costs of preparation are seen to comparable or more than the value assigned to existence. This latter case happens with predominance of mercantile mentality - which will immediately grimace at the prospect of having to part with parts of the personal nafa and reliquish that nafa towards preparation. Or those for whom existence indpoendently with ones' own culture and knowledge base is sort of trivial or valueless.