Posts by glenster

61

I know there is NO GOD

by jam in

isis, plain and simple.

if there is a god there is no way he.

would allow this to occur (beheading of james foley).

glenster

Both events are on a coin with no merit as currency.

61

I know there is NO GOD

by jam in

isis, plain and simple.

if there is a god there is no way he.

would allow this to occur (beheading of james foley).

glenster

"Islam has got to go. How you ask?" etc.

Too general. Criticizing old text as not inerrant isn't just the domain of
non-Muslims but liberal Muslims. Compare liberal Stephen Colbert: if ISIS were
replaced with Stephen Colberts they'd actually be an exceptionally nice group.
Why would you want to kill Aasif Mandvi?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aasif_Mandvi

Two, as mentioned before, if we killed all the racist/homophobic etc. people
in the US in 1900 it would be very quiet here (it would get notably quieter
here even if done in 2014). An option to the Hiroshima approach, debatable at
best as an ethical solution, is to have the same thing happen there that hap-
pened here regarding LGBT people in the last generation or so (not thousands of
years)--not increase their prejudice against the West but spread information.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberal_movements_within_Islam

61

I know there is NO GOD

by jam in

isis, plain and simple.

if there is a god there is no way he.

would allow this to occur (beheading of james foley).

glenster

"it was done out of a type of ransom to put a stop to the current war but
more specifically the mass killings of innocent iraqi bystandards to US
launched missles."

"Have you watched the video?"

"Who memorizes a 'prepared and read statement' like that..?"

Foley speech
http://pastebin.com/yjYChv13

His focus is the US as the enemy and notably the last air strike in Irag,
which was against ISIS. He asks us to think about who was targeted, which
was ISIS, for which the US "signed their death certificate."
http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2014/08/20/cen"tcom-pushing-for-more-iraq-strikes/14357707/

It's only a paragraph of ISIS propaganda--not a lot to memorize. No mention
of innocent bystanders. ISIS no doubt claims they're they're righteous
fighters--not bystanders. ISIS has made big threats against the US--that "We
will drown all of you in blood" (I assume including non-combatants)--which
isn't a great strategy for diminishing airstrikes. It more likely seems in-
tent on pandering to ham-handed East-West prejudices to justify their own
terrorism. Not a lot of careful thought into who real victims are there.
http://time.com/3143745/isis-iraq-airstrikes-obama/

61

I know there is NO GOD

by jam in

isis, plain and simple.

if there is a god there is no way he.

would allow this to occur (beheading of james foley).

glenster

"it was done out of a type of ransom to put a stop to the current war but
more specifically the mass killings of innocent iraqi bystandars to US launched
missles."

"...ISIS posted a video to YouTube depicting Foley reading a prepared state-
ment urging Americans to stop their support for the U.S. government for its
bombing campaign against ISIS targets. The video then shows his beheading as
well as revealing that ISIS is holding another American journalist named Steven
Joel Sotloff and will kill him unless U.S. President Barack Obama halts air-
strikes against ISIS."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Wright_Foley

God and religion:

"ISIS is known for its extreme interpretation of the Islamic faith and sharia
law and its brutal violence, which is directed at Shia Muslims, indigenous As-
syrian, Chaldean, Syriac and Armenian Christians, Yazidis, Druze, Shabaks and
Mandeans in particular. It has at least 4,000 fighters in its ranks in Iraq
who, in addition to attacks on government and military targets, have claimed
responsibility for attacks that have killed thousands of civilians. ISIS had
close links with al-Qaeda until 2014, but in February of that year, after an
eight-month power struggle, al-Qaeda cut all ties with the group, reportedly
for its brutality and 'notorious intractability.'

"ISIS’s original aim was to establish a caliphate in the Sunni-majority re-
gions of Iraq. Following its involvement in the Syrian Civil War, this expand-
ed to include controlling Sunni-majority areas of Syria. A caliphate was pro-
claimed on 29 June 2014, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi—now known as Amir al-Mu'minin
Caliph Ibrahim—was named as its caliph, and the group was renamed the Islamic
State."

See the article below for much more:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islamic_State_of_Iraq_and_the_Levant

"Islamists believe that Islam fuses religion and politics, with normative
political values determined by the divine texts. It is argued that this has
historically been the case and the secularist/modernist efforts at secularizing
politics are little more than jahiliyyah (ignorance), kafir (unbelief), irtidad
(apostasy) and atheism. 'Those who participated in secular politics were
raising the flag of revolt against Allah and his messenger.'"
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islam_and_secularism

61

I know there is NO GOD

by jam in

isis, plain and simple.

if there is a god there is no way he.

would allow this to occur (beheading of james foley).

glenster

PS: as you can believe in life, with its good and bad, apart from any God
idea, you could believe in a God somehow behind it all. You could add a nice
afterlife as sweetner on the deal. Whether or not that's your choice doesn't
make for an important reason to choose which basic definition.

61

I know there is NO GOD

by jam in

isis, plain and simple.

if there is a god there is no way he.

would allow this to occur (beheading of james foley).

glenster

That can certainly be a choice but it criticizes an all beneficent stipula-
tion one may require for it, not the basic definition. The Bible God comes with
various names and stipulations beyond the basic definition.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Problem_of_evil

61

I know there is NO GOD

by jam in

isis, plain and simple.

if there is a god there is no way he.

would allow this to occur (beheading of james foley).

glenster

Neither ISIS nor anything else proves the basic God or atheist definitions.
Bad things in the world only proves the stipulation they wouldn't happen isn't
a credible one to add.

Since the basic God idea (let alone with added names and interventions) is a
possibility, not a proven, you might hope for or not, there's an ethical reason
to not have harm: it would be arbitrary hurting and killing--sadism and murder.

The only points ISIS makes to me aren't about the basic definitions but that
you shouldn't be 'centric or intolerant about things that aren't character de-
terminants, and the basic definitions don't have them. By this view, Stalin's
atheism didn't hurt anyone--his 'centric intolerance about it did. Likewise
the Inquisitors--their 'centric intolerance about God belief hurt people.

I think of how this country has come a long way in the last generation or so
about LGBT people. It would be a lot quieter around here if we just killed all
the bigots about that back then. I think the spread of such information
described above caused the change, yet look at all the racism and conservative
misinformation still going on here (giving Jon Stewart a lot of material) let
alone bigotry over there.

There's a lot of conservatism let alone extremism over there. If police or
even army are needed at times, the bigger change would come about there as
mentioned as happening here.

74

Robin Williams passes

by designs in

don't know quite what to say.

just stunned at the news.

comic genius and actor.. share your favorite robin williams moments.. .

glenster

HST and coke
http://www.openculture.com/2013/08/hunter-s-thompsons-harrowing-chemical-fueled-daily-routine.html

"known for his lifelong use of alcohol and illegal drugs"
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hunter_S._Thompson

I won't go into personal reasons, things that happened to loved ones and my-
self, a beloved friend who talked suicide when they did coke, etc., why I know
you should never give money to organized crime. They're about money no matter
what--extortion, hurting, murdering--and they don't care. They have all the
empathy of a serial killer. It's like they're watching it on TV--they're just
thinking about the money they're coming into. You never give those SOBs money.
You want to feel different or get your dopey damn dumb d**k hard, do it some
other way, but you never give those guys money.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drug_cartel

You can hear hours of these things talked about on talk shows and nobody ever
mentions it. It should be mentioned occasionally when I read about problems
exasperated by harder drugs you could only buy from them and things like this
happen.

"Artist-collaborator and friend Ralph Steadman wrote: '... He told me 25 years
ago that he would feel real trapped if he didn't know that he could commit sui-
cide at any moment. I don't know if that is brave or stupid or what, but it was
inevitable.'"

"While suffering a bout of health problems, Thompson committed suicide at the
age of 67." "...resulting from his many painful and chronic medical conditions,
which included a hip replacement."

His loved ones still loved him and accepted it, everything considered, but had
no idea he was going to do it when it happened let alone did he ask for their
blessing to do it at the time. He and HST did it off away from everyone--one of
the ways a court decides if someone knew right from wrong when they did some-
thing.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hunter_S._Thompson

RW and Koko
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GorgFtCqPEs

74

Robin Williams passes

by designs in

don't know quite what to say.

just stunned at the news.

comic genius and actor.. share your favorite robin williams moments.. .

glenster

Robin. Already? GTFOH

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qM-gZintWDc

31

Will someone, please, stop ISIS?

by skeeter1 in

will anyone stop isis?by josh levs, cnnupdated 2:07 pm edt, thu august 7, 2014(cnn) -- if you're following the news about isis, which now calls itself the islamic state, you might think you've mistakenly clicked on a historical story about barbarians from millennia ago.. in a matter of months, the group seized territory in both iraq and syria and declared an islamic caliphate, celebrating its own shocking slaughter along the way.. "i don't see any attention from the rest of the world," a member of the yazidi minority in iraq told the new yorker.

"in one day, they killed more than two thousand yazidi in sinjar, and the whole world says, 'save gaza, save gaza.'".

in syria, the group hoisted some of its victims severed heads on poles.

glenster

Airstrikes undertaken as US re-engages in Iraq

http://news.yahoo.com/airstrikes-undertaken-us-engages-iraq-132111436--politics.html