[MD] Theocracy, Secularism, and Democracy

[Steven Peterson]

Hi Dave, Horse, DMB, Platt,

When we think about why building a Muslim community center there may
be regarded as objectionable (even though it ought not be prohibited)
is that there doesn't seem to be moderate Islam of the sort where
there are Muslim leaders willing to come out and say that Salmon
Rushdie and apostates in general ought not be killed or to stop
apologizing for those threatening the lives of cartoonists.  Most
Muslim's understanding of Islam is actually a very real and present
danger to religious freedom. While militant atheists are working to
eradicate all religion, a more reasonable approach is to condemn the
specific religions or specific religious practices that are evil and
support religious freedom rather that equating Islam with every other
religion as equally problematic.

Harris from a speech called "The Problem with Atheism":

"...consider how we, as atheists, tend to talk about Islam. Christians
often complain that atheists, and the secular world generally, balance
every criticism of Muslim extremism with a mention of Christian
extremism. The usual approach is to say that they have their
jihadists, and we have people who kill abortion doctors. Our Christian
neighbors, even the craziest of them, are right to be outraged by this
pretense of even-handedness, because the truth is that Islam is quite
a bit scarier and more culpable for needless human misery, than
Christianity has been for a very, very long time...To be even-handed
when talking about the problem of Islam is to misconstrue the
problem..The refrain, “all religions have their extremists,” is
bullshit—and it is putting the West to sleep. All religions don’t have
these extremists. Some religions have never had these extremists."


Best,
Steve