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Kajeesus posted:hey, remember the Crusades? Those wars that resulted in a few small crusader states being established because the Turks were harassing Christian pilgrims? That's pretty small potatoes compared to what the Muslims did before and after that. How about the arab conquests?  On the topic of completely divorcing religion from behaviors, there seems to be a trend for left-leaning people to do that and I don't get it. Right-wingers do a similar thing where they ignore economic effects on an individual or cultural group. Is it really that shocking that a religion whose holy text (handed down word-for-word by God, or so they say) endorses slavery, rape, and systematic murder of heathens result in it's believers performing those actions? Come on now. ----------------
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Jul 4, 2015 23:41
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computer parts posted:This isn't a very strong thesis because this sort of behavior exists independent of any particular religion, even the supposedly "peaceful" ones (Hinduism, Buddhism, etc). Hindus and Buddhists never overran a third of the known world in violent conquest after founding their religion. They may form violent sects and butcher Muslims in their own country, but I'm having trouble thinking of holy wars that took place on anywhere near the same scale as the Islamic conquests. The closest I can think of are the crusaders in the pagan slavic/baltic states. ----------------
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Jul 4, 2015 23:47
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Kim Jong Il posted:There's a difference between arguing about abstract notions of religious first principles (where it's correct to state that Islam is inhumane and barbaric in the way that the overwhelming majority of religions are), and the reality of what the majority of its believers think and practice. Clearly, what's currently seen as Islamic-motivated political violence owes a lot to the war, political repression, and poverty in the Middle East. I think that explains the majority of it, but it's not really helpful for the Glenn Greenwalds of the world to reflexively criticize people like Dawkins who are coming more from the "all religions are barbaric" side than the "let's use this as convenient excuse to bomb and and use drones" side, and this sort of mischaracterization does quite a bit to damage their credibility. I'm arguing the other side of this because no one else is, but yours is more the direction I lean. Most people are reasonable & kind, and will ignore the repugnant parts of the religion they claim to follow. That said, I do think that it's easier for leaders (of countries, political movements, terrorist groups) to build support if the religion they're building an organization upon endorses their less savory actions. ----------------
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Jul 4, 2015 23:57
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Ghost of Reagan Past posted:A larger percentage of Americans oppose interracial marriage. computer parts posted:The BNP polled similarly in 2010 UK. It must be weird going through life with no sense of degree or scale ----------------
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Jul 5, 2015 14:23
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Rakosi posted:Also, please don't minimize the belief that the Quran is the literal word of god. Where there are contradictions, there is the law of abrogation where a chronologically later verse usually takes precedence over the earlier contradiction, but everything in it is the literal Word of God(tm) Interestingly, more of the earlier verses are more peaceful than the later ones. Which is made hilarious (in a sad way) by the fact that the Quran was assembled after it's dictation. We could've had a much more peaceful Islam if the pages of a book had been shuffled a bit differently. TheImmigrant posted:That looks like Khmer. Are you trying to make some kind of point about Buddhism? It wouldn't be D&D without contextless pics that are posted in the hopes that you don't get it so they can smugly explain the significance instead of just laying their ideas out in text in the first place. ----------------
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Jul 8, 2015 21:18
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ToxicAcne posted:The Quran is assembled according to the length of the surahs not chronological order (the last surahs in the book are actually the first revealed). But by all means enjoy you quirky jab at a religion you don't even understand. Wait... so if they're assembled by length and not chronological order, why do the later passages take precedence? That makes even less sense. ----------------
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Jul 8, 2015 21:24
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Fizzil posted:The law of abrogation is bullshit trotted out by Islamophobes. There is no such thing, unless specifically pointed out in Hadith. Its a complete invention. The Wikipedia article doesn't say anything about the contradictions needing to be pointed out in Hadith: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Naskh_(tafsir) It does mention 3 Hadith that do so, but according to the article the determination of abrogated passages is an ongoing process for Islamic scholars. I'm not sure which part of that is "bullshit trotted out by Islamaphobes". 
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Jul 9, 2015 14:50
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Liberal_L33t posted:Napoleon Bonaparte was a pretty baller-rear end dictator actually, the modernization of Europe would have been set back at least a century if it weren't for him and the modern world would be a 10 times better place if he'd won in Russia. Ataturk, although perhaps not strictly a dictator (but hardly purely democratic), had great success forcefully modernizing Turkey - notice that even with Erdogan it is leagues less barbaric than the rest of the Muslim world. Ho Chi Minh forcefully unified and modernized Vietnamese culture in order to put up a united front against western imperialism. The Bourbon Reforms in Spain were not at all democratic or egalitarian yet they succeeded in modernizing a badly-lagging Spanish government and culture. Democracy is the preferable option for reform of harmful laws or practices, all other things being equal, but it is not the only method that has EVER EVER produced positive results. I'll throw in Lee Kuan Yew: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lee_Kuan_Yew Singapore went from one of the poorest provinces of Malaysia to having one of the highest standards of living in the world in just a few decades. I'm not sure how much 'cultural' progress was made, but I'm sure they're better in that department than "Islam is the State Religion"-Malaysia. ---------------- Narciss fucked around with this message at 17:10 on Jul 9, 2015 |
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Jul 9, 2015 17:07
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Liberal_L33t posted:For the Islamic apologetics in this thread; can you give a hypothetical example of a quote or doctrine that would mark Islam as an inherently violent doctrine to your satisfaction Haha, good luck with that. I don't know why some posters insist on the view of "all religions are created equal and it doesn't matter what their holy books say its all culture & economics, man". Rakosi posted:We all know the real reason why the majority Christian countries don't put adulterers to death nowadays is more because of political and social modern convention rather than Biblical precedence, and I'm arguing that when a normal, peaceful Muslim says killing apostates is murder and bad, they're founding that belief more in our liberal western social thought than the what they have got from the Qu'ran, to the extent that they sometimes actually ignore some very clear laws. Thank you. Some posters have argued "well, the Old Testament is pretty violent and Christians hold that as scripture". I fully believe that if Judaism or Christianity were followed to the letter of the law, their believers would be more violent. The difference is that a follower of Christ's teachings can very credibly ignore large swaths of the canonical Bible, considering what a mess the assembly of it has been. God knows what Jesus' teachings actually were and how accurately the gospels reflect them; others gospels were of course left out of the bible altogether by priests hundreds of years after their initial writing. Islam, on the other hand, is very very clear on what the word of God is. There is the Quran, written in a single dialect of Arabic, and that is the perfect unquestionable word of God. You cannot be a Mohammedan without following what is stated in the Quran. To do otherwise is to be an imperfect Muslim; and to the degree that the majority of Muslims on earth are tolerant, civil people is proportional to the degree that they ignore their holy book. Islam is a cynical religion created by a warlord-wannabe and has been used to drive violent conquest since the time of it's creation. I honestly do not have much respect for it. ---------------- Narciss fucked around with this message at 18:11 on Jul 9, 2015 |
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Jul 9, 2015 18:04
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icantfindaname posted:Pre-nicene Christianity was so internally fractured and divergent it shouldn't really be called a single religion or equated with modern christianity. Modern christianity, AKA the religion 99% of people ITT are discussing, is a Roman invention Your argument could just as easily be twisted around to say "oh the crusades? That wasn't 'real' Christianity, that was a Roman invention.  " You can't say "well that Roman brand WAS Christianity" and ignore the existence of numerous Christian sects that existed at the time and were not a driving force behind the crusades.
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Jul 12, 2015 02:31
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computer parts posted:So just like everything else post 325. Other people may have different arguments, but mine has been that Islam is a worse religion than Christianity (in terms of "which would I rather exist in the world today?") because it's Holy Book, handed down word-for-word from God himself, explicitly supports rape, murder, forced conversion, slavery, and all kinds of nasty stuff. Did Christians do all that too? Yes. I think it's much easier for those things to happen when a fifth of the world follows a religion whose unquestionable holy book supports them. ----------------
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Jul 12, 2015 02:34
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Smudgie Buggler posted:Similarly, I really don't see how you can define 'Muslim' any more narrowly than, for instance, than 'one who believes there is no god but Allah and Mohammad is his prophet.' A major difference is that you could very credibly call yourself a Christian and reject the Old Testament and large swathes of the New Testament based on what you perceive as a lack of validity, given how the Christian Bible was compiled over a hundred years after Jesus' death from a wide variety of sources and whether or not you believe Jesus' teachings superseded Jewish law (like how Christians don't follow Jewish dietary practices). A Muslim cannot do the same for the Quran, although they can pick and choose their Hadiths. ----------------
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Aug 1, 2015 21:01
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PT6A posted:To be fair, most of the horrible poo poo that fundamentalists do comes from hadiths or from cultural practices with no actual link to Islam. This is hardly accurate. Just google "Quran quotes slavery/war/apostasy" and you'll find plenty of repulsive material condoning the raping of women captured in battle, the sanctity of war waged by believers on non-believers, and the lawfulness of executing those who renounce Islam. ----------------
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Aug 2, 2015 15:41
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computer parts posted:The Hadiths are usually lumped under the "Quran" designation in Western society. I'm sure your right in some cases, but it's hardly necessary to turn to the Hadiths to find quotes that would make your average liberal-minded person go "uhhhhh": Surah 4 Verse 89 posted:They wish you would disbelieve as they disbelieved so you would be alike. So do not take from among them allies until they emigrate for the cause of Allah . But if they turn away, then seize them and kill them wherever you find them and take not from among them any ally or helper. ----------------
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Aug 2, 2015 15:49
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Panzeh posted:You can also trawl through both testaments to the bible to find some very "uhhh" quotes. When we're comparing millenia-old desert religions and the degree to which they are anathema to modern liberal sensibilities, it's always going to be a matter of degree. I would contend that no religion is as blatantly incompatible with liberal society as Islam, and I think many people in this thread would agree. I did some quick googling for "worst New Testament verses" and the stuff I've found is pretty milquetoast when compared to the Quran. Most of the 'violence' is saying how bad things will happen to bad people in the afterlife (as opposed to Islam, which mandates bad things happening to not-bad people in this life), or very clearly symbolic sayings like "if your right eye offends thee, pluck it out". I'll also circle back around to my earlier point about how Christ's teachings are much more open to interpretation for a variety of reasons, given how little we know about him and how his teachings all went through a game of Telephone before being put to paper. Someone isn't any less of a Christian just because they ignore, say, the gospel of Mark and choose to believe the gospel of Thomas better represented what Jesus taught. Islam & the Quran are very different. The Quran is not open to picking & choosing; Mohammad was the final prophet, the Quran is the word of God, and that's the way it's been since Mohammad started the religion. If you are a Muslim, you follow a religion whose unquestionable holy book says that it's ok to rape slaves, murder apostates, and wage holy war. The degree to which Muslims do not endorse these things is the degree to which they are not Muslim and practice cognitive dissonance in order to function in a modern world. ----------------
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Aug 2, 2015 17:10
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computer parts posted:There are multiple passages in the New Testament about how women should be subservient and even petty stuff like banning them from showing their hair during church service. Well for one thing, 'women should be subservient to men' is pretty tame for something written two millenia ago, especially compared to many passages in the Quran. If you're referring to Colossians, was that even written when Jesus was alive? My main issue with Islam is that it is not open to interpretation the same way Christianity is. Christianity can bend & adapt with the times because whatever Jesus actually taught has been long lost to the mists of times. All we have are a bunch of writings from followers and followers of followers to pick and choose from, all of questionable historical validity. As a Muslim, you just can't do that and still call yourself a Muslim with any degree of credibility. I'm not religious, so I'm looking at both of these religions from the point of view of "which is easier to get along with as a non-believer", which I believe is roughly in line with the spirit the thread was started in. ----------------
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Aug 2, 2015 17:19
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Abner Cadaver II posted:So if we accept the premise that Islam is fundamentally the Worst Evil Bad Religion on the planet then what exactly is your solution? Saturation nuclear bombardment? Mass brainwashing? I like how you accepted my conclusion but super sarcastically in a way that makes me think you're not open to a real discussion.  tooterfish posted:If it were as rigid as you say, Islam would be much more hierarchical in structure surely? There's no Islamic equivalent of a pope or anything like that. The Caliph could be viewed as the Islamic patriarch/pope, although it's quite a bit different. Islam sees no dividing lines between religious and political life and the Caliph is the leader of the entire Muslim community in both spheres. I'm not sure what textual basis there is for a Caliph or what the Quran dictates about how one should be selected. That said, just because Islamic is rigid in the degree to which it is open to interpretation doesn't mean it has to have a single leader. There is interpretation, sure, but there's a limit to how much you can soften verses like the ones saying you can kill apostates. If you google Islamic scholar's readings of 4:89, I doubt you'll find an interpretation that has you saying "ah yes this is ok with me". ----------------
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Aug 2, 2015 18:15
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icantfindaname posted:I don't know why anyone is bothering to argue with a guy who seriously says that you can summarily dismiss self-identified "Muslims" who don't follow ahadith they don't like You need to read what I wrote again. Muslims can pick & choose Hadith, as many of them are of questionable historical validity and as far as I know Mohammad never said "do as I say *and* as I do", as he of course had no way of knowing the collection of writings and stories known as the Hadith would pop up after his death. What I said was that Muslims can't pick & choose bits of the Quran to follow and still call themselves Muslims; if you disagree, I'd be interested to know why. tooterfish posted:Maybe. Who's Caliph now then? According to Wikipedia the 2 current major claimants are Al-Baghdadi (Sunni) and Mirza Masroor Ahmad (Ahmadiyya). Obviously anyone calling themselves Caliph will have a good chunk of the Muslim world saying "no you're not". ---------------- Narciss fucked around with this message at 20:25 on Aug 2, 2015 |
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Aug 2, 2015 20:13
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Abner Cadaver II posted:What's your solution - suppress democracy and prop up supposedly secular dictators and oligarchies in Islamic countries? Or at least stop topping secular dictatorships creating a power vacuum in which groups like ISIS or the Muslim Brotherhood can gain power (yes, I know that the Muslim Brotherhood is nowhere near as bad as ISIS). The U.S. not destabilizing democratic Iran and installing the Shah would have also been cool, I think we can all agree on that. ----------------
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Aug 2, 2015 22:46
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Abner Cadaver II posted:If Islam is inherently anti-liberal and must be prevented from gaining political control of majority-Islamic countries, why wouldn't you want to overthrow democratic rule in Iran in favor of the Shah? Because Democratic Iran was relatively secular, and after the overthrow of the Shah a hardliner Islamic regime overpowered the liberal elements of the revolution and took power. If it's not broke, don't fix it. You seem to be under the impression that I'm advocating some type of Foreverwar against any and every Islamic regime so that we can attain perfect liberal democracy across the planet. That'd be nice but it's unrealistic; all I'm trying to do is present my view that Islam itself is anathema to those types of institutions. It can even participate in them, but eventually you end up with the Islamic parties de-Islamifying or an Islamic State being established and undermining the liberal elements. ---------------- Narciss fucked around with this message at 23:19 on Aug 2, 2015 |
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Aug 2, 2015 23:12
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Abner Cadaver II posted:Yet you're arguing (forgive me if I'm confusing you with Liberal_L33t with this characterization) that Islam itself is so fundamentally anti-liberal that it's preferable to have a secular dictator than a democratic state controlled by its Muslim population. Iran was no less Muslim in the 1950s, and even if attitudes were generally more secular by your view of Islam wouldn't you expect it to gradually transform into a theocratic state through the votes of the Muslim majority? I would say that it's a danger, but not a certainty. Muslim constituencies and the individuals they comprise can liberalize and lose their Islamic edge. I think what's happening here is that you're trying to connect my view of Islam to my geopolitik too directly. When I'm talking about religions I'm speaking in generalities; I think Islamic populations are less conducive to liberal democracy, because the tenets of their religion found in their holy book are directly opposed to many of the basic ideals of that ideology. But no, liberal democracy in Muslim-majority countries is not impossible. It's just that it is made possible by the population and their representatives selectively ignoring parts of their holy book. That view is a far cry from "overthrow all Muslim democracies and install a secular warlord". ----------------
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Aug 2, 2015 23:29
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Abner Cadaver II posted:So at what point do you think it is permissible to overthrow a democratic government and install a secular dictator in a Muslim nation, if ever? That is an awfully broad question, but I'll give it a shot. I'd say: when that government is committing enough human rights abuses to sufficiently offend my liberal sensibilities, and when the hypothetical intervening entity actually has a good shot at improving the lives of the people in that country over the long term. Then there's other hypothetical situations like such a democratic/islamic country invading another sovereign state where I'd maybe say "we (the U.S., where I live) should intervene" and our resulting victory would mean a regime change. ---------------- Narciss fucked around with this message at 00:19 on Aug 3, 2015 |
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Aug 3, 2015 00:14
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Immortan posted:Can we all agree that the Shaw was infinitely preferable to what came after him? I would think so. I'd even agree that what came before him was preferable to the Shah, even without the benefit of hindsight (the Islamic revolution and all that). ----------------
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Aug 3, 2015 00:34
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hypnorotic posted:Doesn't Tunisia have a 40% quota for women in their parliament? I'd say that's pretty loving liberal. I think ethnically and religiously homogeneous Muslim nations (like Tunisia) are entirely capable of engaging in liberal reforms, but the presence of any "other" in the midst provides overwhelming ammunition to reactionaries and overpowers any secular or liberal factions. The West should provide citizenship to any minorities in the Middle East (Christians, Druze, Zoroastrians, Alawites) then work on cleaning up the borders so as to create ethnically homogeneous nation states. I'm not sure about a quota, but Tunisia does have a higher proportion of woman in parliament than the US does in Congress. As for your citizenship idea, my God that would be a nightmare. We'd have hordes of mainstream Sunni muslims coming in, going "yup I'm *oppressed religious minority*" and then ghettoing it up in Dearborn, Michigan. (USER WAS PUT ON PROBATION FOR THIS POST) ----------------
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Aug 3, 2015 00:51
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Abner Cadaver II posted:So destroying all political and civil liberties and subjecting your people to a reign of terror is okay as long as it isn't for religious reasons. No? You must have misread what I typed. The Democratic government of Iran was preferable to the Shah, in my view. Secular dictators are what you settle for in the Mideast when a functioning democracy isn't a viable option because there is no tradition of "let's not kill those different from us"; you don't go around overthrowing functioning democracies to regain oil rights (ideally, at least). ----------------
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Aug 3, 2015 00:55
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God I hope Germany is not yet cucked enough to accept this offer, but I don't have high hopes. ----------------
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Sep 12, 2015 16:37
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Miltank posted:Islam is stronger than Western liberalism. Unsurprisingly, when an ideology that says "we will accept you and your beliefs no matter how alien" meets with one that says "ours is the one true way and we will push & push until you accept that", the latter tends to supplant the former. ----------------
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Sep 12, 2015 17:50
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CommieGIR posted:'OMG THEY ARE BRINGING SHARIA LAW, drat DIRTY LYING ARABS!' But this actually happens... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sharia_patrols Your portrayal of it with "HURR DURR IM SO CRAZY" doesn't make it any less a danger. ----------------
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Sep 14, 2015 19:00
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Effectronica posted:you worm You are such a drat baby. Are you capable of debating like an adult? ----------------
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Sep 14, 2015 19:15
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icantfindaname posted:If you want to use state violence to force revolutionary gender equality, I'm all for it, but it seems laughable not to start at home, with the native white Christian Euros, instead of panicking over some impoverished war-refugees from a desert hellhole The fact that you're trying to even remotely equate gender 'inequality' in Europe with the hellscape that is the middle east makes me think you're just trolling. ----------------
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Sep 14, 2015 22:37
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The necktie was a Croatian invention originally placed around the necks of soldiers going off to war by their wives; it symbolizes the hold the gynocracy has over mens' very lives. Oh wait that sounds ridiculous and so does comparing high heels to burkas ----------------
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Sep 15, 2015 00:08
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