LONDON—A U.K. jury found Anjem Choudary, a prominent radical Islamic preacher, guilty of inviting support for Islamic State, underscoring efforts by authorities to stem the spread of violent extremism.
Authorities accused Mr. Choudary, a trained lawyer, of praising the extremist group in a series of online comments.
Mr. Choudary, 49 years old, was found guilty of a single count of inviting support for a banned organization. The jury reached its verdict July 28, but a court-imposed restriction meant it could only be reported on Tuesday.
Mr. Choudary’s close associate, 33-year-old Mohammed Mizanur Rahman, was also found guilty of the same charge. The two men are due to be sentenced on Sept. 6 at London’s Central Criminal Court, known as the Old Bailey.
Authorities in the U.K. and other Western countries have long expressed frustration about how to deal with fundamentalist Islamic leaders who they allege use laws ensuring freedom of speech and religion as a shield to espouse controversial views.
As much as I think that guy is basically scum, I'm not at all comfortable with that being a law. Dude should be able to invite support for whatever he wants, as long as he's not actually suggesting people kill other people... which admittedly would be a fine line to walk when it comes to being pro-ISIS.
__________________ "The great promise of the Internet was that more information would automatically yield better decisions. The great disappointment is that more information actually yields more possibilities to confirm what you already believed anyway." - Brian Eno
The thread title could be labelled "The failure of the regressive left to deal with ____________."
I don't know if it's because my balls are turning grey and starting to sag to my knees in the last few years but the regressive left seems to be everywhere. It's a scourge over influencing too many issues and yet at the same time completely failing to balance extreme right wing energies.
Sorry for the derail.
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Originally Posted by Biff
If the NHL ever needs an enema, Edmonton is where they'll insert it.
The thread title could be labelled "The failure of the regressive left to deal with ____________."
I don't know if it's because my balls are turning grey and starting to sag to my knees in the last few years but the regressive left seems to be everywhere. It's a scourge over influencing too many issues and yet at the same time completely failing to balance extreme right wing energies.
Sorry for the derail.
Great custom user title material in that post.
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What will it take for you to admit change is happening? Sharia law across western nations? Or something more minor such as separate swimming pools for men and women?
This was my first post in the thread so not sure why you're directing these questions at me while completely dodging the question I asked.
I'm just trying to understand when you had the ideal "western way of life" which you claim is under attack and being destroyed.
If something has changed so much as you put it; you must have a reference point as to when it was right. When was that? What are you wanting to go back to?
Sincere question: how different is it from when white, Chinese, Mexican, or Trinidadian teens join violent organized criminal organizations? Are similar dynamics at play? Are the consequences less severe?
This is clouding the issue unnecessarily. The answer is they all do for different reasons which can be explained rationally.
And they also don't join violent gangs in the same numbers that culturally-Muslim teens join ISIS.
Sincere question: how different is it from when white, Chinese, Mexican, or Trinidadian teens join violent organized criminal organizations? Are similar dynamics at play? Are the consequences less severe?
Sure, gangs attract alienated young men who are trying to prove themselves. What they don't do it inspire those young men to commit mass murder against strangers and kill themselves in the process. There's a vanishingly small number of organizations or credos that have proven to have that level of malign influence (a handful of death cults), and only one that has spawned hundreds of thousands of murderous fanatics.
There's more to it than Islam, but Islam is an essential element.
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If this day gets you riled up, you obviously aren't numb to the disappointment yet to be a real fan.
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This is clouding the issue unnecessarily. The answer is they all do for different reasons which can be explained rationally.
And they also don't join violent gangs in the same numbers that culturally-Muslim teens join ISIS.
Wow is that ever not true. Estimates of teen gang members in the US are over a million. Numbers quoted for ISIS militants are anywhere from 12,000 to 30,000 total.
The difference is who they attack. Gang members tend to attack other gang members and maybe paticipate in some crime against non-gang members in their area. ISIS is hitting places all over the world, in coordinated efforts, but that doesn't necessarily take a lot of people. In fact, the fewer possible, the better I would think. It does, however, reach a wider audience. And they're not just in a turf war for part of a city, their in a idelogical war with a world that has moved on from their barabaric rules.
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Wow is that ever not true. Estimates of teen gang members in the US are over a million. Numbers quoted for ISIS militants are anywhere from 12,000 to 30,000 total.
The difference is who they attack. Gang members tend to attack other gang members and maybe paticipate in some crime against non-gang members in their area. ISIS is hitting places all over the world, in coordinated efforts, but that doesn't necessarily take a lot of people. In fact, the fewer possible, the better I would think. It does, however, reach a wider audience. And they're not just in a turf war for part of a city, their in a idelogical war with a world that has moved on from their barabaric rules.
I did specify that the gangs were violent. I think the only groups of a similar level to ISIS are the Mexican cartels.
US Gangs don't kill in the name of a God for the glory of God, nor for the rewards of the afterlife.
That distinction is incredibly important. When you deal with Jihad, you cannot apologize their violence and determination away as just disaffected youths or any of that simplification of the issue.
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US Gangs don't kill in the name of a God for the glory of God, nor for the rewards of the afterlife.
That distinction is incredibly important. When you deal with Jihad, you cannot apologize their violence and determination away as just disaffected youths or any of that simplification of the issue.
I agree that the distinction is very important. They are fighting a desperate battle for beliefs that are being forced to disappear. They will hold onto it because you can't pull them out of it with offers of opportunity, like you possibly can with gang members. It is an indoctrination of their mind, a literal brainwashing. Some I would assume are straight up psychos, and like most organizations, those people are probably at the very top. But the rest is largely a collection of people that really do believe this is the way to live, and that's scary.
But I would also lean in the direction that a teen joining ISIS, particularly those that live in the ME, is born out of similar circumstance.
- Lack of proper education
- Born into the area most affected by both sides of the conflict, and thus psychologically damaged.
- Likely faces pressure from older local people to join, possibly even with threats of violence.
- Attempts to defect, or showing dissent, maybe lead to harm to oneself or loved ones.
After decades of post-modernism, Western societies also have very little offer as an attractive alternative.
A lot of the attackers - at least in Europe - hold a lot of similarities to the general Western underclass - marijuana abuse, out of wedlock children, and heavy pornography use.
They are losers in every sense of the word, but not victims. The rhetoric of Islam holds more potency than the crude cultural gangster signalling of an inner-city or cartel gang.
The topic is worth discussing, but things quickly devolve into a conversation about how best to define a term. Then it is a logical fallacy bitchfight. After that the conversation moves to pedantic arguments. Online discussions more and more skirt the actual topic and end up in one up man ship about who can pick apart the previous posters reply the best.
The lefts reaction to ISlam is a concern. But so is the rights. Let's discuss the issue and not the language around the issue.
Edit : the last page is much better
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Sincere question: how different is it from when white, Chinese, Mexican, or Trinidadian teens join violent organized criminal organizations? Are similar dynamics at play? Are the consequences less severe?
The difference is the ideology. The teachings.
Trinidadians (I assume) do not have a religion that preaches their deity is a warrior that will/should conquer all others. Whites (and many other races) usually follow the teachings of Jesus, Yahweh, or Joseph Smith, or other religions that generally teach (or, are interpreted as) non-conquerors.
My comment is not intended to glorify the religion of the white race. Buddhism, Hinduism, and virtually all polytheism is similar or more benevolent.
Islam does not preach self-immolation, patience or tolerance. It makes special claims for itself, is interpreted strictly, and is uniquely problematic.
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There's always two sides to an argument, and it's always a tie.
Western societies have little to offer as an alternative to rhetoric that preaches the subjugation of pretty much any person that is not a straight Muslim male to the point of outright torture and barbaric forms of execution for even the most basic transgressions?
Come on. There are a lot of issues in western societies, but the idea that there aren't attractive alternatives to plenty of Muslim people better than violent crusading is complete garbage.
And, really the tough part of the issue is fihgting it only breeds more hate. Which is really where this uber-liberalism idea is coming from. What can we do? We try to help, but in the process innocents die, and thus more extremeists are created. We try to win with peaceful resolution while a band of psychopaths, morons, and disenfranchised people attempt to take over the world while the rest of us hold hands hoping they just figure out that this is not cool behavior because we keep saying so.
The only solution can come from within Islam itself, how is anyone not Islamic supposed to help this? What would you suggest for attractie alternatives? Christianity? They sure as f*** don't want that.
I think a lot of people miss the importance of the youths being attracted to Jihad, the belief in a Moral superiority, that God is on their side. Muhammed only successfully started to spread Islam when he started Jihad and military conquest, this idea is strong in groups like Isis, the idea that the long war of slowly taking over the west with more becoming Muslims, increasing the populations by birth rates.
We have so many cases in the past of nations which at one point Muslims were a tiny minority ended up after many decades as a majority Muslim nation.
The Quran, the Hadiths and the Biography of Muhammad are not just about being a Muslim, but a massive amount of it deals with how to deal with the non believer, how to govern, conquer, etc.. Its a religion that has a template on its own civilization, unlike the other Abrahmic faiths deal so much more with how to be a believer.
Actualyl Matty, the older generations of Muslims in Europe are much more liberal and this is the biggest surprise most people are not aware of.
In the UK, the contrast is stark, youths in Muslim families with what we would see as moderate and even liberal parents/relatives are seeing their children becoming radicalized.
Majiid Nawaz discusses this quite frequently, and its very worrisome because if we go back 20-30 years in the Middle east, this level of radicalization wasn't like it is today, things have progressively gotten worse.
Highly recommend this video, where he talks about his own radicalization and what is happening with the youth in Islam, int he west, in the Middle east, Asia...
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Last edited by Thor; 08-17-2016 at 12:22 AM.
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Actually that doesn't really surprise me. I don't disagree that we all have to denounce the acts of ISIS (and other outdated practices) and fight against them ideologically, the difficulty comes in how to do that, as a non-Muslim person, without also marginilizing Islam itself, and therefore pushing more people to extremism as you denounce their fundamental beliefs. It's not hard to see why a young person would look at what goes on the US, the hate that is being spewed about them (Islamics, not necessarily just ISIS) there and in other nations, and have an angry response. Imagine the garbage we see shat all over Fox News and the like but reversed and propaganized against something that is a fundamental truth to you. Something that you build your life around. Even if youre a peaceful person it would make you angry, possibly enough to bring about violence. Think about how mad some people get over something as minor as a sports match.
Now, I don't know if I believe in something passionately enough to kill someone over it, but we do have to find a way to fight it without A) physically fighting it and B) angering even more people with rhetoric that groups them as a single entity that is a plague on society. We have a few of those, neither ISIS, nor Islam are alone in that regard.
So while we should all be against what they stand for, what can we really do? That's not a throw my hands up and give up statement, it's a sincere question. What is there to do? Even as a Muslim moderate, what can they do? There's a lot of people throwing up how they should be denouncing the actions, and publically shaming it all. There is terror and bravery involved in those actions that is not in everyone's DNA. It's part of the way we need to fight it, but people also need to understand that doing so, in major ways, involves putting their, and their loved one's safety at risk. Would you do that? If the KKK had another uprising and was bombing people who disagreed with them all over the world, would you be holding large Christian, gatherings denouncing their actions publically, a group known to torture and murder for far less?
The world needs people who put themselves in harms way to do good, but it's not an accident that those people generally end up dead, and that they are few and far between. It's easy to sit at a keyboard and claim we want to be part of the solution, but how hard are you really willing to try?
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