Immoderate Islam

I’ve bashed on Mitt Romney enough for a twenty-four hour period. Now it’s time to bash on Muslims again for foisting off their brand of violent, misogynistic lunacy on the rest of us. Specifically, I refer to the utter and barbaric cruelty of Shari’a law. Go ahead and read the linked op-ed (by my latest hero, Somali/Dutch humanist Ayaan Hirsi Ali) and shudder in horror to think of what happens when religion is given power over the implements of government. Go ahead and read about "The Girl From Qatif" and try to not be outraged.

Ali raises an excellent point: where are all of these so-called “Islamic moderates” who join us Westerners in being outraged by things like this? Why are no Muslim nations or leaders critical of the Saudis, Sudanese, or Bangladeshis when their co-religionists perpetrate these outrageous human rights abuses? Whether their silence is the result of feelings of fear or feelings of fraternity, it is still inexcusable. Evil is evil, no matter what mask it wears.

I call “bullshit.” The Koran is just another collection of pretty-sounding fairy tales (I’ve heard the first Sura sung in Arabic, and it is quite pretty) bearing little resemblance to the world in which it was written, and even less to the world we live in today. Any modern, industrialized society that would claim a seat at the table of civilization in the modern era ought not to conduct itself according to the social code of Bronze Age nomads.