The Only Thing as Dangerous as Islamic Extremism Is Obama's Extreme Multi-Culturalism
Today, we face an enemy that has killed about 60,000 U.S. and allied troops in the past decade — and just last month, killed more than 5,000 innocent civilians.
Yet Sunday night, President Obama assured the American people that Islamic extremism represents only a "tiny fraction of Muslims." And, he argued that his policies, which have allowed this enemy to grow exponentially, will somehow "achieve a more sustainable victory."
Increasingly, this president is showing himself to be completely out of touch with reality. Does anyone besides Bernie Sanders actually believe Obama's claim that gathering to discuss Climate Change last month served as a "powerful rebuke to jihad terrorists"? Certainly, no one in their right mind still believes Obama's assertion that terrorists pose "no specific or credible threat to the United States." Nor, do they believe his delusion that ISIS is "contained."
Get Our Latest News for FREE
Americans are not reassured by Obama's dismissive attitude or lectures on Islamophobia; they're terrified by them. Quite frankly, the only thing as scary as radical Islamic terrorists is the leader of the free world denying their expansive reach and influence. This is why Donald Trump is gaining so much support for his extreme immigration stance, despite the fact that it negates the religious freedom conservatives hold dear.
The terrorist threat is not imagined; it is not tiny; and it is absolutely an outgrowth of a particular religious ideology. If Obama would simply recognize this reality and take appropriate action, people would not reactively embrace the opposite extreme. But, President Obama cannot bring himself to recognize this truth because it negates his entire worldview.
Obama's Extreme Multi-Culturalism
What is clear from Obama's speech and actions is that he interprets the world through a thoroughly post-modern, multi-culturalist lens. As Nancy Pearcey writes in Total Truth, multi-culturalists believe that "truth is relative to particular interpretive communities" and "knowledge claims are at best social constructions" and at worst "power plays." In other words, multiculturalists believe truth is nothing more than a convenient fiction that each community — based on gender, race, sexuality or religion — creates to serve its own interests. And, since each community's fiction is equally valid (after all, they're all made up) — trying to impose one community's fiction on another community is simply an attempt to dominate (which is wrong, even though there is no wrong).
Over the past seven-and-a-half years, President Obama's relativistic worldview has become painfully obvious.
For example, when he ran for office in 2008, he said he believed marriage was the union of one man and one woman. Then, due to his views "evolving," he switched and not only embraced gay marriage, but boldly promoted it.
Similarly, he was incapable of determining if taking the life on an unborn baby was wrong, saying the question was "above his pay grade." But, he's had no qualms about supporting a women's right to kill her unborn child and has actually funded it.
And now, when faced with radical Islamic terrorism, President Obama seems incapable of naming this nemesis or calling it "evil." Instead, he continues to make apologies for Islam, insisting — despite the evidence— that it is a peaceful religion.
Obama must continue to spin the myth that all religions say basically the same thing and that none could actually be evil — especially one embraced by 1.5 billion people. After all, if a world religion truly perpetuated objective evil, his entire worldview would crumble. So, despite the facts, he perpetuates a myth.
A case in point was last Thursday, at the annual tree lighting ceremony.
There, Obama said, "That's the message of the child whose birth families like mine celebrate on Christmas — a prince born in a stable who taught us that we should love our neighbors as ourselves ... These are the lessons of Jesus Christ. But they're also the bedrock values of all faiths."
Unfortunately, though, it's not just President Obama who's promoting this myth. Recently, a pastor I know posted a video of Iranian-American writer, Reza Aslan, to Facebook, calling his analysis "spot on." In the video, Aslan asserts that "Islam doesn't promote violence or peace. Islam is just a religion. And, like every religion in the world, it's what you bring to it. If you're a violent person, your Islam, your Judaism, your Christianity, your Hinduism is going to be violent."
So apparently, even to a Christian pastor, all religions are basically equal. And, Islam isn't inherently violent; some people are just inherently violent. And, for some strange reason, a large proportion of them live in Muslim countries.
This is sheer lunacy. Christians aren't suicide bombers because we don't believe in jihad. Ideas matter — and religious ideas, because they tell us who we are and why we're here — matter most of all.
The Truth About Islam
Though it's true that many Muslims practice their faith in a peaceful way, the message Muhammad taught is incredibly violent and imperialistic. In the Quran 2:191-193, it says, "And kill them wherever you find them, and turn them out from where they have turned you out." Similarly, Quaran 8:12 reads, "I will cast terror into the hearts of those who disbelieve. Therefore strike off their heads and strike off every fingertip of them"
Many will argue that the Old Testament has equally violent texts. However, the violent texts in the Old Testament are constrained to a very specific historical context — the ancient Israelite conquest of Canaan. However, these verses in the Quran are open-ended and believed by many Muslims to be as relevant today as they were when they were first penned.
This is why so-called radicalized Muslims are not a "tiny minority." According to a 2015 Pew Poll, 63 million Muslims support ISIS in the 11 countries polled. Now, that may be a minority, but it's certainly not tiny. What's equally troubling is that if one takes into account those who are undecided about ISIS, the number climbs to 287 million! And, in Pakistan, a state with nuclear weapons, only 28% of the public view ISIS unfavorably.
Other surveys show that anti-Semitism runs rampant in Muslim countries too — a whopping 74% among North African and Middle Eastern residents, including 92% in Iraq. Many Muslims also support the death penalty for those who leave Islam. According to the Washington Post, 88% of Muslims in Egypt support the death penalty for converting, and 62% in Pakistan.
These are the actual facts of Islam, not the sanitized fiction President Obama perpetuates. Though many Muslims practice a gentler, kinder form of this religion, Islam is inherently violent and intolerant. Instead of pretending it's not, we need to expose it, address it, and recognize its link to jihadist behavior.
Ideas matter and evil exists. Obama's multi-culturalism, on the other hand, is a dangerous fantasy.
