The arrival of the caliphate would give no reason for wild celebrations. A rather large spike in the unemployment figure and a loss of revenue would be the first signs that the caliphate would lead us to a condign kakotopia. Some industries to close would be the club industry ($3.1 billion tax paid to NSW gov’t in 2004) with a loss of jobs (50,000 employed in horse racing industry alone in 1996, Bob Carr May 1996). Other industries would be forced to close. Even industries built around frivolous leisure pursuits would be forced to close. Anyone for tennis? Sorry, because I have no job I have no money to hire the court. I don’t think the Koran printing industry will be able to hire all those who through the arrival of the caliphate will lose their job.

Even the Olympic Games would be reduced to a meaningless carnival if in fact it could go ahead. Each team would have to have a sizeable contingent of religious police. After all we can’t have young men coming into contact with unescorted young women. Think of the consequences. And there would be no guarantee that women would be allowed to attend.

I wonder how many people really subscribe to this Caliphate idea?
And how much power to they actually have?
Perhaps this concept is just the latest weapon used by the those on the "right" in their usual fear based language of polarising binary exclusions?

For a start you cant convince "Islam" of anything. And there is no monolithic "Islamic" understanding of anything.

There are only individual people who believe various ideas etc associated with the religion of Islam. And you can only convince each such individual person one at a time of your "point of view" about any and everything---which by the way, may also be either completely wrong or only partially true.

David comments:

"As every reasonable person knows that salvation can not be guaranteed only hoped for, that fact alone would be reason enough to always ask the governed for their consent."

If David had extended his research to include the Christian basis on which declarations of independence (democracies) are based on and rooted in - he would have not even entertained the possibility of any Theocratic intrusions.

I would have thought that it is because:

1) Christianity GUARANTEES eternal salvation for the believers and followers of Christ Jesus;

and because

2) the Kingdom of God is not of this world,

and

3) all are created equal,

that we should govern ourselves by ourselves.

Theocracy (Caliphate) is an Islamic concept derived of their own understanding of the alleged revelations of a despotic god they call ‘Allah’.

The bloody History of Islamic conquests must never be forgotten when determining our future.

The notion of an Islamic Caliphate must be expelled from our democratic vocabulary, of our accepted thoughts, and collective secular wisdom – if we want to “secure our rights to life liberty and the pursuit of happiness”.

The idea that we're all in danger of becoming part of some pan global caliphate is about as realistic as the imposition of some pan global revival of the Holy Roman Empire.

To me the choice is increasingly becoming "Democracy or Authoritarianism". We are being told over and over again that in order to combat the terrrrrists we must give up rights (such as freedom of association and increasingly the right to a presumption of innocence).

To paraphrase a Vietnam general we are being told "We need to lose our rights in order to be free".

Why should the Muslim give up on the idea of a Caliphate. In two to three generations they will be able to do what they like. The great thing about democracy is if your the majority you can change it to a Caliphate

For better or worse ALL Traditional Cultures were governed by the Wise and the Wise Elders. And there was an appreciation for the Wisdom of the Elders. Membership of the Wise was always based on a prolonged period of testing---even a life time of testing. Real demands and tests were given. Inititiations were tests of real intelligence. Sometimes failure even meant death as in the confrontation with real danger in vision quests or tests in battle.

If you passed the tests it demonstrated that you could be trusted. You were an adult---not a self indulgent adolescent any more.

We in the West have no Wisdom Culture or Wise Elders. Such concept of Wise Elders is actively discouraged. Contary to popular mythology we do have various ruling elites such as the captains of industry etc, who are almost universally bereft of Wisdom.

Who rules in the West then.

The TV created consumer "king" or every man does. The consumer "king" "educated" by the TV anti-"culture", who is "free" to indulge in any and every gross whim that pleases him. And if he becomes (inevitably) frustrated the little everyman king will become "righteously" angry. Such a wisdomless "culture" of "kingly" every-man inevitably degrades everything.

And then we all get "righteously" angry when we discover that everything has fallen apart. And we look for someone (or collectives of someones) to blame. The dreadful applied politics of scapegoating. Sacrificial victims being the order of the mob driven day.

These two essays address these issues.

http://www.dabase.org/polunity.htm
http://www.dabase.org/radicpol.htm