BryanMaloney
Premium Member
The problem is not religious. The problem is economic. The Western Allies created this situation starting in 1920. The dissolution of the Ottoman Empire was taken as an opportunity for the UK and France, in particular, to re-assert their colonial practices (de facto if not dejure) in the Levant, North Africa, Central Asia, and other modern "Muslim hot spots". Just look at the history of these countries from 1920 to WWII. They were all dealing with powerful arbitrary and mercantilist colonialist French and British meddling. The French and the British propped up local strongmen. To make matters more tricky the foolish Balfour had released his "Declaration" in order to induce the USA to enter WWI. His tactic failed, but it did mean that the British Mandate for Palestine was saddled with a problematic policy that would make for later trouble.
After WWII pretty much trash-canned overt Franco-British colonialism in the area (the real powers of the world--USA and USSR--didn't want to play that game), they and their successors (mostly the USA) still used the strongman approach to rule these areas by proxy. The British, especially, in the person of Lawrence, had made all kinds of promises regarding "independence" from the Ottomans. They were not interested in keeping these promises. Thus, the local dicatators were intimately associated with Europeans. Political opposition found shelter among the lower non-industrial economic classes, who are almost always more socially conservative than are the urban proletariat, bourgeoisie, or elite. Islam, like many religions, has some measure of social justice in its teachings. It is very easy to construct a form of Islam (or Christianity, Judaism, etc.) that casts the poor as the oppressed faithful and the rich as the servants of Satan. If these servants of Satan happen to be propped up by foreigners who practice a different religion, so much the better.
This is why we see movements like Wahabbi arising in the 1920s. They are religious expressions of economic and political rebellion. Rather than live up to their own propaganda, the USA and UK (France quickly became a nonentity in the region) made matters worse by supporting the dictators against their own people. The USSR responded by pretending to adopt the cause of the dissidents. Simple geopolitics, no real doctrine behind it.
In the present day, these dissident groups now find themselves riding the tiger. They have had decades of being sufficiently repressed to keep resentment alive but insufficiently repressed to be exterminated. Even if their leaders wanted to, they could not moderate their message. The tiger would turn on them. The best thing the USA can do is cut the ground out from under them.
What does this has to do with blaming non-extremists for the acts of extremists? This is an economic issue. So long as the governments in these countries treat people as they do, so long as oil is sold and the people never see the benefits, so long as rich countries worry about an "obesity epidemic" and the people in these countries worry about starving, absolutely nothing that non-extremists do will change anything. The conditions have nothing to do with who "controls the conversation". The conditions are simply a response to underlying economic and political forces. In the West most people haven't a lick of sense, so they blindly believe that the entire rest of the world segregates and compartmentalizes religion like we do. This practice is actually abnormal. Even in our own history, compartmentalization of religion is unusual.
The non-extremists could talk themselves blue in the face and be murdered by the thousands by extremists. It won't change anything until the conditions that convince young people that they will get a better deal with the extremists no longer exist.
After WWII pretty much trash-canned overt Franco-British colonialism in the area (the real powers of the world--USA and USSR--didn't want to play that game), they and their successors (mostly the USA) still used the strongman approach to rule these areas by proxy. The British, especially, in the person of Lawrence, had made all kinds of promises regarding "independence" from the Ottomans. They were not interested in keeping these promises. Thus, the local dicatators were intimately associated with Europeans. Political opposition found shelter among the lower non-industrial economic classes, who are almost always more socially conservative than are the urban proletariat, bourgeoisie, or elite. Islam, like many religions, has some measure of social justice in its teachings. It is very easy to construct a form of Islam (or Christianity, Judaism, etc.) that casts the poor as the oppressed faithful and the rich as the servants of Satan. If these servants of Satan happen to be propped up by foreigners who practice a different religion, so much the better.
This is why we see movements like Wahabbi arising in the 1920s. They are religious expressions of economic and political rebellion. Rather than live up to their own propaganda, the USA and UK (France quickly became a nonentity in the region) made matters worse by supporting the dictators against their own people. The USSR responded by pretending to adopt the cause of the dissidents. Simple geopolitics, no real doctrine behind it.
In the present day, these dissident groups now find themselves riding the tiger. They have had decades of being sufficiently repressed to keep resentment alive but insufficiently repressed to be exterminated. Even if their leaders wanted to, they could not moderate their message. The tiger would turn on them. The best thing the USA can do is cut the ground out from under them.
What does this has to do with blaming non-extremists for the acts of extremists? This is an economic issue. So long as the governments in these countries treat people as they do, so long as oil is sold and the people never see the benefits, so long as rich countries worry about an "obesity epidemic" and the people in these countries worry about starving, absolutely nothing that non-extremists do will change anything. The conditions have nothing to do with who "controls the conversation". The conditions are simply a response to underlying economic and political forces. In the West most people haven't a lick of sense, so they blindly believe that the entire rest of the world segregates and compartmentalizes religion like we do. This practice is actually abnormal. Even in our own history, compartmentalization of religion is unusual.
The non-extremists could talk themselves blue in the face and be murdered by the thousands by extremists. It won't change anything until the conditions that convince young people that they will get a better deal with the extremists no longer exist.