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Politics : View from the Center and Left -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Elroy who wrote (37810)	5/24/2007 2:09:03 PM
From: JohnM	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 542129

Do you think the West (the capitalist, secular, democratic, civil, free societies of the world) have been trying to weaken and divide the Islamic World (whatever that is) for the past 100-200 years? Well, we have. Secular life by definition weakens and divides religions. Prior to secular government religious organizations had the power, with the implementation of secular government the politicians have the power. Look at how the West has replaced weakened the Catholic church relative to its position in society 500 years ago. I could argue with that, particularly the notion that "by definition weakens" but only one rejoinder there. It's particularly that notion that is now under attack in the US, has been so since 1980 at least and the movement continued to gain strength until its most recent failures thanks to the Bush administration. So secular life doesn't, certainly not be definition, weaken religion. But regardless, back to the question. The point of the question is not to discover the truth or falsity of the claim that secular beliefs undermine religious beliefs, but rather to discover whether Muslims generally feel the Bush administration is attacking its religion. Not a particularly difficult notion.

To: Elroy who wrote (37810)	5/25/2007 3:07:01 AM
From: Cogito	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 542129

Elroy - I think that while the points you are making have some validity, they miss the point of the survey. The survey said that a majority of Muslims in several countries think "the US is trying to weaken and divide the Islamic world". How we live our secular lives here in the States is immaterial to those Muslims. What matters is things like the US spearheading the invasion of Afghanistan and the ouster of the Islamic government there. (I agree that ouster was completely justified, but many Muslims may not feel that way.) Then there's our continuing support of Israel vs the Palestinians, the invasion of Iraq, and our saber rattling at Iran and to a lesser extent, Syria. It's clear to me that a majority of Muslims believe we should leave their countries alone instead of throwing our weight around and telling them what to do. If we did, they would most likely leave us alone. - Allen