Democracy in Jakarta

For John, BLUF:  Not everyone thinks about politics the same way.  Nothing to see here; just move along.

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The Christian governor of Jakarta was convicted of blasphemy for arguing that the Quran does not bar Muslims from voting for a non-Muslim.

This is from the Blog of Law Professor Ann Althouse, out in Madison, Wisconsin.

Basuki Tjahaja Purnama was given a 2-year sentence (which he will appeal), and he is now in jail, the NYT reports.

Bivitri Susanti, head of the Jakarta chapter of Indonesia’s Association of Constitutional Law Lecturers, criticizes the application of the law:  “It’s not about the speech itself and whether it’s condemning Islam itself.  It’s about whether society believes it’s wrong or annoys them.”

Mass rallies were organized calling for his arrest, with some zealots demanding that the governor be put to death.  Many analysts said that the protests had been orchestrated by his political rivals and that they were a strong factor in his 16-point defeat in last month’s election….

Among Indonesia’s population of 250 million are more than 190 million Muslims, but there are also smaller, influential minorities including Christians, Hindus and Buddhists.

“First, this verdict is really intimidating for minority groups,” said Tim Lindsey, director of the Center for Indonesian Law, Islam and Society at the University of Melbourne.  “Second, it tells Muslim politicians that they should try to use the religion card in other elections.  Religion has never been absent,” he continued, “but this is a real shift. This has been building up for a long time.”

From the Comments at the Althouse Blog (Commenter being "exhelodrvr1") we have this:

That's why we should increase Muslim immigration - it would speed up the process of implementing those ideas.

Here in these United States we have options:

• We can ignore this as taking place in Indonesia, based on an assumption that nothing that happens in Indonesia ever flows back over to the United States.
• We can claim that this is just some aberration and not of importance to our overall understanding of Islam.
• We can put this down to a political party which just uses whatever is at hand to throw at the opposition, telling ourselves that such thinks can't and won't happen in these United States.
• We can realize that Islam is not just a religion, but also a political philosophy.
• We can shrug our shoulders and decide that it can't happen here.

Does anyone else have an option?

Hat tip to Ann Althouse.

Regards  —  Cliff