A brief look at the means by which Islam requires “death by a million cuts” – as the saying goes -- tiny leaps of faith away from reason which result in the destruction of the mind, character, and will.
In my book “Essays” I discuss the topic of religion and its effect on personal will - namely, the degree to which religions with more strict requirements necessitate a higher level of intellectual self-mutilation. Islam, poster-child for this practice, through the obsessive degree of control it imposes on behavior, reveals itself as merely a mechanism of social reproduction. Like schools, families, languages, and of course, other religions, Islam has its own ways of ensuring its existence, creating unquestioning, unthinking, docile, servile sheep.
Let us first examine the concept of subjectivity – the “uniqueness” of our experience which shapes us as human beings. This subjectivity, this uniqueness, is not a biological certainty, but a result of power relations which shape us during our life time – parent/child, school/student, employer/employee, state/citizen. We must be mindful of the dichotomy between “training” and “education.” The two are not synonymous.
For this reason, the state of “being” has not remained constant throughout time. “Reality” for ancient man was far different than that of modern man. This process which I mention, that of subjectivity-creation, this so-called uniqueness, should by now be alarming to the more astute readers…It should be plainly, painfully apparent that most people are decidedly not unique. In fact, they are largely the same. It is a result of normalizing forces: the parent decides what is normal behavior for a child, the school for a student, and so on, until we come to Muslims, who are taught the Quran, an antiquated children’s book, is the unalterable source for all that you may desire.
For those outside the Arab world, the control is stronger. Most are taught how to read Arabic – but not to understand it – so that they may read the Quran in its original script. Most do not bother reading it in their native tongue, yet will still defend it fiercely. They do so because they are taught to do so.
For this reason it is impossible for a true individual, someone truly educated, someone with a real understanding of the world in which they live, someone with a knowledge of strategy, power, control, philosophy, anthropology, sociology, to ever consider themselves a Muslim. To be a leader, to be great in any task requires “ego development” – a sense of self – while Islam creates excessive “superego” development – a preoccupation with what is right and wrong, in great detail, right down to the hand you use to eat and the foot with which you step into your home.
Islam is man’s greatest attempt to legitimize suffering. Personal weakness is an honorable thing. Place yourself in the hands of god. Do not learn or better yourself – you will not succeed without god. And if all your meager attempts fail, you must not try harder, “black magic” or the “evil eye” are convenient scapegoats for incompetence.
Be servile. Kneel five times a day. Never forget that you live your life on your knees. Be sexually repressed. Be thankful your parents found you a nice beta male/obedient woman to marry, so that you may “play house” and delude yourself into believing you’re in love. I’d advise caution; he or she may be your cousin. This is “projection” – the psychological condition in which repressed feelings result in improper infatuation towards individuals with imagined ideals.
And so the cycle continues – away from reason, away from dignity. For example, consider the following passage:
“Have they not observed things that Allaah has created: (how) their shadows incline to the right and to the left, making prostration unto Allaah, and they are lowly?
And to Allaah prostrate all that is in the heavens and all that is in the earth, of the moving (living) creatures and the angels, and they are not proud [i.e. they worship their Lord (Allaah) with humility]”
[al-Nahl 16:48-49]
I once heard a man claim that all animals were created in a constant state of prostration, on all fours, and that man alone, being able to walk on two feet, was given free will – the ability to decide whether or not to worship. This was one of the many miracles in Islam. Perhaps he never saw a penguin…or a kangaroo. My intention is to point out the absurd degree to which this grown man performed mental gymnastics in order to rationalize what his mind knew was irrational. I believe every former Muslim can recall countless similar examples.
All mature individuals will attest to the notion that not all things should be rationalized, that human beings are both rational and emotional, both Apollonian and Dionysian. In fact, many atheists are incorrectly portrayed by the religious as considering “reason” their religion. But it is Islam and religions like it which bastardize both of these faculties, attempting to rationalize the irrational, to poison the rational with bitter emotion and hatred, and to reify the absurd. Be a Muslims – be sheep, sacrifice for your flock, be servile, afraid, and ignorant – or embrace the power of personal freedom. As Satre said, the shepherd is the most devious of charlatans – leading his flock to green pastures, only so that they may be fat for the slaughter.
