Islamic free speech/diversity training

True, IMO. There are many Islams. It is not the same a Turk or an Indonesian that an Iraqi or a Iranian. There are in addition sects like the Shiites or the Sunnis and so on. To encompass all Muslims under one definition is simply ridiculous. I think it is capital to understand who is the enemy in this war. Islam need some fixing, a revolution like the one Christianism underwent , and probably what we are witnessing now expressed as terrorism is just a reaction against those changes that are inefable, inevitable. But we have to understand that Islam is not the enemy.

If so, then what? Should we anhililate one fourth of the population of the world?

 

Absolutely true, Uncle Janko. Here they were sweating blood to hide and even justify the atrocities that took place (and still happen) in Sudan while they put people in the streets to demostrate against "terrorist" Bush and the Iraq war. It is cynism at its greatest form of expression.

As I said earlier, the Left (liberals is a word that here in Europe mens something else ) has a tacit alliance with Islamic forces against capitalism. There are tons of great articles that point out in this direction. Please find attached a great article I found last week in the Internet abouth the Euro- Arab axis. I am shivering.

 

Perhaps I am naive. I really don't understand why people like you love killing.

I don't understand why you rejoice at the sight of Iraqi children with their heads blown off. And I don't understand why people like Osama rejoice at the death of American children. I don't get it.

There are people on both sides who want it to stop. Stop now. No more vengance. But on both sides, there are those who tell those people that they are naive. That the enemy is evil and the enemy will not stop until they are destroyed, so it is pointless to try to end it.

I know that you want to perpetuate this cycle of violence, and I hope you get a chance to play an active role in doing so.

 

Eurabia

 

Oh geez, how could I have been so stupid as to "cry out loudly" about Catholic priests raping little boys? I should have realized that they were Christians, so I should just let it go.

Now, tell me, who is making excuses for the murder of Van Gogh? I said that it is assinine to blame it on Islam. That is not making an excuse.

And for that matter, please show me examples of any "Western Liberal" making excuses for any of the things you mentioned.

 

Don't worry too much, grgrwll...I suspect a lot of it has to do with the fact that you don't know the first thing about me, but don't let that get in the way of your passing judgements such as that quoted above.

I hope you don't mind, but I've crafted a little poem from your words.

Keep hating.
Keep killing.
Keep belittling other people's beliefs. (most Christians... advocate wholesale genocide of Muslims.)
Muslims are pigs. (the victims of Christian-fueled hate.)
Sure, one could make that argument. It would be moronic.
Oh how nice.
Yeah, right.
We rape the shit out of them (Ya gotta "break some eggs)
Those of us who don't hate (understand) ((This is manifestly not true.))
Stop. Just stop. Stop the hatred.
I know that you want to perpetuate this cycle of violence, and I hope you get a chance to play an active role in doing so.

 

One could make the argument, but I'm not sure that I would agree with it.

Here's what the US State Department thinks of the religious situation in Turkey:

http://www.state.gov/g/drl/rls/irf/2001/5694.htm

Islam's Semitic features: its community (as opposed to individual) emphasis and its divinely sanctioned legalism do present hurdles that some other religions don't face when accomodating to democracy.

But Judaism probably is the paradigm of that sort of religion and the Jews seem to handle modern democracy pretty well, all in all.

I think that the problem is less with Islam itself than with how many Muslims relate to it and conceptualize it. To be blunt, much of the Islamic world still has a medieval tone. There was never a Muslim renaissance, a Muslim scientific revolution or a Muslim enlightenment.

Instead, their world turned away from philosophical rationalism post-al-Ghazzali and kind of drifted off into popular piety and Sufi mysticism that was rudely shaken awake by European colonialism. The Muslims suddenly awoke one morning to the realization of their inability to compete with the West and rushed off on various frantic missions to reform themselves.

One direction was the Western-style secularism of the "young Turks". But the more popular "reformist" direction was traditionalist, what we call "fundamentalism". Muslims sought to transform their civilization by its own internal resources, denouncing their own corruption and by returning to the fundamental purity of the faith that they imagined had brought their ancestors victory in the 7'th century.

It's Islamic Revolution of the sort that brought the Saudi wahabis, the Iranian ayatollahs and the Afghan taliban to power. (And threatens to claim post-Saddam Iraq.)

I'm not convinced that Islam has to follow that path any more than Jews have to wear black and grow side curls, and refuse to drive cars on the Sabbath.

There are historical reasons why so many Muslims choose to take a political-fundamentalist theocratic path. I don't think it's because their religion doesn't contain other potentialities within it.

Europe managed to emerge from the religio-centric mindset of the middle ages, Judaism transcended its God-given religious law. Islam can probably accomplish it too.

But it isn't inevitable that it will happen, or that if modernization does happen, that the transformation will go down any more peacefully than Christianity's.

Echos of that centuries long struggle for the mind and soul of Western civilization still reverberate today on the American religious right.

 

In this, you are absolutely correct.

I don't want this "war to the death", but if it comes to us then by God the US and its allies (which will be there once Kerry takes the reins of office in January) will defeat this new threat to world peace utterly and absolutely, with not even a fly left alive in Arab lands if that is what is required to protect all the rest of us who share this precious mother Earth.

 

stromata

Pedophile "priests"-- hang 'em high as Haman, as far as I'm concerned. To try to blame me for the crimes of that sect's personnel would be a bit like blaming the Aga Khan for Wahhabi/Salafi atrocities (except that the Left's fairness doctrine would find only the latter false blame to be offensive), but go ahead, if it makes you feel better. The confusion of terms is deliberate and interesting. Pedophilia is equated with sexism. Oh, yeah, right, after feminists have been telling us (rightly) that rape is a crime of violence and not of sex.

It is worth recording that the Founder of the blood-lust-crazed Christian religion did not "marry" a nine-year-old girl.

It is worth recording that on the third Sunday of October every year we commemorate liturgically the victims of the Inquisition as martyrs for the faith.


As I look out the rectory window and see the mobs of Christians screaming "Kill all Muslims", I wonder how I can control the passions I have so evilly unleashed. Yup, mobs of Christians howling their blood lust in the streets of "Palestine" when the Petronas Towers were blown up by Presbyterian terrorists. Oh, how I shudder. How I weep when I think of the airplane flown into Bashar al-Assad's secret police HQ by a band of Quaker (FUM, of course) hijackers. How I am filled with shame at the parochial school kids sent out as suicide bombers by Lutherans and Adventists. It's good that I have no ethics at all and the scent of murder always in my nose, 'cause otherwise it would be a tad depressing.

To paraphrase Milton, in light of JLV's trenchant observations, "new Muhammad is old Marcuse writ large." The unspent wrath of would-be Weathermen now has a new set of proxy killers to applaud.

Funny thing. The hideous murder of a young gay man who brings up sex to the wrong people in a shabby American bar is a hate crime. The murder of a flamboyant gay politician who brings up Islamic hostility to Dutch civil society is not a hate crime. The murder of a Christian cleric who brings up Christ to the wrong people in the southern Philippines is not a hate crime. The "moderate" west coast imam's calling Jews "apes and pigs" is not a hate crime.

Also, where on earth did President Bush say Muslims had no souls? He is a malapropist of nucular proportions, but I just don't believe he said it. Julius Streicher would understand the tactic well, however.

 

No

Hi Bill,

I'm specifically talking about Turkey. Constitutionally, Turkey is thoroughly secular. You might not call Atatürk's reforms a renaissance, However -

http://web.deu.edu.tr/atiksu/ataturk/14ani.html

http://web.deu.edu.tr/atiksu/ataturk/15ani.html

 

Thanks, Charles.

 

I am trying to understand why you guys debate on the islam/muslim issue.

It doesn't matter if you're a dem or rep, black or white, pro life or pro choice, the bottom line is that these extremists want us non-muslims dead. It's okay to have these debates, but in the long run we still have to work together as AMERICANS.

These people will stop short of nothing to kill us all, and everyone knows that.

Since we are on the subject I'll pitch in... EVERYTHING I LEARNED ABOUT ISLAM I LEARNED ON 9-11. How's that?

 

Whoa.. Dude.. Where do you get off making such claims? Remember the 90's? Our troops went to Somalia (a Muslim country) to feed the hungry. 18 Army Rangers And Delta Force operators gave their lives in Mogadishu in one day. Do you remember why? It was because we went after Aidid after he massacred 28 Pakistani soldiers (Pakistan also a Muslim country).

In the late 90's we bombed the crap out of the "Christian" Serbs ("Christian" in its loose terminology). Do you remember why? To protect the Muslims in that country..

I admit that I distrust Muslims although I know that not all muslims are bad. But I DO NOT WANT THEM MASSACRED, as you claim. And no, I do not hate them, I just distrust them.

Dude, you are a looney.

 

Javilla and Uncle Janko, you guys are hilarious! I totally agree with you.
I think that maybe our intentions are being misunderstood by grgrwell-->we intend to stop those who wish to kill us. War is not fun and who, other than these extremists (who once again wish to kill us <they even wish to kill you>), find glory in this? We intend to stop them using every weapon that is at our disposal (to keep us all alive <yes, even you>). I'd much rather use dialogue/diplomacy but on 9/11 they dictated to us how they want to "talk". Our armed forces are trying to hunt the bad guys down over there (and to only kill them but it's kind of hard to tell who is with us and who is against us <and that's probably because one minute they are with us and then a few minutes later they're against us> ). Can you imagine that our soldiers are over there killing and dying to preserve your right to think lowly of them? Unbelievable. Who are you rooting for?

 

We have killed 100,000 Iraqi civilians who could not have cared less about the United States. They didn't want to kill us. Most had no clear idea of who we are. They weren't fighting us. But we killed them. And for what?

I am all for killing the terrorists. But that is NOT what we are doing. Osama is taunting us, and 100,000 Iraqi civilians, who had nothing to do with this, are dead.

I have some problems with what is going on in Iraq, but it is not the fault of our soldiers. I always support our soldiers, and I will NEVER denigrate the medals earned by a solidier because I happen to disagree with his/her political views.

Yet that seems to be a favorite pastime for the "real American patriots."

 

War is rough and I could never condone the killing of innocent civilians but it's an unfortunate part of war. Do you think that Osama even blinked at the fact that he killed thousands of civilians? Here's where you're going to say: "He only killed 3 thousand of us and we've killed 100,000 of them!", right?

I imagine if the people that worked at the WTC or the Pentagon had known that there was an attack coming, they probably wouldn't have gone to work--they probably would have left the city/state. As horrible as this sounds...I believe we gave advance notice to the Iraqi people (they knew we were coming). No, I'm not a warmonger but I was flipping the channels the other day and this guy walked in this club (he was preparing to shoot it up) and he announced: "Anybody that wants to live, get out!" and those who wanted to live did just that (and in a hurry). It made me think about what's going on in Iraq. No, I'm not implying that this collateral damage is acceptable (because it's not) but can you tell me why you expect us to be the only side to be civil in this war?

 

Thank you for brining this up. In fact, I will say quite the opposite. For a variety of reasons, I believe that Osama killing 3,000 Americans is actually worse than us killing 100,000 Iraqi's. There are many other factors, but to be sure, he wanted to kill far more, and we wanted to kill far fewer.

While it certainly would have been much more difficult for the average Iraqi to get to safety, I certainly think you make a good point.

Yes. Because, to me, that is what we are fighting for. We don't target civilians. We don't torture people. We don't conquer countries - we liberate them. As soon as we give up those values, we become no different from our enemies. And that is why it is incumbent for us to be "civil" even if our enemies will not.

On Friday, I heard Bill O'Reilly saying that we should learn some lessons from Saddam Hussein in how to run Iraq, and I really wondered what we are fighting for.

 

grgrwll,

I didn't hear Bill say that but it reminds me of something that I said on another board. After we toppled the regime and the Iraqi people turned on us it made me think: "There was a reason Saddam ruled the country the way he did.". No, I'm not justifying it (at all) but....the entire world sees.

Other than the prisoner "abuse", I'm very proud of our troops. Now I use the term "abuse" loosely because from what I can tell it was more prisoner "ridicule". I think we have been very civil. I don't recall us kidnapping people or decapitating soldiers/civilians. When you consider what they're up against, I think they've done an awesome job.

G, you're sharp! I can tell that...you can get your point across without alienating everyone on the board (and you should). That's conducive to good dialogue.

 

I agree.

But then my question is: Why did we invade Iraq? After the WMD excuse fell through, Bush claimed that it was to "liberate" the people of Iraq. If we are going to adopt Saddam's tactics, the obviously, that was a lie.

In the 2000 election, when Bush spoke out about using our troops for "nation building," I thought he made some good points. There are many things that must be in place BEFORE democracy can be established. Political Scientists refer to this as a "civil society." It includes a free press, tolerance for diverse ideas, etc. None of these factors were in place in Iraq. It would have been incredibly foolish to think that we could go into Iraq and establish a democracy. And the Bush adminstration are not fools. They knew that it wouldn't happen, but they lied to us because their other "justifications" had been exposed.

 

G,

I remember when President Bush made the speech about "nation building" and I agreed with him but alot happened between the time he made the speech and the time we went to war in Iraq. He didn't lie to get us there. He said the same thing that Clinton was saying when he was in office--which happened to be the same thing that John Kerry was saying (before the election of course)--they all thought they would find WMD in Iraq. You really can't point the finger at any one of those individuals though because they're not the ones out in the field collecting the intelligence--they were all wrong (although they are ultimately accountable). Being wrong isn't the same as being a liar.

Have you ever been to that area of the world? I have and it may have biased me a little but I honestly think that war is the only thing that they understand. Kerry was on crack when he suggested having "summits" to resolve this. How can you rationalize with people who don't value life? They value death. Can you imagine standing watch over a group of people who you know would slit your throat if they had a chance? I have so I'm stuck in the middle--I want to help them but I know we can't trust them. That entire region is oppressed and I applaud the President for doing whatever he can to help them. I'd rather we not be at war but we all know that the U.N. hadn't done anything and wouldn't have done anything (especially when it was in their benefit not to <bribery>). I hated going over there in "peace" time and I am really tired of our guys being there now. I think the moment the people turned on us, we should have left. Of course there would have been worldwide outrage but...we stayed and there's still worldwide outrage! lol Don't get me wrong, I think it's honourable that our President is going to keep his word but the sooner the elections are held, and that we finish training their troops, we can get our heroes back home.