Can One Be A Good Muslim And A Good American Simultaneously?

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Can One Simultaneously be a Good Muslim and a Good American?


September 6, 2010 by John Pratt

Filed under Featured Commentary

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Can one simultaneously be a good Muslim and a good American?



In the context of the story of Pfc. Naser Abdo, an infantryman who joined the U.S. Army a year ago and just this past June filed for conscientious objector status on grounds that his faith and service could not mix, I was recently posed this very question. I did not immediately give a response. I wanted to give this some thought, and objectively compose a response weighing the inherent qualities of both sides of this question. I did not want to go off “half-cocked” and bash one side over the other.



I think the best way to determine the answer is to look at the historical example of both positions. Whereas words are ultimately what men live and die by, it is well proven that words can also be cheap. Particularly to those who practice to deceive.



From its inception through today, Islam has spread its faith by the sword. It does not have a long written and oral history dedicated exclusively to itself. Nor does it have the ability to legitimately claim an evolution from another faith. Yes, it can see itself as a decedent of the father of a faith. But only as a branch of the tree; begotten from a cast-out, bastard child. And from this stems much of what I would term the problem with Islam — a massive inferiority complex.



Since it cannot connect the dots religiously, Islam has chosen to extend itself culturally and politically. When vying for souls, and one’s faith-based argument is pitted against those that got there well before you, a mediocre argument does not resonate with those who already believe something else. Sure, it works on the heathen and those already of like mind, but there are only so many of those. If you’re going to increase sales but you find yourself with a crappy product and your potential customers don’t like what you’re selling, you sometimes have to get aggressive. And if you already have a genetic disposition for barbarism, it ain’t much of a jump.



See, for example, the ongoing saga with Dutch MP Geert Wilders, or consider the fate of Dutch film director Theo Van Gogh.



Now, when Islam comes a-knockin’, you have two choices: convert, or die. If you choose the latter, your fortitude is quickly bred out of the gene pool. If you’re in the first group, your crappy moral compass proliferates. And you eventually get to the point where you’re genetically insecure, have massive power, and not to mention an all-consuming drive to wield it.



Accordingly, Islam spreads like a cancer, attacking the weak and establishing itself in its stead. No longer is it about faith for faith’s sake. It’s now about control. And you can see it in everything Islam concerns itself with. No aspect of Muslim life is free from the religious, cultural or political control of Islam. Hell, the word means “submission.”



To be a good Muslim you must totally submit. To submit to the group. To give up their individualism and do whatever they are told: for Islam. And by extension, cause others to do likewise. Ultimately you are submitting to a power that you can then use over others. Islam is then, by it’s very nature, totally self-serving to Islam.



This is the antithesis of what it means to be an American. America was founded wholly from refusal to submit. From the establishment of Jamestown, Americans have been consumed with doing whatever they damned well pleased. An American is more likely to do what he wants, than what he’s told. Particularly when he knows he can do it better. Jamestown damn near failed, and was ironically saved, because of it.



Eventually, the American sense of individualism grew to a sense of independence. We no longer needed nor desired to be bound to the old world. We now had to establish a new one. One where the individual was free to explore their own path. And herein lies the truly amazing part. Those that set out to do so fully intended the benefit to not be upon themselves alone. They did so even for those who did not participate. Never wanting others to submit to their will. But only unto their own.



We learned that we could easily destroy ourselves by this individualism if we did not temper it with a sense of duty to the whole and respect for the individualism of others. And we so embraced these concepts; we not only established them as our rule of law, but we also have fought and died for others we did not know to enjoy the same. We even ripped a great hole in our national fabric, the patches still visible today, to impart this upon those totally incapable of taking it for themselves.



In the past century, hundreds of thousands of Americans have sacrificed and died the world over. Across Europe and in the Pacific. Throughout the Middle East. Not for themselves, but for others. So others could enjoy the same opportunities we have. Never, not once, imposing our will on another. And never taking a single inch of ground except to bury our fallen. Each and every time we knock down our enemy, we subsequently help him back up as a friend.



Therein lays the fundamental difference, in my opinion, between what it means to be an American and what it means to be a Muslim. Americans have never conquered. Americans have never subjugated their enemies. America does not put down. We raise up. Americans do not submit. Islam cannot, in a single instance throughout it’s entire history, say the same.



So, to answer the original question — No.