The Problem Is Not Just Islam, The Problem Is All Fundamentalism

Between Terry Jones’ aborted Koran burning and the furor over the non-mosque that is not at Ground Zero, it’s easy to lose track of the real issue at hand.

I am no naif when it comes to the dangers of radical Islam. I am also not unaware that numerically there are a whole lot of radical Muslims even if the majority are not. There are a billion of them after all.

That said, I am more than a little wary of people like Daniel Pipes. He wrote in the Jerusalem Post to remind us how the Muslims are somehow taking over America because Obama and General Petraeus asked Jones not to burn the Koran. For Daniel Pipes and many other neo-conservatives, there is no such fear of the other radical religious threat to America, Christian fundamentalists.

CBS News reported yesterday that the Texas Board of Education is considering a resolution “calling on textbook publishers to limit what they print about Islam in world history books.” The effort is being pushed by, among others, young earth creationist and Board member, Don McLeroy. Here is one of his gems:

“It’s that great idea. That radical idea of Judeo-Christianity, that man is created in the image of God. So if you have world history books that downplay Christianity – Judeo-Christianity – and it doesn’t even make it in the table of contents, I think there’s a great concern,” McLeroy said.

I’m going to put aside his pathetic expression of the faux-victimhood of evangelical Christianity.

What is crucial to remember is what Islam and this brand of “Judeo-Christianity” have in common. The biblical creation story talks about the image of God. Islam teaches about the soul’s creation by Allah. These are pretty words that mask ugly world views. All fundamentalists have identical views on sex, gays and science and they overlap greatly on women’s issues. Given half a chance, both of them impose their beliefs on others. The fact that they are at war with each other only makes it worse.

The correct stance here is that of “a pox on both your houses.” We would be wise to remember that the real threat to freedom is the belief that an omnipotent sky god commands obedience. The fact that extremist partisans for Hashem, Jesus and Allah can’t agree on which books and religious medievalism to impose on the rest of us is a generally unimportant detail.