Submitted by: Mike Spindell, guest blogger
While I‘ve been trying to take a break from all politics and news as I bask in the glow of my family staying with me this week, I’ve nonetheless been fascinated by the fall of Egyptian President Morsi, in what must be described as a military coup. I’ve never been a fan of coups as I expect is true of most of us, yet the fall of Morsi has raises issues that I think are far more nuanced than appear on the surface. The salient facts are that after too many years the corruption of the government of Hosni Mubarak (who had been installed by the Egyptian military) led to severe economic issues and dissatisfaction with totalitarian rule. This then led to such massive protest that the military felt compelled, or justified to remove him. Mubarak’s removal was cheered, but then the clamor for free elections arose and after 18 months of martial law elections were held, as the first step towards transitioning to democracy and formulating a constitution.
The Society of Muslim Brothers, or Muslim Brotherhood was:“Founded in Egypt in 1928as a Pan-Islamic, religious, political, and social movement by the Islamic scholar and schoolteacher Hassan al-Banna,” It’s stated purposes was to: “to instill the Qur’an and Sunnah as the “sole reference point for …ordering the life of the Muslim family, individual, community … and state. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muslim_Brotherhood In a country such as Egypt, with its’ long history of totalitarian rule, the concept of political parties was not strong. Through its 85 years history the Brotherhood became the most stable opposition faction in the Egyptian political scene and was the main focus for opposition to whoever ruled Egypt by dint of the Egyptian Military’s backing. Such has been the success of the Muslim Brotherhood that it has branched out to have a significant presence in 20 nations around the world, many without a Muslim majority, such as the Russian Federation, the Indian Subcontinent, Great Britain and the United States. Therefore when the Egyptian Revolution of 2011 took place, the now legal “Brotherhood” was in an excellent position to vie for political power and formed the “Freedom and Justice Party” as its electoral arm. It won more than 40% of the parliamentary seats and its candidate Mohamed Morsi won election as President with 51.73% of the vote. His chief opponent had been a man who served as Mubarak’s Prime Minister. The Egyptian voters were faced, I think, with a “Hobson’s Choice” of Presidential candidates and chose what they perceived to be the lesser of two evils. Sound familiar? What I will attempt to examine here is a question which is framed as: “Are Religious Fundamentalists capable participating in a pluralistic democratic society?”The stated objectives of the Muslim Brotherhood through its’ “Freedom and Justice Party” politically were certainly ones that few of us could complain about and perhaps soothed the secular voters of Egypt and its non-Muslim Egyptians.
“We believe that the political reform is the true and natural gateway for all other kinds of reform. We have announced our acceptance of democracy that acknowledges political pluralism, the peaceful rotation of power and the fact that the nation is the source of all powers. As we see it, political reform includes the termination of the state of emergency, restoring public freedoms, including the right to establish political parties, whatever their tendencies may be, and the freedom of the press, freedom of criticism and thought, freedom of peaceful demonstrations, freedom of assembly, etc. It also includes the dismantling of all exceptional courts and the annulment of all exceptional laws, establishing the independence of the judiciary, enabling the judiciary to fully and truly supervise general elections so as to ensure that they authentically express people’s will, removing all obstacles restricting the functioning of civil society organizations,etc”http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muslim_Brotherhood
However, that statement is belied by the following objectives openly acknowledged by the Brotherhood:
“In the group’s belief, the Quran and Sunnah constitute a perfect way of life and social and political organization that God has set out for man. Islamic governments must be based on this system and eventually unified in a Caliphate. The Muslim Brotherhood’s goal, as stated by Brotherhood founder Hassan al-Banna was to reclaim Islam’s manifest destiny, an empire, stretching from Spain to Indonesia.[21] It preaches that Islam enjoins man to strive for social justice, the eradication of poverty and corruption, and political freedom to the extent allowed by the laws of Islam. The Brotherhood strongly opposes Western colonialism, and helped overthrow the pro-western monarchies in Egypt and other Muslim countries during the early 20th century.
On the issue of women and gender the Muslim Brotherhood interprets Islam conservatively. Its founder called for “a campaign against ostentation in dress and loose behavior”, “segregation of male and female students”, a separate curriculum for girls, and “the prohibition of dancing and other such pastimes … “
“The Brotherhood’s stated goal is to instill the Qur’an and Sunnah as the “sole reference point for …ordering the life of the Muslim family, individual, community … and state.”
“The Brotherhood’s credo was and is, “Allah is our objective; the Quran is our law, the Prophet is our leader; Jihad is our way; and death for the sake of Allah is the highest of our aspirations.”
This is then the dichotomy of beliefs that the Brotherhood’s political party presented to the Egyptian voter. On the one hand it had denounced violence and agreed to work within the framework of a democratic political process. Yet its’ core beliefs are that (at least within predominantly Islamic countries) they should be ruled by the beliefs of Islamic law and justice in accordance with their interpretation of the “Qur’an” which they believe is perfect. Part of the task of the Morsi government was to create and implement a Constitution for Egypt. It was also promised that his government would include all factions of Egyptian society including the large group of Egyptian Coptic Christians. What occurred though was that Morsi only brought in Brotherhood political allies into the various Ministries of government and created a Constitution that was decidedly Islamic in content. Egypt, which was one of the most enlightened countries in the Mid East in the treatment of women, was being pushed into a far more fundamentalist outlook. This decidedly religious obsession of the Morsi government failed to pay attention to improving Egypt’s collapsing economy, growing poverty and the social unrest that goes with those conditions. Rapes of women increased in alarming increments and crime soared as people sought the wherewithal to feed their families. Cairo, that great and venerable city, increased to a population to more than twenty teeming millions the majority living in horrendous slums. City services in Egypt’s capitol collapsed under the weight of those numbers. The elation of the 2011 Revolution led inexorably to the despair of 2013 as millions of Egyptians, many with nothing to lose took to the streets and gave the Egyptian Military the tacit permission to remove Morsi and arrest the top leaders of the Muslim Brotherhood.
It is not my intent to paint the Muslim Brotherhood as evil, nor is it to give a litany of their history of violence and terrorism. Such a view is in my opinion one sided and ignores the reality that led to the Brotherhood’s creation and to its success in surviving for 85 years in a hostile Egyptian climate. Historically, since the fall of the Ottoman Empire, the Mid East has been an area controlled by wealth and Western imperial power. While wealthy rulers lived in luxury, the middle classes were relatively small and the masses lived in abject poverty. No doubt from the perspective of the Brotherhood’s founders they were mandated by their beliefs to aid their brother Muslims and to return them to the “perfection” of Islamic Law. Intermingled with those beliefs was the memory of Islamic empire and the determination to return to its’ glory. However, noble their motives may have been and are, within their beliefs is this inherent problem. If you see that everything you believe is “perfect” and mandated by God, then the idea of compromising those beliefs is blasphemy and sacrilege. How indeed can you live in a pluralistic society, when those who reject your beliefs, are by your definition “evil” and “sinful”?
There are two thoughts that arose in my mind and caused me to write this piece. The first is that the entire concept of “Democracy” has been deconstructed through the years by ours and other governments to mean the ability to vote and little else. How often throughout the world have we seen dictatorships legitimized simply because elections were held? A democratic government needs to be supported by democratic institutions and the agreement of its citizens to abide by the results of the electoral processes. Beyond that it needs an overall conceptual structure that provides the framework for the existence of a government that will protect the rights of all the people, not just the ever changing majority. It requires a legal system and a judiciary that protects its conceptual framework (constitution) and with it the rights of the individual. It’s of course more complicated than that, but if you’re a regular visitor here I’m sure you get my meaning and could on your own flesh it out beyond my brief offering. The point is that when the world saw the welcomed upheaval of the “Arab Spring” it had been conditioned by years of propaganda that made simply holding a vote appear to be the acme of a democratic process. There is much more to developing a democratic society than simply voting for a “leader” and the election of Morsi, given his subsequent actions, did not a democratic Egypt make. This leads me to my second thought on this subject.
I seriously wonder whether it is possible for Fundamentalist religionists to actually be able to take power in a democratic society and wield it in a way that allows people of differing beliefs their freedom to have those differing beliefs? When you have a belief system that you not only see as “perfect”, but as the road-map for a perfect society, how can you make the compromises that are necessary to maintain a pluralistic, democratic society? From the perspective of the Muslim Brotherhood, indeed it is their stated goal; you can only build a “perfect” society based on Islamic law and justice. In this respect they are not really very different from other Fundamentalist true believers that see “their way” as the only way towards true righteousness.
When we apply this to America the abortion debate comes to mind. There is no doubt that the majority of Americans do not believe that women should be denied the right to choose what they do with their own bodies, yet in the years since Roe v. Wade this has been one of the flashpoints of the American political scene. The only conceivable, immutable ending for those anti-abortionists to this national controversy, is the complete end of abortions. Compromise of positions can only be temporary and must include small gains for their side. If and when those opposed to abortion finally gain power they will not hesitate to end it completely, regardless of the equity of the situation and a sizable opposition to their actions. I use abortion though as merely an illustration of this problem. There are many other areas, prayer in schools for instance, where the same dynamic would apply. The problems is that when someone sees their views not only as perfect, but also as the only way to live, compromise becomes ugly and unacceptable.
My contention is that without the ability of people to compromise, maintaining democratic institutions becomes impossible. This is true whether in Cairo, or Washington. The nature of much of today’s religious fundamentalism, be it Muslim, Christian, Hindu or Judaic, is that compromise is impossible, because one cannot compromise “God’s Word”. If you are a true believer than that is an obvious fact of existence and you would cease to be a “true believer” without that philosophy. This brings me back to Morsi and Egypt. I hate the idea of military coups anywhere, but what was to be done in Egypt. There is strong evidence, that contrary to their platform, once in power those of the Muslim Brotherhood returned to their stated principles and were moving quickly to establish the version of Muslim Law upon Egypt, while at the same time denying equality of treatment to others. This fanaticism in the application of their beliefs distracted them with dealing with the economic and social problems that plagued most Egyptians and led inevitably to the Egyptian Military’s coup. I think this is a quandary that is at the heart of the difficulty of maintaining a democratic, pluralistic system in many countries, including ours. While is certainly is not the only difficulty, it ranks high on a list of contributors to political dysfunction. The question is what to do about it and the answer is quite difficult. The problem is that if you exclude religious fundamentalists from the political process due to their authoritarian views, then you no longer have a pluralistic society because of that exclusion. In a pluralistic society religious fundamentalists should also have a voice, or when do you stop excluding. Please help me out here because while I can frame the problem I admit that I don’t have the “perfect” answers.
Submitted by: Mike Spindell, guest blogger
DavidM: Forgive me for my ignorance,
I don’t think I should, because I don’t think you are that ignorant; I think you know full well that word is loaded and find it convenient to pretend ignorance so you can continue using it.
Terseness at the expense of unintended connotation (if you are to be believed) is not a good thing.
I think it funny that you first adopt the word of a group you claim to know full well is extremist to the point of disgusting you, and fail to realize that whatever word they use for those they oppose is highly likely to be objected to by those they oppose. That should be common sense, David.
I think the pro-choice group calls itself pro-choice.
I think it is fair to say that doctors willing to perform abortions are pro-choice doctors, but trying to get more specific than that is offensive because such doctors do not, usually, exclusively perform abortions, their practice is obstetrics and/or gynecology or even more broadly, women’s health. Labeling them an “abortionist” focuses on a single aspect of their practice that may represent a tiny percentage of the work they do; it is like labeling a policeman a “government hit man” because in the course of doing their duty for years protecting citizens, on one day they shot and killed a violent criminal.
DavidM: I don’t believe you, you hold too much hatred for atheists to become one under any circumstances. As for “proof” there is plenty of it which you refuse to see; and far better explanations for our origins than claiming an unseen Creator exists but you cannot explain where it came from, how it works, by what physics it operates or anything else. You have just put all mysteries into one jar and labeled it Creator, as if that “explains” something.
It actually explains nothing to say, “X is the way it is because that is what the Creator decided/wanted/did.” It is a false explanation of why X is the way it is because the Creator is impenetrable. A real explanation provides an understandable mechanism that can be generalized so that knowledge is not just a collection of specific states, but a framework for understanding new things.
And that is what makes other explanations better than your phony “explanation,” real explanations let us model reality and predict outcomes and predict states with better-than-chance accuracy.
Tony C wrote: “you hold too much hatred for atheists to become one under any circumstances.”
Please, try to understand that I do not hate atheists. It is the philosophy of atheism that I find very detestable. People come to embrace philosophies for a variety of reasons, and I make the decision not to judge people for what philosophies they embrace. Furthermore, people are complex, and their minds and emotions are complex. One single philosophy like atheism or theism for that matter does not entirely define that person. And people sometimes do change their working paradigms. So I can have disdain for atheism without hating atheists.
You obviously hate the philosophy of theism. Would that mean that you also hate me because I am a theist? I hope not. Please tell me if it is not as I assume.
Atheists come in a variety of forms. I was once invited to debate at the atheist student group at the University of South Florida. There were about 40 students in attendance and the debate went great from both my perspective and that of the atheist organization. They had a huge stack of books on the table in front of the room. However, I did not make a single argument that they expected, so they never used one of them. The president of the group expressed amazement at how the debate went. They found my reasoning interesting and thought provoking. That doesn’t mean that I won them over, but they were civil and looked forward to doing it again sometime. This was a good experience for everyone.
In contrast, a socialist group at that same school invited me to give a presentation about my work with the homeless and poor in downtown Tampa. A communist (also an atheist) who was part of the group had worked closely with me on a variety of social justice issues, and being an officer in the socialist group, he invited me there to explain to everyone my work and what we were doing. We had created a “Homeless Network” and he wanted to involve some people from his group. As I gave my presentation, an atheist man who I knew by name, who I had debated several times in one-on-one encounters on campus, a man who was active in building the atheist group on campus but who was not one of its officers, became enraged, and getting up from his desk at the back of the classroom, he stormed up to the front where I was speaking. He was screaming, “it’s God, God, God…” and he physically attacked me. Two people there had to restrain him. I remember being embarrassed about my shirt being completely torn to shreds such that it was unwearable and I was now bare skinned in front of the big group. I also was shocked that this man held such bitterness. The group became split after that. Half of them believed the atheist was justified to attack me. The other half of the group believed he was wrong. Needless to say, this was not a good experience.
Now concerning this atheist who desired to harm me, I do not hate him. I have hoped that one day he would reconsider the factors that led him to detest me and what I was saying. It has happened with other people, so I have hope it may with him as well. So while I find that atheism has done much harm to people in society in how it shapes the way they think, I do not hate atheists.
DavidM: The evidence points to Meth Rage and robbery to support his drug habit as the overriding motivations.
Only if you presume he was lying first and telling the truth second, instead of vice versa. The opposite is more likely, if McKinney’s lawyer was concerned he made a tactical error by admitting the truth, but when that failed became concerned the death penalty would be more likely if the murder was regarded as a hate crime.
Meth Rage is not exclusive of Gay rage, one could have begotten the other. The attack began when Matt made a homosexual pass at the perpetrator (put his hand on his leg), by his own admission. Which makes his original “gay panic” story fit better with the rest of his testimony; except it wasn’t panic, it was uncontrolled rage because he was on Meth. Being tied to the fence with barbwire is more consistent with an intent to demean and torture, not rob, and stopping a beating in order to position Matt thusly is not very consistent with an “uncontrolled” rage: He stopped beating him, tied him up, and then picked up his gun and started beating him again. That suggests a plan of several minutes and an intent to demean and humiliate, not a “loss of control” at all. That is more in line with a hate crime.
and so embedded in his ideology that he has been unwilling to consider another position might be legitimate/he is wrong. As he stated: “The problem is when a person adopts an intractable paradigm of thought from which he has decided he will never budge no matter what evidence or reasons are given. “
AY: Thanks for agreeing with me.
leejcarol: On top of that, David knows perfectly well “abortionist” is a loaded word that carries connotations beyond its definitional meaning for both sides.
Tony C wrote: “David knows perfectly well “abortionist” is a loaded word that carries connotations beyond its definitional meaning for both sides.”
Forgive me for my ignorance, but I really do not understand these nuances that are so clear to you.
All of this reminds me of when I participated in a forum with anti-abortionists who believe in killing doctors who perform abortions (ugh… really? I can’t just say abortionist instead of “doctors who perform abortions”?). When I referred to them as “pro-life,” the posts began coming in about how insensitive I was to their position, and how I was purposely calling them pro-life to insult them and win the argument using emotion instead of logic. At least they readily gave me a term when I asked what the proper term to use would be. They said they were anti-abortionists and not pro-life. Okay, so I used that term from then on in any dialogue with them or about them.
Seriously, if a medical doctor can give me a distinct word that they prefer as one that identifies them as a doctor who terminates pregnancies, I would gladly use that term instead. I have nothing invested in using the term abortionist except the effective way in which it communicates a concept tersely in my sentences. As you have probably noticed, I have a tendency to be too wordy and make my sentences too long, and forbidding me the use of the word abortionist will make my sentences even longer.
“… if only you had some “proof” of the impossibility of God.” you have said.
What is your “proof” of G-d? That is equally impossible since Belief is based on Faith and is not quantifiable.
Tony C. Thank you.
Second, Jesus did not die: He suffered some torture, but lived again. The same goes for any Theist that believes in an afterlife, if you don’t believe that death is the end, you have no reason to withhold your death. Only an Atheist can truly know he sacrifices EVERYTHING by dying for a cause.
Martyrdom for Allah and Martyrdom for Christ seem to have very similar rewards. …. being eternally united with family and justice, streets paved with gold, two cars in every garage, (it would be a sinful waste of gold streets if one didn’t drive on them), cherubs serenading , bacon trees (already perfectly cooked ) every ego infinitely and eternally correct, willing virgins, (I assume this holds true for women too) As an aside, Where do these virgins come from? ……and possibly FREE cable.
Sheesh, Heaven is like a dream, you have to be unconscious to believe in it.
Oh a toxic shower instead of a golden one …. Nice switch…. Oh wait, you do both…. Bath Salt fool…
A meaningless criticism since Tony made the same mistake and we’d both read the article I had posted.
Your lack of clarity is nobody’s fault but your own, AY.
You should be used to that by now.
David:
I checked the spam filter but did not see it there. Maybe someone approved it for you already. I don’t know.
Sure Gene….
If you’d read the article you’d had a clue….
AY,
Given that Tony read your comment as I did, perhaps some effort for clarity on your part would be convenient since Tony and I had both linked to articles.
DavidM says: The problem is when a person adopts an intractable paradigm of thought from which he has decided he will never budge no matter what evidence or reasons are given.
1) I see, so you are willing to abandon theism? Can you honestly say that?
2) My intractable paradigm of thought is that theism is not just illogical, contradictory, paradoxical and untestable, but there are logical alternative and natural explanations for every major feature claimed that better fit the evidence.
It is true I will not abandon logic for emotionalism and circular reasoning. I do not subscribe to the notion that reality is determined by popular vote. I do not accept as valid any “proof by antiquity,” or proof by assertion, and I do not subscribe to the theory that something must be true because the alternative is distressing and would make some people think that their life has no meaning. I do not subscribe to the notion that denying an uncomfortable truth will somehow change the truth from what it is.
I am proud to say I am intractable on those points.
Tony C wrote: “so you are willing to abandon theism? Can you honestly say that?”
Yes, of course, I am very willing to abandon theism. In fact, I would welcome proof that there was no Creator. Believe me, I have searched very hard for such proof, dedicating more than 9 years at the university specializing in the study of ecology and evolution, looking for the proof. There is nothing inherent about theism that binds me to it, nothing that would make me unwilling to abandon it for a better explanation of our origins.
Actually Tony,
It was addressed to gene….. But, since he defected it to you…. I was speaking of the card post….. But, I guess when you’re a proficient blogger like gene… It seems that he would forget what he’d posted…..
Gene H.
1, July 10, 2013 at 4:02 pm
‘Tolerate’ Your Homophobia, Orson Scott Card? Um, No
But, hey… It is what it is….. I was just agreeing with what you said….
Gene H:
Of course it isnt, I agree 100%.
Bron,
I think it’s simply not my choice to make.
AY: What article did I post? I do not recall an article about an investigator. I posted an article on Grant’s discussion of escalation of commitment.
Gene H:
You might be right but I would not do them if I was an Obgyn. My opinion of abortion [not that I am in favor of making it against the law] changed 180 degree after I had my first child. I used to argue with a law student who was Catholic about it when in college and we used to go round and round. I was all in favor.
My first child was an eye opener, I would look at him for the first 2 years and wonder where the hell did he come from, obviously I knew, but it was the wierdest thought/feeling. After that I was opposed to it for myself.
DavidM: From your JME article: “Also, the number of physicians willing to perform abortion services has declined, in part, because it has become increasingly risky to do so. As the cases of David Gunn and John Britton’° reveal, there is a genuine, if unlikely, threat to personal safety. And
there is an even greater threat of harassment and intimidation, including anonymous calls and mailings and picketers at both work and home.”
From your article: A sample of reasons given by physicians for not wanting to perform abortions:
1) one physician viewed participation as creating a potential economic conflict for his private practice in fertility; he worried that his private patients would question his commitment to their goal of producing
a child if he was at the same time willing to end the life of another.
2) A second physician saw himself, and wished to be perceived, as a specialist in gynaecology rather than obstetrics.
3) A third candidly admitted that he did not wish to be considered an abortion provider since such services are typically not lucrative.
4) A fourth commented that, second trimester abortions are “complex and frankly ugly. They are most unpleasant for everyone involved”.
These are not conscientious objections over a fetal right to life, David, they are about money, marketing, and “unpleasantness,” which hardly rises to the level of thinking abortion is murder. Watch reruns of “Dirty Jobs,” there are many unpleasant jobs most of us would avoid, and we do not assume that the people that refuse those jobs are automatically conscientious objectors to dealing with filth, garbage, and biological waste. We assume they have found a way to earn a living without dealing with what they find unpleasant.
The same goes for doctors. As for your “Family Health” article, the article itself claims it is probably inaccurate, because
a) 1/3 of the surveyed respondents refused to answer,
b) the survey included more older doctors than the previous (22%) survey, and it is evident from many surveys that there is a disparity in the age of abortion providers tending toward the younger doctor,
c) The survey excluded private practitioners that perform a significant share of abortions.
It is plausible to presume that the danger and vitriol invited by becoming publicly known as an abortion provider preferentially make doctors willing to provide abortion to some patients to refuse any request (including a survey) to identify themselves as an abortion provider, by refusing to participate in such a survey, as 1/3 of them did. Likewise, conscientious objectors might preferentially choose to make the time.
The survey differential, from 22% in 2008 to 14% in 2011, may not reflect anything but a decline in the willingness to participate in such a survey, or the willingness to publicly admit a willingness to perform abortions when they are requested in private, due entirely to the raging protests and insane acts of a minority of religious fanatics that pose a real physical and even lethal danger to such physicians.
Bron,
In some ways, I think the clinic business model is probably just more cost effective than having an Ob/Gyn do it as outpatient services. That might explain a lot of that.
Gene:
interesting post. It seems reasonable too, although I am surprised only 14% perform them. I thought it would have been higher.