OH, WHAT THE HECK.....
Reader comment on item: The Worst Book of 2007?

Submitted by DANIEL REDMOND (United States), Oct 27, 2007 at 19:14

Oh, what the heck, I've not read Heck's book but I'll comment on some of the criticisms made of it. Please be advised that I am not only a non-Muslim but I am adamantly anti-religion to the core, a life-long Atheist uninclined to defend any form of religious extremism or the errant idiocy of fundamentalist Muslim "scholars" in particular.

My comments: 1) Having perused both the Koran and various editions of the Holy Bible, including the Old Testament, I don't think that Heck's viewpoint that the Koran is no more bellicose than the Old Testament is that far off the mark. Yes, the Koran exhorts its readers toward holy jihad against "infidels" and non-believers but the Old Testament is itself filled with gruesome, sadistic stories of incredible perversion; a book literally filled with tales of miserable people doing horrible things. To use it as a guide toward living is abominable.

2) Islam's differences with Judaism and Christianity probably are limited, given the fact that Christianity was largely a plagiarized version of Judaism and Islam is a largely plagiarized version of Christianity. One would have to expect considerable similarities.

3) We have a long history of creating our own monsters, as was the case with Saddam Hussein, who was courted by several successive American administrations. And it was Anglo-American meddling that sanctioned the infamous land grab of an Arab state (Palestine) and its conversion to a Jewish state (Israel). To that degree we have, in fact, created much of the conflict in the Middle East.

4) I don't know much about the Muslim Brethren but it is pretty well documented that we curried favor with Osama bin-Laden and financed his war efforts against the Soviets in Afghanistan in the 1980s, thereby creating al Queda.

5) Considering the fact that Islam is completely incompatible with our own concepts of freedom and democracy it is not at all unreasonable to conclude that a theocracy is the appropriate government for Islamic societies.

Note: Opinions expressed in comments are those of the authors alone and not necessarily those of Daniel Pipes. Original writing only, please. Comments are screened for relevance, substance, and tone, and in some cases edited before posting. Reasoned disagreement is welcome, but comments are rejected if scurrilous, off-topic, vulgar, ad hominem, or otherwise viewed as inappropriate. For complete regulations, see the Guidelines for Comments. For informational purposes, we identify countries from which comments are sent.