I get that, and to be honest as frustrated as I get with some of the views and repetitive conversations we have had. There have been points where I progressed and learned from some of your views elsewhere and also saw you curious to learn more about what others were saying even about islam when presented the right way. But the reason I take it as an attack is even just the label it self calling it islamists just sounds like the religion, the ideology is the issue and then there are just the few moderates like myself that are ok. but the majority or the core of the religion is the issue when you and others use the the title islamist bc its so basic and and general. Also when you attack the ideology(and I do realize that you are trying to attack that group of violent people and terrorist) you are still attacking me because I do believe in islam and follow that book and therefore technically that ideology. Obviously the outcome with me is different and I take it differently from many of them and many people take it in different ways. It is decentralized and you will see quite the variety of interpretations. Yet we all do follow the same core ideology so I don't think that is the issue and find that its just not the accurate thing to attack. like I said before, lets talk about those extremist and attack their backward oppressive ways and culture and I'd probably attack with you and see the problems. But we need to accurately describe who we are attacking or criticizing and islamists shouldn't be it. Its often mixed with pre arabic culture, political turmoil, or whatever else that I have gone over before. So when we you do accurately and more properly describe who you are talking about, we might actually agree on more than we realize. But when you say the ideology or islamists or something along those lines, even if you don't mean it towards me, I believe in that book, islam as well so i mean its not far fetched to call me an 'islamists' at that( i just don't think that is the proper term for the people I think you are trying to target) So yea, i've said it before, I have spoken to you before and see that despite popular belief, you were open to hear about different viewpoints and so I was exposed to a side that I appreciate and not many have seen. Yet I just think if you articulated it differently and began to use that same research and argument for radicalism in general then it wouldn't just be an attack on my belief system.
No problem, and yes I've read through every link I sent; I didnt read them all immediately before sending...some, like the RAND and FBI Report, I read a while back. Let me know which links you're referring to in terms of what I linked to not being on the page. Thanks for reading it all; I honestly dont have time to give a full response as I have to get going, so I'll be brief. Think of the entire Shariah Conspiracy Theory Industry and you'll get a sense of just a few of the crowds that have exaggerated the risks. I understand your point; it's difficult assigning 'values' to terrorism incidents. So, for example, bombing a minor office building where one or two people die isnt the same as 9/11, where thousands died. In fact, the total casualty count is really nothing more than 9/11 and the Unibomber attack combined. Here's a graphical depiction of the terrorist incidents: As you can see, almost every listed attack was a bombing or arson, which is terrorism. If you go to the bottom of the page, you'll find: Chronological Summary of Terrorist Incidents in the United States 1980-2005. Tabulate every single event within that time frame and divvy it up yourself. You'll find the exact percentages I listed. ? How so? The shoe bomber was listed: dont really have time right now to respond to all this. Will take a look again tomorrow if I find time....
Doesn't address the double standard....to me you are saying: Essentially comes down to saying people should condemn their own group only when it comes to murdering in the name of religion...but if it's racism or prejudice, then it's not required to condemn your own. Whatever.
Also , I guess as I got overemotional and defensive, I badmouthed you and at times I believe in the past I tried to use the whole nazi argument to prove my points(not to use a broad stroke to paint people as the same). That said, I was frustrated and wrong to insult you and shouldn't bring in that sort of argument and don't agree when it is used because that sort of logic is exactly what I don't appreciate when people use towards me and even the term islamists. Ultimately, it becomes just a pissing fight and it is just cyclical of insults, negativity, and never progressive if we try to respond to do what we others have done to us and keep passing the same action on in bitterness. In essence, it just dignifies that initial generalization and promotes that sort of mentality. Instead, its better if we live to our ideals and even if the they are not done to us. i am not perfect and will make mistakes. So as a human, I will fall in at times, but I just need to keep getting back up and aspiring to reach my ideals. In terms of islam, it brings a story in line where there was a lady who used to throw trash on the Prophet when he passed by her street. He would ignore it every time until one day she fell ill and did not throw it on him. He grew curious and went to check on her to find out she was ill. He helped nurse her back and she was astonished on how he treated her after she treated him so poorly. In reference to that, not just to the other muslim posters, but to people not just of all faiths even, but if you believe in something. Be it a religion, moral code, value set, whatever it is, the best response to this sort of negativity would not be coming back to attack someone, but to show your ideals in person. There is no better representation of that faith and no argument that can have as much impact as being that ambassador for your beliefs. its ideal thinking, nad I don't think we should be afraid to call it realistic and hopefully we can all strive for this sort of mentality and we would all grow to new heights as a society. So that said, I do get emotional in this topic and a bit defensive. While I do not agree with many of your assertions and would hope that as much negativity is there in islam, there are several and plenty ambassadors that live quielty or may not get publicity, but everyday focus on the general gist of the quran(unfortunately the radicalist cherry pick things out of context from there), and the general gist is of peace, its of giving, its of living a good moral and value life, and being able to coexist with your neighbors however different they are. It is of the value of intellect and the pursuit of knowledge and a spiritual connection with one self and god. Its of will power, compassion, and be able to appreciate struggle(jihad) that it takes to become a better human being to contribute and impact the world around you(the people and the environment,which is also spoken of in the book) in a positive manner. I have spoken to aTW back and forth throw some PMs before and I have seen him open to some ideas and we had some positive exchanges before that despite popular belief, showed some progress and gave me sincere hope that the attacks would stop. Like I said before, if the issue is suicde bombings, radicalization, oppression, those are all things that I would stand next to him in fighting and attacking, but when he puts those just under Islam(because they are bigger in scope than that) or associates the belief in the religion as a big reason for those to exist rather than looking deeper to find the other and IMO true causes of these unfortunate issues, then we just simply disagree. Anyways, I'll try to keep working on being more positive in my responses and not badmouthing or talking badly of someone. All the best
How many terror attacks in the US have resulted in the murder of many people? In the past decade, only two come to mind: Ft. Hood and 9/11. The rest were either thwarted, or minor in impact. I'm glad to hear you say that. I'd venture to guess that for most readers of this forum, its not obvious that you feel this way. There's no evidence to suggest that at all. Much the same way that, as you rightly pointed out, terrorism incidents can be subject to further scrutiny based on the fickle enterprise of assigning values, so too can aggregating select statistics across a broader population. For example, if make-believe country x has a population of 10 people in the US, and two of them commit a crime, thats a 20% crime rate. If the population of people from country x went up, their crime rate would invariably decline, though the total number of crimes would likely go up as well. The same is true for the Muslim community. If there were 30 million Muslims in America, that percentage would undoubtedly be lower, but the total number of terrorist acts conducted by Muslims would probably go up...just not at a rate proportional to the current percentage. I think I explained how this train of thought is fundamentally unsound above. Agreed, but it's difficult to make too many assumptions on this stat. What are the mitigating circumstances that are leading individuals to those conclusions? For example, a Pakistani immigrant from a village that's suffered from a host of drone attacks is probably more likely to be hesitant in condemning terrorism, even if the said person would never consider commiting a terrorist act themself. The stat is one of feeling, and the reality is that the US has not done the best job of winning the battle of 'hearts and minds' across regions where its been engaged in major conflicts. "Every Muslim doing taqiyyah" appears to be a prevailing theme in certain circles. The unnecessary paranoia in these circles is astonishing- A recent pew survey found that 67% of the tea partiers believe Islam is more likely to encourage violence than other faith groups, and 66% of conservative republicans feel this way. Realize that's not a coincidence, but rather a product of a concerted campaign by opportunistic politicians and self-styled 'experts' (with no relevant credentials to speak of) that continue to fan the flames for their own personal benefit. I dont know why you make it sound as though I'm the one drawing the conclusions I cited previously. If I gave that impression, my apologies. The report was from the FBI, and the other was from the RAND corporation. Neither is in bed with Islamist organizations, and none has any interest in painting Islam or the Muslim community in a favorable light. I found both reports enlightening, and with legitimate organizations that have experts in this field (CIA, NSA, FBI, Europol, etc.) I find approaches that are far more pragmatic; they arent naive about the threat of Islamic Terrorism, nor are they victim to the general hysteria present in the right wing of this country. Maybe I'm being misunderstood. I'm not suggesting that religion is playing no role; it's clear that terrorists are co-opting a particular religious expression to further their own cause, but the primary motivation, one that supercedes the religious component of this, is political in nature. The messages left after 9/11 were indeed clear: Motives for 9/11 The reality is that terrorism is a multifaceted enterprise, and the actions of terrorists are motivated by a variety of circumstances. As I mentioned, it's clear to me that the primary motivations are political. This statement- of the primary motivations being political- is often misconstrued as 'blaming America first' and thats not the case at all. Personally, I supported the Afghan War when we initially responded post 9/11 (though at the moment, I cant figure out why we're still there), but I knew that going into Afghanistan was going to result in more terrorism, not less. The decision at the time weighed both pros and cons, and someone decided that it was worth risking an increase in terrorism to depose Taliban leadership. Beyond that, there are localized socio-religious-political realities that play into the hands of terrorist organizations. In Saudi Arabia, for example, hardline religious scholars are about as apolitical as you can get. Their silence on major current affairs is conspicuous, and they spend much of their time debating nuanced theological controversies rather than speaking to the issues of their day...and in a sense, they're not in a position to do so- any scholar thats come out publicly and voiced an opinion not toe-ing the party line eventually got arrested and was subject to significant persecution. So there's a vacuum when dissenting voices arent present, and radicals often fill that vacuum, because in a way, they're the only relevant voices in that entire region. Whereas others are scared, they openly condemn the Iraq War, Abu Ghraib, etc. This sentiment is one I've heard from experts in the field of National Security directly, so I find it credible. In the RAND report, it said that almost all cases of US terrorism conducted by radical Muslims were a product of online conversions. Compare that to the prevailing wisdom amongst many groups that mosques are to blame, and that we need to be actively monitoring every mosque in America along with every Muslim organization and you'll see a major contradiction. I have to get back to work, and I probably wont be available to continue this debate/discussion much further as I'm traveling in the coming days and am busy preparing for that, so I'll conclude with the following: Like I said before, I believe that a lot of your opinions are influenced by a cognitive bias, be it my previously mentioned Availability Heuristic, or a Confirmation Bias. And although for the most part you do take the time to think through a lot of what you post, much of the time you're guilty of broad brushing the entire Muslim community and/or religion of Islam with offensive stereotypes. Which probably explains a lot of the flak you get from others in this folder. Thanks for taking the time to analyze and read what I said. I actually dont think we're terribly far apart on this issue, and I think you'd be surprised if you actually knew the number of Muslims and Muslim organizations in America that regularly work with law enforcement and intelligence agencies. Anyways, thanks again.
http://video.nytimes.com/video/2011/03/17/magazine/100000000725852/yasir.html I encourage all the members who feel like Muslims do nothing and say nothing about horrendous atrocities committed in the name of Islam to watch this vid.
