"Arab civilization - that sounds like a good idea"

[politicus]

To paraphrase Gandhi

Most of the Arabic world looks pretty fycked up at the moment, and while its easy to write of arguments like the ones presented in this article as shallow generalisations and hyperbole, it still left me with an afterthought of "this has a core of truth to it".

So read it (if you want to..) and share your thoughts.

"Arab civilization, such as we knew it, is all but gone. The Arab world today is more violent, unstable, fragmented and driven by extremism—the extremism of the rulers and those in opposition—than at any time since the collapse of the Ottoman Empire a century ago. Every hope of modern Arab history has been betrayed."


http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2014/09/the-barbarians-within-our-gates-111116.html?ml=po_r#.VCSUoxalrlc

[politicus]

I thought this was going to be a thread about whether or not an "Arab civilisation" existed in the first place.

That seems to be accepted as a given in the entire Arabic speaking world, the controversies begin when you start speaking of an Arab people or nation.

How would you accomodate non-Muslim minorities (both religious and atheist) within political islam?

[politicus]

Something I find kind of weird is even though Islam is fairly friendly to converts, converts between different branches of Islam are quite rare. Even in countries that have significant populations of both Shia and Sunni. Even Muslims in Western countries don't seem to. There are probably far more cases of non-Muslims converting to Islam than a Muslim converting between branches.

It would be rare for an Orthodox to become a Roman Catholic (or vice versa) as well. Those things are very basic to ones identity + you run the risk of ostracism if you convert to the "wrong" kind of Islam.