” We want us to be a memmber of one and the same universal human family” , replied Nobel laureate Mohammed El-Baradei in an interview with Aljazeera english programme, Frost over the world,when Sir David Frost asked him: What do egyptians want now that they have overthrown Hosni Mobarack’s regime successfully?

Given Mr. El-Baradei’s commitment as the former head of the IAEA to the betterment of the the international arena for the human family, one can easily be thinking that he took the young egyptian revolutionaries call for democracy literally. Since  he had already declared himself officially as a candidate for the upcoming Presidential election, it sounded moreover that he was already campaigning. Mr El-Baradai will certainly lose the election if underlying his assertion was a universalistic view embracing liberal democracy; but before I substanciate my claim I would like to investigate into the causes underpinning the revolution.

The popular uprising sweaping across the middle east infact is the result of the US foreign plicy in particular and the spread of liberal values, lifestyle and thoughts across the region in general. As a stratagic partner both economically and with military ties to the authoritarian regimes of the region, which have sacrificed the rights and freedom of their citizens to stablity in the region which was the US’s primary interest, the US has a far reaching influence that helped the distribution/infiltration of wester values and lifestyle into the region. Thus the lack of politcal space on the one hand and the Spread of loose liberal values on the other, forced the religious conservative groups to perceive such a hegemoney as a threat to their moral values. Evidently religious fundamentalism was thus a natural and legitimate reaction of self-defence those groups resorted to. Over time such groups came together under the Umbrella ideology of Al-Kaida and waged war against the west. Thus ,Terrorism was a phenomenon whose coming into being was necessitated by the west’s cultural hegemonism and imperial expansionism exacting Alexander Kojeve’s the end of history thesis with a Machiavellian Might-makes-right politics. Fact is that western moral realism and lifestyle propagated through liberal democracy as the only very best form and mode of social and economic organization for human society is at odds with the cultural and religious consevative values of Islam.

As such, as long as the predicament that gave rise to it has not changed,it is not possible to  think of a middle east society free of fundamentalistic ideology of islamic Jihad. Although large segment of the moslims condemn terrorism on the surface, deeply seated in the islamic culture is the the idea  of intifada as a defenc of their culture and way of living  against western hegemony of moral values. The recent uprising is one such against their own Governments and political elites who have been serving the interest of the west. Prima facie, it looked like the young revolutionaries were demnading for democracy, freedom and respect of human rights; but their primary desire was infact reclaiming their freedon and right which their governments have long denied them.There was no better way of formulating the slogans of the revolution than using the wests’ beloved terms in order to make it appealing to them so that they could get their support to topple those regimes, making a sort of promise that we will establish a liberal democratic society of your prescriptions only help us get rid of these dictators.But when thing have settled, the new societies might be quite different than the promissed. They would probably pick up the procedural aspect of liberal democracy: free and fair elections, accountablity, transparency, equity of resource allocation, eqaulity of opportunity; but not the liberal democracy of the west with all its loose moral values per se per prescription.

Despite the fact that people in different part of the world acknowledge certain common values like the right to life and liberty; and endorse some aspect of the cultural and social values of other societies which would not be in conflict with their cultural, religious and social values, there will not be a globalization of moral values. Therefore , I do not think that Mr. El-Baradai would be able to sell liberal democratic values to Moslim Brotherhoods, nor would the young revolutionaries buy it. After all there is so much uncertainity and conflicting view about the merits and demerits of liberal values even within western societies. The most contentious one is gender equality and sexaul moral

Gender equality and sexaul emancipation the demise of western societies?

It is in the interest of men and women that they both have equal rights to education, economic and employment opportunities; and that the burden and benefits of domestic work be shared equally among the sexes; inasmuch as these gender equalities do not compromise the family as the fundamental unit of society. However , liberal attitude towards sexaul moral and sexaul sceince teaching about gender identities believed to have biologically determined difference of preference and interest, led to equating the familiy and marrige. Taking advantage of such moral looseness, the pornografic industry traded with the body of both sexes adding value via exhibitionism and other ways of promotion. At the end of the day such morality fostered conflict of interest and encouraged both sexes to assume a position that rejected association with each other which inturn induced sexaul deviations like homosexuality, paedophily and violent forms of sexaul inclinations compensating for the psychological and emotional deficit that taking such a position created in addition to other social pressures like work load.

Thus gender equality which is good by its own right when the responssiblities arising from it are shouldered equally seems to have become a malaise causing ethical and hence social decadence becuase of such unqualified right to gender equality.The high divorce rate, child abduction, rape and other sexaul deliquencies in liberal democratic societies underscore this tendency.Worse yet, the rejection and exclusion of the sexes increased the demand for prostitution thus contributing its share for human traficking and sexual tourism across the world.

Obviously such looseness cannot be accomodated into the strict conservative view of Islam. Even for the moderate moslims such moral infinitism as in the liberal tradition may not be palatable. I presume that moslims have long realised the incompatablity of the liberal moral science with their tradition and countries like Iran are legitimately defending themselves against  the moral hegemony and political realism of the west.