Muslims

[CUDA]

Nuf Said

GAZA CITY — Armed militants angered by a cartoon drawing of the Prophet Muhammad published in European newspapers surrounded EU offices in Gaza on Thursday and threatened to kidnap foreigners as outrage over the caricatures spread across the Islamic
world.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,183551,00.html

[Zuruck]

Yah...a little bit much for me.

*edit / didn't see the \"armed\" word...little bit different. let 'em have it.

[Avder]

Im reminded a bit of that movie where the Armed Forces had to pull a US Ambassador and his family out of an embassy that was surrounded, and fired upon, by an armed mob. The C.O. of the unit later gave the order to fire back (in a rather colorful manner I might add), in oder to protect the lives of his troops so they could evacuate. It was one of the better movies Ive watched within the last 5 years.

I'm glad that this situation didnt quite get that far, but one has to wonder how long it will be until reality imitates art. One also has to wonder about how stupid the spark that ignites that incident will be.

To sum it up, these people need to grow thicker skins and encourage their religion by demonstrating its peaceful aspects, rather than going off and decalring 'jihad' (and please note I'm using that term sarcasticly) against anything that pisses them off or treads on Muhammed's name.

[Ferno]

yes, let's paint a whole group the same way based on the actions of a few.

very enlightening.

[Nightshade]

Actions of the few? Ferno seems to live in la-la land.

[Ferno]

personal attack.

yawn.

[Avder]

yes, let's paint a whole group the same way based on the actions of a few.

very enlightening.

My post was not aimed at Muslims in general, but those Muslims who are most visibly seen in world events, such as these.

[Shoku]

This isn't just a Muslim mentality. It's a middle eastern society mentality, which the religion encourages.

[El Ka Bong]

What is a \"moderate\" muslim anyway ?

[roid]

how many christian extremist groups go on similar crusades whenever a gay movie comes out.

not as many, but it still happens.
the Muslim world does seem to be more towards the insane side of the scale though - personally i think that's purely due to socioeconomic factors.

[Flabby Chick]

Not so many moons ago sections of America were burning their Beatles collections because of an offhand remark made by Lennon.

Shoku, not all Mid-East Muslims are what you see on Fox. Go travel a bit.

[Ferno]

avder, my post wasn't directed towards you.

[Avder]

Eh, I felt I needed to clarify anyway. I have no animosity toward a non-militant Muslims, just these extremists.

[Duper]

I worked with a gal from Iran. She said that the extremist faction that we see so much of on TV is grossly over represented and is not how the general populas feels. The are considered dangerous and unstable. They unfortunately hold a great deal of power so elections become a choice of the lesser of 2 evils.

The thing with this article is that it shows stupidity on both sides of the equation. An unthinking artist and unthinking, emotionally driven radicals. I'm sure that not every Muslim feels that way. It would be like calling all Americans: beer drinking, redneck hicks that jerk off to porn 18 hours of each day. ... that's only half of us.. very unfair.

But Shoku is largely correct. The way that folks in the middle east view life is VERY different than we do in the west. It's difficult to define just now...

[Will Robinson]

...The thing with this article is that it shows stupidity on both sides of the equation. An unthinking artist and unthinking, emotionally driven radicals.....

Fair enough but that equation is severely unbalanced! When it comes to choosing which form of political protest to live with I'll tolerate the inflammatory cartoonist over the suicide bomber everytime...

There is a serious deficit in the show-tolerance-and-live-peacefully-among-your-neighbors column that is prevalent among the majority of Muslim cultures, not limited to just the radical segments within them!
And that is a fact that has been ignored at the expense of many lives and much global unrest.

Hey bin Ladden, Muhammed, et al!!
Allah called and said he wants his religion back!!

PS: If my pointing this out offends the Muslim contingent or the politically correct then please, kiss my ossama!

[Kilarin]

I think we are being unfair comparing modern Islam to modern Western Christianity.
Islam is several hundred years YOUNGER than Christianity. Let's look back several hundred years and see how Christians behaved.

Anybody remember the Salem Witch Trials? Mobs murdering poor women for the crime of being old, ugly, and different?

How about the Crusades, A lot of sacking, pillaging, and the occasional rape for the honor of Christ.

Let's not forget the various Progroms against the jews, around 1917 it's estimated that 70,000 to 250,000 jews were killed by angry Christian mobs in Russia.

In the 1500's, someone put posters around France insulting the Eucharist. Did the Catholics make a calm and reasoned response? Nope. They gathered up a bunch of protestant for punishment. Some were lowered up and down into fires, just to make it take longer to die. Others were burned at the stake \"normally\". And there were, of course, other creative tortures.

And, of course, no one expects the spanish inquisition! Much of the torture has been exaggerated, but the truth is still bad enough.

My point is that the common theme here is
A: People who are not as \"Civilized\" as the modern western world
and
B: People who believe strongly in something.

That combination is DANGEROUS, because people who BELIEVE, and have few inhibitions against violence, are likely to respond violently when their belief is threatened in any way.

And don't rely to heavily on condition A, civilization. Civilization is a very WEAK condition that is easy to destroy. I've heard to many right wingers tell me that they don't really care HOW many innocent muslims have to die, just so long as it makes America safer. Civilization is thin veneer, scratch the surface and you will find the barbarity underneath. And the Radical Islamic Fundamentalists have been scratching VERY hard.

[Will Robinson]

I think we are being unfair comparing modern Islam to modern Western Christianity.
Islam is several hundred years YOUNGER than Christianity. Let's look back several hundred years and see how Christians behaved....

Unless you can show me how the muslim humans literally arrived on the planet several centuries after the western humans did, remained secluded, and were only recently exposed to the world environment then I think the relatively young age of the religion is no excuse for the behavior of the followers.
They choose their behavior and to represent themselves and their religion in the way they do and there is no biological or genetic circumstance I'm aware of to justify a several centuries lag in their cultural evolution! The lag is based on choice.

The Amish in america chose to live a simple life with strict religious fundamentalist rules but since they don't include bombing the non-believers they don't represent a problem to society beyond having to wait to pass them in their horse drawn carriages when they're on the highway.

You see, once you strip it down to the basics were really just comparing people with people, their religion is just a wrapper to package their choices in.

[Kilarin]

You see, once you strip it down to the basics were really just comparing people with people, their religion is just a wrapper to package their choices in.

Actually, that was the point I was trying to make. People seemed to be blaming Islam for making it's followers violent. I don't think Islam is responsible, its the combination of "uncivilized" and "true believers". That combination is powerful and dangerous, no matter what the religion.

[Will Robinson]

I don't think Islam is responsible, its the combination of "uncivilized" and "true believers". That combination is powerful and dangerous, no matter what the religion.

Well you confused me with the point about islam being 'several centuries younger' than western religions then.
If you understand its really about the choices people make then the date the people started up Islam has no bearing on their ability or willingness to be tolerant and restrain violence and clean up their own house when their members go off the reservation.

Further, the start of human life on the planet, regardless of whether you believe it started in the Garden of Eden or with a bi-ped struggling to stand upright as he crawled from the primordial soup, it began in the very region where they are concentrated so if there is any kind of disparity in development based on a timeline it would seem they have the headstart not the other way around!

I think they are weak and have become the people of submission. Where western culture has always evolved and is always producing pioneers they stopped seeking to grow and instead each generation has resolved themselves to accept the roles handed down to them, the role to either be the warlord or be the warlords biotch.
Lazy weak and borderline useless like rodents is how I see their culture having evolved. Turkey is the only exception I can think of off the top of my head and that's only because Turkey has successfully put Islam in it's place and put a secular government above a muslim doctrine! So I credit a western influence or model for that success.

[Kilarin]

Well you confused me with the point about islam being 'several centuries younger' than western religions

The adoption of Islam was essentially like hitting the "RESET" button on arabic culture. In many ways, their culture is very similiar to the culture of Christian Nations several hundred years ago. That's not meant as an excuse, some people choose to be civilized no matter what. I was just pointing out that the age of the culture is probably more important for the general condition of a society in this case than the religion.

I think they are weak and have become the people of submission. Where western culture has always evolved and is always producing pioneers they stopped seeking to grow and instead each generation has resolved themselves to accept the roles handed down to them

During the dark ages, science, civilization, and culture were far more advanced in the Moslem world than in the Christian world. Somewhere they took a wrong turn and entered their own dark ages. Predictable, but not really anything to make us superior to them. We've been through it as well.

[Zuruck]

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060202/ap_ ... aust_video

Similar.

[Will Robinson]

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060202/ap_ ... aust_video

Similar.

Not quite the same at all really. In both cases you have people seeking results based on religious beliefs but I don't see the christians kidnapping the teacher and haven't seen them setting off suicide bombers to terrorize those in charge of the school system.

There's been considerable progress made in western cultures in recent centuries in reigning in their fundamentalist whacko's.
An important change that the followers of Islam have failed to implement and I'm tired of making excuses for them. My patience for that line of thinking ran out completely on Sept. 11 2001.

[Zuruck]

Will, have you ever read Goethe's \"Faust\"? I'm telling you right now that if we don't reign in these damn christians whacks, it WILL be like the Muslims in a decade. The only thing next for them is become militant. The Muslims from that part of the world exist around daily violence, unfortunately it's part of the culture, we see it as horrible, they see it as the only necessary way to be heard. Isn't a guy like Eric Rudolph the beginning? It only takes one....

[Kilarin]

I'm telling you right now that if we don't reign in these damn christians whacks, it WILL be like the Muslims in a decade.

And trying to get some particular group "under control" because, even though they aren't doing it now, you "KNOW" they are going to be doing something bad soon, is a VERY dangerous attitude.

[Dedman]

It seems to me that when a group of people start using their religion for political purposes, they really shouldn't ★■◆● when symbols of their religion start showing up in political satire cartoons.

[VonVulcan]

I would like to take a moment and applaud everyone here and express
my envy at how you all are so good at expressing yourselves. I know what
I believe but when it comes to expressing it... sharing it, I get all mixed up in how to say it.

So anyway, bravo!

[Will Robinson]

Will, have you ever read Goethe's "Faust"? I'm telling you right now that if we don't reign in these damn christians whacks, it WILL be like the Muslims in a decade....

No, it won't be because we don't hesitate as a society to reject any kind of theocratic legislation and we don't have clergy with authority over the civilians issuing fatwahs against MTV and declaring jihad on the Jews.
We have a very different approach to how we deal with religious freedom. We understand it's only true freedom if we are just as free to denounce it, ridicule it, draw disparaging cartoons about it, etc. as we are free to cherish it and practice it if we choose.
And that is the big glaring difference between our cultures and although an unfortunate side effect of such a free society is there can always be an Eric Rudolph or a Timothy McViegh they are an aberration and not symptoms of a developing trend.

You can count the total number of christian-whacko bombers we've had in this country on one hand. In the middle east they run out of fingers for the tally every month and they've been counting for decades!!

[Palzon]

There's been considerable progress made in western cultures in recent centuries in reigning in their fundamentalist whacko's.

An important change that the followers of Islam have failed to implement and I'm tired of making excuses for them. My patience for that line of thinking ran out completely on Sept. 11 2001.

I wonder...

How do you reconcile your stance with the fact that in WWII we waged wholesale warfare against civilian populations? We killed more innocent civilians in any given boming run on a major city than all terrorists of all time combined. no shiz.

Now, I am not saying we shouldn't fight terrorists with military force. I'm just supporting Kilarin's position that we don't exactly have the right to call foul. I mean after all, if Rummy himself admits that you go to war with the army you've got, not the one you want - how can we blame them for waging war the most effective way they can?

what do you expect them to do - array their guys in neat little rows so we can mow them down from 10,000 feet before they can fire a shot?

you should try reading Saul Alinsky's Rule's for Radicals. One doesn't always have much of choice when picking tactics.

I've made similar comments here in the past but your stance in this thread makes me think it's worth restating. This seems to me like more of grey area than you'd like to admit.

[Duper]

To quote a famous Vorlon \"It will end in Fire...\"


Really though, there won't be a way to reconsile this. It's the nature of the region. We can discuss and debate this and that, but squashing of placating the anger in that area of the world will continue.

[Lothar]

How do you reconcile your stance with the fact that in WWII we waged wholesale warfare against civilian populations?

We've decided not to do that since then.

I don't think it has to be any more complicated than that. In WWII, both sides bombed civilians because they thought it was appropriate. Now we've decided differently, and we've developed our weapons and strategies around that. Any group that hasn't made the decision is lagging seriously behind.

if Rummy himself admits that you go to war with the army you've got, not the one you want - how can we blame them for waging war the most effective way they can?

I don't think randomly blowing up little girls walking to school while avoiding confrontation with the guys with guns on the other side is the most effective way to wage any war. And even if it is, at some point you have to say "the war we're waging isn't worth the atrocities we have to commit to wage it."

A lot of people would apply that line to Coalition forces in Iraq. While I'd prefer zero atrocities, I think it's worth the small number that have been accidentally committed. (The intentional ones are a different story!) The "other side" seems to think no atrocity is too much, so they make killing civilians their main tactic.

[roid]

Don't give me this \"we are simply superior\" crap

Islam was the multicultural meltingpot center of intercultural trade, Science, Medicine, Mathematics, and cultural liberalism. While Christianity was busy burning heretics and running from it's own shadows in the dark ages.

Islam has since taken a lot of hits, and has culturally suffered as extremists and fundamentalists took the limelight. The Islam we know thesedays is a whisper of it's former gnostic self.

IIRC the current \"Muslim dark age\" as Kilarin puts it was caused by the Western World's military (?) decimation of the Islamic world. With a cultural power vacumm, the extremists and fundamentalists emerged from the ashes with a newfound ideological desperation - \"Jihad\".

The current state of Islam is not something Christianity has evolved outof - it's something that will more likely emerge from it's ashes after it has been decimated.

Much like in the story \"The Time Machine\".
Is it the past, or the future?

the circle keeps spinning

[Duper]

I would like to point out that Islam slaughtered everything in it's path that would not convert. the blood bath that insued after its inception was as bad or worse than anything that happened in a \"christian\" culture.

BTW, do you really think that God approved of the atrosities that happened during the middle ages?

[Avder]

I would like to point out that Islam slaughtered everything in it's path that would not convert. the blood bath that insued after its inception was as bad or worse than anything that happened in a "christian" culture.

Proof please. I have a hard time believing that.

[De Rigueur]

Islam was the multicultural meltingpot center of intercultural trade, Science, Medicine, Mathematics, and cultural liberalism.

Speaking of socio-economic factors, the middle east is geographically situated on trade routes between Europe and the East. The Arabs managed to capitalize on that bit of luck in a big way. They also discovered Aristotle first which gave them a little head start in science.

I'd say one of the main reasons why the West developed more than the Middle East was the discovery of the New World. That was a windfall for the west.

IIRC the current "Muslim dark age" as Kilarin puts it was caused by the Western World's military (?) decimation of the Islamic world.

Yes, you do remember correctly. I believe this is bin Laden's account.

[dissent]

One of the reasons that the Arabs haven't progressed along the same arc of history as in the west has been due to their tribal political structures.

[dissent]

oh, and this is rather interesting.

[Avder]

Just for the record, has anyone seen the cartoon that got these muslims so riled up to begin with? The more I read about this incident, the more I want to see exactly what got them so pissed off.

[Lothar]

has anyone seen the cartoon that got these muslims so riled up to begin with?

http://www.brusselsjournal.com/node/698

All 12 of the cartoons are on that page.

[Top Gun]

Just for the record, has anyone seen the cartoon that got these muslims so riled up to begin with? The more I read about this incident, the more I want to see exactly what got them so pissed off.

As do I. I doubt that any news organization would post it, for fear of offending viewers, but you'd have to think that someone somewhere managed to get a hold of it and upload it. As for the actual reaction, let me put it this way: I've seen/heard of a lot of articles/images satirizing/slandering Christianity. Have I been pissed off at their creators? Absolutely. Have I engaged thoughts of sinking my fist into their faces? I'm not too proud to say I haven't. Have I, or for that matter, any significant number of Christians risen up in armed mobs because of such occurrences? Not in the least. I don't pretend to know all of the reasons why this difference exists, but I know it's there.

Edit: Thanks for the link Lothar. Now I'm even more disturbed. That's what the extremists are up in arms about? This isn't some Virgin Mary image done in elephant feces or something. Hell, it isn't even anywhere near South Park level. It's a damn political cartoon, and they're getting violent over it. Unbelievable.

[Duper]

I would like to point out that Islam slaughtered everything in it's path that would not convert. the blood bath that insued after its inception was as bad or worse than anything that happened in a "christian" culture.

Proof please. I have a hard time believing that.

dude, then you need to read up on your ancient history. It's not obscure.