Can Islam be Reformed?

If Hitler had called his National Socialist ideology a "religion", would you feel compelled to show it any respect? Or would you remain entirely hostile to his ideas and agendas, and get on with the business of kicking his ass? (If you were teleported back to the early 1940s, that is.) Islam, as an ideology, needs to have its ass kicked every bit as much as Nazism did. But, thus far, very few progressives have seen this enemy for what it is -- because it's a religion, after all -- and because our survival instincts have gotten a bit rusty and decrepit since the romp 'em, stomp 'em days of WWII.

The Nazi analogy actually comes pretty close to the mark, in terms of suggesting what Islam has to offer mankind, for his spiritual and moral advancement, and his general well-being. It's got the virulent anti-Semitism. It's got the fascist ideology and the slave mentality of the masses -- only instead of pledging their allegiance to a living fuehrer, Muslims subjugate themselves to a seventh century prophet and his brutal god. It has the desire to create a "purer" world, full of like-minded zealots, at the expense of everyone around them. It has no qualms about killing off homosexuals and other "undesirables". And it's got jack-shit to do with spirituality.

In addition to these features that it shares with Nazism, Islam also promotes misogyny in the most potent form ever devised by man. And, unlike National Socialism, Islam retards scientific advancement and technological development -- except for nuclear weapons technology, which Pakistan has mastered, thanks to Paki scientists educated in the West. (And we're happy to help out, of course, in the name of multiculturalism; even though Pakistan's military and intelligence service are full of zealous, Global Caliphate yearnin' Islamists. We wouldn't want to hurt anyone's feelings, after all!)

There's been a lot of discussion, ever since 9/11, as to whether or not Islam can be reformed, so that it becomes compatible with democracy and human rights. The debate still rages, with some pundits saying it can be done (often pointing to Turkey as a shining example), while many say this religion is just inherently incompatible with secularism and modernity (sometimes pointing out Turkey's recent backsliding as evidence for their case).

But it seems to me that we've skipped a step here. The question we should be asking first is: Is Islam worth reforming? I think that, for anyone who values progressive ideals, this one should be a lot easier to answer. And I've got a hunch that undermining Islam (by attacking its truth-claims) might actually be easier to accomplish than trying to fit this very square peg into a round hole.

Would any reasonable person suggest that the Nazi ideology should have been "reformed" and kept alive in some less-lethal form? Perhaps, if we could have gotten them to leave off the Jew-killing, the Gypsy-killing, and the cripple-killing, the Nazis would've been a swell bunch of guys. But, of course, by that point, they really wouldn't have been Nazis anymore, would they? Because all of that murderous violence was the direct expression of their core ideology. And it's the same deal here.

I think we can all agree that it made more sense to crush Nazism, rather than trying to "rehabilitate" it. Well, Islam is every bit as poisonous and pernicious as Nazism, and would pose an even greater threat to Western civilization, if it ever achieved the sort of military power that Hitler possessed in WWII. This is not an exaggeration. But most Westerners don't see this, because Islam passes itself off as a religion (which is a bit of a stretch, really) -- posing as something that's holy and spiritual and worthy of our respect. And because many of us don't really listen to what the Islamists are saying, when they drone on and on about how they're gonna conquer the world for Allah.

The women of Islam can most effectively be rescued via the simple revelation that it was a self-serving con man -- not God -- who decreed that they should be slaves to men.

Hitler's biggest fan club in the 21st Century. (They were pretty enthusiastic cheerleaders in the 20th Century, too.)

In The Politically Incorrect Guide to Islam and the Crusades, Robert Spencer, from Jihad Watch, does much to dispell the false claims of Muslim apologists and self-hating dhimmis.

Spencer is one of those writers who feels compelled to continually point out Christianity's superiority to Islam. (Which is not much of a yardstick, really.) And, while most of his points are valid, I think he's still missing the really Big Picture. (i.e., all myth-based religions do far more harm than good...and Christianity is one of them.)

In spite of that, this is a very worthwhile book -- especially for any Western infidel who believes that we started this blood fued, by embarking on the Crusades. Spencer points out how the Crusades were, for the most part, a defensive response to Muslim aggression...and that Muslim jihadists had been invading Christian (and European) lands for centuries before the first Crusades took place.

The fact that many Muslims manage to be decent people, in spite of their religion, says nothing about the religion itself. And the fact that 1.4 billion people have been brainwashed into believing that Islam is a precious gift from heaven has no bearing on the reality of the situation. It only proves the efficacy of brainwashing people from infancy, and threatening to execute them if they happen to decide that this religion is not really for them after all, thanks very much.

It's a miracle that Christianity has been reformed (via three centuries of interaction with deists, humanists, and secularists) as much as it has, given its brutal track record from the Dark Ages. But Christianity, for all its hocus-pocus insanity, does at least contain the seeds of decency and compassion, in some of Jesus' more enlightened teachings. Jesus was the original hippie peacenik. Mohammed was a bandit and a tribal warlord. And, as it turns out, this is a pretty important difference.

But, as tame as Christianity has become over the last few centuries, it still needs to go. It still needs to be undermined and eliminated, via the light of reason, science, and a more highly-evolved moral sense. It's pointless to continue reforming it, because at its very heart, it's bullshit. It needs to be abandoned, en masse, because it's built upon lies and myths, because its moral code is deeply flawed, and because it's still very harmful -- even though Christian extremists rarely resort to violence these days.

Islam is far more destructive than modern-day Christianity. Anyone can see this. News reports confirm it every day. So the idea of reforming Islam is even more absurd. There's simply no good reason to keep this religion alive, in any form it might take. It was a bad idea in the seventh century. It's a really bad idea in the twenty-first.

It's time for all of us to grow up, and learn to live without our ancient superstitions. This is the only option that really makes sense. And, as difficult as this may be to achieve on a global scale, those of us who reject magic-thinking have some really big guns on our side -- such as reason, logic, science, and reality. We just need to start using those advantages more effectively. More aggressively. And without apology or hand-wringing. No one's apologizing for eliminating the Nazi ideology, right? And no one will miss Islam, once it's gone. Least of all the former Muslims.

If he had just called his program a religion, we'd still be puzzling over how to "reform" it. So much for German efficiency!

The fact that children can be brainwashed and turned into faith junkies does not lend any credence to the veracity, or the beneficence, of their faith.

The truth is, there's really no good reason for "reforming" Islam. If you're not going to practice Islam the way the prophet Mohammed -- THE authority on Islam -- meant for it to be practiced, there's simply no reason to align yourself with this barbaric, retrograde ideology.

Here's the deal: Either Islam is based upon reality, and divine revelation, and it has the ability to save a believer from the torments of hell, and to gain them admittance to Paradise....or it's not based upon reality, and it has no such magical/cosmological advantages to bestow -- in which case, why the hell would anyone want to be a Muslim? So they can have their intellectual, moral, and spiritual development permanently stunted? So they can deprive themselves of romance and a healthy sex life? So they can be deprived of basic human rights and human dignity, if they happen to be female? So they can be forever at odds with the modern world? So they can be despised (or, at best, pitied) by people who loathe all that Islam stands for? You pay some heavy dues to be a Muslim. If it's not gonna pay off in a BIG way in the afterlife, it's a bum deal. There's just no way around that.

And if Islam has the ability to pay those cosmological dividends in the afterlife, surely the payout is only for real Muslims -- for those True Believers who practice Islam the way the Prophet taught it and lived it himself. This means that Paradise is full of Wahabbis and recently-deceased Taliban pricks....and hell is full of peaceful, "moderate" Muslims who oppose jihad and Sharia, and who accept democracy as a spiritually-viable political system.

Here's the rest of the deal: Because Mohammed claimed to be taking Divine Dictation, either he got it right, and there's no need to "improve" on his system, or he was an imposter -- in which case, there's no point in improving on that system, because the entire religion is a gigantic, and tragic, fraud. (I have an opinion on this, which I'm coyly keeping to myself, as sophisticated writers often do.)

Young Muslims memorizing the literal word of God....or wasting their lives on an ancient fraud. (Either way, there's no need to "reform" it.)

Handbook for Infidels

The Candid Progressive's Guide

to Islam & its War on the West