Whistling Past the Graveyard

“Don’t you think German women dress better now, since the war, M. Daladier?” “Why, yes indeed I do, Mr. Chamberlain.”

Two Christian Science Monitor articles Illustrate the optimistic wishful thinking prevalent today in some circles.

In an attempt to show that Islam is changing, the Monitor’s editorial board points out in its 5/11/09 article, The Unseen Burqa Revolution, that:

[…] it's so important to recognize victories large and small – from the women who gained 25 percent of the seats in Iraq's provincial elections Jan. 31, to the two Palestinian women in the West Bank who appear to be the first female sharia judges in the Middle East. […]

As the Pakistani Army fights the Taliban, remember that this Muslim country twice elected a woman as prime minister – the late Benazir Bhutto. In the past 20 years, female premiers have led Indonesia (the world's largest Muslim country), Bangladesh, and Turkey. […]

On 5/8/09, the Monitor ran a story by John Hughes, Islam and Democracy, which included:

[…] skeptics have argued that this is a lost cause, and that democracy and Islam are incompatible. So it is heartening to see the integration of democracy and Islam taking place in three huge countries whose Muslim populations make up somewhere between a quarter and a third of the world's entire Muslim populace. […]

Mr. Hughes goes on to say that democracy is thriving in Indonesia, India and Turkey.

Three very interesting countries, but not examples of thriving democracy, Mr. Hughes. In fact, just about the opposite. The Indonesian government systematically denies equal rights to non-Muslims. From the 2/9/09 Christian Today:

[…] Sixteen of 32 provinces have passed laws influenced by sharia. These laws vary widely in form. In Padang, both Muslim and non-Muslim women are required to wear headscarves, while a law in Tangerang allows women found “loitering” alone on the street after 10.00 pm to be arrested and charged with prostitution. Other laws include stipulate Quran literacy among schoolchildren and severe punishment for adultery, alcoholism and gambling. This is unacceptable because it is not in line with the pluralism that the constitution recognizes,” according to some lawyers. […]

India is an example of Islam held in check by a Hindu majority which answers Islamic aggression in kind and Turkey is an example of a failing attempt to maintain a secular government which Ataturk installed by force over a Muslim-majority populace.

More typical of the integration of Islam and democracy is the case of Maher El-Gohary, reported in Compass Direct of 5/12/09. Mr. El-Gohary is the first Egyptian Muslim ever to get official permission to change to Christianity. He is in hiding, in fear of his life, while his lawyer sarcastically says “In Egypt we have freedom of religion, but these freedoms can’t go against Islam.”

David P. Goldman writes injects a sense of reality in the 5/12/09 First Things:

America is even more vulnerable today, when its government cannot even identify who and what the enemy might be. President Obama insists that America is not at war with Islam, but it surely is at war with an interpretation of Islam shared by tens and possibly hundreds of millions of people. By falsely representing the terrorists as an unrepresentative minority in the Muslim world, Western governments have left their people vulnerable to a profoundly demoralizing shock.

What those hundreds of millions of Muslims share is not an interpretation but acting upon the commands found in the Koran that have never been limited in time or place.

And then there is the arch-pessimist himself:

The march of time cannot be halted; there is no question of prudent retreat or
clever renunciation. Only dreamers believe there is a way out. Optimism is
cowardice.

Men and Technics, Oswald Spengler

Originally posted on 5/13/09