Islamists murder secular opposition politicians in Tunisia, Libya

It's clear you have very little understanding of the history of Islam and the region. As I said, Islam used to be the center for world thinking and enlightenment. It wasn't always radicalize in the way you see it now. It was once a proud and rich culture that showed tolerance towards others. Radical Islam is a reaction to the European crusades and imperialism. Countries like the British sapped the wealth and essentially enslaved these countries...which is where the mistrust of the west comes from. Islam became radicalized as a means to fight against imperialism. After the colonial era, Israel became a symbol of continuing western imperialism. So today you just see Radical Islam behind everything but you don't know the history of how Radical Islam came into being. You just say, "oh it must be the religion". That's naive and simplistic.

You need to study your history. Because calling people idiots doesn't cover-up your own ignorance. Maybe it works for you and those who already think the way you do, but for everyone else they just think you are weirdly obsessed and brainwashed.

You sound just as radical as the fundamentalists - just the other side of the same coin. Yet you can not even see that. I won't call anyone an idiot, but I certainly will call you blind.

If you want to end the radicalism, you have to remove the source cause of it and why people feel sympathetic to it. And that's letting these nations rise up and become economically viable functioning states. Democracy is key. It's going to be ugly, and messy, and bloody.

What's happening in Egypt - and the reason I haven't said anything, is because I think it's part of the process. They are figuring out the future of what Egypt is going to be. Is it an Islamic state, a democracy, or an autocratic one. It's mess, no side is innocent or in the right. They are all corrupt. They are all willing to kill. But it really is the future of the middle east that is unfolding. And for the most part, all I can do is watch.

 

ATW - narrowminded thinking such as yours is the true root of things like fundamentalism. You are a fundamentalist. You can change the colors, and you may not resort to violence, but people like you start to make other people think - "them Muslims are the problem" which begins to foment the roots of justifying violence against people.

And like I said, your reaction to being criticized, be resorting to name-calling, only demonstrates that I am hitting a nerve you are not comfortable with. The more you meltdown, the more you prove my point.

 

Again, you aren't listening. If you look at Nazism it's roots starting by first criticising Jews as being money minded and other generalizations. The violence came much much later. What you are doing here is laying a foundation for hate. You are saying Islam is inherently violent and therefore creating the justifications to act on that.

It's not direct, but it leads in that direction.

And again, calling people idiots and morons is really only making yourself look bad. I am trying to tell you to stop for your own sake man. Do you realize how funny it is that I am making you look bad by letting everyone see how petty you are?

 

You can't separate Muslims from Islam like that.

 

You did that pretty much on your own.

 

I thought this was relevant.

kudos Paul Graham.

 

ATW - dropping some hammers up in here !!!

DD

 

That's actually really funny. Looks like Dada is about to circle-jerk rep ATW too.

 

You can always point fingers but at some point the blame lies within the religion itself. You seem to always fall back to this notion of Islam once being a shining beacon of math and science. I'm going to try to find the video, but Richard Dawkins absolutely dismantles this argument. He points out that this was the most secular era of the Middle East. So the pattern stands that the more a region moves AWAY from Islam the more economic, social and scientific success it encounters.

As an atheist I have no bias towards Christianity or Islam. I believe both are false. You made a statement that stated that the Bible is no more adapting to the modern secular world as the Quran is. I find that horribly inaccurate. Unlike the Quran the Bible is divided into two distinct parts. The Old Testament and the New Testament. The two books create a clear divide between God the punisher and God the savior. It is rather difficult for a Christian who abides by the New Testament to perform acts of violence or inflict human rights violations based on their beliefs. Of course there are the select few such as the Westboro Baptist Church that still abide by the Old Testament way of life. But that select few is relatively small when compared to Muslims who take any violent verse in the Quran as literal commands. There is no one segment of the Quran where it is easy to comprehend that "well this violent verse is not meant for us". It's scattered throughout the book. On top of that Islam institutes a form of religious government. Thus Islam inherently is not compatible with a secular government.

You say education and money will change Islamic regions into modern secular regions that do not commit human rights violations on a daily basis. I say that a reformation of Islam will bring about that educational and economic change you are looking for.

But at the end of the day as an atheist I hope mankind will just move on from the Abrahamic religions just as mankind moved past Zeus and Ra.

 

Richard Dawkins thinks ALL RELIGIONS inherently lead to conflict and are unnecessary. Not just Islam.

I actually agree with Dawkins and do think people take their religions too seriously. But that's a problem with religion, not Islam. If you swapped Christianity with Islam you'd have Christian terrorists and people complaining that Christianity was too violent and extreme.

Here you have devout Muslims like Hakeem - what's the difference - he's rich and well off. Muslims here aren't radicalized. Because they enjoy an open and free culture with prosperity. It is often the poorer classes that flock to the Islamic fundamentalists today. You look at the Egyptian elections, and the Muslim Brotherhood did better in rural areas.

Let's see the pattern - Christian fundamentalists are strongest where? In rural red states!

The point is that economic development comes with an exchange of ideas and openness that is required to make an economy work. Authoritarian cultures can not have economic success by the very nature.

The problem these countries have isn't that they have Islam, which is the reason they are backwards - it's that they are backwards and thus the only thing they have to turn to is religion.

We can not eliminate Islam - it is here to stay. But we can help the moderate Muslims of the world be the ones who win out against fundamentalists.

This will not happen by demonizing their religion as inherently violent though.

 

I don't follow your post. I certainly understand why the military stepped in, and why it was widely supported. I've posted about it here more than once. Maybe you missed it. You know what my problem is, treeman? Statements like this:

"...the people are, frankly, majority nutcases."

"They ARE far different from us. They are utterly foreign, almost alien. A nonbeliever such as yourself would not understand their piety and their desire to live under God's rules. You CAN"T understand it really until you've lived among them. They are most certainly not like us."

As I said before, you demean yourself by posting this, pardon my French, crap in amongst your arguments. It makes it very difficult to take you seriously. Sorry, but there it is. Cut those kinds of statements out, and a discussion is possible. Don't, and all I can say is that there are words to describe that attitude towards a people, and I don't care to use them here. With all due respect.

 

No sir you are the one playing into Islamic extremist hands. You are painting all Muslims with one broad brush by constantly posting every negative thing that happens and harping at "Look at what Islam does! It is an evil violent religion!"

You are the one bucketing moderates in with the fundamentalists. You're playing into their hands. The WHOLE FREAKING WORLD KNOWS THAT THERE IS A PROBLEM WITH ISLAMIC EXTREMISM - we don't need you to constantly point it out! No, you in your zeal, all you do, intentionally or not, is paint the whole of one billion people as extremists.

All you are doing is to create fear and mistrust which feeds into exactly what extremists need. You don't get anywhere by polarizing people in life. Those tactics help you win credibility with those who are already polarized and disenfranchise everyone else.

I am not preaching peace, love, or appeasement. That's is a gross and ignorant misrepresentation. No, I am preaching pragmatic sensible solutions.

Things like resolving Palestine. Things like continuing to dismantle terror networks. Things like promoting economic development. Things like working with moderates to understand how to positively impact that region with the power we have.

Not this garbage you spew everyday.