The world is going to hell.

Submitted by Michael S (United States), Sep 27, 2016 at 02:27

Hi, Prashant. You made some good points.

"Islam acts as a unified military/political power."

Let me qualify that, by seeing how that statement pans out in various Islamic areas:

1. Sub-Saharan Africa: The best place to look is Nigeria, which is half Muslim and half Christian. In the Muslim half of the country, Sharia Law is official on the STATE level; but it is not imposed on Christian states. Nigeria currently has a Muslim President, who once was a dictator but now is not; and I must say, he gets better grades concerning democracy and corruption than his Christian prececessor, Goodluck Jonathan. He has also wholeheartedly gone after the Islamist Boko Haram extremists, something Jonathan was lax about. All in all, I would say this man (Muhammadu Buhari), has not used religion to further a political agenda.

2. The Middle East: Islam is extremely political. You are absolutely right.

3. South Asia: Very political, almost as bad as the Middle East. Pakistan is plagued by some very political Muslims; but this is not so much the case in India and Bangladesh.

4. Central Asia: Not so much. The Soviet Union left a legacy of atheism and secularism, which has so far held its own against Islamic fundamentalist politics. Ditto in NW China. Both places are plagued by violent Islamist extremists. The same can be said for Europe and North America: Yes, we have a very vocal Islamist minority; but many Muslims also seem to be quietly trying to fit into society.

5. Southeast Asia and Indonesia. Political Islamists are very much in the minority. The vast majority of Muslims there live in Indonesia, and most of them are in central and eastern Java. This is where President Joko Widodo is from, a man who does not mix religion and politics in any noticeable way.

Your premise holds, therefore, in the Middle East; but not so much elsewhere.

You went on,

"Muslim countries support each other in the same ways as communist countries of the last centuries supported each other."

This is true in policies toward Israel (most Islamic countries do not recognize Israel). Overall, though, Communism was far more unified, with only two major camps: the USSR and China. Islam is split pretty deeply between Iranian, Turkish, Saudi and other spheres, which are in bloody conflict with one another.

"Islam acts as an economic entity."

Not true. The only functioning free trade area among solely Muslim countries is the GCC. The Christian world, on the other hand, has the EU, NAFTA, MERCOSUR and the SACU. The Hindus have only two countries (India and Nepal), but they are closely connected economically. The Buddhists do not have dedicated trade ties with one another. The Jewish state has strong trade connections with the major Western trade blocs. By contrast, Morocco and Algeria, though economically tied to each other on paper, have had a closed border between them for decades.

"Islam has its own constitution (Sharia)". True.

"Islamic countries have their own armies (alquaeda, ISIS, PLO etc) which cooperate with each other.."

...and also fight each other, cats and dogs -- almost as badly as Christians do (viz. Rwanda). Nearly all battle deaths in Islamic wars consist of Muslims killing Muslims. This is generally true, among all the major world religions (Koreans, Vietnamese, Chinese, Soviets, Muslims, African Christians, European Christians...).

"SOLUTIONS:

"1. Shift your primary focus to spirituality. Not to economics, not to politics, not to wars of independence, not to social aspects but to spirituality.

"2. ..."

I don't see any solution. The world is going to hell. Down deep, it wants to go to hell, and will vehemently attack those who try to stop it.

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