I'll have to use THAT excuse and see if it works! It is true that the Islamic community is diverse in both geography and belief. But I have from the beginning of this thread said that this is ONE point of conflict among many between Islam and the West, and that there are Muslims that do NOT practice FGM. Invasion is not the solution in every case, or even in most cases. 'War' (as I meant it, and have said repeatedly) is more an acknowledgment of open conflict that literal action.
Just because some one does some thing in the name of their religion, IT DOES NOT MEAN THE RELIGION SUPPORTS IT. I am sure those priest's that raped and molested those young children in the name of God. Should I cause a war with Cathlocism because of that? No, because it isn't justifable. Hayes, face it you're a RACIST against ISLAM.
1st, I think the title is borderline irresponsible (implying we might want to should wage war Islam rather than terrorists who happen to be Islamic fundamentalists largely in decimated parts of the world). Hayes, I think your title was unfortunate because I think your discussion of FMG and what we as a nation should do with other countries denying fundamental rights is quite important. 2nd, if you want to be a literalist from most religions documents, you can find examples that would suit your need for violence. As Sister Helen Pregene (sp?, Author of Dead Man Walking) said “you can justify anything with quotes from the Bible if you look hard enough”. Violence in the name of religion has been around as long as the religions have. As familiar your are with history I am surprised you didn't see the larger context--that charismatic leaders have forever tried to rally desperate people through whatever means (religion, nationalism, ethnicity, perceived wrongs to their group) for warring purposes. 3rd, the vast majority of Muslims in our country and across the world are scared to death of guys like Osama. The PLO and the King of Jordan (even Iran) were as disturbed by 9-11 and scared by these guys as much as anyone, why? 1) Because they know the extreme violent radicals are going to result in further stereotype all Muslims--exactly what your title suggests and what you are arguing even though you admit you are not a scholar in the area. (I am not saying you can't argue on this, but like arguing one group is genetically inferior, it is the line of thinking you better darn well have a fool proof well researched case or you should take a ton of heat) 2) Many of those folks are more familiar with Osama and the Taliban than the Western world is—and they know they can turn on them just as fast only they have fewer defenses. 4th, as far as I know, I have never heard of an American raised Muslim wagging war on America. You see countless Muslims (the overwhelming majority) across the world denouncing barbaric acts as inconsistent with Islam. If the problem was Islam itself, this would seem impossible. Arguing these folks just misunderstand Islam just seems tenuous, as if Islam is not evolving and go through re-interpretation as is any other faith. The fact is you get some fundamentalist Muslims, Christians and Jews all critizing more moderate, less literal, peoples of those faiths, let alone even more liberal and modern groups. My own opinion is many of the radical warring Islamic fundamentalists seek out desperate peoples in desperate places (Afganistan, S Phillipeans) because they are easily manipulated. Again, this is a countless history story you should be familiar with regardless of the particular religion they attempt to capitalize with. Also, I believe America should put political and economic pressure (and maybe more) to fight genital mutilation in the world. I also believe we should also work against any country not respecting the religions of all peoples as a basic right (if this reflects Islamic republics, China, Israel, so be it). Of course we would have to use different tactics for different places—we could and did militarily intervene in Bosnia where the rapes and ethnic (and religious) cleansing was happing, obviously we can only do what we can do in China (economic, political, cultural pressure). Of course IMO we have a lot of work to do in our own country too.
Sorry, I did make an assumption. I was going to question the authenticity of the hadith, but I searched on google and I found these links mentioning it and some other stuff. http://www.minaret.org/fgm-pamphlet.htm http://www.jannah.org/genderequity/equityappendix.html Well, I never said I was for FGM, I am against FGM. Nevermind about what I said, I don't remember what I was trying to say. Please, don't troll. Yes, it is relevant, you said Islam and modernity can't coexist, but if you knew any muslim families, you could see that they coexist just fine. Show me a quote from two different translations that says Arabs are the chosen people. Who are these Islamic officials? Islam is not a church, there are no officials.
The Catholic Church has NEVER endorsed at ANY level child molestation. Islam has. Even if you want to say they currently do not, it is simply untrue that it hasn't happened in the past. Look at the beginning of the thread. I quote sources that lay FGM at Islam's door. No, but we could have a War on Catholicism & Protestantism (if that's a word) in Northern Ireland. Is Islam a race? Don't be so quick to label me. My questions are not invalid. And if my conclusions are simply wrong then you can show that, and then everyone who reads this will have a realistic view of Islam. Labeling me just makes you look desperate. The only passage we've seen from the Koran is violent. Mango posted multiple sites about the conflict between capitalism and Islam. I point out that Islam is flexible where there is a countering influence as in East Asia (Buddism) and the States (modernity), so I don't think my view is one sided, just controversial.
<A HREF="http://www.islamfortoday.com/shia.htm">The Origins of the Sunni/Shia split in Islam</A> <i>.....Worldwide, Shias constitute ten to fifteen percent of the overall Muslim population...........</i> Your flip response indicates an unfamilarity with my reputation for research. It will become clear to you very shortly. <A HREF="http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/low/world/middle_east/1603178.stm">Analysis: The roots of jihad</A> <i> By Middle East analyst Fiona Symon The Arabic word jihad means literally "struggle" and Islamic scholars have long been divided on how it should be interpreted. For some it means the struggle to defend one's faith and ideals against harmful outside influences. For others it has come to represent the duty of Muslims to fight to rid the Islamic world of western influence in the form of corrupt and despotic leaders and occupying armies. This is a view that has come to be widely accepted among the more militant Muslim groups, although most would not agree with the methods adopted by Osama Bin Laden and the al-Qaeda movement. Modern jihad The origins of Bin Laden's concept of jihad can be traced back to two early 20th century figures, who started powerful Islamic revivalist movements in response to colonialism and its aftermath. Pakistan and Egypt - both Muslim countries with a strong intellectual tradition - produced the movements and ideology that would transform the concept of jihad in the modern world. In Egypt, Hassan al-Banna's Muslim Brotherhood and in Pakistan, Syed Abul Ala Maududi's Jamaat Islami sought to restore the Islamic ideal of the union of religion and state. They blamed the western idea of the separation of religion and politics for the decline of Muslim societies. This, they believed, could only be corrected through a return to Islam in its traditional form, in which society was governed by a strict code of Islamic law. Al-Banna and Maudoudi breathed new life into the concept of jihad as a holy war to end the foreign occupation of Muslim lands. Wide acceptance In the 1950s Sayed Qutb, a prominent member of Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood, took the arguments of al-Banna and Maududi a stage further. For Qutb, all non-Muslims were infidels - even the so-called "people of the book", the Christians and Jews - and he predicted an eventual clash of civilisations between Islam and the west. Qutb was executed by Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser in 1966. According to Dr Azzam Tamimi, director of the Institute of Islamic Political Thought in London, Qutb's writings in response to Nasser's persecution of the Muslim Brotherhood, "acquired wide acceptance throughout the Arab world, especially after his execution and more so following the defeat of the Arabs in the 1967 war with Israel". <b> Qutb and Maududi inspired a whole generation of Islamists, including Ayatollah Khomeini, who developed a Persian version of their works in the 1970s. </b> Afghan impetus The works of al-Banna, Qutb and Maududi were also to become the main sources of reference for the Arabs who fought alongside the Afghan mujahideen in the 1980s. One of these was the Palestinian scholar, Abdullah Azzam, who had fought with the PLO in the 1970s but became disillusioned with the Palestinian leadership because of its secular outlook. Azzam studied Islamic law at Cairo's Al-Azhar, where he met the family of Sayed Qutb, and went on to teach at university in Saudi Arabia, where one of his students was Osama Bin Laden. first Arabs to join the Afghan mujahedeen, along with Osama Bin Laden......... 'Mentality of jihad' Saudi Arabia, which follows the fundamentalist Wahhabi school of Islam, had become a natural haven for radical Islamist scholars, including the radical Egyptian Islamist Ayman al-Zawahri....... </i> A nice read is <A HREF="http://www.ict.org.il/articles/articledet.cfm?articleid=415">The Heritage of the Sunni Militant Groups</A>. <i>......The country in which this effort acheived its greatest success was Egypt, during the struggle of the Muslim Brotherhood against the Nasserist regime in the 1950s and 1960s. Some of the Brotherhood leaders found refuge in Saudi Arabia or recieved Saudi assistance in other Arab States. This led them to adopt the Salafi/Wahhabi ideas in their more extremist commentaries. Others while serving out sentences in Egyptian jails were encouraged by the <b>teachings of Sayyid Qutb, the ideological father of the Jihadi current in Egypt and other Arab States, who legitimized the Jihad against Arab rulers</b>.......</i> Here is the introduction to <i>Milestones</i> by the noted Sayyid Qutb of the Muslim Brotherhood. <A HREf="http://www.witness-pioneer.org/vil/Books/SQ_Milestone/Introduction.htm">Milestones: Introduction</a> <i> Mankind today is on the brink of a precipice, not because of the danger of complete annihilation which is hanging over its head-this being just a symptom and not the real disease -but because humanity is devoid of those vital values which are necessary not only for its healthy development but also for its real progress. Even the Western world realises that Western civilization is unable to present any healthy values for the guidance of mankind. It knows that it does not possess anything which will satisfy its own conscience and justify its existence. Democracy in the West has become infertile to such an extent that it is borrowing from the systems of the Eastern bloc, especially in the economic system, under the name of socialism. It is the same with the Eastern bloc. Its social theories, foremost among which is Marxism, in the beginning attracted not only a large number of people from the East but also from the West, as it was a way of life based on a creed. But now Marxism is defeated on the plane of thought, and if it is stated that not a single nation in the world is truly Marxist, it will not be an exaggeration. On the whole this theory conflicts with man's nature and its needs. This ideology prospers only in a degenerate society or in a society which has become cowed as a result of some form of prolonged dictatorship. But now, even under these circumstances, its materialistic economic system is failing, although this was the only foundation on which its structure was based. Russia, which is the leader of the communist countries, is itself suffering from shortages of food. Although during the times of the Tsars Russia used to produce surplus food, it now has to import food from abroad and has to sell its reserves of gold for this purpose. The main reason for this is the failure of the system of collective farming, or, one can say, the failure of a system which is against human nature. It is essential for mankind to have new leadership! The leadership of mankind by Western man is now on the decline, not because Western culture has become poor materially or because its economic and military power has become weak. The period of the Western system has come to an end primarily because it is deprived of those life-giving values which enabled it to be the leader of mankind. It is necessary for the new leadership to preserve and develop the material fruits of the creative genius of Europe, and also to provide mankind with such high ideals and values as have so far remained undiscovered by mankind, and which will also acquaint humanity with a way of life which is harmonious with human nature, which is positive and constructive, and which is practicable. Islam is the only System which possesses these values and this way of life. The period of the resurgence of science has also come to an end. This period, which began with the Renaissance in the sixteenth century after Christ and reached its zenith in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, does not possess a reviving spirit. All nationalistic and chauvinistic ideologies which have appeared in modern times, and all the movements and theories derived from them, have also lost their vitality. In short, all man-made individual or collective theories have proved to be failures. At this crucial and bewildering juncture, the turn of Islam and the Muslim community has arrived -the turn of Islam, which does not prohibit material inventions. Indeed, it counts it as an obligation on man from the very beginning of time, when God deputed him as His representative on earth, and regards it under certain conditions a5 worship of God and one of the purposes of man's creation.......... </i>
I don't have a problem with the conclusion that we should wage war on Islam as practiced in many places. That war, as I've explained, can have economic, political, cultural, or military actions and implications. People in other threads PRAISE Jimmy Carter because he made us the 'universally recognized champion of human rights,' but then refuse to act on or support any action that would infringe on the sovereignty of another country. It is silly. Islam has different views on human rights than Western civilization. Islam has different views on economics. Islam is based on a violent script. Carnage is better. Look at the quote. Is it an unpopular position? Looks like it. But where are the convincing rebuttals from...well anyone? There aren't any and we are 800 views into this thread. Yes, FGM is important. But it is only the tip of the iceberg and we have to decide if we believe there are universal rights, why would we NOT act. Would we stop slavery somewhere? Should we stop genocide? I say yes. I do not think you have to LOOK for violence in the Koran. I think it is violent. Like I said earlier, compare 'turn the other cheek' to 'carnage.' If it is so untrue then where are the quotes? Bible thumpers would've had ten pages of scripture by now. I can research an area and get a picture. I am not an expert in the Koran, and I don't hold a State Department job in the Middle East, that is true. But I am not stereotyping anything. Frankly, that is insulting. I have made caveats for Muslim populations in the West (moderated by modernity) and in the East (Buddism). But there is plenty of evidence that Muslims throughout the Middle East and the subcontinent and Africa, and some in Europe, and a couple in America, are at war with us. And not just with flying planes into buildings. But a conflict of core ideology. Why have you not disputed Mango about capitalism and Islam being incompatible? I already pointed to the lack on quotes from the holy text of the religion. I can point to Osama, and the fact that he and the Taliban were bankrolled by the Saudis. Who needs a picture drawn. If we believe humans have universal rights then we are bound to do what we can. The starting point is recognizing the conflicts. I haven't ignored any arguments. If you feel I have inadequately responded to something, please point it out and I'll address it. If that were true then the Saudis would not be bankrolling him. AND no one would be hiding him. I thought the shoe bomber guy was an American muslim. And there is a guy in Trafalgar Square every week, a big Muslim recruiter to wage war on the West. So even in the West, although again pretty much non-existant as far as I can tell in America. I think there were initial declarations but there is also mass support for Osama within Islamic communities. A Muslim COUNTRY gave him safe harbor and we had to INVADE to get him out. Why are the Saudis funding him? And that still doesn't address the other conflicts between our concept of rights and economics and Islam. Not really. I think there can be moderating influences as I've pointed out. Well, I posted a quote that WAS from an Islamic souce that talked about how is DOES NOT change as much as any other faith. Look back at the beginning of the thread. If you are going to make an assertion you darn well better back it up, pardner. AND, I'm not the one arguing they are misunderstanding Islam. That is your argument, lol. You are saying fundamentalists are not practicing 'real' Islam but some warped version. Stop trying to confuse me with the ol' Bugs Bunny/Daffy Duck 'No I'm not' 'Yes I am' routine. Not sure what that point is. Well all the hijackers were middle class and above Saudis. So were do you get that theory? This is exactly what I've been saying, DS. You're preaching to the choir. But those are places where our concepts are at war, a zero sum game, with thier concepts. Each degree our ideas increase there, their ideas decrease one percent. And 'War' is used in this context. A military war. A war of ideals. So to whistle and wish away the hard choices is not the best course of action.
No doubt there are families that have incorporated Western ideals into their own culture/community. Not sure what that proves. There are already quotes earlier in the thread that spell out that 'non-believers' are second class citizens. The religion is centered in Saudi Arabia, and every Muslim is supposed to come there once right, ensuring money for Arabs in perpetuity. The Koran says the decendants of Ishmael will profit more than the descendants of Abraham. "Every Prophet is appointed for his own nation but I have been appointed the prophet for all nations." (Mishkat, 5500, Vol.3) The hadith no. 5751 (Mishkat, Vol. 3) reports the Prophet saying: "Love the Arabs for three reasons because (1) I am an Arab (2) the Holy Koran is in Arabic and (3) the tongue of the dwellers of paradise shall also be Arabic." "But Islam, it must be remembered, also happens to be a faith that does not possess a clerical class or a supreme leader like the Pope. On the positive side this lends the creed an egalitarian outlook which puts all Muslims on par with each other. But on the negative side the absence of a centralised hierarchy also means that the Muslim world is full of self-proclaimed 'leaders of the faith' like the Taliban and their unwanted guest, Osama bin Laden." Dr. Farish A. Noor is a Malaysian political scientist and human rights activist. He has taught at the Centre for Civilisational Dialogue, University of Malaya and the Institute for Islamic Studies, Frie University of Berlin. He is currently associate fellow at the Institute for Strategic and International Studies (ISIS), Malaysia. Desert Scar, this also goes to your question of the importance of the question 'Is Islam violent. "The task that lies before the Muslim community today is to reclaim the concept of 'Jihad' and to invest it with other meanings different to those imposed by the Mullahs and militants. Cognisant of the painful realities that stand before the Muslim world at present, Muslim intellectuals must jump into the fray and regain control of the discourse of Islam which has for too long been regarded as the exclusive purview of the dogmatic Mullahs. We have to break down the rigid pedagogical structures that have kept Islamic discourse in such a static mode by by-passing traditional institutions of learning and indoctrination. Everything - from the universities to the media - will have to be used as the new sites of Islamic thought and education, in order for us to spread our message across to the wider public." Dr. Farish A. Noor is a Malaysian political scientist and human rights activist. He has taught at the Centre for Civilisational Dialogue, University of Malaya and the Institute for Islamic Studies, Frie University of Berlin. He is currently associate fellow at the Institute for Strategic and International Studies (ISIS), Malaysia.
I bolded your clause above because if you would have added that to the title it would have been less potentially offense and I wouldn't have had a problem with it. If I were a peace loving productive Muslim (which there are many in our nation) I would take offense at the title without that clause. If violence in Islam is so central it is just surprising that the vast majority of Muslims and Islamic nations are nonviolent. Are all these people just deviating from the literal text. I don't know, but even if so (e.g., they are bad Muslims according to literalists), religions evolve and change in interpretation. Thus another title to your thread could have been "should we wag war with radical- literalist-violent segments of the Islamic faith" or "or should we work to change the tennets of radical Islam that have no place in a civilized society". It only takes a few rich nuts to fund something like that--it is hardly an endorsement of the majority of Saudi's, and further, it is clear we have favor with the Saudi's in power (government). As for some Afgans supporting him, that is exactly the kind of place (with nothing left) where such people can prosper. I never said Osama and his gang are misunderstanding Islam. Is not possible Osama has interpreted most things about Islam correctly while peace loving Muslim's also have interpreted most things correctly. We are all talking about interpretation of faiths , not abolutes. I admit I am not a scholar on Islam to get into specifics, but I think that is beside the larger point when you consider historical context. The larger point is their are violent and non-violent people of all faiths, wars have been launched in the names of the world most popular faiths, and all of the popular faiths have tremendous diversity and interpretation within. You can argue the violent elements of Islam need to be stamped out, do you really believe this is equivalent to fundamentally stamping out the whole religion? No, I don't think you have ignored my points.
Wow, this thread is still going Rebuttals ... it takes too much time to go thru and find relevant quotes and hadiths from here and there, and I personally don't feel like sitting here and trying to change your mind. If you want to think of Islam as this backwards, violent, root-of-all-evil religion that needs to be put out, please, go right ahead, but I do wish you'd keep an open mind about it. The Islam I follow, and the Islam I see practiced by the many people in Kuwait, Pakistan, and Saudi Arabia (places I've grown up in) is peaceful, calm and righteous, where folks are helpful, honest, caring and giving (not saying/implying that thats not the case here). It has taught me respect, patience, hard work, and has given me what I need to lead a well-balanced life, and continues to do so. Growing up, what I learnt wasn't tempered by any Western ideologies and I haven't gotten the watered down version either. I really wish you could have attended the ISNA conference here in DC over the Labor Day weekend, it would have answered a lot of your questions (which, as I've said before, are valid). There were Christian and Jewish scholars present as well, who discussed the true face of Islam, and what it really stands for. I, myself, learned a whole lot than I knew before in terms of history, what somethings really mean, how I'm supposed to act in certain situations, etc, etc. (And I realized how attractive women with hijab are ) With this, I officially sign off the thread I hope you find the answers you're looking for Hayes, and I also hope you realize that Islam is not what you're painting it out to be. A lot of reform is needed in the power-hungry upper levels, but believe me, of the 1.3 billion Muslims in the world ... the ones who're destroying Islams name are less than a percent. Look at all the Muslims on this board --rockit BTW, doesn't 'turn the other cheek' apply to you in this case ... you're not agreeing with something and you're suggesting a war of some sort (social, economic, whatever...) ... shouldn't you just turn the other cheek?
Some stats to back up my theory. "In all these places, the relations between Muslims and peoples of other civilization -- Catholic, Protestant, Othrodox, Hindu, Chinese, Buddist, Jewish -- have been generally antagonistic; most of these relations have been violent at some point in the past; many have been violent in the 90s. Whereever one looks along the perimeter of Islam, Muslims have problems living peacefully with their neighbors. The question naturally rises as to whether this pattern of late twentieth-century conflict between Muslim and non-Muslim groups is equally true of relations between groups of other civilizations. In fact, it is not. Muslims make up about one-fifth of the worlds population but in the 90s they have been far more involved in intergroup voilence than the people of other civilization. The evidence is overwhelming. 1. Muslims were participants in 26 of 50 ethnopolitical conflicts in 93-94 analyzed in depth. 20 of these conflicts were between groups of different civilizations, of which 15 were between Muslims and non-Muslims. There were, in short, three times as many intercivilizational conflicts involving Muslims as there were conflicts between all non-Muslim civilizations. The conflicts within Islam were also more numerous than those in any other civilization, including tribal conflicts in Africa. In contrast to Islam, the West was involved in only 2 intracivilizational and two intercivilizational conflicts. Conflicts involving Muslims also tended to be heavy in casualties. Of the six wars in which Gurr estimates 200,000 or more people were killed, three were between Muslims and non-Muslims, two were between Muslims, and only one involved non-Muslims. 2. The New York Times identified 48 locations in which some 59 ethnic conflicts were occuring in 93. In half these places Muslims were clashing with other Muslims or non-Muslims. 31 of the 59 conflicts were between groups from different civilizations, and parallelling (other) data, two-thirds of these intercivilizational conflicts were between Muslims and others. 3. In yet another analysis, Sivard identified 29 wars (defined as conflicts involving 1000 or more deaths in a year) under way in 1992. Nine of twelve intercivilizational conflicts were between Muslims and non-Muslims, and Muslims were once again fighting more wars than people from any other civilization." (S. Huntington) That was just a comparison of religious philosophy. I am not religious...
Hayes, could it be that Islam for whatever reason (it is promoted there, for some reason it hooks in there) is spreading to desperate areas prone to violence? In other words, instead of the cause perhaps it is a frequent symptom in todays world. Before Islam arrived at those places was it peaceful, then after it arrived it because warring. If so that would provide more support for your theory. As far as the middle east--I think most of those conflicts of peoples there way predate Islam. You are also comparing wars in developed countries with those in undeveloped countries since the 1950s. Further, both world wars we have had and probably the 5 leading causuality causing wars had little to do with Islam.
Hayes, I think there have been countless convincing rebuttals. You don't buy the rebuttals, but I don't buy your arguments. Having read the Koran, and done some study(I'm not an expert by any means, I admit.) Still I can say that Islam is less concerned with converting others than Christianity is. Islam says that to murder an innocent is to murder all of Humanity. The Koran also defines what makes a person not an innocent, and it isn't his religion. It's whether he's killed someone or is endangering someone. The innocents that died at WTC do not qualify with that. The problem isn't the religion itself but how some extremists interpret the religion. I've also pointed out that the country with largest muslim population in the world, does not accept the practice of FGM, and has a Female president. Both of those things seem well integrated with modern society. The problem seems to be that you make your interpretation of what the Koran says, or abide by the interpretation of extremists, or another guy who isn't muslim but claims that islam is at it's core violent. I've also given an example closer to home. Was 'the dream' more or less violent after his re-dedication and closer following of Islam? I know that he has studied the religion probably more than either of us, and in his heart it's made him more peaceful. None of those things or the other posts on here, have convinced you, but I found all of these as well as posts by some of the muslims on this board to be convincing rebuttals. To one of the posts you responded that the muslim didn't know as much about Islam as he claimed... insinuating that you knew more about it's practices than this person who's family is muslim and who grew up with Islam all his life. Here's a quote from the bible ordering genocide. from Deut. chapter 25. "When the Lord your God gives you rest from all the enemies around you in the land he is giving you to possess an inheritance, you shall blot out the memory of Amalek from under heaven. Do not forget! This is from the bible in the book of Numbers chapter 31. "Now kill all the boys. And kill every woman who has slept with a man, but kill every woman who has slept with a man, but save for yourselves every girl who has never slept with a man." This passage has God's chosen people killing boys and women, and taking slaves virgin girls. I could go on and on listing violent passages like that from the bible. I could point to isolated incidents in the modern day where Christian serbs sought to commit genocide against muslim civilians in that region of europe, or list incidents of Christians blowing up abortion clinics and claim that the Christians along with the bible were violent and should have war declared on them. I'm not saying that Christians or the bible instruct that kind of violence. I would say that the people who carry out those violent plans are misusing the bible, just as most muslims say the people that carry out terrorism in the name Islam are misusing the Koran. Neither religion is inherently evil or preaches it's followers to use violence to achieve it's goals. There are some muslims who are at war with us, but not Islam as a whole. In the Bosnian/Serb conflict it's Christians who are seeking to wipe out Muslims. They are bankrolled by Christians, and aren't very democratic. That doesn't mean that Christianity is bad. Also predominantly Muslim countries like Pakistan, and Turkey helped us in that invasion to drive out the Taliban. Iran also gave limited support by allowing it's territory to be used if our side had any heliocopters etc. in distress. AND, I'm not the one arguing they are misunderstanding Islam. That is your argument, lol. You are saying fundamentalists are not practicing 'real' Islam but some warped version. [/B][/QUOTE] Many muslims and muslim clergy are saying that as well. It seems like you are only accepting the extremist interpretation as being Islam, and basing that as an argument to war against it.
Wow Hayes, you and Ann Coulter must be on the same wavelength. I just saw her column from this week. It's about the exact same subject as this thread. And it came out the same day you started this thread. Spooky! Here it is: In "The Trust" by Susan E. Tifft and Alex S. Jones, a fawning historical account of the New York Times and the family behind it, the authors describe how the Newspaper of Record conspired to hide information about the Holocaust: A July 2, 1944, dispatch citing "authoritative information" that 400,000 Hungarian Jews had already been deported to their deaths and an additional 350,000 were to be killed in the next three weeks received only four column inches on Page 12, while that same day a story about Fourth of July holiday crowds ran on the front page. To find out what the enemy is up to in the current war, you keep having to turn to obscure little boxes at the bottom of Page A-9 of the Newspaper of Record. In a little-noticed story almost exactly one year after Muslims staged the most horrific terrorist attack the world has ever seen, a Muslim en route from Germany to Kosovo emerged from the airplane bathroom and tried to strangle a stewardess with his shoelaces. (Not that there's anything unpeaceful about that.) That story was squirreled away in a small box at the very bottom of Page A-9 of the Times. In the entire Lexis-Nexis archives, only three newspapers reported the incident. Not one mentioned that the attacker was a Muslim. It was a rather captivating story, too. Earlier in the flight, the Muslim responded to the stewardess' offer of refreshments by saying, "I'd like to drink your blood." (Not that there's anything unpeaceful about that.) Also last week, another practitioner of the Religion of Peace, this one with ties to al-Qaida, tried to board a plane in Switzerland with a gun. This story did not merit front-page coverage at the New York Times. On July 4 this year, an Egyptian living in California – who had complained about his neighbors flying a U.S. flag, had a "Read the Koran" sticker on his front door, and expressed virulent hatred for Jews – walked into an El Al terminal at the Los Angeles airport and started shooting Jews. (Not that there's anything unpeaceful about that.) The Times casually reported the possibility that his motive was a fare dispute. Four days after the shooting, the story vanished amid an embarrassed recognition of the fact that any Muslim could snap at any moment and start shooting. Despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary (generally found around Page A-12 of the Times), Americans have been cowed into perseverating that Islam is a "religion of peace." Candid conversations about Islam are beyond the pale in a country that deems Screw magazine part of our precious constitutional freedoms. If the 9-11 terrorists had been Christians, the shoelace strangler a Christian, the gun-toting Swedish Muslim a Christian, the Los Angeles airport killer a Christian and scores of suicide bombers Christians, I assure you we would not be pussyfooting around whether maybe there was something wrong with Christianity. In a fascinating book written by two Arab Muslims who converted to Christianity, Ergun Mehmet Caner and Emir Fethi Caner give an eye-opening account of Islam's prophet in "Unveiling Islam: An Insider's Look at Muslim Life and Beliefs." Citing passages from the Hadith, the collected sayings of Muhammad, the Caners note that, by his own account, the founder of Islam was often possessed by Satan. The phrase "Satanic Verses" refers to words that Muhammad first claimed had come from God, but which he later concluded were spoken by Satan. Muhammad married 11 women, kept two others as concubines and recommended wife-beating (but only as a last resort!). His third wife was 6 years old when he married her and 9 when he consummated the marriage. To say that Muhammad was a demon-possessed pedophile is not an attack. It's a fact. (And for the record, Timothy McVeigh is not the founder of Christianity. He wasn't even a Christian. He was an atheist who happened to be a gentile.) Muslims argue against the Caners' book the way liberals argue against all incontrovertible facts. They deny the meaning of words, posit irrelevant counterpoints, and attack the Caners' motives. Ibrahim Hooper, with the Council on American-Islamic Relations, says that by "6 years old" the Hadith really means "16 years old" and "9" means "19" – numbers as similar in Arabic as they are in English. Hooper also makes the compelling argument that the Caner brothers – who say they wrote their book out of love for Muslims whom they want to see in Heaven – are full of "hate." Other Islamic scholars concede the facts, but argue that Muhammad's marriage to a 6-year-old girl was an anomaly. Oh, OK, never mind. Still others explain that Muhammad's marriage to a 6-year-old girl was of great benefit to her education and served to reinforce political allegiances. So was she really 16, or was it terrific that he had sex with a 9-year-old to improve her education? This is like listening to some Muslims' earlier argument-in-the-alternative that the Zionists attacked the World Trade Center, but America brought the attack on itself anyway. Muhammad makes L. Ron Hubbard look like Jesus Christ. Most people think nothing of assuming every Scientologist is a crackpot. Why should Islam be subject to presumption of respect because it's a religion? Liberals bar the most benign expressions of religion by little America. Only a religion that is highly correlated with fascistic attacks on the U.S. demands their respect and protection.
Yes, and those same constitutional freedoms protect Ann Coulter's freedom to publish articles such as this, full of ignorance and faulty logic. Good find on this article Mrs. JB. I try and read as much of her stuff as I can.
If your supposition was true then it would have to be a mighty big coincidence that Islamic countries war with each other and with other civilizations MORE than others. If conditions independent of religion within those countries were responsible, then there would be a more even spread of violence. There is not. The evidence overwhelmingly shows that Islamic countries are more violent. Not sure what you are saying here. Well, WWII was certainly a war of ideology (democracy vs. facism and communism), as was the Cold War (democracy vs. communism). And the intensity of the conflict is irrelevant to the question at hand. The question is whether Islam is inherently violent unless moderated by some outside influence.
That is your choice. But the numbers prove I'm right. Well, historically that is not true. And there can be no doubt that Islam favors Arabs over all others. Again if you want to dispute that please go back in the thread where I and others have posted about this particular point. What is the difference between Dar al-Islam and Dar al-harb? Doesn't the Koran say they should be treated differently? Isn't that the way it is practiced? I already answered that with Rockit. Repeating the same argument that has gone unanswered does not move it from the unconvincing category to the convincing category. Displace them as they displaced you. Carnage is better. That is the quote. So Israelis are not innocent, correct? So Israelis are all fair game, correct? "Originally posted by rockit And fight for the cause of God against those who fight against you: but commit not the injustice of attacking them first: God loveth not such injustice: And kill them wherever ye shall find them, and eject them from whatever place they ejected you; for civil discord is worse than carnage: yet attack them not at the Sacred Mosque, unless they attack you therein; but if they attack you, slay them. Such the reward of the infidels. But if they desist, then verily God is gracious, merciful." It's pretty clear from this passage that you only resort to killing if you have been provoked, you should never be the perpetrator." Sure, but what is provocation? How about the existence of Israel? "And eject them from whatever place they ejected you; for civil discord is WORSE than CARNAGE." Wouldn't that also apply to Afghanistan? Wouldn't ALL Muslims be obligated to fight the US since we took down Afghanistan, according to the Koran? Already answered that. Originally posted by FranchiseBlade As far as the Koran goes, it states that whoever murders one innocent murders all of humanity. The terrorists plain and simple are going against the Koran when they perform their terrorist actions. Not if they define all Westerners as the enemy. Then it is not murder. Same principle the Allies used to bomb cities in WWII. Make the civilians combatants and they will exert pressure on the government to sue for peace. Same principle (when you look at it) at bombing Serbia to stop aggression in Kosovo, which (you guessed it) caused the people to rise up and remove Milosevic. Already answered that. I point to every Muslim that supports Osama, to every Muslim that said 'they got what they deserved after 9/11,' to every Muslim that practices FGM on their children, to every Muslim that takes multiple wives, to every Muslim that rallies against modernity/development. There are more 'extremists' than you are willing to admit. And I already answered this multiple times. There is a moderating influence (Buddism) within the culture. Just as there is in the States (modernity). Although I will point out that there has been plenty of violence there between the Muslims and the Chinese (ie different civilizations). "Ethnic Chinese, for instance, are an economically dominant minority in most Southeast Asian countries. They have been successfully assimilated into the societies of Buddist Thailand and the Catholic Philippines; there are virtually no significant instances of anti-Chinese violence by the majority groups in these countries. In contrast, anti-Chinese riots and/or violence have occured in Muslim Indonesia and Muslim Malaysia, and the role of the Chinese in those societies remains a sensitive and potentially explosive issue in a way it is not in Thailand and the Philippines." (Huntington) Nope. That is NOT the problem. I have looked at interpretations of the Koran, and I have simply answered the Koran as posted. Look above at Rockit's post. He clearly thinks it says one thing, and I another. But I'm not sure how he can ignore the 'Carnage is better than civil discord' part. Don't brush my opinions off because you can't think of an answer except 'you don't get it,' or 'you are Islam hatin'.' Irrelevant. He was moderated like most Muslims in the States by modernity. And he was young when he got here and aggressive as many youths are, and one basketball player does not make for any measurable conclusion. If it was legitimate to draw a conclusion from one person, why wouldn't it be the man of the hour, Osama bin Laden? On what points specifically? How do you explain the hard numbers that show Islam fights internally and with their neighbors considerably more than other civilizations? Yes, I did. That poster said he had never heard of FGM, while maintaining that I could not be correct as he knew so much about Islam. My response that he apparently 'did not know as much as he thought' was warranted. Already answered. Christianity has in most places been moderated and are contained in secular states, where their religion is not the influence that it is in Islamic states. The statistics show Christian countries do not war anywhere near Islamic countries. And I'm not a Bible expert nor a practicing Christian, but is that old testament stuff? Already answered this. It was secular (but highly) Christian countries that intervened to stop the Serbians. And again this does nothing to the overall numbers. I did not say Christian or Hindu or Buddist countries NEVER go to war, only that the number of Islamic countries involved in conflict far outnumbers those from religions of relative size. These are not relevant in size or scope. In fact, their limited numbers suggest a large gap between religious inspired violence and that we see in Islam. I don't believe I've ever used the word 'evil.' I believe that has only been used by yourself and several others to try and make my views seem extreme. Please don't misquote me. In the quotes we've seen from the Koran so far, there is nothing to discredit the idea that it is violent. In addition, as the 'Bible' has lessened in influence within the West, the violence attributable has lessened. Maybe there is a lesson in there for Islam. Answered already. Turkey overall has long ago joined the West (see NATO) and its moderating influences (democracy) although even now we see Islamic forces within it, and within Pakistan bursting with violence. Iran is playing realpolitiks, offering almost nothing for a seat at the table. Surely you are not saying Iran does NOT sponser terrorism. Surely you are not saying Iran has only a small cadre of fundamentalists that have no power in the government? Actions speak louder than words.
