> Nope, but they are important for the functioning of a society. > but even the flawed ones are better to live in Easily disproven by contradiction, specifica

> Nope, but they are important for the functioning of a society. > but even the flawed ones are better to live in Easily disproven by contradiction, specifically if by democracy you mean today's Western definition of it where anything is up for voting by any fool from the street. The Islamic Golden Age is a shining example of a prosperous nation that did not abide by today's Western definition of democracy. We have something called "Shurah" in Islam, which is a restricted form of opinion seeking and consultation of experts on the subject matter, a much more superior approach. What's ironic is that today the West doesn't even follow its fabled democracy and freedom of expression. We've literally just witnessed the double standards in what happened in Canada in the past few weeks. Rules for thee but not for me as they say. > the downsides for a wrong court decision become enormous That is why in Islamic Law, punishments are fended off with any ounce of doubt. Today, the West threw out the baby with the bath water, where even in clear cut cases like the Boston Marathon bomber, or the countless other cases where confessions were had not under duress, the killers and serial rapists are left to live. Fornication is having sex outside of marriage. Normalizing this behavior, as we see in the West today, leads to many casualties like the spread of STD's, teen pregnancies, destruction of families, call for so called "abortion rights", mixing of lineages, even siblings who don't know they're siblings grow up separate from each other and get attracted to each other, and countless other messes that are causing a decline in morality and dragging down society with it. It's known that sexual immorality produces new diseases that did not exist in previous nations, HIV being one clear example. We don't have marry your rapist laws in Islam, so it's a non issue for us. As a matter of fact, a rapist is severely punished, and can be executed depending on the situation. Yes, we value purity and virginity, not just for women, but for men as well. Honor killings are not part of Islam, and in fact, the punishment for and honor killing is to execute the killer. > there were a few recent cases in countries as supposedly developed as Qatar and UAE of foreign women being convicted of it. I heard about some of those cases, and they were not clear cut. e.g. the woman was drunk (another thing that should be prohibited and punished), so the testimony is difficult to prove. Ideally in such a scenario, both parties involved are to be punished.