Could the Arabs be de-Islamized?

Jason S. writes:

What if Islam were detached from the Arab the way Communism fell off the Russian self?

Islam came to attach itself as a second self upon the primary Arabic persona at a certain point in history just as Communism came upon the Russian persona at a specific point in time. However this second self fell off the Russian person just like a man sheds a coat. These secondary selves or personas are not eternal.

LA replies:

You’re talking about the difference between an alien political ideology imposed by force on the Russians, and a religion sent straight from Allah, a religion expressly designed for the Arab psyche and culture, a religion dictating and forming all aspects of life and human personality, a religion that formed the divided Arab tribes into one people and made them a force in the world for the first time.

And you’re talking about the difference between 74 years and 1,389 years.

Also, long before the political ideology had reached the 74 year point, the Russians had already stopped believing in it and were just mouthing slogans. Islamic fervor is as strong as ever. Islam still “works” for many of its adherents, fulfills them in ways we do not understand.

This is not to say that Arabs and other Muslims, as a whole, might not some day give up Islam. That indeed is the ultimate hope. But it’s not something that anyone can make happen. It would have to evolve out of events and impulses within the Islamic community that outsiders have absolutely no control over. I think the best thing we could do to help the process along would be, for our own protection, to isolate and quarantine the Muslim world from the rest of mankind. When the Muslims realize that the rest of mankind absolutely rejects them and are ready to keep them locked up in quarantine forever, or as long as they remain Islamic, that could possibly make them realize that Islam is a losing proposition, and so motivate them toward some kind of Kemalist movement within their societies, as I’ve written before, or even a wholesale abandonment of Islam. But we cannot make that happen. All that we have the power to do is to protect ourselves from Islam, by separating it from our world and permanently quarantining it.

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Rick U. writes:

Sort of answers the question of whether or not Islam should be regarded as a religion. If it were merely a political structure or a political ideology, then de-Islamization would be well within the realm of the possible, rather than an almost utopian hope.

LA replies:

Excellent point.

N. writes:

It should be obvious that individual Arabs can be de-Islamized, this happens all the time. Some become secularized to the point that they are no longer Moslems even in outward practice. Some convert to Christianity, and overtly turn from Islam. But what is possible at the individual level and what is possible at the trans-national level are two different things.

And it is worth pointing out that Islam is explicitly a racialist religion; the Koran declares the Arabs “most excellent of people.”

It is not possible for one group to be “most excellent” without other groups clearly being inferior to them. Communism, while it extolled the workers, did not make such a proclamation.

Perhaps if Nazism, with its racial purity notions, had actually lasted for a thousand years, it would look something like Islam. This is not to say that Islam equals Nazism, but to observe that there is really nothing like Islam within the Western world (Belloc notwithstanding).

May 21

Vivek G. writes:

So long as we are obsessed with saving them, such confusions will keep arising. We need to realize that before we save them, we must ensure that we save ourselves!

De-Islamizing Arabs may be possible, but de-dhimmifying ourselves is urgent and mandatory! And so long as we believe in multiculturalism etc., we are dhimmifying ourselves further and further.

To put it even more clearly, so long as we do anything less than completely separating ourselves from Islam, we are on the path to self-dhimmification, which will Islamify us!

Posted by Lawrence Auster at May 20, 2011 05:17 PM | Send