Islamic forum posts

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Islamic Opinion
You asked what it is in Islamic opinion that is so bad about Western lifestyle and values. This is a question which has a very long answer, but I will try to be brief.

We dislike many things. The way you mistreat your women by viewing them as sex objects. You use women to sell anything and everything. This is unfair to women, who have been relegated to objects whose worth is based on their bodies, and this is unfair to society in general.

And then you have the gall to criticize our women, who willingly observe modesty and do not want to be treated as mere objects.

We dislke your rampant consumerism and materialistic way of life. America in particular, has around 6% of the world population, yet it consumes the most resources and materials.

Your values are so low that you no longer feel revulsion when someone violates the institution of marriage and commits fornication or adultery - yet it was your own [Western] society that would take red-hot branding irons and brand the foreheads of adulterers with the letter "A" to signify the crime of adultery. I am not saying I agree with that practice, but I am pointing out that you have lost much of your social values you too, once had.

You have gone even more low and begun to accept sodomy in your way of life. You ignore and reject the clear dangers that sodomy presents to society. We ask ourselves, regarding your culture, that how long will it be before you also find incest and bestiality as being socially acceptable?

We dislike the glorification of murder and crime in your sub-cultures. In your music industry there are countless albums and songs which corrupt the minds of your younger generations and make them think that if anyone even looks at them with a percieved insult, then that is enough of a reason to take their life.

In your films and movies you routinely show murder and crimes being committed by the stars of the movie or the hero. In turn, this impresses upon the minds of viewers. Slowly by slowly, your people become indifferent to such crimes. There was a time in your society when people would genuinely feel some concern for the victims of murder, but now attitudes have decayed to the point where everyone simply cares only about themselves. If someone suffers a loss or dies, other people think nothing of it because it does not affect them personally.

Social values have dropped so low that people have accepted foul language as a part of regular language. People have lost respect for each other. Four-letter words come as easily to the mouths of some people as does breathing.

In your homes, many parents are so intent on running after a better job and more money, that they do not realize their children are growing up wthout proper care. Next thing you know, the kids are misbehaving, commiting juvenile crimes, cussing their parents, getting drunk and committing even more crimes, running away from homes, physically fighting with parents and in various cases, parents and children have even killed each other.

Drugs and prostitution are rampant in your society. Everyone knows the dangers of these two, yet no real effort is made to stamp it out for good. Smoking consumes so much of the finances of a person and yet, it not only goes to sheer waste, it also negatively impacts on the health of other people. Ditto for alcohol.

Your media has made an absolute art out of lying and ignorance of reality. Your media never tells people the whole story, it merely tells them that which is consistent with government objectives, national security, or that which is needed to brainwash the public into supporting any war, no matter if it is blatantly unjust.

The language, the ambiguity used by popular media imparts the idea to people that, it is acceptable to lie and cheat if you use certain terms or language. Your so-called justice system has made it permissible for anyone to sue anyone for even the slightest offences. People exaggerate their losses and then rip each other off.

Corruption prevails at even the highest levels of your society. Have you ever realized how many criminals sit in your government? In the Congress and in other places. Many of them have committed crimes including but not limited to murder, embezzlement, forgery, fraud and so on. If these people are running the country, then what can be said of its citizens who have elected these officials?

What can be said of a country whose President cannot even control his own desires nor be faithful to his wife?

And you are not content with keeping such immorality within your own borders - no, you aggressively export it all around the world. You lure people with all your false glitter and along the way you corrupt their values, their minds and their way of life.

Then there is your unsatiable penchant for bloodshed and war. The Western media accuses Islam of spreading by force, but history bears witness as to why our wars were fought, and it also bears witness that America has launched more aggression and oppressive wars, and killed more innocents than any other country, empire, or entity in history of mankind. And all for what? For spreading your own pseudo-religion; Americanism. Also known as the "American way of life".

This is just the tip of the iceberg - these concepts which I have listed above. This is what we resent and dislke. If you had kept such immorality within the confines of your own border then that may have been acceptable. But the fact that you export your culture, and you do it with military force if you meet any resistance, - this is completely unacceptable to us and this is what has us very disturbed and unhappy.

Women

In Islam, mothers are given thrice the importance that fathers are. Inequality? No.

In Islam, bringing up three daughters [or even two] in this world and sheltering them from vice and promiscuity; teaching them to be exemplary in conduct and virtue - such action is cause for entry into Paradise. It is however, not the same if you raise two or three sons similarly. Inequality? No.

In Islam, if a woman so chooses, she does not have to cook, sew, feed the kids, wash / iron the clothes, etc. It would fall upon the husband to do so, in addition to him having to be the bread-winner for the house already. Inequality? No.

In Islam, the inheritance of a woman is less than that of a man. Usually it is half. But the woman gets to keep her inheritance, as well as her dowry for herself; to spend on herself as she pleases. She is under no compulsion to spend out of her inheritance or dowry upon her husband, her children or her house. The husband however must spend on his wife, his children and house, as well as upon himself. Yet he gets no dowry but he does get a larger share of inheritance. Is this inequality? No.

In Islam, women are allowed to keep their maiden names, to run businesses, a right to a dowry, equal pay, equal consideration in society - things which Western / Christian women could barely dream of even at the beginning of the latter half of the last century.

As was pointed out by others, Islam does not seek to make men and women the same. It gives them both rights and equal chance in this life - but clearly God made men and women different. Mentaly, physically, chemically and so on. Will you now accuse God of injustice because of the diversity He has established in His Creation?

- Why is it that men cannot have babies?
- How come women are allowed leeway every month during a certain time wherein they do not have to pray?
- Why is it that women have more care and affection for their family members than men?