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True or False statement regarding Christians and Muslims in the United States

Discussion in 'BBS Hangout: Debate & Discussion' started by fchowd0311, Feb 19, 2015.

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True or False: Christian theocracy is a more imminent threat to American democracy than Sharia Law.

  1. True

    56 vote(s)
    61.5%
  2. False

    35 vote(s)
    38.5%
  1. bigtexxx

    bigtexxx Member

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    I find it hilariously hypocritical that you get recent immigrant groups who come to the US a generation or two ago, who then completely whine and moan about the US and the peaceful groups that founded this country and made it great. It's like: "oh hey I'll do anything to move to the US, then I'll go there and b**** about everything I can." Based on what I've seen, Pakistani and Indian immigrants tend to be the worst offenders. They likely feel ostracized to a certain degree because they don't completely fit in yet, whether that be socially, professionally or religiously. And by the way -- I like both groups, as they tend to be hard working folks who place a high value on education, but I find this aspect to be hypocritical.
     
  2. Air Langhi

    Air Langhi Contributing Member

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    What does this have to do with this thread. Given Indian are the richest ethnic group in America, they have done well for themselves. Maybe you are just jealous or an ignorant old man.
     
  3. g1184

    g1184 Member

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    Obviously, just follow the lead of the peaceful groups that founded this country and made it great:

    [​IMG]

    No need to whine and moan about it.
     
  4. Remii

    Remii Member

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    Peaceful groups... Bwahahahahaha...!!! You're a perfect example that the U.S. educational system is greatly flawed. You don't even know the history of your own country. Lol.
     
  5. HR Dept

    HR Dept Member

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    Where's the poll option for fallaciously loaded question?
     
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  6. Dark Rhino

    Dark Rhino Member

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    Yes, thank you for stating that which has somehow gone completely ignored (but at the same time is blatantly obvious).
     
  7. bigtexxx

    bigtexxx Member

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    great post, HR Dept.

    It's a false choice.
     
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  8. HamJam

    HamJam Member

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    As a non Christian who has watched politicians hell bent on this being a Christian nation my entire life, I think the three of you are wrong. It is not a false choice. Christianity is a danger to the liberty of this nation and this nation in general. It causes politicians to change text books, determine social and medical policy, set foreign policy, legislate citizen behavior...

    People may think that this nation is beyond the possibility of Christianity threatening the democratic nature of this country -- but that is a false confidence.

    If the Michelle Bachmans and Dan Patricks of this country got as much power as they wanted, I would seriously be worried about the fate of this nation and my place in it.
     
  9. HR Dept

    HR Dept Member

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    And as a Christian I respectfully disagree, to an extent. Some of the issues you mentioned like textbooks, social/medical policy, etc... Yeah, I disagree with a lot of the stuff that gets attributed to the "Christian Right". But you find these things happening exclusively in stronghold areas and not remotely close to the national scene. Look at liberal strong holds like NY, Colorado, and the West Cost and you'll find contrasting ideas enacted that are pretty extreme. Do you consider that as a threat as well?

    Think about the evolving federal stance on legal mar1juana (early stages), same sex marriage, abortion. Those are all wars fought and lost by the ones that are "threatening the democratic nature of this country." The picture that you're painting just isn't a reflection of reality.

    This country is becoming more socially liberal on a collective level. Which I personally think is a good thing. And I also don't think that there's anything that can be done to stop that, regardless of who's in the White House or owns the majority in Congress.

    I don't see the connection between Christianity and foreign policy, I think you may be drawing an imaginary line there.
     
  10. fchowd0311

    fchowd0311 Member

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    You fail to understand that I am speaking in relative terms here and am addressing a specific point and audience. I understand that Christian theocracy is not a legitimate threat even though certain aspects of the Christian evangelical movement is affecting public life such as revising public school textbooks. I'm addressing a certain group of individuals, individuals with irrational fears. Obviously these individuals exist in abundance as MULTIPLE state legislators are wasting time passing "anti-sharia law" bills. I don't see any Muslims trying to revise textbooks. I never witnessed a Muslim in the U.S proselytizing. They usually mind their own business. It's as if the Muslim community knows the reaction they would receive if random Muslims started proselytizing in the streets like many Christians do.
     
    #50 fchowd0311, Feb 20, 2015
    Last edited: Feb 20, 2015
  11. AroundTheWorld

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    http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2013/feb/19/how-muslim-proselytizing-creeps-into-public-school/

    The Loudoun County School Board is reaching the denouement of a multiyear deliberation about an application for a charter school that has strong ties to Fethullah Gulen, a Turkish Islamist. His followers have already started some 135 American charter schools. Their focus is to promote an increasingly Shariah-dominated Turkey.

    Incredibly, the school board’s members are studiously avoiding any acknowledgment or discussion of the role of Fethullah Gulen and his movement in the charter school. They have wrestled for many months with a host of problems with the application — such as serious deficiencies with the proposed curriculum, the financing, the management, the teachers and Maryland’s Chesapeake Science Point Public Charter School, the school in Anne Arundel County specifically cited as the “model” for the Loudoun Math and Information Technology Academy.

    Yet the members of the school board have, to date, been unwilling to recognize that these problems are actually endemic in Gulen-associated schools — including Chesapeake Science Point. These problems are also much in evidence in three Gulen charter schools in Fulton County, Ga. Two of the three have lost their charters; the third — an elementary school — may soon follow suit.

    I had the occasion to visit Fulton County last week and talked with several people involved in one aspect or another of its difficulties with the Gulenists. These included a former teacher, the parent of a former student and a local administrator. One thing is clear from these conversations: You simply cannot begin to understand, let alone cope with, the sorts of issues inherent in “Gulen-inspired” schools if you indulge — for whatever reason, be it “political correctness,” sensitivity to “diversity,” fear of litigation or being branded an “Islamophobe,” racist, etc. — in the pretense that applications like the one in Loudoun County can be properly evaluated while excluding from the evaluation process the 800-pound gorilla in the room: the applicants’ manifest associations to the Gulen movement.

    Fortunately, the Loudoun County School Board is expected to hear from Mary Addi on Tuesday, in the course of its last public input session on the application for the Loudoun Math and Information Technology Academy. Ms. Addi and her Turkish husband, Mustafa Emanet, both formerly taught in a Gulen school in Cleveland. They have courageously made public their insights into issues sure to afflict the Loudoun County school system if the current application is approved: systematic mismanagement; use of Turkish teachers who are unqualified to teach, do not speak English comprehensibly or both; visa fraud; financial irregularities; chronic deviation from the curriculum and other rules and regulations meant to govern its operations; and so on. These issues have affected other Gulen charter schools around the country. Ms. Addi and her husband have even contributed to an ongoing investigation of the Gulen Movement and its schools by the FBI.

    In a letter previously submitted to a select committee of the Loudoun School Board that — to its credit — actually recommended rejection of the Gulen charter application, Ms. Addi wrote:

    “According to my husband, in addition to garnering as much taxpayer money as possible, the Gulen movement’s other agenda is to spread Islam though subliminal indoctrinations. More specifically, the mission is to spread Islam by means of the Turkish events such as trips to Turkey, the Turkish Olympics, other cultural events and teaching Turkish as a second language.

    “Although the Gulenists are careful not to speak directly about their religious beliefs, it is their hope that by indoctrinating American students and parents with their culture and hospitality, that the students will likewise be more susceptible to religious conversion.”

    Such behavior would, of course, fall afoul of prohibitions in the Virginia code barring proselytization in public schools. Like the rest of the Gulen program, however, unless the application is rejected, it is predictable that Loudoun County will find itself wrestling with what other school systems have confronted elsewhere: an entrenched school, indifferent to its obligations and responsibilities — and exceedingly difficult to discipline due, in part, to the Gulenists’ intensive efforts to buy political protection from county supervisors, state legislators, governors and others.

    If the mere prospect of those sorts of vexing problems were not grounds enough to reject the application, this passage from the Loudoun County School Board code of conduct should be: “I must never neglect my personal obligation to the community and my legal obligation to the State, nor surrender these responsibilities to any other person, group, or organization; but that, beyond these, I have a moral and civic obligation to the Nation which can remain strong and free only so long as public schools in the United States of America are kept free and strong.”

    Keeping our public schools free and strong means keeping them out of the clutches of cultish supremacists, be they of the Turkish Islamist stripe or any other.

    Frank J. Gaffney Jr. was an assistant secretary of defense under President Reagan. He is now president of the Center for Security Policy (SecureFreedom.org), a columnist for The Washington Times and host of the nationally syndicated program “Secure Freedom Radio.”
     
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  12. HamJam

    HamJam Member

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    Maybe my view is slanted due to the fact I live in one of those stronghold areas (Texas). But, even with the Text book changing, that affected the entire nation, and having representatives from these stronghold areas has an effect on the overall policy of the nation.

    As for whether or not I consider certain legislation passed from more liberal areas a threat -- the answer is, sure, at times. But, since those examples of legislation are at least attempts at pragmatic improvements and are not based or motivated by Christian Morality, they tend to worry me less. I mean, corruption and abuses of power always worry me, and that s**t knows no political or religions barriers -- where government exists, so does that.

    I would agree we are becoming a more socially liberal nation policy wise. But we have become much more conservative politically and economically. The Democrats are as far to the right as the Republicans were a few decades ago -- the Republicans are of course to the right of this. This is not directly attributed to religion, but, books like Whats the Matter with Kansas demonstrate there is a definite relationship.

    Also,while we are becoming more socially liberal, this is also resulting in a backlash among Christians that, since their views are closely tied up with the movement of the nation to the right politically and economically, could definitely result in people of the Christian Conservative mindset gaining power. Look how many leading republicans, even presidential candidates, have been of this mindset.

    I'll withdraw my foreign policy statement -- you're right, I don't have anything concrete on that.
     
  13. fchowd0311

    fchowd0311 Member

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    I really don't understand the point of that article in addressing my assertion:confused: Like I've said before, I have never witnessed a Muslim proselytizing in the U.S. and I know the Muslim community quite well in multiple states. I never stated that you can find an article suggesting otherwise. If you think Islamic proselytization is prevalent in the U.S. then you obviously have never visited the United States. And from my knowledge of the Muslim community here, I exactly know why that is the case. Most Muslim Americans understand the consequences of overtly proselytizing Islam in the streets of every day America... ugly resentment with some cases of border line violence as retaliation. Just look at what happened to the group of Muslims in Austin when they wanted to meet in public at the state capitol building.
     
  14. MadMax

    MadMax Member

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    There is no model for a Christian theocracy that literate Christians can point to in the Bible. I think that helps mitigate the risk of that. The words in red are generally about "getting along" with government, but recognizing that the "King" is not of this world. It's easier to sell concepts like the Crusades or the Inquisition to people who can't read the Bible and challenge those "religious authorities" than it would be today to a Western world that can read.

    Having said that, I think Christendom is a dying reality anyway --- to the extent it has been reality in the past --- and as a Christian I'm quite happy about that. Christianity is most like Jesus when it works from the margins and concerns itself primarily with how much it can evidence love.

    With respect to Sharia law, I'm not worried about it, frankly. I think it fails in the marketplace of ideas...particularly to Western culture.
     
  15. AroundTheWorld

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    I was simply adding a data point to your anecdotal assertion that you don't know of any Muslim proselytizing in the U.S.

    It does fail in the marketplace of the ideas - the problem is that in many places, there is no free market for ideas, and sharia law is stuffed down your throat.
     
  16. fchowd0311

    fchowd0311 Member

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    I would say one article about one school district is more anecdotal than my knowledge of some of the largest Muslim communities in the United States.

    He is I am assuming an American citizen residing in the U.S., thus for him he has no rational reason to fear it.
     
  17. AroundTheWorld

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    The Gülen movement is a very influential network that, as the article states, is already running 135 charter schools in the USA. They are also quite active in Turkey (obviously) and in Germany, for instance.

    Not currently. But we are also citizens of the world. And if it is only an issue of how close Muslims are to making up the majority of citizens in a country, or making up a significant enough percentage of the population, in order to get elements of sharia law creeping in, then one needs to take it into consideration when making immigration decisions.

    If you are American, you are culturally reasonably close to Brits. You just need to look over there to get an idea what happens once certain thresholds of percentage of Muslims in the country are met.

    http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/ukn...Muslims-want-sharia-law-in-Britain-claim.html


    Radical Muslim group Islam4UK has launched a campaign to impose sharia law on Britain, starting with a rally in London, according to a report.
     
  18. okierock

    okierock Member

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    This country started Christian and for the most part still is so I'm not sure how the principles that created this nation are now a "threat" to it. Where those principles did not fit they have been changed and will continue to.

    There are some parts of Sharia that I think would probably change things around here for the better but I really don't want to see a music video for California Girls where the girls are wearing Burkas ever. So I pick that as the greatest threat.
     
  19. fchowd0311

    fchowd0311 Member

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    :rolleyes: Name me ONE Christian "principle" that unique to the formation of the Constitution?
     
  20. Deckard

    Deckard Blade Runner
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    I no longer vote in non-public polls, unless Clutch starts them, because not putting your moniker there makes them meaningless, in my opinion. As for the topic, here in Texas the Christian Right has had influence far exceeding their numbers and are hurting the state, badly, with the policies they promote, many of them at odds with our democratic institutions, and certainly at odds with the constitution of the United States. Eventually, the worm will turn and they will be viewed as yet another extremist group shuffled off to the proverbial dustbin of history. Meanwhile, the sane people of this state need to get off their butts and vote. The only reason this minority has the influence they have is money from rich Americans with their own agendas, gerrymandering of congressional districts outside of the 10 year census cycle, using far better technology to draw boundaries than was ever available before, and mainly because people just don't vote, and that makes the whole rotten system work.

    As for the rest of the country? I'm not addressing that now. We have enough problems with Christian extremists here in Texas. And Muslims in Texas? The ones I know are just like everyone else. Trying to make a living and take care of their families.
     
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