Joe Biden and the Clash of Civilizations

We do not believe in a clash of civilizations. We do see a shared struggle against extremism—and we will do everything in our collective power to help the forces of tolerance prevail. In the Muslim world, a small number of violent extremists are beyond the call of reason. We will defeat them. But hundreds of millions of hearts and minds share the values we hold dear. We will reach them. President Obama has made clear that we will seek a new way forward based on mutual interest and mutual respect. It was not by accident that he gave his very first interview as President to Al-Arabiya.

That’s Vice President Joe Biden speaking at a security conference in Munich last week.

The late Samuel Huntington’s famous “clash of civilizations” thesis is a big topic with many nuances on which responsible and honorable Americans can disagree. But the public discussion on whether Western Civilization and the Islamic world are involved in something like a clash of civilizations simply can’t be declared out of existence with an assertion that “hundreds of millions of hearts and minds share the values we hold dear.” That’s because the simple fact is that hundreds of millions of hearts and minds also are quite content with Sharia law and hence also reject the many of the values “we” hold dear.

A serious public discussion can hardly be engaged unless we are willing to discuss openly those Western values not shared by those whose values are embedded in Sharia law. Radically distinct notions of religious liberty and other Western liberties such as freedom of association and expression leap to mind.

But then again, given that the Dutch Parliamentarian Geert Wilders is being prosecuted for his anti-Islamic film Fitna and now is being denied entry into the UK , perhaps the differences between Western ideas of freedom of religion and freedom of expression and Sharia law aren’t so different after all, particularly when it comes to criticizing the Koran, “defaming the prophet,” or being “Islamophobic.”

Preemptive capitulation of the West, I suppose, is one way to prove there simply is no “clash of civilizations.”