in over your depth

Ominous,

I appreciate the role that an honest discussion can have in breaking down barriers between people with opposing views. Sometimes there has to be some confrontation for that to happen. Even so, I hope you will take my advice and tone things down a bit until you learn some facts. Simply put, you are in over your depth. The propaganda which you have been taught is, at the very least, misleading.

Other posters have pointed out that a number of Islamic nations (as well as others) did try democracy, only to have the United States support coups or assassinations that ended that democracy. Only a few years ago, the United States implicitly backed a Fatah coup against Hamas, even though Hamas clearly won the elections. Because the West Bank and Gaza are separated by Israel, Hamas has held on in one territory, but naturally many Muslims (and others) will wonder how serious the United States is about democracy when it condemns those who win elections and acts against them.

There are also many examples in Latin America, and the 1950s through the 1980s was a time when things like this happened frequently. Iran had democracy until the USA helped the Shah depose their democratically elected leaders and take over the country.

Now in some cases it wasn't such a bad thing - there is a huge difference between democracy and liberty, and some of those democratically elected officials were very much anti-liberty. It speaks of the ignorance of the American people that they admire Democracy so much and frequently deplore Liberty, both at home and abroad. It is notable that the Founders were in favor of Liberty and had some serious doubts about Democracy. So, as I said, in some cases it was not such a bad thing, but in many cases it was. Sometimes pro-liberty democrats were deposed or killed to make way for others who were more willing to act as puppets for the USA. Often the democratically elected leader was a jerk, but was replaced by someone else equally bad or worse.

In all these cases, the United States government has demonstrated hypocrisy by praising and asking for Democracy on the one hand, and then changing course when it doesn't like the results of an election. It might be a little more respected if Americans were at least honest about it.

Finally, I will just say that a large majority of the people of the Middle East want peace and prosperity. There may be some problematic passages in the Koran, but there are plenty in the Bible too - and most of the believers in both traditions ignore those or take them metaphorically, because the desire for peace and prosperity is great. Their ideas of how this should work out may not match yours or mine, but in general we would make a lot more headway using persuasion than force. It's not like Americans reached the present consensus overnight. 150 years ago we still had slavery. 50 years ago, women and minorities were second class citizens with a reduced set of rights - that time is still within living memory!

The rest of the world has lately been making cultural changes much more rapidly than Americans ever did, but considering that Americans and Europeans have had about 500 years to adapt to modernity it seems a bit much to expect other cultures to make the same changes in two or three generations. It takes time to get a new consensus, especially while the old folks who grew up in much the same manner their ancestors did 5000 years ago are still living.

So please, have a little patience, and also keep in mind that American culture got a few things wrong itself, and maybe some people don't want to copy those parts.