Editor,

Recently, one of our government officials stated that we are at war with the “philosophy of Islamic fundamentalist fascism.”

Is the philosophy of Western fundamentalist fascism a better option? (My dictionary’s definition of fascism aligns with Western corporate states, not the Islamic State. The Islamic State is a self-organizing resistance movement.)

Let’s take a look at our backyard. Since 1960, violent crime in the United States increased 560 percent, single mother births went up 419 percent, and divorce rates and the number of children living in single-parent homes both climbed by 300 percent.

This is massive social decay.

We should ask ourselves what’s gone wrong with the West, where materialism and affluence coincide with corruption, addition, arrogance, imperial intervention, the pursuit of the frivolous and ecocide. As for the Middle East, most of its problems arise from continued Western intervention in the region (brought to you by Exxon-Mobil).

Should it be surprising that so many Islamic fundamentalists are willing to fight and die resisting the influence of our deteriorating culture? How does a life of austerity and faithfulness win out over instant gratification and self-indulgence? The materialism that is the face of the West is a challenge to a civilization based on faith, a civilization where praying is still more important than shopping.

While the West has been living lavishly for 60 years, consuming with such ferocity that the trajectory of the planet’s biosphere has been forever altered, the rest of the world has become angry and sick of it all. The Islamic State is but a beginning of the kinds of self-organizing that will occur once the latest round of neo-political activism fails. The West is bloated, soft and decadent. This decadence will not last; it never has and never will.

MATT LINDER

Langley