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Islam does this, Islam does that…

Been laid up up for a few days with a bum ankle. This has given me some time to catch up on my web reading. It doesn’t look good from here. Forgetting Iraq and Saudi Arabia, for the moment, I am saddened that calmer voices have been shouted down both here and in the Muslim world. We have made this an issue about Islam, and I too have been guilty of this. I apologise. I have recently been in the company of some really interesting thinkers listening to them debate the current state of Islam. Thinkers such as Reinhard Schulzeand…

Combating Anti-Muslim Bias | Teaching Tolerance

Combating Anti-Muslim Bias | Teaching Tolerance. When Basir Jamil was 8 years old in 2001, he hated the terrorists who destroyed the World Trade Center, smashed into the Pentagon and downed an airplane full of people in rural Pennsylvania.  So when he was called the same thing—a terrorist—a few years later in middle school, he was shocked.

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3 thoughts on “Islam and Democracy”

  1. A bit ironic that you link to an op/ed by Dilip Hiro that lauds Qatar’s democracy when you also note the banning of your site by that same country. Anyhoo, I don’t know what democracy will look like in Iraq, but I’m baffled Hiro’s optimistic opinion that 1) the country has a chance of remaining unified, and 2) it won’t follow a theocratic model. I want to make it clear that I don’t think Iraq needs to follow a secular, liberal democratic model (which happens to be my preference which is why I live here and not in Saudi Arabia).

  2. I wanted to work on Hiro’s piece a bit, but I knew I wouldn’t get to it immediately, and I thought it was more useful just to get it out there. I liked it because I thought I thought it talked about the various ways Islam fits into government models.
    I’m not sure Iraq will stay together without some help. However, I think the administration has enough sense to realize that if Iraq falls apart soon, it will count as a failure. I’m fairly confident that “vilayat-e faqih” will not take hold in Iraq b/c Sistani has come out against it, and was opposed to Khomeini on this point. That, of course, does not preclude a theocracy.
    Is free speech a sign of democracy? (Qatar) Remember that recently several ABC affiliates refused to air “Saving Private Ryan” for fear of a government backlash, after two years of showing it. Does that mean we are not a democracy? (Rhetorical interest. Your point is taken.)

  3. Yes, that was pretty lame self-censorship on the part of stations that balked at showing the movie. I agree that free speech is not a sign of democracy, but is a sign of a liberal democracy (as distinguished in Fareed Zakaria’s excellent read, the Future of Freedom). Hiro thinks that Qatar is both.

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