THIS IS WHY ISLAM GAINS SUCH A LOW OPINION/RECEPTION

Trevor Thomas at the American Thinker gives some more insight to the Islamic world and just why's it's been so earning of the scorn it's received:

Illiteracy plagues the Arab world. About a third of those living in Arab countries cannot read. This includes about half of all women. There are fewer than 18 computers per 1,000 persons in the Arab world, compared to the global average of 78.3; and only 1.6 percent of Arabs use the internet.

In the 57 nations in the OIC, there are a total of about 500 universities. There are over 5,700 in the U.S. In just over 100 years, the Muslim world has produced nine Nobel laureates, while a mere 14 million Jews have produced 166. There are about 400 scientists and engineers per 1 million people in research and development in Arab countries, compared to about 4,000 per million people in North America.

Particularly disturbing, and most telling, as one examines Islam, is the role of women in Islamic society. Islamic law (sharia) prohibits women from looking men in the eye, forbids them from wearing shoes that make noise, and forbids them from becoming educated. As Ergun and Emir Caner note in Unveiling Islam, "women are considered possessions in any orthodox Islamic regime[.] ... The wife is considered the husband's sex object." Also, one of the most alarming admonitions in the Koran allows the husband to punish his wife physically.

Of the eight nations that the U.S. has placed on its State Sponsors of Terrorism list, 6 of them are Islamic regimes. Of the 16 nations the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) has under its Country of Particular Concern designation, 11 are Islamic regimes (all of the others are differing authoritarian regimes, including North Korea, China, and Vietnam). Nice company, huh?

Interesting that their problems with illiteracy far exceed what you find in most other parts of the globe. That's practically a way that totalitarians can keep the public mindset in their grasp.