Oklahoma beheading - Islam is a disease

by Simon 1524 Replies latest members adult

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  Frazzled UBM

  It would be nice if mana11 would indeed clarify on the thread that he is not advocating wiping out all 1.6 billion muslims.

  Simon - part of the problem is that I believe you are asking the wrong question - you look at the Fanatics and say can the Fanatics use the Quran to promote violence, if so Islam is the problem? The answer to this question is obviosuly yes as that is exactly what they do -- in the same way the WBTS misuses the Bible to operate a cult. Just because it is possible to do that doesn't mean that the Fanatics represent Islam or that all Muslims believe the same thing and everything I posted was trying to show this. If you actually ask the question - is Islam now a violent religion? and you looked at what proportion of Muslims are violent in the name of the religion and what proportion are peaceful (so look at behaviour rather than words) then you would have to conclude that the overwhelming majority - well over 99 percent - are peaceful. It goes to the analogy of the blind man and the elephant I used long ago.

  The other thing that annoys me is being characterised as defending Islam. I am not a defender of Islam, I am very aware of and critical of its shortcomings and the need for social and attitudianl change in the Muslim world, but I am a promoter of tolerance towards non-fanatical Muslims and their rights to their beliefs, however misguided and I am arguing against the flawed proposition that Islam and mainstream Muslims are to be blame for ISIS and other Islamic fanatics. It is fanaticism that is to blame. Anyway - I know it is futile to rehearse all of this again as both sides of the argument have been debating at cross-purposes now for 72 pages.
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  Frazzled UBM

  One tactic which has been used over and over again in this so called debate is the creation of a strawman Islam by people who have no idea about Islamic beliefs and then demolish the Strawman with relish. Alphaman is Exhibit A: "Islam has the Prophet Muhammad who wrote a holy book full of hate and promoting the killing of all Jews and people everywhere who will not convert to Islam. The agenda of Muhammad and Islam is the exact same agenda. World domination where only that particular agenda and ideology is allowed." It is not possible to have a rational debate with such people.
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  AlphaMan

  Alphaman is Exhibit A: "Islam has the Prophet Muhammad who wrote a holy book full of hate and promoting the killing of all Jews and people everywhere who will not convert to Islam. The agenda of Muhammad and Islam is the exact same agenda. World domination where only that particular agenda and ideology is allowed." It is not possible to have a rational debate with such people.

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  HA.....it's all true, and even in the Koran and promoted by Islamic leaders. I notice you can't refute it AND you left out the comparison of Islam to Nazism, because you know it's true. Get your head out of the sand. LOL
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  Frazzled UBM

  Alphaman - I have made numerous posts on this thread with extracts from Islamic sources showing your characterisation of Islam to be wrong (all that happened when I did this was that cognitive dissonance set in and the argument was that they were engaging in a form of Islamic theological warfare - i.e. we know what these people are really like and so if they say good things they must be lying) - why don't you provide evidence based on a thorough, as opposed to your preferred selective literalist approach, review of Islamic literature in support of your claims. You set yourself up as an expert who knows the Truth but I suspect the reality is that you know very little about Islam and you have no interest in actually understanding it. Don't let knowledge get in the way of prejudice.
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  Simon

  If you actually ask the question - is Islam now a violent religion? and you looked at what proportion of Muslims are violent in the name of the religion and what proportion are peaceful (so look at behaviour rather than words) then you would have to conclude that the overwhelming majority - well over 99 percent - are peaceful. It goes to the analogy of the blind man and the elephant I used long ago.

  I disagree. If you take away the terrorism entirely you are still left with a cruel ideology responsible for numerous human rights abuses and daily barbaric treatment for many people.

  You claim over 99 percent are peacful but way more than 1% support the barbaric cruelty that goes on in islamic-governed countries, openly in areas where islam has a strong influence and in secret within western countries.

  You are simply making up a claim that not only doesn't have the facts to back it up, it has facts that contradict it.

  You are taking terrorism and then using the lack of it by 99% of the population to claim that all those people are peaceful and so by definition, islam has no problem. Forget that more that 1% support even terrorism. That is where your logical error is.
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  Simon

  I think some are fooled - the extremists of islam are so extreme that people imagine everything else is moderate by comparison.

  The reality is the majority of islam is of course more moderate than the islamic extremists (duh, definition of the word 'extreme') but that does not actually make them moderate in an absolute sense, only relative.

  The catalog of islamic human rights abuses is long, growing and depressing.

  We want to support the reformers who want to change islam so that it stops promoting and supporting these things. They get no support if the only message is "nothing wrong here, move along now" !

  I don't see why this aim is a concept that any sensible moral or liberal person would possibly object to.

  Apparently some people think they know more about islam than islamic reformers who are saying these very things.
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  AlphaMan

  I suspect the reality is that you know very little about Islam and you have no interest in actually understanding it. Don't let knowledge get in the way of prejudice.

  
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  cofty

  I think there are two debates going on.

  We all agree that there is a problem with radical, violent Islamists.

  Most of us agree that this is a relatively small percentage of the 1.6 billion Muslims in the world. A worrying significant group also claim to approve or sympathise with this violence.

  Some people refuse to see the connection between the teachings of Mo and the behaviour of these extremists. This seems to me to be the epitome of wilfull blindness. It is like saying there is no connection between the Watchtower and a teenager who dies refusing blood.

  A second debate concerns another, massive group of conservative Muslims who do not engage in violence.

  These hundreds of millions of muslims take the words and traditions of the quran seriously. Their backward, hate-filled, misogynistic, insular, ideology has no place in civilised society.

  Outside those two circles there is a large group who know little about their holy book and who have been raised in enlightened communities that define Islam in more vague terms about charity and goodness.

  Most of us know people from this more westernised group. The chances are they are not entirely immune from the misogyny of their faith but they see themselves as full citizens of enlightened liberal democracies.

  How can this, mostly silent group, take control of the agenda? I don't think they can. Threats of beheading by the first group tends to trump niceness.
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  Simon

  A second debate concerns another, massive group of conservative Muslims who do not engage in violence.

  I think this group doesn't engage in "terrorist" type violence but a large number either engage in or directly support domestic abuses of minorities, women and children and see nothing wrong with brutal punishments.

  Some people seem to be classing this is 'not violent' when if it happened to even a fraction of the extent elsewhere there would be an ooutcry. Because it has the label of islam on it but isn't the extreme violence of terrorism then it's dismissed and not counted against islam.

  The reality is that there are lots of brutal killings and other treatments that go on by this large group including the psychological damage caused by threat of death for leaving or speaking out.

  PS. FYI Alphaman: I don't believe posting images like that strengthens your argument but rather it makes you appear unreasonable IMO.
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  Simon

  I saw an advert on TV yesterday about support for victims of domenstic violence.

  Just think about it for a second - in countries where there are laws and institutions to protect, prevent and punish incidents of domestic violence it is still a problem.

  What on earth do people imagine the state of affairs is like for people living in places where the religion and the state both not only promote the idea that women are worthless and can be abused but they even command and encourage it!

  How can that ever be considered a healthy society in any way or at all benign.

  It frankly turns my stomach to see the glib dismissal of the violent and abusive nature of islam and attempts to excuse it by making false comparisons to christian groups like the WBC, taking incidents from history or making everything relative to the extremes of terrorism.

  It is a scourge upon humanity both at the macro level and the individual level and it needs to be transformed.