Dare to Speak: Islam vs. Free Democracy and Free Enterprise.
Below is the last chapter of the book entitled "Dare to Speak: Islam vs. Free Democracy and Free Enterprise by Al Bailey. It succinctly summarizes the problem we are facing with Islam. The complete book can be down loaded from this website.
Chapter 8: What next?
One normally expects a conclusion at the end of a book, but that is not what you will find here; in fact, this book has probably left you with more questions than answers. My goal has been to share a framework for understanding the resurging conflict between the House of Islam and the West, and reveal the causes of Islamic rage which have been long concealed by Western naiveté and mistaken assumptions. This framework answers the question that rang out after September 11’s attacks: “Why do they hate us?”
In summary:
Islamic terrorism cannot be blamed on a single person, like Osama bin Laden, or a single group, like al Qaeda, or a single nation, like Iran. Instead, it emanates from one root source: Islamic holy scripture. This scripture embodies a political philosophy that directly opposes Free Democracy and Free Enterprise and commands Muslims to pursue their opposition through deception, intimidation, terror, and conquest.
Islam joins religion inextricably with governance, and opposes Free Democracy’s separation of Church from State. Its tight union of religion and law causes believers to struggle against what they see as Free Democracy’s sacrilegious disregard for Allah’s Shari’ah.
While some Muslims struggle against Free Democracy with terrorist attacks, others do so more subtly. Leaders of oil-rich Islamic nations use their wealth to build mosques, madrassas, found Islamic Studies programs at universities and colleges, and silence whistleblowers through litigation around the world. They also spread anti-Western propaganda to undermine the Free Enterprise system that produces their luxuries. Muslim immigrants, claiming to seek Western freedoms, use population growth to turn Majority Rule into a time bomb that will destroy those freedoms as they vote Free Democracy out of existence. This phenomenon has already begun in the United States with the election of Representative Keith Ellison.
These subtle revolutionaries, whom we mislabel “moderates,” seek to transform Free Democracies into Islamic Democracies, where only Muslims hold political power. In an Islamic Democracy, the goal of legislators is to refine and update Shari’ah through a legislative form of ijtihad. Their goal is not to represent the will of the people, and they specifically exclude non-Muslims from the legislative process.
Islam’s regressive impact is not restricted to the House of Islam. In fact, Islam’s destructive arm can wield its scimitar very effectively in lands where Muslims do not have a majority. Through international embargoes and terrorist acts, Muslims have the power to cow Western nations into submission despite their minority status, as the Danish cartoonist fiasco demonstrates.
The choice between Free Democracy and Islamic Democracy, or any other form of Islamic government, really does matter. The tenets of Islam damage society in a variety of ways that are subtle but devastating:
Poverty. Islam’s prohibitions against what it calls usury and gambling, as well as other constraints to trade, lead Islamic nations into severe economic declines unless they happen to be blessed with vast natural resources. These declines are exacerbated by the corruption that Shari’ah’s shortcomings in corporate, municipal, and criminal law enable. These shortcomings warp the economies of Islamic nations and cause them to fall substantially behind Free Democracies.
Repression. Shari’ah represses both Infidels and Muslims on multiple fronts:
It deprives non-Muslims of political voice by disallowing criticism of the state religion and excluding non-Muslims from government.
It burdens women with institutional disadvantages regarding work, independent living, marriage, divorce, inheritance, and legal testimony.
It condones slavery, especially the enslavement of non-Muslims. To the extent that slavery has been eliminated from the Islamic world, it has only been a response to outside pressure from Free Democracies, and slavery is still practiced in some Islamic countries.
It muzzles free speech in ways that Westerners can hardly comprehend, let alone believe. The Muslim response to cartoons of Muhammad revealed only one facet of this repression.
Additionally, because the Koran, the Hadith, and Shari’ah developed in a tribal context, their teachings do not fit well with the corporate and national institutions of the West. Instead, Islam institutionalizes tribalism and the strife that is a natural part of tribal society.
Scientific and technological stagnation. Islam knocks out scientific and technological progress with a powerful combination punch:
It represses free speech, and therefore free thought, particularly when those thoughts threaten Islamic beliefs or Islamic leaders.
It claims to have jurisdiction over all aspects of life. This claim gives Islamic scholars authority to scrutinize all inventions, innovations, and ideas, and decide whether they should be permitted. Today, many of these scholars rage against Infidel inventions such as photography, television, and democracy, which they obviously would have outlawed if they had the power to do so.
It claims to have all of the answers. Therefore, it turns scientific research away from the scientific method and toward Islamic holy scriptures. If the Koran and the Hadith have all of the answers, why look elsewhere?
It prohibits lending at interest, making it difficult to finance large-scale research.
It opposes insurance, making it difficult to protect research institutes from loss. Almost invariably, new technologies in the Islamic world have been imported from the West. Not only has the Islamic world not given birth to these advances, it struggles to simply accept them. In short, Islam tends to return Muslims, along with their “protected” Infidels, back to the days of medieval Arabia, with all of its injustices, ignorance, slavery, polygyny, and tribalism. Without a continuous influx of Western money, technology, and political philosophy, the Islamic world would rapidly revert to its ancient condition. Unfortunately, Islam is spreading right now because of a combination of factors:
There are longstanding “open arms” policies in the West for oppressed people.
The economic and political oppression that Islam creates is causing a mass exoduses to the West.
Islamic nations with vast natural resources have used their wealth to underwrite efforts to propagate Islam internationally, through both peaceful and violent methods.
Islam’s followers understand how population growth leads to political power, particularly in democracies, and they are quietly using it to bring new nations into the House of Islam.
The spirit of religious tolerance fostered by Free Democracy has been interpreted by many Westerners as an endorsement of moral relativism, which they call inclusiveness. This version of tolerance mistakenly assumes that there is no such thing as a pathological religion and that tolerance will always be reciprocated. It has damaged the West’s ability to recognize that Islamic beliefs destabilize society and do not reciprocate Western respect. As Islam spreads, its journey to ancient ways will not be limited to the traditional Islamic world. It will also spread its misery in nations that were once Western-oriented but are switching to Islam, such as Nigeria. If this trend continues, Free Democracies will no longer be able to constrain Islam’s severe and despotic tendencies. The concept of Free Democracy will become discredited and derided as evil and Godless, while Shari’ah’s advocates impose their laws with impunity.
If this happens, we can look forward to a global death-spiral of living conditions. Without Free Democracies to prop up the economies of Muslim lands with aid and new inventions, the world’s economies will rapidly decline, particularly as the Middle East’s oil resources decline. Islam’s blindness to its own faults will prevent Muslims from seeing that Shari’ah is the cause of this disaster. Instead, they will attack their favorite scapegoats, such as the Jews, Christians, Hindus, Buddhists, Pagans, Atheists, and Hypocrites. Violence will also escalate as leaders clash over whose Islamic sect is the true “Congregation.” As conditions deteriorate, their battles to counter the crisis with ever-more Islamic forms of Islam will become fever pitched, and continue long after society reverts to medieval levels of chaos. In effect, we will return to the Dark Ages we experienced during Islam’s first rise.
Hard to believe? Consider Somalia, Sudan, Afghanistan, and Iraq. Despite claims by those who want to blame all of the House of Islam’s troubles on Western colonialism, these nations were actually oppressive and chaotic long before the days of Western influence. Even more disturbing is the deterioration of Lebanon, which has been experiencing a miniature version of this descent into chaos over the past few decades.
We have seen Islamic oppression in Shari’ah’s dictates on slavery, women, and Infidels. We have seen Islamic strife and chaos in the histories of Islam’s religious sects and the nations that have suffered Islamic subjugation. We have also seen the major fault lines that crisscross Islamic nations even today. Iraq has taught a hard lesson to those who believe in Free Democracy: Saddam Hussein’s despotism may have been a natural product of the Islamic society he came from. Furthermore, while it may be possible for democracy to succeed in Iraq, we can say with confidence that it will not be a Free Democracy. In fact, Iraq’s new Constitution confirms that our hopes for Free Democracy in Iraq are over. This realization is even more dismal after considering the massive military operations, lives, and treasure devoted to building democracy there. One day we may awaken from our dreams of nation-building to discover that we have created another “democracy” like Afghanistan, capable of sentencing a man to death for his personal religious beliefs. Or, even worse, a “democracy” like Iran.
It should now be clear that it is not enough to deal with Islamic terrorism and warlike threats through police actions or disjointed policies toward individual countries. Doing so simply attacks Islam’s violent off-shoots while ignoring the root cause, which will only sprout new violence in the future. The uncomfortable conclusion we are left with is that, in the long run, we can only hope to preserve the liberties of Free Democracy if we develop a response to the true source of Islamic terrorism: Islam itself.
But how can we, as people who believe in Freedom of Religion, do such a thing? How can we take actions to preserve the liberties we cherish without destroying them in the process? How can we protect ourselves from violence without ourselves becoming violent?
Islam, with its religious belief that Shari’ah should be the law of the land, poses a particularly difficult quandary for those who cherish Free Democracy hallmarks: Freedom of Speech and Freedom of Religion. However, there are solutions, and I would like to share my thoughts on them with you.
At this point, you may have guessed why this book does not end with a conclusion:
Dare to Speak is actually the introduction to another book, Dare to Act, which seeks solutions to the conflicts we face between Islam and the dual institutions of Free Democracy and Free Enterprise.
I hope you now appreciate why this book is called
Dare to Speak. Muslims are likely to be offended by what it says, and it is quite possible that I will have to go into hiding, like Salman Rushdie, the Danish cartoonists, Isioma Daniel, Silva Shahakian, Abdul Rahman, and Ayaan Hirsi Ali, to avoid execution. I may also become a victim of Islamic hatred, like Theo van Gogh and Hitoshi Igarashi. However, I believe that the freedoms we enjoy as the beneficiaries of Free Democracy are so precious and irreplaceable that I would rather risk my life to preserve them than stay quiet in cowardice. Our children have the right to enjoy these freedoms as we have enjoyed them, and we have an obligation to protect those freedoms from Islam. In protecting those freedoms, we will do nothing more than our forefathers who defended them from Fascism and Communism. Compared to the great sacrifices of our predecessors, this book, written in the comfort of a safe and secure home, furnished with the many benefits of Free Democracy and Free Enterprise, barely registers. Those who will receive the hero’s wreaths will be those who act.