Explosion near Stadium in Paris, multiple shootings and hostage taking...

[CorsiHockeyLeague]

Originally Posted by combustiblefuel

Respect his freedom of choice to be a "Disbeliever" - as this is a right bestowed upon humanity by God:
Quran 18:29 proclaims, "The truth is from your Lord": it is the free will of any person to believe (in God) or to be an Infidel (Un believer).

. Even if a Muslim should be convinced that someone is a non-believer, still he must accept that his fate is in the hands of God alone, since no one human can condemn another - this must be left to the judgment of God.

This is obscurantist bull####. There is no sect of Islam, none, that preaches tolerance towards infidels. People of the book, yes. Non-believers? Absolutely not. You are being sold a bill of goods.

This specific passage you've quoted says the following:

And say, "The truth is from your Lord, so whoever wills - let him believe; and whoever wills - let him disbelieve." Indeed, We have prepared for the disbelievers fire whose walls will surround them. And if they call for relief, they will be relieved with water like murky oil, which scalds. Wretched is the drink, and evil is the resting place.

EDIT: other translations at - http://www.alim.org/library/quran/ay...-disbelieve%22

How utterly disingenuous would you need to be to suggest that that preaches tolerance?!

[driveway]

Re: countries becoming more conservative. Look no further than Turkey, founded proudly as a secular nation with EXTREMELY strong barriers between church and state.

Those barriers have been steadily eroded. More and more conservative politicians have been elected, drawing support from rural Turkey.

[PostandIn]

Obscurantist is my new favourite word. Take a rec. :-)

[WCW Nitro]

Originally Posted by CorsiHockeyLeague

This is obscurantist bull####. There is no sect of Islam, none, that preaches tolerance towards infidels. People of the book, yes. Non-believers? Absolutely not. You are being sold a bill of goods.

This specific passage you've quoted says the following:



EDIT: other translations at - http://www.alim.org/library/quran/ay...-disbelieve%22

How utterly disingenuous would you need to be to suggest that that preaches tolerance?!

This is describing Hell, not telling Muslims to kill someone who does not believe.

[combustiblefuel]

Originally Posted by CorsiHockeyLeague

This is obscurantist bull####. There is no sect of Islam, none, that preaches tolerance towards infidels. People of the book, yes. Non-believers? Absolutely not. You are being sold a bill of goods.

This specific passage you've quoted says the following:



EDIT: other translations at - http://www.alim.org/library/quran/ay...-disbelieve%22

How utterly disingenuous would you need to be to suggest that that preaches tolerance?!

That like Wce Nitro already said that is decribing hell. That is saying that non belivers will be sent to hell. That it is Gods judgement to do what he will will non belivers and it is not mans place to take judgment into their own hands.

I am far from being religous but no other religion can start throwing stones when they live in glass houses.

[Street Pharmacist]

Originally Posted by combustiblefuel

That like Wce Nitro already said that is decribing hell. That is saying that non belivers will be sent to hell. That it is Gods judgement to do what he will will non belivers and it is not mans place to take judgment into their own hands.

I am far from being religous but no other religion can start throwing stones when they live in glass houses.

Originally Posted by WCW Nitro

This is describing Hell, not telling Muslims to kill someone who does not believe.

It also does not say you cannot, which you've said it does

[combustiblefuel]

Originally Posted by Street Pharmacist

It also does not say you cannot, which you've said it does

You guys have changed my mind. Lets just bomb the #### out of all these muslim countries , round up the muslims in every country and kill them all and house them all in camps.wait a minute.... I think some one tried this once before and It didn't work so well.

To say all of Islam is terrible is no difference between all the propaganda promoted in Germany about the Jews. There are those groups within Islam that are completely horrible but to group 1.6 million people all into the same boat is getting ridiculous.

Maybe It's how tired I am today but the hate for 1.6 billion people is really grinding my gears today.

[Street Pharmacist]

Originally Posted by combustiblefuel

You guys have changed my mind. Lets just bomb the #### out of all these muslim countries , round up the muslims in every country and kill them all and house them all in camps.wait a minute.... I think some one tried this once before and It didn't work so well.

To say all of Islam is terrible is no difference between all the propaganda promoted in Germany about the Jews. There are those groups within Islam that are completely horrible but to group 1.6 million people all into the same boat is getting ridiculous.

Maybe It's how tired I am today but the hate for 1.6 billion people is really grinding my gears today.

See, this is our point. Can we not point out the inherent violence in Islam yet not bomb anyone? I am all for accepting refugees, I think the "vetting" concerns people have is vastly overblown.

That doesn't mean we need to pretend Islam is a peaceful religion. It isn't. At least it isn't now. You don't have to pretend verses don't exist to not bomb period FFS. Can't we live in reality?????

Hating ideas =/= hating people

[CorsiHockeyLeague]

Seriously, I'm starting to think some people are just incapable of anything other than black and white thinking. Either Islam is perfectly faultless and has nothing wrong with it, and is just a big tome of tolerance, or it's all terrible and the same as Nazi propaganda so let's kill them all because obviously pointing out the problems with ideas in a book is the same as hating people who vaguely subscribe to some of them.

Is that really the level of nuance you're intellectually capable of? F***ing hell...

[Max Cow Disease]

Islam, like other religions, is a dogma born of the desert nearly 2 thousand years ago, and so therefore will obviously contain its fair share of poor ideas. There's no doubt a vast contingent of blabbermouthed racists out there who are simply xenophobic, but nonetheless, conflating criticism of these ideas with bigotry towards Muslims as people is an ongoing theme, I find. This is also fairly exclusive to religion in most cases, as in most any other context (politics, tastes, etc), one's ideas or beliefs are fair game for discussion.

Facebook's rife with memes about how "ISIS isn't Muslim any more than the KKK is Christian". Aren't they? These guys seem fairly devout to their scripture and spend their hours wandering the streets quoting it. They're taking what seems to be a fairly literalist interpretation, and from what I see, the moderate Muslim who disregards the obviously archaic sections of their faith aren't "real Muslims" any more than these lunatics, just because they're peaceful. To ordain someone the "actual" or "better" Muslim because they're more peaceful is to pay far too much credit and credence to Islam as an ancient set of largely outmoded ideas, in my opinion.

[WCW Nitro]

The issue I have is not criticism of religion, but it's that for some the same standard is not applied across the board. Let's say you think Islam is inherently violent. Ok, fine. Now how many people in that group think for example that the U.S. is inherently violent? Has the U.S. not targeted civilians? Has it not gotten engaged in conflicts completely unprovoked? For how much of its history, especially recent, has it been involved in some form of conflict? So, what I fail to understand is why this obsession with religion for some while simultaneously ignoring or not criticizing as heavily non-religious actors?

[T@T]

Originally Posted by combustiblefuel

You guys have changed my mind. Lets just bomb the #### out of all these muslim countries , round up the muslims in every country and kill them all and house them all in camps.wait a minute.... I think some one tried this once before and It didn't work so well.

To say all of Islam is terrible is no difference between all the propaganda promoted in Germany about the Jews. There are those groups within Islam that are completely horrible but to group 1.6 million people all into the same boat is getting ridiculous.

Maybe It's how tired I am today but the hate for 1.6 billion people is really grinding my gears today.

It's been estimated that 20-25% of Muslims believe in a Sharia type radical system. The other 75-80% need to step up an openly criticize this barbaric part of their religion. Instead of turning the other cheek, fight for whats right. That part of the religion needs to evolve and modernize to the rest of the world or this will never change and likely will get much worst.

Maybe write a new testament!

[CorsiHockeyLeague]

^Suggesting the Qur'an requires any amendment or modification is, sadly, a non-starter for a lot of Muslims. The whole religion is premised on the notion that it's the inerrant word of God. So a New Testament ain't coming. All that's really open to people is probably reinterpretation of passages already there and somehow discarding a bunch of hadith.

Originally Posted by WCW Nitro

The issue I have is not criticism of religion, but it's that for some the same standard is not applied across the board. Let's say you think Islam is inherently violent. Ok, fine. Now how many people in that group think for example that the U.S. is inherently violent? Has the U.S. not targeted civilians? Has it not gotten engaged in conflicts completely unprovoked? For how much of its history, especially recent, has it been involved in some form of conflict? So, what I fail to understand is why this obsession with religion for some while simultaneously ignoring or not criticizing as heavily non-religious actors?

Sorry for the bluntness, but this is absolutely awful reasoning. First, no, the USA does not "target" civilians. If the USA had perfect weapons capable of zero collateral damage there would be no collateral damage. Second, there is no set of American doctrines compelling America to engage in any particular foreign policy action. Its government makes foreign policy decisions on the basis of what it believes is the best course for the country, at least in theory - and sometimes they just screw it up royally. If the US Constitution said, "All good citizens of these United States shall smite the British heathen upon his neck", or some such, you'd have a point.

I don't know why I'm bothering to explain this as it should be absolutely self evident that these things are not comparable.

[T@T]

Originally Posted by CorsiHockeyLeague

^Suggesting the Qur'an requires any amendment or modification is, sadly, a non-starter for a lot of Muslims. The whole religion is premised on the notion that it's the inerrant word of God. So a New Testament ain't coming. All that's really open to people is probably reinterpretation of passages already there and somehow discarding a bunch of hadith.

Well, alrighty then, since that's a "non starter" how about teaching them GOD is imaginary and a pile of bullshat on a stick (or book) and their whole religion is based on crap.

Will they believe that?

[WCW Nitro]

Originally Posted by CorsiHockeyLeague

^Suggesting the Qur'an requires any amendment or modification is, sadly, a non-starter for a lot of Muslims. The whole religion is premised on the notion that it's the inerrant word of God. So a New Testament ain't coming. All that's really open to people is probably reinterpretation of passages already there and somehow discarding a bunch of hadith.

Sorry for the bluntness, but this is absolutely awful reasoning. First, no, the USA does not "target" civilians. If the USA had perfect weapons capable of zero collateral damage there would be no collateral damage. Second, there is no set of American doctrines compelling America to engage in any particular foreign policy action. Its government makes foreign policy decisions on the basis of what it believes is the best course for the country, at least in theory - and sometimes they just screw it up royally. If the US Constitution said, "All good citizens of these United States shall smite the British heathen upon his neck", or some such, you'd have a point.

I don't know why I'm bothering to explain this as it should be absolutely self evident that these things are not comparable.

The U.S. does not target civilians? Are you kidding me? From Japan until the Iraq war there's plenty of evidence that it has many times. Yes, there is no doctrine or anything in its constitution, but that is not relevant. There is an entity and it has done certain things, you can't just say oh well since there's nothing written it can't be judged. Which is moot since you don't even acknowledge the obvious such as targeting civilians, which brings me back to my original point of some not applying the same standard across the board.

The point is, like anything else religion can be a force of good or a force of evil. Are there not many people who gave up some destructive behaviour because they "found religion"? To say a blanket statement like religion is stupid ignores all the good that comes out of it.

[PostandIn]

Originally Posted by Max Cow Disease

Islam, like other religions, is a dogma born of the desert nearly 2 thousand years ago, and so therefore will obviously contain its fair share of poor ideas. There's no doubt a vast contingent of blabbermouthed racists out there who are simply xenophobic, but nonetheless, conflating criticism of these ideas with bigotry towards Muslims as people is an ongoing theme, I find. This is also fairly exclusive to religion in most cases, as in most any other context (politics, tastes, etc), one's ideas or beliefs are fair game for discussion.

Facebook's rife with memes about how "ISIS isn't Muslim any more than the KKK is Christian". Aren't they? These guys seem fairly devout to their scripture and spend their hours wandering the streets quoting it. They're taking what seems to be a fairly literalist interpretation, and from what I see, the moderate Muslim who disregards the obviously archaic sections of their faith aren't "real Muslims" any more than these lunatics, just because they're peaceful. To ordain someone the "actual" or "better" Muslim because they're more peaceful is to pay far too much credit and credence to Islam as an ancient set of largely outmoded ideas, in my opinion.

Things that Sam Harris, Christopher Hitchens, et al, have been saying for years are now finally getting legitimate mainstream traction. Until recently they have been treated by the mainstream press mostly as smart oddities but probably bigots and not representative of a valid, workable, point of view that reasonable people could embrace. That is changing and fairly rapidly.

Today there's more and more moderate Muslims and other significant leaders (like David Cameron recently) saying things that are almost word-for-word what Harris has been saying since 2006. ISIS' behaviour is forcing a serious dialog amoung Muslims that can't be ignored and downplayed any longer because the stakes continue to rise. The Islamic concepts of martyrdom, jihad and Sharia law (especially Wahhabism) have to be dealt with by Muslims in the face of modernity. The world isn't going back to the iron age where these concepts were sustainable, unless of course, we nuke our selves back there.

[FlamesAddiction]

People are a product of their environment for the most part. As easy as it is to just blame the religion which has been used as the tool for their cause, it isn't the root cause of all the problems. The geopolitical influences and subsequent instability, human rights issues and poverty in the Muslim world is the main reason for the rise of extremism.

If it was simply the religion, then it wouldn't explain why Muslim communities in Poland and the Baltics (Lipka Tatars) have lived in peace since the 1300s, or why Muslims have been present for centuries in places like Bulgaria, Ukraine, Bosnia, Albania, Macedonia and Russia (meaning Muslims of actual Russian ethnicity not Chechens) have relatively low rates of religious extremism.

The problems in the ME and the ensuing religious extremism has roots in more secular geopolitical issues like controlling resources and capital.

[CorsiHockeyLeague]

Originally Posted by T@T

Well, alrighty then, since that's a "non starter" how about teaching them GOD is imaginary and a pile of bullshat on a stick (or book) and their whole religion is based on crap.

Will they believe that?

Will 1.6 billion people suddenly lose their faith overnight and apostasize? Is this a serious question?

Originally Posted by WCW Nitro

The U.S. does not target civilians? Are you kidding me? From Japan until the Iraq war there's plenty of evidence that it has many times. Yes, there is no doctrine or anything in its constitution, but that is not relevant.

From a moral perspective, of course it's relevant. The intentions, the underlying motivation for actions contain all of the information about how the actor is likely to behave in the future.

Japan is a good example, but it's the only one and it's 70+ years old now. The USA did not target civilians in Iraq. Civilians died, many of them, but there was never a US mission aimed at killing civilians. They had other goals, and in the process of pursuing those, civilians died. In admittedly simplistic terms, from the American perspective, evaluating whether a military operation went well involves three questions: was the objective achieved, how many casualties were suffered, and how few civilians were harmed. The Paris attacks demonstrate that for Jihadists, the success of an operation is determined by how many civilians were harmed. There's just no comparison.

Your confusion apparently stems from the premise that all that matters in analyzing behavior is the body count.

To say a blanket statement like religion is stupid ignores all the good that comes out of it.

I have never said this, or denied that religion frequently motivates behaviours that I think are good and helpful. Without religious organizations I can't imagine what state the charitable sector would be in in Canada, for example. This statement demonstrates your overly results-focused analysis, but has no rational connection to the above.

[blankall]

Originally Posted by FlamesAddiction

People are a product of their environment for the most part. As easy as it is to just blame the religion which has been used as the tool for their cause, it isn't the root cause of all the problems. The geopolitical influences and subsequent instability, human rights issues and poverty in the Muslim world is the main reason for the rise of extremism.

If it was simply the religion, then it wouldn't explain why Muslim communities in Poland and the Baltics (Lipka Tatars) have lived in peace since the 1300s, or why Muslims have been present for centuries in places like Bulgaria, Ukraine, Bosnia, Albania, Macedonia and Russia (meaning Muslims of actual Russian ethnicity not Chechens) have relatively low rates of religious extremism.

The problems in the ME and the ensuing religious extremism has roots in more secular geopolitical issues like controlling resources and capital.

There's definitely been a change in the religion in the past 60 years or so. Saudi Arabia has been pushing a more extreme form of the religion that incorporates more historical regional values. Obviously, this isn't endemic to all of Islam. As you point out, there are relatively secular population as well.

It has a lot to do with Wahhabism/Salafism and the more extreme and violent interpretations of Islam, which sprung from Wahhabism/Salafism. Saudi Arabia has spent billions of dollars over the last 100 years pushing these more extreme forms of Islam, and we are seeing the effect of that now.

You theory about geopolitical influences and poverty, doesn't really hold up. Saudi Arabia, which has had the least amount of outside influence and has extreme wealth, also produces its fair share of islamic militants. If you look at a cross section of terrorists, there really is no link between poverty and terrorism. Many terrorists are well educated people with good access to jobs. For example, of all the acts of terrorism in Europe, the perpetrator was more likely to have been to University than the average person, with engineering students being over-represented.

[CliffFletcher]

Originally Posted by FlamesAddiction

If it was simply the religion, then it wouldn't explain why Muslim communities in Poland and the Baltics (Lipka Tatars) have lived in peace since the 1300s, or why Muslims have been present for centuries in places like Bulgaria, Ukraine, Bosnia, Albania, Macedonia and Russia (meaning Muslims of actual Russian ethnicity not Chechens) have relatively low rates of religious extremism.

The problems in the ME and the ensuing religious extremism has roots in more secular geopolitical issues like controlling resources and capital.

But if it has nothing to do with religion, why don't we see terrorists organizations sprouting from other regions of the world that have dysfunctional political systems, poverty, and post-colonial meddling, like sub-Saharan Africa, Latin America, and southeast Asia?

It takes a bad political climate and religious extremism to foster terrorism on this scale. And the two are connected - Muslims in the Middle East are trying to cope with the agonizing failure of their societies to reconcile their faith the modern world. Their political systems do not work. Their educational systems do not work (there have been almost no patents filed in the Arab world in the last 40 years). It's a culture in trauma. But that trauma won't be salved by killing Americans, Israelis, and French. The culture has to adapt, the way southeast Asia adapted and become prosperous, despite being mired in poverty 50 years ago. Some Muslims are adapting. Others (mainly in the Arab world) are not.