The "Great Satan"

In the WSJ a comment intrigued me.

The West -- the Great Satan -- is an existential threat to the power that the theocrats hold over their struggling nations-- largely 'the street' -- for as long as those hovels have satellite dishes, can see how the West lives, and can see how they live.

I believe this misses the point because it assumes the perspective of the "Secular West." For much of it's long existence the West was not secular but Christian. During this time there was also a clash of cultures, but not a clash or morals. When the West became "secular" with a vengeance (that battle is being waged in the West as a cultural civil war with religion in retreat), Islam began to see the West not just as an opponent, but as the "Great Satan." The cultural manifestations of secularism must be viewed from their perspective as a destroyer of the soul. For a deeply religious people that is worse than a physical threat.