What is Democracy

In light of the recent terror attack in Paris and the increasing number of attacks the world has seen in the past, I cannot help but feel there is rising anger in the west and this could eventually manifest itself in retaliation or, at the least, a change in government policy.  For example, we ask ourselves whether Islam should be allowed?  Of course it should we respond because we believe in religious freedom.  There is also part of us which understands that not all Muslims are the same.  But there is also a growing disquiet with this view too because emotionally, we are angrier and more fearful.

I think there are two things to keep in mind when wrestling over these sorts of questions.  The first has to do with a perspective on religious/ideological history.  I include ideological because fundamentalism afflicts ideology as much as it does religion.  Hitler, Stalin, Pol Pot, and Chairman Mao were atheists who managed to kill millions of people in the name of their ideology.  I suppose I can and should add Lenin to the list as well.  When we look at the history of any religion or ideology it seems that any of these which has lasted for any length of time has had its fundamentalist hay day.

For Judaism, it was in the first century.  This resulted in two extremely bloody wars with Rome along with a second Jewish Diaspora.  Christians took their turn at various times in the Middle Ages culminating in the Spanish Inquisition which was probably the crowning achievement of Christian fundamentalism.  Meanwhile, Islam was enlightened in comparison.  While Christendom worried about falling off the edge of the flat earth, Muslim scholars preserved and expanded astronomy, science, biology and optics. 

Even Tibetan Buddhism had their turn at oppression back in the 18^th century.  The reasons for this seemingly cyclical expression of fundamentalism are complex and for me to explore these would turn this pseudo-rant into a long essay.  Since I have had my own flirtation with fundamentalism, however, I have given this matter a great deal of thought.  In essence, any religion or ideology is vulnerable to fundamentalism though some are more vulnerable than others.  On the surface, the reasons for fundamentalism may differ, but at its core, fundamentalism is the same regardless of religion or ideology.

So to conclude my first angle, while Islam is today experiencing fundamentalism in a big way, there was a time when, relatively speaking, it did not and it was the Christians who were the fundamentalist terrorists so-to-speak.  I’m not saying Islam was ever devoid of fundamentalism, but I am speaking of a large manifestation of fundamentalism.

It is, in fact, a reaction against Christian fundamentalist totalitarianism which inspired the United States Constitution’s famous First Amendment and led to the adoption of secular states tolerating religious diversity among all of today’s Western democracies.  In other words, the freedoms we experience today in the West were brought about because of Christian, not Muslim, fundamentalism.  And this leads to my second angle.  Exactly what is democracy?

You can look at democracy in any number of ways but at its core, democracy is a system whereby the people define the boundaries of their freedom.  In our case, we have a representative democracy so technically speaking, this means people elect representatives who define the boundaries of our freedom.

This is a very important definition because it immediately gets rid of many rhetoric inspired myths about our society.  For one thing, we have never had complete religious freedom.  Therefore complete religious freedom has never been guaranteed.  Let me use an extreme example which is hypothetical to illustrate this point. 

Suppose I am a devoted Satanist who sincerely believes human sacrifices are necessary for my advancement.  I then take my neighbor’s child and perform the gruesome rite.  It is obvious this should not be allowed.  A democracy places a boundary against such freedom.  It says “although we believe in religious freedom, we restrict the Satanist’s freedom in this regard.” 

A simple mundane example which has nothing to do with religion also suffices to illustrate my point.  Most of the people reading this are free to drive wherever they wish, when they wish.  They are not free to do so above the speed limit but otherwise, they are free to drive where they will.  I am not.  Democracy has said – and correctly I might add – that a legally blind person is not free to drive anywhere.  Thus my freedom has been restricted and that restriction has been defined by the democracy.

With this in mind, let me return to fundamentalism.  No religion has ever been guaranteed total and complete freedom.  Their freedoms have always been restricted.  Speech has likewise always been restricted.  It is therefore the right of a democracy to impose restrictions on freedom.  The danger, of course, is that a democracy goes too far.  For instance if we ban Islam today, might we ban Buddhism tomorrow for who knows what reason?  But it is clear that some restrictions are proper and the trick is finding that balance point.

At this stage the temptation is to adopt the politically correct line.  Don’t over react.  Don’t speak ill of another group.  And while this belief is not in itself erroneous, it becomes a problem when it is blindly followed.  In other words, I think it is perfectly legitimate in the light of Islamic State and the various attacks recently to start asking questions.  And I think it is legitimate to ask very hard politically incorrect questions.

To understand my thinking here, all we need do is study the history of religions under Hitler.  So long as the other religion was being persecuted, the rest remained silent.  But one by one, religion after religion fell and joined the ranks of the persecuted.  Eventually, it turned out that mainstream churches who should have spoken out never did.  My own Seventh-day Adventist church supported Hitler and by saying nothing, supported the holocaust as well, which they certainly knew was happening.  By failing to ask the hard politically incorrect questions early, Hitler was able to rise to power.  It is ironic that most Americans despise Communism and uphold Christianity, while condemning Hitler.  But in Germany, Most Christians remained silent while it was the Communists who opposed Hitler most vehemently. 

In short, if we do not allow ourselves to rationally ask hard, politically incorrect questions about Islam, or anyone else for that matter, we may find ourselves deeply regretting our blind adherence to political correctness later.  And this can fall two ways.  We could be overrun by Islam, or we could find ourselves in a secular police state in which many religious freedoms have been lost.  While intelligent rational dialog may not solve problems, it can often prevent them from arising.

Is Islam a religion of peace?  Is mainstream Islam doing enough to fight fundamentalists?  Do they even want to fight it?  While these questions may not exactly be fair on a segment of our population, a democracy whose job it is to define the boundaries of freedom must be allowed to ask such questions and to come up with answers for its people.

I will end this with another history lesson.  After the attack on Pearl Harbor in December of 1941, the United States reacted by interring thousands of Japanese Americans simply for being Japanese.  In essence, the US threw its own constitution out the window.  White Americans of German ancestry were not interred, but the oriental Japanese were.  Since I am Japanese this naturally outrages me.

But it was also understandable.  Many Japanese, but not a majority, sent their children to Japan to be educated because they felt a Japanese education was preferable.  So the US feared indoctrination.  Also, spies for Japan could easily pass themselves off as Japanese Americans and the Japanese community had a good deal of sympathy toward the mother country.

The United States grossly over reacted to legitimate concerns.  Most Japanese Americans were unfairly treated and that is putting it mildly.  But it is important to understand that the US had legitimate military and national concerns about the Japanese-American community.

As a result of this, a group of Japanese men felt they needed to go above and beyond to show their loyalty to the United States, their adopted country.  The 442^nd Infantry Regiment was the result.  This regiment was not trusted to fight Japan, but they were trusted to fight Germans in Europe.  And fight them they did.  The 442^nd Infantry Regiment is the most decorated regiment in US military history to this day.  This regiment had profound effects which were far reaching not only on how Americans perceived Japanese Americans, but on the Japanese Americans themselves.

For the purposes of this discussion, though, this episode in US history serves to illuminate our present situation.  I feel Muslims in the west need to go above and beyond to show their loyalty.  It is unfair to them but as we say in America, “it is what it is.”  They need to understand that people have legitimate fears.  The politically correct media will blast anyone who asks hard politically incorrect questions, but the first step to solving these problems is to acknowledge that fears are legitimate.  If Muslims wish to prevent an overreaction such as the US had toward Japanese Americans, it needs to acknowledge these legitimate fears, and stop castigating anyone who asks questions.

And finally, all of us need to understand that our society provides us with a certain amount of freedom, but not complete freedom.  We must find a level of freedom we can live with.  Failure to understand this will lead to some form of totalitarianism.  Totalitarianism can be secular as easily as it can be religious.  We stand in danger of both if we do not allow our democracy to intelligently explore and define the boundaries of our freedom.