# Islamic democracy vs Secular dictatorship, which would you choose? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [July 18, 2016, 3:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/islamic-democracy-vs-secular-dictatorship-which-would-you-choose/760186 "2016-07-18T03:33:52Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Salvor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b5e925/32.png) [@Salvor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Salvor)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2016, 6:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/islamic-democracy-vs-secular-dictatorship-which-would-you-choose/760186/61 "2016-07-19T06:30:16Z")
> [@coremelt](#): > > I got a feeling that the people saying this have never been to any Islamic country. If you had travelled in Indonesia, Malaysia or Morocco you probably wouldn’t feel that way. (Yeah Morocco is a monarchy but it has a parliament and some limited democracy). This is probably true, most of my reactions are fueled by the worst of what I see from the muslim world. I don’t know how widespread the presume barbarism I expect exists in day to day form, but I’d rather not test it. ---
**Author:** ![coremelt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/4491bb/32.png) [@coremelt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/coremelt)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2016, 6:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/islamic-democracy-vs-secular-dictatorship-which-would-you-choose/760186/62 "2016-07-19T06:40:59Z")
> [@Salvor](#): > > This is probably true, most of my reactions are fueled by the worst of what I see from the muslim world. I don’t know how widespread the presume barbarism I expect exists in day to day form, but I’d rather not test it. Unfortunately, peaceful day with no religious violence doesn’t make for great headlines. Now don’t get me wrong, there are many many problems with Islam and I have critiqued them elsewhere, but I’d still rather live in an Islamic Democracy as long as it had a bill of rights, separation of powers and rule of law, than a Secular Dictatorship. ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2016, 6:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/islamic-democracy-vs-secular-dictatorship-which-would-you-choose/760186/63 "2016-07-19T06:48:48Z")
> [@coremelt](#): > > I got a feeling that the people saying this have never been to any Islamic country. If you had travelled in Indonesia, Malaysia or Morocco you probably wouldn’t feel that way. (Yeah Morocco is a monarchy but it has a parliament and some limited democracy). A lot of European democracies are monarchies, as is Japan. And Australia. And Canada… “Democracy” and “republic” aren’t the same word! ---
**Author:** ![Hiker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/3be4f8/32.png) [@Hiker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hiker)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2016, 7:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/islamic-democracy-vs-secular-dictatorship-which-would-you-choose/760186/64 "2016-07-19T07:00:54Z")
> [@Salvor](#): > > This is probably true, most of my reactions are fueled by the worst of what I see from the muslim world. I don’t know how widespread the presume barbarism I expect exists in day to day form, but I’d rather not test it. To take a narrow view of Islam shaped by the worst of it seems a questionable approach to me. I have been to two of the three countries that \*\*coremelt \*\*mentioned. I have drunk alcohol and eaten pork there. The women in my company never wore a headscarf (except when visiting a place of worship). No one has ever bothered us about it. Now I am aware that neither of these countries is a liberal democracy like the countries in Western Europe or North America are. But they are very different from what many Westerners seem to envision. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2016, 7:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/islamic-democracy-vs-secular-dictatorship-which-would-you-choose/760186/65 "2016-07-19T07:10:24Z")
> [@AK84](#): > > Really? Where exactly has that happened. Or more accurately, where has that happened and the perps not been arrested for it. Why would anyone be arrested? It’s the state doing it. > [@](#): > > :rolleyes: > After the Soviets left the country had 7 years of warlordism. Those guys were expressly _not_ religious, they were either ethnic or socialist. “Islam” as you seem to call the Taliban (wrongly) Oh, Islam is far larger than just the Taliban, though I’m not sure the Taliban would have agreed. Anyway, the Taliban had near-absolute power over Afghanistan, could have made it better, chose instead in the name of their religion to make it worse. > [@](#): > > came in only much later and in opposition; to the warlords. And the Taliban were and are much more heterodox than what traditionally conservative Muslims were and are. Plus most of Taliban laws were based on Pashtun tribal mores not religious texts. I’m not fond of laws based on tribalism, either, so I’m rather disinclined to be impressed it’s pointed out that people weren’t being condemned because of Ignorance Version A but Ignorance Version B. > [@](#): > > :smack: > > I.AM.SITTING.IN.PAKISTAN.RIGHT.NOW I hope you’re typing quietly, then. What if I was sitting next to you? Would I be subject to arrest? ---
**Author:** ![Hiker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/3be4f8/32.png) [@Hiker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hiker)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2016, 7:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/islamic-democracy-vs-secular-dictatorship-which-would-you-choose/760186/66 "2016-07-19T07:12:17Z")
> [@Bryan\_Ekers](#): > > What’s _your_ example of a majority-Muslim democracy, or a majority-Muslim country that is working toward democracy? Albania. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2016, 7:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/islamic-democracy-vs-secular-dictatorship-which-would-you-choose/760186/67 "2016-07-19T07:36:51Z")
> [@Hiker](#): > > Albania. Interesting reading so far. It looks like they managed to emerge from USSR control without succumbing to the same kind of sectarian violence that befell neighbor Yugoslavia. Good for them. Really. ---
**Author:** ![AK84](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/85e7bf/32.png) [@AK84](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AK84)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2016, 7:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/islamic-democracy-vs-secular-dictatorship-which-would-you-choose/760186/68 "2016-07-19T07:38:04Z")
> [@Bryan\_Ekers](#): > > Why would anyone be arrested? It’s the state doing it. Then pray give me some examples. > [@](#): > > I hope you’re typing quietly, then. What if I was sitting next to you? Would I be subject to arrest? What crime have you committed? ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2016, 8:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/islamic-democracy-vs-secular-dictatorship-which-would-you-choose/760186/69 "2016-07-19T08:17:52Z")
> [@AK84](#): > > Then pray give me some examples. Google “Iran execution” and see how far you get down the list before you find something better suited to the 13th century than the 21st. > [@](#): > > What crime have you committed? Islam, like all religions, is based on superstition. Did that wound your religious feelings? If a judge thought so, I’d be looking at a year in jail, had I said that while in Pakistan. Now maybe they’re slack when it comes to enforcement and nothing would happen. Maybe there’s only a few well-publicized cases a year, making a few omelettes to keep all the other eggs in line. ---
**Author:** ![coremelt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/4491bb/32.png) [@coremelt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/coremelt)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2016, 8:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/islamic-democracy-vs-secular-dictatorship-which-would-you-choose/760186/70 "2016-07-19T08:45:40Z")
> [@AK84](#): > > Then pray give me some examples. > > What crime have you committed? Come on now, let’s be realistic here. In Pakistan it’s probably not the government you have to worry about but the dangers of speaking freely about Islamic extremism is very real. > **[Pakistani activist who condemned religious extremism gunned down | CNN](https://edition.cnn.com/2016/05/08/asia/pakistan-activist-khurram-zaki-killed/)** > > Khurram Zaki spent years denouncing Islamic extremists in his homeland. He apparently paid for it with his life. Athiest bloggers in Pakistan also regularly receive death threats and have to take extreme measure to protect their identities. And to answer your earlier question about which country is being held back by sharia law: Pakistan. I think there is a good case to be made that a large factor in Pakistan falling behind India in economic growth over the last ten years is the rise of religious extremism in Pakistan and the calls for a fuller implementation of sharia. Sharia law had only a very limited role in Pakistan until 1978 and also Pakistan’s growth was almost neck and neck with India until that time. The increasing influence of religious extremism in Pakistan has coincided rather neatly with slowing of economic growth and development. ---
**Author:** ![Gyrate](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gyrate/32/3588_2.png) [@Gyrate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gyrate)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2016, 9:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/islamic-democracy-vs-secular-dictatorship-which-would-you-choose/760186/71 "2016-07-19T09:47:51Z")
> [@Salvor](#): > > Shift to Turkey. From what I’ve read the military was set up in part by a previous dictator, Ataturk, to safeguard the democracy against Islamist forces. They were charged with stepping in if some Islamist leaders went too far and tried to peel back the secular democracy he established. And it worked, several coups have been engaged in over the years, and each time power was shifted back with elections to less Islamized factions. This is a point of ambivalence for me. In any other country a military coup has dire overtones, but in Turkey there is precedent for the military to occasionally take a democratically-elected government going off the rails, kick it out, reverse some of its worst excesses and then reboot the democratic process. Is it democratic? Absolutely not. Is it a reliable system? Absolutely not - even if all the previous coups resulted in a reinvigorated democracy, there’s always a chance that _this_ time the military might just hang onto power a little bit longer… But it’s a system, however jury-rigged, that has worked in the past. Conversely, how democratic is what Erdogan was doing? Suppressing or controlling the media, suppressing political opposition, implementing increasingly theocratic policies, conducting pogroms…at a certain point the playing field is so skewed that calling it a “democracy” is barely accurate. I have Turkish friends who have been horrified by the changes over recent years which have reduced the freedoms and increased divisiveness in a nation proud of its blend of secular government and religious faith. It’s a sad state of affairs. (Also note, for those people attributing this decline on “Islam”, that the people opposing it are also, by and large, Muslims. The problem is Erdogan.) So in this specific case we have a dictatorship that may not be a dictatorship and an democracy that isn’t very democratic. At least the food is nice… > [@AK84](#): > > I.AM.SITTING.IN.PAKISTAN.RIGHT.NOW How’s the weather? > [@coremelt](#): > > Athiest bloggers in Pakistan also regularly receive death threats and have to take extreme measure to protect their identities. Whereas in Western countries such things only happen with regard to _important_ topics, like online gaming and and remakes of 1980’s comedy films. ---
**Author:** ![coremelt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/4491bb/32.png) [@coremelt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/coremelt)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2016, 10:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/islamic-democracy-vs-secular-dictatorship-which-would-you-choose/760186/72 "2016-07-19T10:04:38Z")
> [@Gyrate](#): > > Whereas in Western countries such things only happen with regard to _important_ topics, like online gaming and and remakes of 1980’s comedy films. Presumably you’re talking about “GamerGate”. Now exactly how many people have they killed? 4Chan trolls make threats all the time, but they seldom follow through on them. ---
**Author:** ![Gyrate](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gyrate/32/3588_2.png) [@Gyrate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gyrate)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2016, 11:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/islamic-democracy-vs-secular-dictatorship-which-would-you-choose/760186/73 "2016-07-19T11:10:10Z")
> [@coremelt](#): > > Presumably you’re talking about “GamerGate”. Now exactly how many people have they killed? 4Chan trolls make threats all the time, but they seldom follow through on them. I didn’t say anyone had been killed - you mentioned death threats and measures to protect identities, and that _has_ happened. And while you handwave away these threats as mere trollery, it’s worth noting that both the subjects of the threats and the police have taken them very seriously, seriously enough to formally investigate, to cancel public events and in some cases to move home. So not just frivolous internet hijinks at all. ---
**Author:** ![coremelt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/4491bb/32.png) [@coremelt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/coremelt)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2016, 11:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/islamic-democracy-vs-secular-dictatorship-which-would-you-choose/760186/74 "2016-07-19T11:27:29Z")
Yeah, get back to me when someone in the west is hacked to death by a machete because they had a disagreement over gaming journalism. > **[Another Secular Blogger Murdered in Bangladesh](https://thediplomat.com/2016/04/another-secular-blogger-murdered-in-bangladesh/)** > > A liberal Bangladeshi blogger has been killed by religious fanatics, the latest in a spate of attacks. ---
**Author:** ![Chihuahua](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/dec6dc/32.png) [@Chihuahua](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chihuahua)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2016, 11:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/islamic-democracy-vs-secular-dictatorship-which-would-you-choose/760186/75 "2016-07-19T11:53:27Z")
> [@Inbred\_Mm\_domesticus](#): > > So no predominantly Muslim country should have democracy? Where did I say this? Muslims can have democracies all day long. I just don’t want to live in one. > [@Hiker](#): > > I suppose you are not big on personal freedom then, are you? Somewhere above someone mentioned South Korea as a positive example for dictatorship. I guess you could even call it that - it was economically successful and the growing wealth of the population provided it with popular support. But even in that “successful” dictatorship there was no freedom of speech or of the press. The national security service KCIA frequently detained and tortured members of the opposition. That’s what dictatorship is like, even without a “seriously brutal maniac” at the helm. I don’t give a shit. It would still be better - and safer - than living in an Islamic country. ---
**Author:** ![coremelt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/4491bb/32.png) [@coremelt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/coremelt)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2016, 12:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/islamic-democracy-vs-secular-dictatorship-which-would-you-choose/760186/76 "2016-07-19T12:04:41Z")
> [@Chihuahua](#): > > I don’t give a shit. It would still be better - and safer - than living in an Islamic country. There are degrees of dictatorship and degrees of islamisation in countries. To say you’d prefer any secular dictatorship over any islamic democracy is a pretty naive. Go for a holiday in Bali (Indonesia) some time, it’s a pretty pleasant place. Jakarta is a shit hole but there’s some really nice cities in Java, Sumatra and Borneo that I’d have no problem living in. ---
**Author:** ![Chihuahua](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/dec6dc/32.png) [@Chihuahua](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chihuahua)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2016, 12:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/islamic-democracy-vs-secular-dictatorship-which-would-you-choose/760186/77 "2016-07-19T12:20:06Z")
> [@coremelt](#): > > There are degrees of dictatorship and degrees of islamisation in countries. To say you’d prefer any secular dictatorship over any islamic democracy is a pretty naive. Go for a holiday in Bali (Indonesia) some time, it’s a pretty pleasant place. Jakarta is a shit hole but there’s some really nice cities in Java, Sumatra and Borneo that I’d have no problem living in. Ok, have fun with that. I would rather shoot myself in the fucking skull than live in any Muslim country. ---
**Author:** ![Gyrate](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gyrate/32/3588_2.png) [@Gyrate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gyrate)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2016, 12:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/islamic-democracy-vs-secular-dictatorship-which-would-you-choose/760186/78 "2016-07-19T12:59:38Z")
> [@coremelt](#): > > Yeah, get back to me when someone in the west is hacked to death by a machete because they had a disagreement over gaming journalism. > [Another Secular Blogger Murdered in Bangladesh – The Diplomat](http://thediplomat.com/2016/04/another-secular-blogger-murdered-in-bangladesh/) Yeah, get back to me when you stop moving the goalposts. “Muslims are bad because they do X!” “But we do X too!” “That doesn’t count because we don’t do Y.” “I didn’t say anything about Y. We were talking about X.” “Whatever, loser. Come back when you have proof of Z.” Very constructive. Meanwhile, Brianna Wu continues to get so many threats two years later she employs a full-time staff to deal with them. > [@Chihuahua](#): > > I would rather shoot myself in the fucking skull than live in any Muslim country. Your loss. Recent turmoil aside, Turkey is beautiful. ---
**Author:** ![coremelt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/4491bb/32.png) [@coremelt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/coremelt)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2016, 1:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/islamic-democracy-vs-secular-dictatorship-which-would-you-choose/760186/79 "2016-07-19T13:14:20Z")
> [@Chihuahua](#): > > I would rather shoot myself in the fucking skull than live in any Muslim country. Let me guess you’re from the US, don’t have a passport and have never visited any country which you needed one for? ---
**Author:** ![Hiker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/3be4f8/32.png) [@Hiker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hiker)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2016, 1:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/islamic-democracy-vs-secular-dictatorship-which-would-you-choose/760186/80 "2016-07-19T13:17:49Z")
> [@Chihuahua](#): > > Ok, have fun with that. > > I would rather shoot myself in the fucking skull than live in any Muslim country. To each his own. I’d prefer Tirana over Chihuahua any day. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/islamic-democracy-vs-secular-dictatorship-which-would-you-choose/760186.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/islamic-democracy-vs-secular-dictatorship-which-would-you-choose/760186.md?page=5)