Parallels with the Witnesses are tempting, primarily the absence of a dignified way to leave without harsh judgement of divine retribution or "repudiating" the (Divine) "Truth". At least the Witnesses are prepared to await God's killing of apostates, with to date, no extremist variants that declare it part of the Divine plan to personally take it upon themselves to kill apostates this side of Judgement Day.
Lifting the Veil on "Islamophobia"
by cofty 108 Replies latest social current
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Oubliette
Steve, although JWs do not practice stoning, WT literature makes it clear they would if they could.
Make no mistake, shunning is the psychological equivalent of capital punishment.
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Laika
Religious people can be very inconsistent. My JW brother-in-law shares cigars with me from time to time, gambles, drinks way too much and talks to disfellowshipped friends, but still attends meetings and gets upset when I say anything 'apostate'.
I have no doubt that Ayaan has suffered, I'd never downplay that as an ExJW but people like Sam Harris have an agenda that forces them to buy into a kind of simplistic thinking that needs to categorise people imo.
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bohm
Laika: but people like Sam Harris have an agenda that forces them to buy into a kind of simplistic thinking that needs to categorise people imo
What part of the article is simplistic thinking? Where is the Quran misrepresented by sam harris and hirsi ali?
- Is it misrepresented as condoning bodily mutilation as punishment for smaller crimes?
- Is it misrepresented as condoning killing apostates?
- Is it misrepresented as being deeply anti-women, ie. womens testimony is worth half of a man and so on?
or is it muslims who are being misrepresented? In which case, can you point to some large muslim organization who actually (in writing) say they do not think the Quran and muhammed was correct on the above 3 points?
Why is it whenever there is a muslim on TV over here, and I am talking about the major spokespeople for muslims who has had the benefit of university education and living in peace in one of the worlds richest countries, whenever he or she get asked directly on one of the above questions they keep giving a non-answer: "Q) do you think apostates should be killed? A) I do not think it is relevant in the xxxx society to attempt to enact such a law and I am not actively trying to make it a law".
In short, on what major points of fact are sam harris and hirsi ali in error?
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Paralipomenon
For me, the very nature of Islam is a dormant political entity. The end goal of Islam is to spread Sharia Law and rule to all countries. Once is place, it crushes democratic laws and persecutes all other religious beliefs.
I have yet to see a moderate muslim government and do not wish to live under Islamic rule.
So long as it remains a sleeping political entity, I will oppose it. It is not a "phobia", it is the product of an educated, deeply researched project that leads me to concern. I don't feel Islam should be banned, but so long as it has a political agenda, it should be required to register and promote itself as a political party.
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LisaRose
Very well put Paralipomenon, I have to agree. I know there are many moderate Muslims who don't believe in extremist sharia law, but you cannot ignore the fact that there are many extreme Muslims would take us back to the stone age when it comes to women's rights and religious freedom.
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Oubliette
Paralipomenon: It is not a "phobia", it is the product of an educated, deeply researched project that leads me to concern.
Exactly correct!
According to Merriam-Websters, a phobia is
: an exaggerated usually inexplicable and illogical fear of a particular object, class of objects, or situation
When one takes a good, hard objective look at the facts, there is nothing inexplicable or illogical in being afraid of fundamentalist Islam. It is a very dangerous belief system.
LisaRose said it right. Just imagine a world where we all lived under Islamic law. Who of us would want to live there? That would be worse that being a JW for goodness sakes!
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cofty
can you point to some large muslim organization who actually (in writing) say they do not think the Quran and muhammed was correct on the above 3 points?
This is the challenge to anybody who claims that there is such a thing as a benign version of Islam.
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MeanMrMustard
I think a distinction needs to be made: There is a difference between Islam and Mulims. In every religion, you will have some people that don't know a lot about the teachings, and yet still claim membership. You will have some people that go to the church/mosque/KH and watch the leaders preach about what they should be doing according to God, and then go home, eat, and don't do any of what the preacher/preist/s heikh/elder said to do.
But that doesn't change the ideology, it doesn't change the distinction. Just because there are more moderate Muslims, doesn't mean the ideology isn't violent. I am worried that the "extremeists" are simply the Muslims that are following their religion, and the "moderate" Muslims are the ones that are choosing to ignore parts of their religion/political system.
MMM
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KateWild
I have to agree that I have observed Islam in the UK becoming more fundamentalist and very sexist, for a western country it seems to have taken a u-turn since the days of my youth. Many Muslims from my youth living in Western society were non religious and not sexist, but as the years have passed I have witnessed awful sexisim.
IMO I think Islam can sometimes be just an excuse for a man to treat his wife and daughters as slaves, I think there is more of a problem with FGMs now than there used to be 20 yrs ago.
If boys are brought up to think they can treat women abusively and get away with it they will do so, non religious Muslim men, who smoke and drink alcohol don't necessarily treat women as equals. I also think it is much easier to become a non-religious Muslim man than to leave Islam as a woman.
Polygamy is leagl in a lot of Muslim countries, and some Muslim men marry western women illegally in order to have multiple families in multiple countries and allow the state to care for their families.
I have to say I have met many lovely, kind Muslims. I am not prejudice and will befriend anyone with good qualities regardless of race or religion, I just hate Islam as a Religion and it's policies.
Kate xx