London terror attack

I don't see how it's even up for debate anymore. It's not the religion itself really, but it's the current interpretation of the religion that is an awful thing. Sadly, that's not something that can be changed in a short period of time, Islam will likely still be largely a terrible thing decades from now.

Of course that doesn't mean all muslims are terrible people, but a large enough percentage of them are terrible people to where the world will keep having problems with them everywhere they go. There was a time Christianity was very similar, so there's hope for the distant future if the awful parts of Islam can be suppressed enough eventually.

 

Another one?
http://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/78...lough-mowed-Essex-Road-old-queens-head-injury

 

These polls are stupid because they are POLLS.

If you polled the U.S. whether or not we should bomb the Muslim world out of existence I am sure at least 20% would answer yes. No one conducts a stupid poll like that for a reason.

 

I agree with your other sentiments, but I don't see how people can blame Islam's issues on "interpretation". Take a look at the Quran and you'll see a hateful book that's filled to the brim with hate, violence, oppression and other twisted views.

How is following the plenty of directives of the book a "wrong interpretation"? You can of course say that the Bible is also full of that stuff, but the vast majority of Christians are able to seperate truth from fiction, which leads to them not taking these passages serious, whereas many Muslims are brainwashed from birth on and think the Quran/Sharia is the only true law and god-given.

That's also my main gripe with the "terrorism has no religion" front, how can you say that when the Quran directly commands its worshippers to kill people that don't follow its law. Terrorists directly follow these words and yet people come out saying "oh no, that's not Islam, they're abusing the religion, we're the religion of peace" etc.

What's closer to worshipping true Islam: Following the Quran (killing non-believers, oppressing females, homosexuals, other races etc) or saying it's a religion of peace (open to all religions/races, not oppressing women etc), when those parts are not even in the Quran? I truly can not see how people can twist that book to something about equality, freedom and peace and then say it's the true version of Islam.

 

You do understand the entire premise of this debate stems from why there is a stark difference between the two religions when both have explcitly violent/draconian sentiments in them? A hypothesis is that majoirty of modern Christians are in relatively wealthy secular nations with relatively high standards of living while a large portion of Muslims are in regions of war and dictatorship and studies have shown that poverty and war has a strong coorelation with fundamentalist religious ideology.

This is a giant red flag to someone who actually read the Quran and was raised Muslim that you have NO ****ING CLUE what you are taking about. Coming from a guy who left Islam and has far more nuance than you on this subject matter, let me tell you that you are just flat out wrong. The Quran must of been the forefather of manic bi-polar syndrome because one passage will be all Kumbaya while the next sura is about how evil and schemming the Jewish tribes were and how they must be destroyed.

Just stop posting on this subject matter. You seem clueless and so does ATW with his anecdotal straw poll that suggests most Muslims are evil.

 

This is pretty bs and I think you know it, most terrorists, especially the ones in Western countries, are from a wealthy/secure background+education and have no connection to poverty.

Sure, there are some kumbaya passages, but even the ones about "peace" mostly contain side-sentences which mention that "innocent person" etc doesn't mean "innocent" in the way which we would define.
My point stands, I think it's impossible for you to deny there's a peaceful overtone in the Quran. Using some of the "peaceful" passages and statements isn't reflective of the book and using it to say "Islam is peaceful" is bogus. What about my "twist that book to something about equality, freedom and peace" is wrong in your opinion?

I surely wasn't talking about it not having a single word/sentence on peace.

 

Lol. That's some amazing propaganda. The vast majoirty of Muslims who are ISIS sympthizers, or join ISIS are from either war torn countries, have criminal records/are lower class back in their European residency.

The attacks carried about by 'educated raised in the West Muslims' are more high profile but are vastly outnumbered by poor terrorist sympthizers.

You probably view these PEW polls as a method to judge other humans so why don't you use them to see that polling data in more safe/higher standard of living Muslim majoirty nations like Turkey have far fewer respondents that vote 'yes' to the draconian questions than in countries like Afghanistan?

 

Didn't say it has no influence, but you've said it yourself, most high profile attacks were from wealthy and highly educated individuals that weren't attracted to radical Islam by poverty.

You also seem a bit picky, comparably well-off countries like Malaysia and other Southern-Asian ones have incredibly high support for Sharia, using a country like Turkey, which isn't similar to other Islamic countries, is a pretty bad comparison to make your point.

Yes, there is a link between poverty and terrorism, but acting like it's the "entire premise of this debate" is bogus and you should know it, especially after having been a Muslim yourself. The issue stems much deeper than poverty and would still exist even if all Muslims were wealthy. Ideology plays a huge part in this problem. I've been around a ton of Muslims, many of them being of extremely rich families and education, but nearly all of them have been extremely brainwashed into thinking their religion is the only truth and that other people are worth less for their believes/opinions.

 

I've been around Muslims all my life also. Your first statement that they believe that their religion is the only truth.... Ya that's what everyone who follows any Abrahmamic faith also believes... How is that unique?

I've never met a Muslim with your second assertion though minus a couple. Can you give me an explcit example? So you hang out with Muslims who think you are a lesser human?

 

Studied in Italy for a while and met quite a lot Muslims there, all of them were from wealthy families that send their kids to elite European universities and provide for them financially. Basically, they send their children to Elite European universities in order to do the whole University cycle up to Master/Doctorate and then do high-level jobs back home or inherit their family business.

With "only truth" and the 2nd part of my post I mean a level of ignorance that's only matched by the most secluded and radical religious followers in Western countries. I've had people with the highest level of education straight-up denying all forms of evolution and evolutionairy science and telling me that all science contradictory to Islam are fabricated lies to manipulate people.
A friend tried to debate with these guys and got straight-up told she believed in utter nonsense (Western views) and would go to hell for her believes, only converting to Islam would save her. They've basically said that all other religions and believes were nonsense and that we were "wrong" for not following Islam. To them, only Muslims are following the truth and are better people because of it.

A roommate had a girlfriend which studied in Germany and was extremely modern in ideology and fashion. His family initially wanted him to marry his cousin and made a deal, but seeing how he was intent on marrying the other girl, he had to go back to Pakistan with her and promise to stay there after University. We saw her after the marriage and she was like a completely different person, immediately had to wear traditional clothing with a hijab etc and barely spoke anymore in our presence. Guy was completely cool with this whole ordeal because of religion and tradition, she even wore the stuff in our student apartment, where no one could see her.

This is my main issue with Islam and the main difference to Christianity, the level of brainwashing is just absurd and leads to perfectly intelligent&educated people being stuck on views that are contradictory to all of modern life. The guys I've met are quoting Allah in 99% of their Facebook posts and everything in life is his plan, the amount of devotion to god and rejection of other values&science is just not comparable to modern Christianity, except for some of the most secluded nutjobs.

And that level of devotion plus seclusion from modern society is what so easily leads to terrorism and violence in my opinion, the incredible majority of Christians is seperating religion from everyday life/science and would never develop the idea of defending their belief in radical ways or revolve their whole life around the words of their holy book.

 

Cool, so give me a number. How many rich Muslims denied evolution? You gave me an anecdote of a couple of Muslims. Good for you.

Does that mean my anecdotes since it deals with Muslims in the hundreds(family, family friends etc) is more valid?

Does that mean my experience of knowing a Christian peer who studies MechE with me who denies evolution gives me enough nuanced knowledge of the community to make broad claims like you do?

 

Every muslim I've met there. I fully believe you when you're saying that a lot of your relatives do indeed believe in evolution and modern society standards, but I think we both can agree that the number is certainly lower than in modern Christian countries.

 

And that's primarly because even the wealthy Muslim nations have a theocratic authoritarian stranglehold on its population. Its what happens when a nation's entire wealth was dependent on tripping on some natural resources rather than merit. There is nothing inherent within Islam or Christisnity that makes one more or less prone to not believing evolution.

 

Semi-agree, but it's also what shows how dangerous religions are and that they're dependent on their followers.

I've said it in the past, I'm not a fan of any religion and fully acknowledge the dangerous parts of the Bible, but Christian believers largely have come out of the middleages and don't follow the problematic teachings. Which is why Islam needs a huge reform, as too many followers don't seem capable of seperating religion from reality. It's also why I am so vehemently against the notion of people saying Islam isn't a dangerous ideology, it clearly is and we have to directly point out the connections between terrorism and religion. Otherwise nothing will change and you'll continue to see the "they're not real Muslims, Islam is about peace" narrative that's preventing any kind of reform.

 

I agree that Islam is 'dangerous' but I still fail to see how it helps the current predicament by yelling it all the time. The people who need to hear it will just scoff at those statements.

Exposure is the long drawn out end game solution here. Exposure is what is going to make secular children. I've actually talked about this in another thread regarding hijabs in the workplace and my premise was that denying these women access to Western secular work places will do nothing but hinder our end game of secularism of the Muslim community. I even drawn out actual real life incidents where a Muslim family member who wore a hijab is a pediatrician now and hangs out with her Western friends attending Zumba and yoga classes... And she has children. I'm quite confident that her children would be raised in a less secular manner if she was more isolated.

 

Isn't how you're describing Christianity pretty much the textbook definition of "interpretation"?

 

I agree. So how do we eliminate theocratic authoritarian strangleholds, which happen to be Muslim as it stands today?

 

Saw your statements in that thread and I see that side of it, but it can't be the true solution. Change has to come from within the Muslim community, there are a lot of influential leaders and voices within Islam (even a lot of celebrities which could attract the people you mentioned), but there's a huge tendency to never criticize Islam and instead disregard any link to terrorism. Even with the hijab topic, you'll see an outcry of Muslim females, but instead of questioning the practice of making females wear a hijab, you'll mainly hear them speak out against the European laws that forbid hijabs in public places.

It just doesn't better Islam in any way and is counter-productive.