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So there's your answer: it's shortsighted, narrow-minded, and ahistorical to paint religion with one broad brush. Leftists readily decry the type of extremism and regressive policies that lead to lost lives and reduced freedoms. But it's not productive or intelligent to lump together all religions, all practitioners, all movements, all theologies, together. And that is because they are not the same, they are different. Play fucked around with this message at 22:32 on Mar 25, 2016 |
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Mar 25, 2016 22:24
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Play posted:So there's your answer: it's shortsighted, narrow-minded, and ahistorical to paint religion with one broad brush. Leftists readily decry the type of extremism and regressive policies that lead to lost lives and reduced freedoms. But it's not productive or intelligent to lump together all religions, all practitioners, all movements, all theologies, together. And that is because they are not the same, they are different. you're talking to an OP, remember, who 100% seriously stated that leftists are normally opposed to 'rampant ideology'
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Mar 25, 2016 22:31
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And I'm guessing that people would prefer to continue wanking off and trying to convince themselves that THEY are the only special darling who recognizes the dangers of radical Islam. Yes, you are the only one. Congratulations sir.
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Mar 25, 2016 22:33
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Mukip posted:I think this is an interesting recent article on the subject: The last two sentences, least likely for a reader to see posted:Most people in Molenbeek are decent people who want the best for their families. But we should not close our eyes to the fact that it is also home to a very deep, and very dangerous, undercurrent of radical Islamism. I would not have guessed that from reading the rest of the article. I was, however, surprised to learn that Belgium as a whole is 6% Muslim, while Brussels in 25% Muslim. This reminds me of something https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0eMNeMOTwdg http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/11/11/american-chinatowns-history_n_6090692.html
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Mar 25, 2016 22:34
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Helsing posted:What if the line of thinking is "what do we do about these people who keep attack civilian targets in Europe"? Well, no one seems to like the answer "nothing beyond catching the perpetrators and checking for any flaws in domestic security."
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Mar 25, 2016 22:41
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MaxxBot posted:Do you have some greater point you are trying to make or are you just pointing out that leftism isn't inherently anti-religion? I agree but I guess that all comes down to what the OP means by the "political left." There's not a conflict between leftist ideology and religion but there certainly is one between for example the "political left" in America and religion. Then that's an issue the political left in the US needs to work on. Especially since (looking at demographics), ~22% of people don't identify with a particular religion, but only 7% are atheists and agnostics. That's a very tiny minority if you're going to be hostile to all religions. computer parts fucked around with this message at 22:48 on Mar 25, 2016 |
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Mar 25, 2016 22:44
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Dreylad posted:Well, no one seems to like the answer "nothing beyond catching the perpetrators and checking for any flaws in domestic security." I like that answer, and also the answer of "stop doing global crimes that give terrorist orgs legitimacy among the locals"
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Mar 25, 2016 22:45
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MaxxBot posted:The problem I have is that many liberals are so averse to criticizing Islam that they'll extend this to a defense of Islamism/political Islam, which is basically as antithetical to western liberal values as humanly possible. There's no conflict between saying saying that Muslims are fine and also that Islam itself is fine but that Islamism is bad, but many just shy away from any criticism at all. Never before have I heard someone from the liberal camp express defense for the idea that Islam should be the overriding power structure throughout human civilization. Who's saying these things? Are there any liberal luminaries such as Robert Reich or MHP saying these things?
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Mar 25, 2016 22:46
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Juffo-Wup posted:But I'm still not clear on what's being said about religion. Like, hypothetically, say you got everyone to agree that Islam is bad. What follows from that? What do you think should be done about it? Juffo-Wup posted:Nothing is at stake here. Nearly all of arguments in this thread have had no real object other than to try to demonstrate that someone has the wrong affective reaction to mention of Islam. But that's a loving stupid thing to argue about. Nothing of interest follows from it. These 'points' get brought up in every religion thread that mentions Islam and the answer is given all the time, it's just ignored. Don't be disingenuous. Since it's apparently necessary I'll go ahead and reiterate that what is "at stake" and what a willingness to criticize Islam "accomplishes": the internal logical and moral consistency of progressive ideology(ies). Can you not see that perceived hypocrisy is a major, serious problem for the credibility of a political idea? It seems like the default response to this is "anyone who makes claims of hypocrisy is just a racist with ulterior motives so their opinions don't deserve a response". Judging by the political movement in Europe over the past year, this strategy is not working out very loving well for the left, at all. If you wanted to respond to threads like this by saying "Yes, I acknowledge that Islamic tradition is bad, but it isn't the biggest current ideological threat, so  , we should only discuss such things in mostly progressive spaces like this one instead of lobbying to make it a major policy focus", I think most of the 'anti-Islam' posters would find that reasonably acceptable. But instead, the inevitable counterattack is that any criticism of Islam - in particular its tendencies towards totalization, legalism, and immutability, not just one or two specific verses - marks the critic as a racist, that's it, discussion over.Your insistence on every particular bit of anonymous criticism online meeting your standard of being "productive" is a thin rhetorical smokescreen for this tendency, and I think you're perfectly aware of that. Your one and only goal posting in threads like this is to convince people to stop criticizing Islam and mock those who do.
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Mar 25, 2016 23:41
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icantfindaname posted:you're talking to an OP, remember, who 100% seriously stated that leftists are normally opposed to 'rampant ideology' He said nothing of the sort. Rather, the point is that leftists are nominally opposed to ideology which holds as an indispensable core doctrine that it is immutable and can never be criticized by any living human being. This is what makes religion "worse" than ideologies like nationalism or racism; those ideologies, harmful though they may be, are based (however distantly and through however many distorted lenses) on materialistic factors. When they fail catastrophically (E.G. Russian monarchism, Pan-German-ism, Japanese militarism), they tend to recede relatively quickly (note that I said "relatively" - all ideologies tend to have some resilience to them).
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Mar 25, 2016 23:45
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Liberal_L33t posted:These 'points' get brought up in every religion thread that mentions Islam and the answer is given all the time, it's just ignored. Don't be disingenuous. I think that is a definitely problem with the Histrionic Online Left, which tends to make itself heard beyond its numbers.
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Mar 25, 2016 23:51
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The people who present themselves as shocked, shocked that leftists support Muslims in the rich countries are basically the same people who insist that blacks hate gays, and for the same reason. Sure, you can rightfully call them bigoted, but this obscures their grand ambition- dividing and conquering. Separate all the groups on the left from one another that they might be crushed one by one. Convince white leftists "identity politics" are bad so that support for affirmative action withers, get people to think they're a "real leftist" rather than part of the "Che Brigade" if they're indifferent to anti-Muslim hate crimes because Muslims follow an evil religion. Eventually, reaction stands triumphant across the broken bodies of the whole world, as the hoi polloi become hateful and violent and abusive and rapine under their reign. It is thus necessary to keep this vision of a hell without exit or end in mind when encountering this expressed belief.
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Mar 25, 2016 23:52
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Effectronica posted:The people who present themselves as shocked, shocked that leftists support Muslims in the rich countries are basically the same people who insist that blacks hate gays, and for the same reason. Sure, you can rightfully call them bigoted, but this obscures their grand ambition- dividing and conquering. Separate all the groups on the left from one another that they might be crushed one by one. Convince white leftists "identity politics" are bad so that support for affirmative action withers, get people to think they're a "real leftist" rather than part of the "Che Brigade" if they're indifferent to anti-Muslim hate crimes because Muslims follow an evil religion. Eventually, reaction stands triumphant across the broken bodies of the whole world, as the hoi polloi become hateful and violent and abusive and rapine under their reign. It is thus necessary to keep this vision of a hell without exit or end in mind when encountering this expressed belief. Identity politics has gotten obnoxious as gently caress in this year of our Lord 2016, in that the ruling class has figured out anybody can wield its language with just a few minor tweaks. https://twitter.com/arthur_affect/status/669187312027217921
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Mar 25, 2016 23:56
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menino posted:Identity politics has gotten obnoxious as gently caress in this year of our Lord 2016, in that the ruling class has figured out anybody can wield its language with just a few minor tweaks. There's never been any kind of language that wasn't directly amenable to that. Republican propaganda about the 47% is derived directly from labor and Marxist language, partly via Ayn Rand.
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Mar 25, 2016 23:59
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Effectronica posted:The people who present themselves as shocked, shocked that leftists support Muslims in the rich countries are basically the same people who insist that blacks hate gays, and for the same reason. Sure, you can rightfully call them bigoted, but this obscures their grand ambition- dividing and conquering. Separate all the groups on the left from one another that they might be crushed one by one. Convince white leftists "identity politics" are bad so that support for affirmative action withers, get people to think they're a "real leftist" rather than part of the "Che Brigade" if they're indifferent to anti-Muslim hate crimes because Muslims follow an evil religion. Eventually, reaction stands triumphant across the broken bodies of the whole world, as the hoi polloi become hateful and violent and abusive and rapine under their reign. It is thus necessary to keep this vision of a hell without exit or end in mind when encountering this expressed belief. Wow. Is there any doubt that the equivalent of this from any other part of the political spectrum would earn itself a red-text avatar within a matter of minutes in this forum?
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Mar 26, 2016 00:09
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computer parts posted:Then that's an issue the political left in the US needs to work on. I'm not saying that the American political left is openly hostile towards religion, I'm saying that the ideas that devout religious practice in America generally promotes and the ideas that the American political left generally promote are in conflict. When Christian denominations try to fix this by becoming more liberal they tend to start hemorrhaging members to more conservative denominations in large numbers. My point is that it makes more sense to me to recognize the differences between what Abrahamic religions promote and what our political parties promote than it does to try to bend one over to comply with the other. I used to be a devout Christian but after a lot of time reading the bible and studying theology I concluded that my values and the values that Christianity promotes are incompatible so now I'm not. The preferred method for a lot of people in America is instead to try to force one of them to comply with the other which seems absurd to me. I think that most people who read through the Pauline epistles will conclude that Christianity promotes his incredibly regressive views on sex and will live their faith accordingly, or just reject them outright. Some will legitimately believe that they can be reinterpreted to comply with the modern age with zero conflict but these people are the minority. EDIT: And I should also point out that I have literally never seen a person who thought that the Democrats were too anti-religious to vote for who didn't also strongly believe that gays and abortion are evil, they're not potential Democrats. MaxxBot fucked around with this message at 00:22 on Mar 26, 2016 |
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Mar 26, 2016 00:11
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Liberal_L33t posted:Wow. I was actually talking more about TheImmigrant than you, because you're not competent enough to conceive of a plan like this. Anyways, I'm glad suggesting your political opponents are smart and think about things is abhorrent.
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Mar 26, 2016 00:12
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Jesus titfucking Christ its no loving wonder people stick to a few threads on this subfora than trying to actually debate and discuss. 1) Okay first off "Ha" at the idea of there being some way of getting rid of gran narratives in the way in which most humans view the world. 2) Louder "HA" at the idea that some how all religions, from Jains who have never been involved in a single act of harm to another living creature otherwise they are not Jains any more, to Sikhism that believes in the exact equality of men and women, are all the same. This is the problem with people who basically go "well all religions that I know are Abrahamic and bad ergo etc". The fact is that there is nothing intrinsic in religions but the whole "in group/out group" poo poo that all people do to a greater or lesser extent. 3) Loudest "Ha loving Ha" to people who seem to have gone off the deep end in terms of how they view the world and painting refugees as a kind of massive wave to create an Arabic Caliphate in mother loving Europe. Even if the entire Muslim world moved to Europe then we may be just about "outnumbered". That isn't just the Middle east and Pan-Arabism places, this is everyone. But if that happens then "score!" we get to move to somewhere with a lot nicer climate in east Asia, maybe set up a cool shadow puppet theater. The fact is that there are legitimate criticisms to be made of mentalist ideologues who believe that they are the only one who can hear the voice of God. That applies across all backgrounds. The problem is that outside this vague idea of "The Left" you have people saying "spy on them and put them in camps" and they are taken seriously and the ideas given sober analysis.
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Mar 26, 2016 00:31
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Effectronica posted:The people who present themselves as shocked, shocked that leftists support Muslims in the rich countries are basically the same people who insist that blacks hate gays, and for the same reason. 40%+ of blacks support gay marriage at this point, there are Muslim countries where 1% of the population thinks that homosexuality should have even a minimal level of acceptance by society. Those two things are not comparable at all. I would also point out that Muslims in America support gay marriage at double the rate of white Evangelical Christians. So there I just destroyed all of the tired narratives that are thrown around. MaxxBot fucked around with this message at 00:49 on Mar 26, 2016 |
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Mar 26, 2016 00:46
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MaxxBot posted:40%+ of blacks support gay marriage at this point, there are Muslim countries where 1% of the population thinks that homosexuality should have even a minimal level of acceptance by society. Those two things are not comparable at all. less snarky since you seem to be aware of this point, but I think you will find viewpoints to be tied more to the countries of origin than religion or race.
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Mar 26, 2016 00:51
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A big flaming stink posted:
Yeah we're in agreement there, my point is that it's silly to talk about Muslims as a monolithic group. I have no worries about living around American Muslims but if you were talking about importing a bunch of Muslims from the middle east or importing a bunch of Christians from Uganda I would be worried, because according to the statistics they loving hate gays. I don't think it's controversial to say that if you import a bunch of these people and throw them in a big isolated ghetto like they seem to do in Europe you're going to have issues, and I would put the blame just as much on the host country.
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Mar 26, 2016 00:57
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Liberal_L33t posted:He said nothing of the sort. Rather, the point is that leftists are nominally opposed to ideology which holds as an indispensable core doctrine that it is immutable and can never be criticized by any living human being. No religion is inherently ideological. Religions can inspire ideologies, and liberals criticize those ideologies aplenty. A religion is many things, and like popular culture fandoms there are sometimes huge rifts between subgroups with vigorous disagreements about what is officially part of it. Islamic State is an ideology that uses Islam as a means of in-grouping, but it wouldn't exist without the justification narrative wherein America used its hegemony to completely gently caress over everyone Daesh is recruiting. To propose that a religion is inextricable from an ideology of violence, cultural domination, and empire (except maybe the worship of Mammon, as Lincoln described it), is to prepare the conclusion that that some community that produces problem specimens, is irreparable unless it is stripped of its religion. That's where treating a religion like an ideology gets us. The liberal approach that I've seen most often is to claim that people who do violence in the name of Islam are No True Muslims, which sounds like a cop-out but has the dual function of 1) telling Muslims here at home that they have a say in what their religion means, and 2) not buying into the attacker's grandiose narrative.
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Mar 26, 2016 01:04
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Blurred posted:then find me a theologian who is prepared to say openly that the dignity of God is not worth a single human life. I've read some of your Bible threads so it strikes me as odd that you say this. I don't know about theologians and I'm not elaborate enough in English to go to great lengths but, in Christianity at large, isn't the ultimate metric for proper glorification of God how you treat your neighbour? Taking a life in the name of God would be blasphemy of the worst kind. Jesus goes to say this: Matthew 5 posted:“You have heard that it was said to the people long ago, ‘You shall not murder and anyone who murders will be subject to judgment.’ But I tell you that anyone who is angry with a brother or sister will be subject to judgment. Again, anyone who says to a brother or sister, ‘Raca,’ is answerable to the court. And anyone who says, ‘You fool!’ will be in danger of the fire of hell. It appears that even inflammatory relations between people, not to mention lives, are more important than the sacrifices the God had ordered to be performed. I'm fairly confident that my understanding is not a rare position among theologians either.
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Mar 26, 2016 01:07
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Valiantman posted:I've read some of your Bible threads so it strikes me as odd that you say this. I don't know about theologians and I'm not elaborate enough in English to go to great lengths but, in Christianity at large, isn't the ultimate metric for proper glorification of God how you treat your neighbour? Taking a life in the name of God would be blasphemy of the worst kind. Jesus goes to say this: this line shows a pretty profound ignorance of most religious theologies. I'm not sure "the dignity of God" actually exists as a concept in such theologies, since it would be the sort of ineffable thing that is beyond man's ability to even minutely effect.
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Mar 26, 2016 01:16
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besides, OP, leftists can be perfectly stupid about other abrahamic religions too! (see the tempest in a teacup regarding Pope Francis's failure to denounce and ban everything sexist and homophobic in the entire Catholic Church)
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Mar 26, 2016 01:18
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MaxxBot posted:
Democrats aren't leftists though.
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Mar 26, 2016 01:36
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computer parts posted:Democrats aren't leftists though. That's why I made such a point of distinction between leftist ideology and the "political left" of any given country, since the case of the US those things are quite separated. Although even when focusing entirely on economic issues it would be hard to assert that American religion, at least in recent times, has been a force for leftism.
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Mar 26, 2016 01:41
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This age is ending and there are clear signs to embrace Gnosticism if you want to be in God's service. Hale-Bopp can be seen every 2,537 earth-years.
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Mar 26, 2016 01:48
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Liberal_L33t posted:These 'points' get brought up in every religion thread that mentions Islam and the answer is given all the time, it's just ignored. Don't be disingenuous. This is just more useless vitriol. You read what I wrote and it made you feel hurt and frustrated, and now you're lashing out by trying to attack my character. But it's just as empty as the rhetoric it was intended to protect. Nobody has actually suggested making anti-Islam a 'policy focus' or even offered an opinion on what kinds of policies such a focus would involve. If you think you're advocating for a radical shift in political attitudes, but you don't think it has any bearing either on public policy or personal behavior or relationships, then it's probably worth reconsidering whether this attitude you have is really a political one at all. 'Islam bad' and 'Islam good' are not opinions, they are emotional reactions.
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Mar 26, 2016 02:24
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Why Won't Bleeding Heart Abolitionists Tell The Truth About Animism?
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Mar 26, 2016 04:07
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McDowell posted:This age is ending and there are clear signs to embrace Gnosticism if you want to be in God's service. Hale-Bopp can be seen every 2,537 earth-years. hails melek-taus, the peacock angel.
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Mar 26, 2016 04:54
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Blurred posted:then find me a theologian who is prepared to say openly that the dignity of God is not worth a single human life. God is human in much of Christianity. From the most important theologian of the last centruy. Karl Bath: Where did we really go astray? Where was and is the starting point for the new change of direction? ... Who and what God is — this is what in particular we have to learn better and with more precision in the new change of direction in the thinking and speaking of evangelical theology, which has become necessary in the light of the earlier change. But the question must be, who and what is God in Jesus Christ, if we here today would push forward to a better answer. ... God requires no exclusion of humanity no non-human- ity, not to speak of inhumanity, in to be truly God. ... The God of Schleiermacher cannot show mercy. The God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob can and does. ... From the fact that God is human in the sense described, there follows first of all a quite definite distinction of man as such. It is a distinction of every being which bears the human countenance. This includes the whole stock of those capacities and possibilities which are in part common to man and to other creatures, and in part peculiar to him, and like- wise man's work and his productions. The acknowledgment of this distinction has nothing to do with an optimistic judg- ment of man. It is due him because he is the being whom God willed to exalt as His covenant-partner, not otherwise. ... On the basis of the knowledge of the humanity of God no other attitude to any kind of fellow man is possible. It is identical with the practical acknowledgment of his human rights and his human dignity. To deny it to him would be for us to renounce having Jesus Christ as Brother and God as Father. https://archive.org/stream/TheHumanityOfGod-KarlBarth/The%20Humanity%20of%20God%20-%20Karl%20Barth_djvu.txt TLDR: To deny the worth of a single human life, is to deny Jesus as the Christ and God as the Father. The Humanity of God is the single most important theological statement in (or arguably ) against modernity. It is however only slightly more important than his commentary on Romans.
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Mar 26, 2016 06:25
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Stinky_Pete posted:Never before have I heard someone from the liberal camp express defense for the idea that Islam should be the overriding power structure throughout human civilization. Who's saying these things? Are there any liberal luminaries such as Robert Reich or MHP saying these things?
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Mar 27, 2016 02:52
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MaxxBot posted:That's why I made such a point of distinction between leftist ideology and the "political left" of any given country, since the case of the US those things are quite separated. Then why even refer to them as a "political" left? American liberals, like european liberals, are center-right. They are the people who dismantle welfare systems.
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Mar 27, 2016 04:10
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HorseLord posted:Then why even refer to them as a "political" left? American liberals, like european liberals, are center-right. They are the people who dismantle welfare systems. Liberalism as a movement was quickly coopted by more powerful interests to ensure that the economics stayed pretty much the same. 'Yes gay marriage, free love, we are all that jazz. Here, we the big rich corporation made you a colourful burger, we are just like you and not incompatible with social equality at all!'
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Mar 27, 2016 06:14
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rudatron posted:That's not what's happening, true, but what is happening is that any honest criticism or concerns about contemporary islamic society gets deflected, ignored or downplayed. They're just not being held to the same standard as any other group, and ultimately that doesn't help. Which is I think what prompted the OP to come in and make his post. Well frequently the problem is that trying to hold groups to a same standard ignorant of the differences in their approaches and so on is a weakness.
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Mar 27, 2016 08:34
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Commie NedFlanders posted:I think a lot of liberals simply align themselves with defending Islam simply because they don't want to be on the same side as Republicans who are critical of Islam This is a very good summary of the current sorry state of the self-described left. Public outrage and many political positions boil down to signalling that you're not one of those people.
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Mar 27, 2016 10:28
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I CANNOT EJACULATE WITHOUT SEEING NATIVE AMERICANS BRUTALISED!
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McDowell posted:This age is ending and there are clear signs to embrace Gnosticism if you want to be in God's service. Hale-Bopp can be seen every 2,537 earth-years. This is relevant because
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Mar 27, 2016 10:33
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I'm curious as to when the old, mythical left passed on the baton to the modern left, because as far as I'm aware criticisms have been levelled against the "modern left" and how they've done hosed it up now at least my entire lifetime, and even before then.
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Mar 27, 2016 12:27
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Ddraig posted:I'm curious as to when the old, mythical left passed on the baton to the modern left, because as far as I'm aware criticisms have been levelled against the "modern left" and how they've done hosed it up now at least my entire lifetime, and even before then. We are always living in the Kali Yuga. If the left declared that Muslims must die, it would be allowing Christians. If they abandoned all support for trans folks, it would be gays and lesbians that are dragging things down. You have to understand that the rank and file deliverers of these accusations are almost always people who believe they are being maltreated because they aren't priority one.
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Mar 27, 2016 13:22
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