ParaPundit notes that secular ideologies have no monopoly on totalitarianism. In this context, he is referring to Islam. God can be fuel for the totalitarian fire, this is no discovery for the liberal imagination.
And yet recently I was thinking, "Why do I label myself a conservative when I consistenly map onto a libertarian set of values?" I can give you a long explanation of why, but I realized that the short answer is Islam! I just don’t see a sensitive liberal being able to make scathing criticisms of the Islamic faith as backward, medieval and illiberal[1]. Contrarian Trotskyist Christopher Hitchens for instance is now considered a neoconservative by some for his aggressive take on foreign policy and his hostility toward conservative Islamic piety. Now, I suspect the man who wrote The Missionary Position: Mother Teresa in Theory and Practice, and regularly excoriates organized theism in the generality, has not turned into a reactionary traditionalist Catholic. But, he has violated the modern liberal consensus of civility and respect for non-white cultural practices, ergo, he is now a "conservative." And so am I, and obviously for very personal reasons.
fn1. I do not deny that some of the vituperation against Islam, and more importantly Muslims, is bigoted, mean-spirited and grounded in ignorance. That does not mean that in response people of sound and reasonable intellect should abdicate our liberal values and traditions when interacting with peoples who engage in practices more befitting of the 8th century than the 21st. Certainly, liberals do not excuse the quaint micro-cultures of the American South their regressive social practices and fundamentalist religiosity (unless they are black of course) .
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