# Will the world be mostly Muslim in 50 years? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [September 18, 2014, 8:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-the-world-be-mostly-muslim-in-50-years/698806 "2014-09-18T08:34:23Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 14\ **Page:** 3
**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:** [September 22, 2014, 2:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-the-world-be-mostly-muslim-in-50-years/698806/41 "2014-09-22T02:34:27Z")
Clearly the best approach is assimilation and corruption. Send them more porn. ---
**Author:** ![slash2k](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/439d5e/32.png) [@slash2k](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/slash2k)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2014, 3:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-the-world-be-mostly-muslim-in-50-years/698806/42 "2014-09-22T03:38:12Z")
> [@bengangmo](#): > > It might not matter to those of you in the US, but round here we regularly get news stories about conflicts arising within families because the children are “recognised” as being Muslim without any overt action on the parents’ part - normally the conflict arises between a Muslim father and a mother of another religion in cases of divorce, and it is settled in the courts. > > I guess it must just be cultural differences, but please do realise - not all share the “American experience” of freedom from religion, in some countries it does matter what religion you are “born into” and the state WILL “recognise” your religion How are you defining “Muslim”? There’s a difference between “there’s a piece of paper somewhere that says X is Muslim” and “X believes there is no god but Allah, and Muhammad is His prophet.” ---
**Author:** ![bengangmo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/50afbb/32.png) [@bengangmo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bengangmo)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2014, 3:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-the-world-be-mostly-muslim-in-50-years/698806/43 "2014-09-22T03:59:05Z")
> [@slash2k](#): > > How are you defining “Muslim”? > > There’s a difference between “there’s a piece of paper somewhere that says X is Muslim” and “X believes there is no god but Allah, and Muhammad is His prophet.” Clearly there is - I was using a little of both, From my personal experience (yeah, the plural of anecdote is not data) I have seen that for Islam, the divide between “piece of paper” and “self identification” is not as wide as might be thought. I have had muslims explain to me that Islam is a little more than a religion - at least in the way that you might define Christianity. It is a way of living life, that even if you don’t necessarily actively participate, your are still said to be muslim. Perhaps a good example would be my half brother’s wife - although she didn’t self identify as muslim, she still abstained from pork - why exactly? It was because of the Hudud laws. In a way, although I was raised by nominally Christian parents, there is nothing at all Christian about my upbringing, however if you are raised by Islamic parents, parts of your day to day life will be Islamic. I am not knowledgeable enough to make a detailed argument of this - it just seems to me that in Islam, there is a much closer correlation to daily life than there is in some other religions. ---
**Author:** ![grude](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e47774/32.png) [@grude](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/grude)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2014, 4:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-the-world-be-mostly-muslim-in-50-years/698806/44 "2014-09-22T04:35:58Z")
> [@even\_sven](#): > > As mentioned, high birthrates are an adaptation to poverty, where kids fill the role of farm labor and a retirement account. In richer societies, kids having lots of kids becomes much less attractive as they need an enormous investment (in education) before they become all that useful. Birthrates fall when people get off the farm and start needing to send their kids to school. > > As it happens, I know a Muslim apostate. My guard in Cameroon converted to Islam after leaving his small Christian village and moving to the big city where Islam was definitely a sign of prestige. He lasted about a week before he decided that praying five times a day wasn’t much fun. > > Nobody killed him. It was a non-issue. Damn you had a personal guard? ---
**Author:** ![even\_sven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/dfb087/32.png) [@even\_sven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/even_sven)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2014, 12:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-the-world-be-mostly-muslim-in-50-years/698806/45 "2014-09-22T12:10:26Z")
> [@grude](#): > > Damn you had a personal guard? Well, I paid a young man to watch my house while I was at work, after a couple incidents with the neighborhood kids breaking in. Most Cameroonians of any means hire a guard and most nice houses had a guard house-- in part for protection, and in part because they are expected to keep a portion of the community employed. Break-ins were inevitable, and violent home invasions were unfortunately common. Often the guards were armed with bows and arrows, which always felt pretty retro. ---
**Author:** ![md2000](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/73ab20/32.png) [@md2000](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/md2000)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2014, 4:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-the-world-be-mostly-muslim-in-50-years/698806/46 "2014-09-22T16:34:44Z")
> [@Ulfreida](#): > > Missing Mass is not a mortal sin. Doesn’t sound like you even learned what was being taught. And do you seriously believe that most Muslims fear being hunted down and killed if they change religions, if they are not living in one of the fanatic nations (where they could be killed for a lot of other things as well)? Fairly official site, dances around the question and never answers it directly - [http://www.catholiceducation.org/articles/religion/re0111.html](http://www.catholiceducation.org/articles/religion/re0111.html) But yes, back when I learned, in the 60’s, impressionable children were told they would burn in hellfire if they missed a mass, unless they played the “Confess out of Hell Free” card (but you had to be sincerely contrite). Heck, it’s one of the three most important commandments, even if Catholics, and also the protestants across the world, ignore the bible in favour of what the 2nd century pope declared - and worship on Sundays not on Sabbath, the Lord’s day. But that’s the whole point on the apostasy law - a less religious, less observant, more worldly and richer society tends to ignore the law, although there is still the problem of vigilante action in the more backward areas of even a relatively open country like Egypt. In Turkey, Ataturk basically forbade the interaction of state and mosque, although the current government is happily backsliding. So to get back to the point of the argument - if Moslem countries become rich and advanced, then likely - based on western and Asian experience - fewer will be devout, fewer will be observant, birth rates will drop significantly, women will ignore the pretend-moslem dress codes, and the Moslem proportion of the world population will likely be not much larger than today. Look at the Arab Spring - before it was hijacked by the more organized Moslem Brotherhood types, it was a movement of the students and the general public in the big cities; the most liberal, most westernized, least strict of the Arab world and the harbinger of heir future society. ---
**Author:** ![Maastricht](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/a88e57/32.png) [@Maastricht](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Maastricht)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2014, 4:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-the-world-be-mostly-muslim-in-50-years/698806/47 "2014-09-22T16:45:12Z")
Pretty much the exact same fears and the same arguments were used in the fifties over the “explosive growth” of the catholics in the USA. Did that problem ever materialize to the extent it was feared? And people back then had far better reason to fear a catholic take-over. The catholics really did have an agressive probirth and pro-large family policy in place. And boy did priests and the pope try to enforce it. ---
**Author:** ![Maastricht](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/a88e57/32.png) [@Maastricht](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Maastricht)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2014, 4:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-the-world-be-mostly-muslim-in-50-years/698806/48 "2014-09-22T16:50:25Z")
Look up the wiki article for demographic threat for an overview. ---
**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:** [September 22, 2014, 5:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-the-world-be-mostly-muslim-in-50-years/698806/49 "2014-09-22T17:09:11Z")
It’s okay if we’re overun with Muslims, the killer bees will wipe them out. ---
**Author:** ![jtur88](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e9c0ed/32.png) [@jtur88](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jtur88)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2014, 5:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-the-world-be-mostly-muslim-in-50-years/698806/50 "2014-09-22T17:36:39Z")
I would suggest that one make a visit to Indonesia, and see how socially liberal and economically progressive a nation can be with a large Muslim majority. Visit the Philippines, too, and make an informed judgment about the comparative quality of life in a Muslim country and a Christian country. ---
**Author:** ![Shodan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Shodan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shodan)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2014, 6:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-the-world-be-mostly-muslim-in-50-years/698806/51 "2014-09-22T18:04:47Z")
> [@jtur88](#): > > I would suggest that one make a visit to Indonesia, and see how socially liberal and economically progressive a nation can be with a large Muslim majority. “Can be” is different from 'is". > [@](#): > > [In 2012, incidents of violence against religious minorities were frequent and occasionally deadly. Islamist militants mobilized mobs to attack religious minorities with impunity. Light prison terms imposed on those prosecuted sent a message of official tolerance for such mob violence. Dozens of regulations, including ministerial decrees on building houses of worship, continue to foster discrimination and intolerance. > > Throughout 2012, dozens of minority Christian congregations, including GKI Yasmin church in Bogor and HKBP Filadelfia church in the Jakarta suburb of Bekasi, reported that local government officials arbitrarily refused to issue them permits required under a 2006 decree on building houses of worship. Both churches had already won Supreme Court decisions to build such structures. Senior government officials, including Religious Affairs Minister Suryadharma Ali and Home Affairs Minister Gamawan Fauzi, continued to justify restrictions on religious freedom in the name of public order. They both offered affected minorities “relocation” rather than legal protection of their rights. > > Suryadharma Ali has himself inflamed tensions by making highly discriminatory remarks about the Ahmadiyah and Shia, suggesting that both are heretical. In September 2012, he stated that the “solution” to religious intolerance of Shia and Ahmadiyah was their conversion to the Sunni Islam that most Indonesians follow. That same month, President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono called for the development of an international instrument to prosecute “religious blasphemy,” which could be used to restrict free expression and the religious freedom of minorities.]([World Report 2013: World Report 2013: Indonesia | Human Rights Watch](http://www.hrw.org/world-report/2013/country-chapters/indonesia)) Not the same period exactly, but > [@](#): > > [The Philippines was singled out for praise by the United States for exerting “special efforts” to respect religious freedom and tolerance, as well as promote interfaith dialogue in the world arena, according to a recent report by the US State Department.](http://www.studymode.com/essays/Religious-Freedom-In-Philippine-Education-629298.html) Regards, Shodan ---
**Author:** ![jtur88](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e9c0ed/32.png) [@jtur88](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jtur88)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2014, 7:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-the-world-be-mostly-muslim-in-50-years/698806/52 "2014-09-22T19:16:02Z")
> [@Shodan](#): > > “Can be” is different from 'is".Not the same period exactly, but > > Regards, > Shodan And which expression would refer to the whole world in 2064? “Can be”, or “is”? What is your point, citing a couple of anecdotal incidents analogous what could be found, with a careful search, in almost every country in the world, regardless of predominant religion. For example, what was all that hooferaw about the building of an Islamc center in lower Manhattan a few years ago? As a non-Muslim, I’d rather live in Indonesia than most other countries in the world, especially those nominally Christian. ---
**Author:** ![Shodan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Shodan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shodan)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2014, 8:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-the-world-be-mostly-muslim-in-50-years/698806/53 "2014-09-22T20:52:20Z")
> [@jtur88](#): > > And which expression would refer to the whole world in 2064? “Can be”, or “is”? “Is” wouldn’t be referring to the future - it is present tense. Were you referring to 2064 with your post? That was also present tense. > [@](#): > > What is your point, citing a couple of anecdotal incidents analogous what could be found, with a careful search, in almost every country in the world, regardless of predominant religion. Human Rights Watch reports and State Department reports are not anecdotes. Regards, Shodan ---
**Author:** ![slash2k](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/439d5e/32.png) [@slash2k](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/slash2k)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2014, 4:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-the-world-be-mostly-muslim-in-50-years/698806/54 "2014-09-23T16:09:22Z")
> [@Shodan](#): > > Human Rights Watch reports and State Department reports are not anecdotes. anecdote: a narrative of a particular incident Human Rights Watch and the State Dept are describing particular incidents. How are those NOT anecdotes? It may be those incidents are typical of what happens in Indonesia, but the parts you excerpt don’t say so. Does every Christian congregation in that country have trouble getting building permits? Almost every? the majority? some? a few? dozens out of how many? The paragraph immediately after the one you quote says that there were 244 religious attacks in 2011. The FBI says there were 1318 religiously-motivated hate crimes in the U.S. that year. Are those comparable statistics? Why or why not? > [@bengangmo](#): > > Perhaps a good example would be my half brother’s wife - although she didn’t self identify as muslim, she still abstained from pork - why exactly? It was because of the Hudud laws. Did your half-brother’s wife abstain from pork because she believed in the Hudud laws, or because she’d been raised to abstain from pork and she continued to cook and eat in familiar patterns? I cook and eat in fashions very similar to my mother and my grandmother before her–it’s not “explicitly Christian” (more like “middle-class mid-Atlantic suburban German-American”), but traditions and habits don’t require belief to sustain them. If she doesn’t self-identify as Muslim, why do you need to identify her as such? > [@bengangmo](#): > > In a way, although I was raised by nominally Christian parents, there is nothing at all Christian about my upbringing, however if you are raised by Islamic parents, parts of your day to day life will be Islamic. If you’d been raised by nominally Islamic but non-practicing parents, would your day-to-day life still be Islamic? What if you’d been raised by staunch believing Christian parents – would there be anything Christian about your upbringing? It sounds like you are comparing apples and oranges here. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-the-world-be-mostly-muslim-in-50-years/698806.md?page=2)