The failure of Liberalism (Regressive left) to deal with Islam

[opendoor]

Originally Posted by CliffFletcher

I'm not sure that's captured in all the statistics. For example, in Scandinavia marriage has declined, but most children are still born to parents in an enduring monogamous relationship. We know that the working class in the anglo world has seen a break-down not just of official, sanctioned marriage, but in enduring monogamous relationships. Children are often raised in households with multiple male adults passing through, losing the benefits of both a stable income and a stable, loving male presence in their lives. That dude who lives with mom for a couple years probably isn't setting aside some of his paycheque every month to pay for your university.

And the same can be said about Canada. About 80% of census families with children in Canada are two parent families. In Sweden and Norway that number is in the 85% range.

[Itse]

Originally Posted by Jets4Life

Calm down, man. Perhaps you know of the situation better, but is that any reason to accuse of of not caring about the situation.

It would have been quicker for you to go to Google and write "French muslim denounce terrorism example" than write the response you did. You could also have done both.

What you do and don't do tells a lot about what you care about. Empty internet posturing is more important to you than finding out stuff.

Here, let me Google that for you.

http://www.thelocal.fr/20160726/musl...-french-church

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worl...ial-media.html

http://time.com/4112830/muslims-pari...islam-condemn/

http://tribune.com.pk/story/991351/m...y-with-french/

http://kurzman.unc.edu/islamic-state...nst-terrorism/

http://www.ibtimes.com/paris-terrori...france-2184848

http://www.alternet.org/media/45-exa...ox-news-missed

Just some quick and dirty results. Stuff like "what some specific French person is saying to some other French people" would obviously most likely be found in French. I don't know any French so you'll have to look for that stuff yourself.

[Itse]

I'll take this moment to link this.

http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7...613772,00.html

Why aren't Muslim leaders being heard?

Op-ed: Mainstream Muslims around the world have issued strong and unambiguous statements against virtually every violent attack, condemning such acts as immoral; yet somehow their responses are barely registering in the public consciousness.

For example, after riots by a predominantly Muslim crowd in the Paris suburb of Sarcelles attacked a synagogue and Jewish businesses, the local Muslim Association sent a letter of solidarity and support to the vice president of the synagogue. National Muslim leaders took part in an interfaith ceremony that denounced the violence and called for reconciliation. Boubakeur, who attended the ceremony, affirmed that the vast majority of French Muslims are not anti-Semitic. How could they be, he asked, when they themselves are battling racism?

Those responses should all have been part of the story. But too often, Islam is not only portrayed negatively, but falsely, as a monolithic entity. As a result, the general public often fails to grasp that there is a diversity of opinion within Islam and that most Muslims condemn extremism and violence.

Yes, Islamist extremism is a genuine threat to world peace. But those who lump all Muslims together, and dismiss as meaningless the courageous stand of the moderate majority against extremism, aren’t helping to win that battle. Rather, they’re strengthening extremism by perpetuating a false narrative of perpetual conflict between Islam and the West. That is something which we must fight with all our might.

Rabbi Marc Schneier is president of the Foundation for Ethnic Understanding and chair of the Gathering of European Muslim and Jewish Leaders (GEMJL)

[rubecube]

Originally Posted by CliffFletcher

Sorry, it's well documented.

My bad. I quoted too much.

Originally Posted by CliffFletcher

But the decline in the social pressure to commit to marriage has deprived men of the motivation to better their economic situation.

Is it the decline of social pressure, or the decline of the perceived benefits of marriage? Marriage is a lot riskier and more financially demanding than it used to be. Perhaps some are just not seeing the ROI from marriage that there used to be.

EDIT: I forgot to add (and I also didn't quote it here) that I think the idea of a "stable male presence" as necessarily conducive to raising a fully functional ignores the research relating to same-sex couples. From what I remember of said research it's far more important just to have two parents than it is to have a "male influence."

[rubecube]

Originally Posted by CliffFletcher

Sorry, it's well documented.

Don’t be a bachelor: Why married men work harder, smarter and make more money (the Washington Post)


The article has links to the studies, and a lot of other data about societal effects of marriage on men. It's worth a read.

Apologies in advance for double-posting/double-quoting, but how do these studies control for X factors such as ambition, intellect, etc.? It seems to me that a correlation between men who work and are married could be easily explained by the fact that they have more desirable personality traits, or could be less prone to risk-taking behaviour (i.e. it's safer to be married). I don't think it necessarily proves that the decline in social pressure is what's responsible for the economic disparity between married men and single men.

[rubecube]

Also I can't be the only one who finds the notion of getting married because it statistically increases your earning potential a complete perversion of the concept, right?

[Handsome B. Wonderful]

Originally Posted by rubecube

Also I can't be the only one who finds the notion of getting married because it statistically increases your earning potential a complete perversion of the concept, right?

You're the probably the only one, because you're the only one to have grossly misinterpreted this.

[rubecube]

Originally Posted by Handsome B. Wonderful

You're the probably the only one, because you're the only one to have grossly misinterpreted this.

Okay, how should I have interpreted it?

[CorsiHockeyLeague]

There was no discussion about good or bad motivations for getting married, only the impacts at a more macro level as a result of the usual features of a marriage.

Why it's being discussed in this thread, who knows. I suppose it's somewhat tied to the RL in the sense that truths about the social importance of institutions like marriage and religion are the sort that will be resisted by the left as anti-dogmatic. But unless you can engineer a substitute for the very human needs that those sorts of institutions fill, it shouldn't really be surprising that the void left by their decline will cause some problems. Which is why this statement is naive.

Originally Posted by MattyC

Isn't the answer to this obvous? I know a lot of people feel the government is a boogyman, but at it's most basic principal, it is a representive of the community.

It's not at all obvious. Government can't really fulfil the psychological needs that religion satisfies for many people. If everyone's moral tribe is a government body or political entity rather than a church, that might actually have much worse results for society at large.

[Coach]

Originally Posted by CorsiHockeyLeague

It's not at all obvious. Government can't really fulfil the psychological needs that religion satisfies for many people. If everyone's moral tribe is a government body or political entity rather than a church, that might actually have much worse results for society at large.

How can that be? Again, at it's most basic principal, the "government funded community center" is there to cater to all members of the community regardless of background, and the rules (or morality) of said institution should be flowing with the natural growth and changes f morals in the community. Achurch, synagogue, mosque, etc.. at their basic principal can't provide that. Their rules are rigid and supposedly the word of an Almighty.

If people need a spirituality to satisfy their psychological needs, that's fine. But it should not be centre of a community that is made of people from many different backgrounds. This is pretty much the basis of separation of church and state. The state needs to make decisions based on what's best for the community as a whole, not just what's best for this one spiritualty we've all decided to gather around for some reason.

And, if we're talking a future place, how are you going to get people who have renounced any sort of theist ideas? There are people that don't believe in what you believe in that live in your community, how can you even begin to attempt to structure it around one?

Our moral tribe already is a "government funded community centre". We follow the laws and morality of Canada which are voted on people we elect to vote on them. These morals are being ever adapted to new knowledge. It may be slow, but it's certainly a lot faster than the movement of religious morals.

[Itse]

Originally Posted by CorsiHockeyLeague

I suppose it's somewhat tied to the RL in the sense that truths about the social importance of institutions like marriage and religion are the sort that will be resisted by the left as anti-dogmatic. But unless you can engineer a substitute for the very human needs that those sorts of institutions fill, it shouldn't really be surprising that the void left by their decline will cause some problems.

While there is an element of truth in this, I would make a few comments.

First of all, there wide variety of marriages and equivalent arrangements in human history is huge, and some are fairly recent. Married couples living apart for years for example has been very common no more than a few generations ago, as has been couples living together without marrying. The social significance of marriage still varies hugely even within one country.

At one end, marriage is primarily a child-bearing and/or financial arrangement with little expectation of things such as romance or even sexual fidelity. To others it's a romantic bond, and increasingly commonly thought of as something that should be broken if the romance dies out, to protect the children. (There are also usually vastly different assumptions related as to what happens in a divorce and afterwards.)

These two types of marriages fill very different needs. That's why I instinctively shy away from statements such as you made, that "marriage fills a human need". It's of course true, yet I feel that it doesn't actually say that much. If people have such different marriages for such vastly different needs, are we really even talking about any one thing when we're talking about marriage?

And if we're not, should we really be so focused on marriage as a concept? (It's tempting for scientists because it's easier to study, but that's not a great reason.)

That said, I do agree that some moralism is good for a society when it comes to human relations and especially child caring. I say this even though I'm a dirty polyamorist who has gotten judged a lot by other people who don't understand or accept what's going on with my relationships. I don't really mind since those concerns are almost always born from good intentions. Being forced to constantly check that I really believe I'm not doing anything wrong is not a bad thing.

[jammies]

Originally Posted by rubecube

Okay, how should I have interpreted it?

I interpreted through the useful lens of pie: married men realize that now the delicious pie has to be shared with two, three, four, or even possibly more, others. He therefore strives to increase the size of the pie, so that the meager portion he is allotted will grow, perhaps even enough to satisfy his appetite for sweetness.

Alas, no matter how he works, the halcyon times when he was able to sit down and uninterruptedly scarf down the entirety of a slightly smaller, but also entirely personal, pie, have gone forever. Still, it's too late now, so he does his best, pretending that he doesn't mind sharing his pie with a pack of squalling ingrates, and he has at least learned the wisdom his own father had fruitlessly tried to install in him, that that he had never understood until placed in the same grim situation: there is no grief like that of a man for his lost pie.

[Fighting Banana Slug]

Originally Posted by peter12

It's also an explicit legal and social arrangement that brings two families together in a joint venture.

How many of you married people had your social circle enlarged by just your spouse? You gained a second set of parents, sisters and brothers-in-law, children, spouses etc... all joined together because of one marriage.

Your responsibilities and obligations increase exponentially - economic productivity increases to meet those obligations, and your personal security is also guaranteed through a strengthened web of family connections.

Most cohabitation is an arrangement of similar intimacy, under the guide of convenience, with a predominant focus on the temporal rather than the permanent. You adopt all of the risks, and gain very few of the benefits.

Nice to see Peter12 argue for the benefits of same-sex marriage. Very refreshing, Peter!

[CorsiHockeyLeague]

I'm going to have to respond really quickly so apologies for the haste

Originally Posted by MattyC

How can that be? Again, at it's most basic principal, the "government funded community center" is there to cater to all members of the community regardless of background, and the rules (or morality) of said institution should be flowing with the natural growth and changes f morals in the community.

A government funded community center may be able to satisfy the community's psychosocial needs. It might not, though - when did you last visit your community centre? Is it packed with people? Do you walk in and know everyone there?

For many communities, the local church is basically the community's lodestone even though it fulfils no government roles, which is why this is a misinterpretation of what was being suggested:

it should not be centre of a community that is made of people from many different backgrounds. This is pretty much the basis of separation of church and state.

No one is suggesting that the church, synagogue and / or mosque should govern.

And, if we're talking a future place, how are you going to get people who have renounced any sort of theist ideas?

That's part of the problem we're talking about. I'm an agnostic (an atheist by some people's definitions). The decline of religion has many good effects, but we can't be blind to some of the voids left, which also lead to significant social problems.

Our moral tribe already is a "government funded community centre". We follow the laws and morality of Canada which are voted on people we elect to vote on them. These morals are being ever adapted to new knowledge. It may be slow, but it's certainly a lot faster than the movement of religious morals.

First, this last sentence says a lot about your sense of morality as a progressive - that it's inherently a good thing for morality to be adapted "a lot faster", and in fact the slow march of Canadian law isn't fast enough for you.

Second, this is idealistic and doesn't really describe people. Almost no one has a moral code derived from Canada's laws. Most people don't even know what's in them, and there's a significant chunk of the population that think how our criminal law is applied (for example) doesn't meet their moral expectations. I'm not even going to get into tax laws. No, most people get their moral code elsewhere - if you're religious, it comes from your religious tradition as tempered by the community you belong to, if you're not, more and more it comes from your political ideology. The liberals are good, our platform is right and virtuous, the conservatives are morally bankrupt, or vice versa.

Both of these forms of moral tribalism cause problems, but given that at least in Canada the effect of moral tribalism in the religious sense is pretty impotent except to the extent it intrudes into politics (which it shouldn't), the latter is arguably more dangerous right now because of the polarization it creates. Admittedly, we're nowhere near the level of discord seen south of the border. Yet.

[Coach]

Originally Posted by CorsiHockeyLeague

I'm going to have to respond really quickly so apologies for the haste
A government funded community center may be able to satisfy the community's psychosocial needs. It might not, though - when did you last visit your community centre? Is it packed with people? Do you walk in and know everyone there?

The community center (and the church, etc..) are alagories for what we should be using to govern our collective moral compass. It's understandable that religious people would want their faith (ie moal compass) used as the benchmark for that, but what I'm getting at is that is simply can not be that way. We use our government and legal system to democratically decide the difference wbetween right and wrong. Does it always work? No. But it is fluid (as it should be) and religion is not.

For many communities, the local church is basically the community's lodestone even though it fulfils no government roles, which is why this is a misinterpretation of what was being suggested:

Sorry, I think that you're misintrepreting the original comment by peter. As noted above, the buildings are represetentative of our collective morality or "what a community should be built around". I'm not denying the good physical churches and the like can do for their communities at all.

No one is suggesting that the church, synagogue and / or mosque should govern.

Govern our morality, not the state. But in the end, particularly legally, doesn't that become the same thing? Peter's question was posed as "what would you want to build your community around, church, cathedral, mosque, etc.. or community center funded by the government?" As if we're talking about a fresh community, with no previous affiliations.

Absolutely it would be the community centre. Morality, consequence, legality and the differences between those things should be taught in school. The very nature of religion will come up their own ideas about those things, and that is fine, to an extent. As we see with a situation such as ISIS, there is a point where we have to say, "no, your religious freedom, your freedom to follow your own moral path is not without limit. We have collectively decided that murdering, raping, stealing, etc.. is morally and legally wrong regardless of what your favorite book says."

That's part of the problem we're talking about. I'm an agnostic (an atheist by some people's definitions). The decline of religion has many good effects, but we can't be blind to some of the voids left, which also lead to significant social problems.

Yeah I dont deny this at all.

First, this last sentence says a lot about your sense of morality as a progressive - that it's inherently a good thing for morality to be adapted "a lot faster", and in fact the slow march of Canadian law isn't fast enough for you.

Second, this is idealistic and doesn't really describe people. Almost no one has a moral code derived from Canada's laws. Most people don't even know what's in them, and there's a significant chunk of the population that think how our criminal law is applied (for example) doesn't meet their moral expectations. I'm not even going to get into tax laws. No, most people get their moral code elsewhere - if you're religious, it comes from your religious tradition as tempered by the community you belong to, if you're not, more and more it comes from your political ideology. The liberals are good, our platform is right and virtuous, the conservatives are morally bankrupt, or vice versa.

Right, but isn't the democratically elected law the agnostic version of an attempt at guiding the collective morality of the community? Certainly not everyone follows them, just like not everyone follows all the strict rules of their religion.

Both of these forms of moral tribalism cause problems, but given that at least in Canada the effect of moral tribalism in the religious sense is pretty impotent except to the extent it intrudes into politics (which it shouldn't), the latter is arguably more dangerous right now because of the polarization it creates. Admittedly, we're nowhere near the level of discord seen south of the border. Yet.

But the problem as become that we can't say "at least in Canada it's pretty good." That's true, but as a species we are connected now. We are one thing. We see what goes on in other places and it's becoming increasingly difficult to stand by and allow "cultural differences" cause oppression, poverty, death, etc.., particularly when it starts happening in our own nation. And so the question becomes "what can we do about it?" We can't denounce their cultural beliefs or attack them without angering more people into extremism. But we also can't just sit and watch them take over the world with hatred. How can we possibly fight against such a paradox?

[CliffFletcher]

Originally Posted by Itse

First of all, there wide variety of marriages and equivalent arrangements in human history is huge, and some are fairly recent. Married couples living apart for years for example has been very common no more than a few generations ago, as has been couples living together without marrying. The social significance of marriage still varies hugely even within one country.

In a more general sense, people benefit from social and economic bonds. People who they can rely on emotionally, and who can buffer them from material hardship. It can be siblings, extended family, church, a tightly-knit village - some protection from social and economic isolation.

The problem is that in most of those societies where marriage is breaking down, the other social networks have already declined. Community declined, extended family declined, church attendance declined. There's nothing to fill the deficit of social capital. So when the nuclear family goes, what's left is atomization and isolation.

This is where Westerners can learn something from immigrants. If you go to a public picnic site like Sandy Beach or North Glenmore Park, you'll notice that at least three-quarters of the sites are being used by visible minorities, typically in groups of 15+. Parents, grandparents, children, cousins, neighbours getting together and sharing their day. Their Western counterparts, presumably, are at home alone watching Netflix of playing Call of Duty. Who do you think will be better able to deal with the loss of a job, a failure to meet mortgage payments, a shortfall in education savings, or the ailing health of a senior? A Canadian living in a closely-knit kinship group of 20 relatives who he has built up tremendous social capital with, or a Canadian with a temporary girlfriend, a sibling halfway across the country they see once every two years, and divorced parents who they spend awkward Christmases with?

[peter12]

Originally Posted by rubecube

Also I can't be the only one who finds the notion of getting married because it statistically increases your earning potential a complete perversion of the concept, right?

Like all concepts, marriage is a complicated thing when put into practice. Economic security and social status are part of the overall package.

[Looch City]

Originally Posted by CliffFletcher

This is where Westerners can learn something from immigrants. If you go to a public picnic site like Sandy Beach or North Glenmore Park, you'll notice that at least three-quarters of the sites are being used by visible minorities, typically in groups of 15+. Parents, grandparents, children, cousins, neighbours getting together and sharing their day. Their Western counterparts, presumably, are at home alone watching Netflix of playing Call of Duty. Who do you think will be better able to deal with the loss of a job, a failure to meet mortgage payments, a shortfall in education savings, or the ailing health of a senior? A Canadian living in a closely-knit kinship group of 20 relatives who he has built up tremendous social capital with, or a Canadian with a temporary girlfriend, a sibling halfway across the country they see once every two years, and divorced parents who they spend awkward Christmases with?

Ha my relatives and I joke about that all the time and reminisce about how if this were back in Iran, any open green space would always be packed with families and friends.

[PsYcNeT]

Originally Posted by peter12

Like all concepts, marriage is a complicated thing when put into practice. Economic security and social status are part of the overall package.

You probably shouldn't marry someone you don't like.

[peter12]

Sorry, I think that you're misintrepreting the original comment by peter. As noted above, the buildings are represetentative of our collective morality or "what a community should be built around". I'm not denying the good physical churches and the like can do for their communities at all.

No, Corsi got it right. I also never said that only one should dominate, but that a community is a complex intertwining of private and public institutions. However, if you had read the rest of my comment, you would see that I mentioned how important it was that these institutions were given the freedom to adapt to local circumstances.

Govern our morality, not the state. But in the end, particularly legally, doesn't that become the same thing? Peter's question was posed as "what would you want to build your community around, church, cathedral, mosque, etc.. or community center funded by the government?" As if we're talking about a fresh community, with no previous affiliations.

Start abstract, and start fleshing out what it looks like in practice. Government services are absolutely important. At no point, did I say that fraternal organizations and churches could do it alone.