Last night I was stuck trying to fall asleep and started thinking about the state of things in this world (ya nice thing to fall asleep thinking). But there is several interesting things when combined together are somewhat interesting to think about.

Islam is an amazingly effective way of controlling people, even more effective than Hinduism. There are some key points I think that make it so.

• Incredible amounts of routine through every single day that forces a person have to be precise, a constant reminder of its presence. Also keeps the people from thinking about other stuff, because it'll alway be there to interupt.
  
• Easy to prove you are devout, simply do the above (helps that prayers are in groups).
  
• Punishment is swift and harsh. People expect to be punished for a crime they commit. The longer you delay the punishment the less it means, the harsher it is the closser it is to proving to the individual the guilt they feel is justified. When all is said and done people prefer harsh punishment and only when they start getting off easier than they think they should that a criminal mentality starts to develop.
  
• It contains a provision for violence.
  

Overall this makes for the most effective way to conquer people (uneducated and not already attached to a strong religion already) and make them feel good about it. In fact there are several cases in the history of Chrisitanity that several of the above points was used, and was very effective establishing colonies(especially when it came to "The New World"). However the technique failed in several places: China, India, and the Middle East. All which had very established "strong" religions already. In fact one could say that the violence felt now between Christian and Islamic worlds was our own damn fault and started with the Crusades.

Really there are about two solutions to the problem at hand:

• Wipe them all out (the Machiavellian approch)
  
• Remove the target of violence, remove the reason for animosity. Figure out a way to increase the freedoms and make their way of life easier. As soon as people start taking luxuries for granted the rote ritutual starts to seem more meaningless and then the control starts to languish. Figure out a way to make them greedy, have them make the translations of the koran canon as well. Increase the size, dilute the population, reduce the punishment harshness and speed. All this to induce rot at the core, and create more division. And then that would put all major religions an equal ground when it comes to controlling people.