Just imagine if this person was a Muslim and was reading the Koran to her... it would be about how Islam teaches to force others to follow. http://www.wwj.com/pages/3866175.php? Kidnapper Read Bible To Captive Homeless Woman Toledo (WWJ) -- A 22-year-old Detroit woman was held captive for three days, and dressed in diapers, while a Toledo man read Bible passages to her. According to Toledo police, Shykea Boykin says she was homeless when she was picked up by the 34-year-old Toledo man and driven to his apartment across the Michigan line. Boykin apparently escaped Saturday afternoon, while the man was sleeping. Police found her handcuffed and dressed in adult diapers, wearing a T-shirt but no shoes. That man was expected to be officially charged later Tuesday.
That is what he was stating. That if a prominent Christian had committed some horrible crime then Christianity would be considered a factor worthy of mention. I've never cut somebodies head off so I don't know how much effort it requires but that still doesn't mean it was religiously motivated. There was a case in Canada a few months ago about a deranged attacker cutting off somebodies head on a bus with a large hunting knife.
This thread is ridiculous. Beheading is such a brutal crime and is so rare, that when it happens people will of course try to understand "why?" When a Muslim man beheads his wife, of course people are going to think about an honor killing. Getting bent about it is lame. Honor killings are a reality of the world we live in. Defenders of Islam can say they aren't supported by the religion all they want, but in the end they are still practiced by a scary number of of Muslim men.
And I suspect we aren't going to see a lot of post mocking Christianity as a religion of peace or people writing about how the Christianity motivates people to do such things. I don't know if religion had anything at all to do with this man beheading his wife. It very well might've have but without more evidence it is speculative. The reason why though I am pointing that out is that in my opinion is that the conflict between the West and Islam, is for a large part driven by misunderstanding by both. Just given some of the posts I've seen on Clutchfans one would assume that just being an American as soon as you set foot in a Muslim country you are going to kidnapped and beheaded. As it happens I've found similar ridiculous views of America in Muslim countries like Indonesia and Malaysia where people there think that American men are all violent and carry guns and that American women, are all sex maniacs. The problem is though if your views of America are shaped by American TV and movies then that would seem logical. A poster noted earlier that it was a logical assumption to presume religion had something to do with this because "we have been inundated with images of Al Qaeda beheading people", well if that is what your view of is of Islam primarily is then yes you would make that logical conclusion. The problem with views like that is that they are shaped on an extremely narrow and limited viewpoint when by far the vast vast majority of Muslims are no more like Al Qaeda than the vast vast amount of American women are like Desperate Housewives. So maybe this was religiously motivated, maybe not I don't think jumping to conclusion though that it was and then using that conclusion to make a blanket statement about Islam is warranted or helpful.
I'm not out to defend Islam but at the same time I don't think using actions like this to bash Islam are warranted. Islam might not be the religion of peace but its not the religion of war and violence either.
Fair enough. I'm not bashing Islam. I think it is fair to speculate that this man's own views on his own religion were a likely factor in this murder. Edit: I can't really think of a good comparable in Christianity, but let's say a very devout Puritan burned his wife at the stake...I think his religion would be a factor in the conversation.
My English professor told us that there was even a law in Texas, that if a husband catches his wife cheating on another man, he can legally shoot and kill her.
Supposedly...until the 70s Texas law held that there was no crime if a man killed his wife's lover caught "in flagrante delicto" (Reed 1981). This is a source of a source (below), but I assume it is accurate and I assume "in flagrante delicto" means what I think it means. "Below the Smith and Wesson Line: Reflections on Southern Violence," in Merle Black and J. S. Reed (eds.), Perspectives on the American South: An Annual Review of Society, Politics and Culture, vol. I. New York: Gordon & Breach, Science Publishers, 1981.
This: And this: Are not the same thing. As it pertains to point #1 above, Ted Haggard did not do drugs and have gay sex because it was the Christian thing to do. Far from it. But the fact that he is/was a prominent Christian evangelical preacher who presumably railed against such behavior from the pulpit certainly makes it that much more relevant. People aren't surprised when a killer kills someone. That's what killers do. But people are surprised when a Mr. Rogers-type commits a heinous act. It's the shock of the hypocrisy that really gets us. We see the brutality of what happened on 9-11, the beheading of American journalists (and others), the beheading of a woman who wanted a divorce, the murders of children who were disrespectful, and people are rightfully shocked and outraged. This isn't ancient history here; it's happening NOW. And whether it's right or wrong, it's happening in the name of Islam. Whether this is the case in this particular instance is still debatable, but I don't see how the relevancy of the TV station can be ignored. People talk about the Inquisition and the Crusades as though they happened last week. No one denies that Christianity has a violent history, (I'm speaking as an agnostic, here) but no one denies the good it has done in the world, either. People say "Islam is a religion of peace," then we see 3,000 people killed in its name and more people getting their heads chopped off and people wonder why others are confused. That makes no sense to me. I would also have to argue that, with the focus on terrorism being what it is, that yes, it would merit not only a mention, but an investigation. Whether or not 'honor killings' have anything to do with Islam is irrelevant to the fact that we've heard a lot about them (honor killings/beheadings), the subjugation of women, and other beheadings of 'infidels' by Muslims that may or may not have anything to do with honor. Again: This isn't just some Muslim dude who snapped and killed his wife. This was a Muslim man who had a TV show devoted to showing everyone else how great, loving, and peaceful Islam is. That's a whole world of difference.
IRA and abortion bombings carried out by believers of particular Christian faiths are not ancient history. Would you be OK with people saying America and Christianity clearly is all about killing and violence. 3000 persons is a small number compared to the number of deaths we cause in other countries each year. And one might argue a greater number of our people subscribe to such beliefs as the people/our government officially endorsed such actions, that it its just a few nuts/extremists. (And you will find plenty of people saying America is a Christian nation, founded on Christian principles, etc--not that I think those that do so have a very good grounding in the context from which the Constitution emerged, or the founders core beliefs) It seems our big challenge to the Islamic world is showing we (America) are not all about imperialism, killing, exploitation and violence, but rather that we instead can help broker piece and support autonomy in other places/peoples. That is the generalization and misperception we are trying to fight--at least I hope we are trying to dispel this. Ironic that so many persons here want to generalize about a whole religion because of extremists. It wasn't a whole lot of people who were involved in the plot to take down the WTCs.
but we are! we are about exploitation and neo imperialism in foreign policy, we are also about doing a lot of good things at same time there is always two sides to each coin. the only problem is because america is a powerful country everything it does is amplified and everything we do can turn to a really horrible and bloody situation or a really good thing. we are like a giant that dont recognize it can crush other people with its actions and we dont think much of consequences to other people the real problem is americans are oblivious or indifferent to how they affect rest of the world. its in our attitude everywhere we go. maybe that will change now but i dont know
The biggest problems with your first paragraph is that western governments and religious institutions have not supported and have condemned such actions. Virtually every ruling body of every institution in the west has done so. That's the difference. Christian loons aren't hijacking planes and killing people by the thousands. They aren't funded by governments and ruling religious entities. This is the difference that so many people see and as a result, question Islam. When people ask, they are accused of racism and bigotry and the only answer they get is apologists and something to the effect of "it's complicated." And all that's a bit of a problem, if you ask me.
Christian people were committing genocide against Muslims just a little over 10 years ago with the help of the government in the Bosnian Serbian conflict.
Huh? Western countries have started wars in the middle east without International agreement or sanction of any form, as recently as 2002. We are talking probably 100K lives lost--wars that got authorized with consent of its peoples, not 4K caused by an extremist faction. And some of the comments of our most prominent Christian religious leaders (Falwell, Robertson, Hagee) have ranged from that we got what we deserved with AIDS, 9/11 and Katrina--because they were gods retribution against our tolerance of homosexuality, to calling the Catholic church a whoring, warmongering, beast. You want America and its ideals judged by what our biggest platform "religious leaders" say?
