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VLC contributor living in Aleppo writing about the Paris attacks

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Re: VLC contributor living in Aleppo writing about the Paris attacks

#721

Post by emilecantin »

SolaceQuantum wrote: post #541
iamthepieman wrote: post #531

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm Not sure exactly what you're saying here. (I understand that perhaps English is not your native language) There are many christian churches and religious groups that function more as social organizations than religious ones. I wish they organized around something besides religion as it would make it less confusing but I don't really have a problem with this. I just don't expect the same views and behaviors from t…

Sorry, I can't speak properly when I'm on my phone. Now I'm on the computer I hope I can be a little more clear. I struggle with the notion of Christianity = love when (arguably) one of the most Christian countries is rife with problems and conflict distinctly un-lovelike. America has horrible education, especially for the children that need it most. It incarcerates a huge amount of people (many used for forced labor…

I agree with you, and I think it's sad that things like this happens. However, I think that the source of the problems you're describing is more cultural than religious. The United States were founded on the values of individual freedom and self-determination above all else, and I think that makes for a very selfish culture. I also think that most "religious" people in the United States (and in other countries too) are mostly doing it to look good to others and don't actually listen to the real message there.

Another issue is that the Bible is quite thick, and it's very easy to forget that it's actually a collection of many different texts with very different importance, authors, meanings and context, and mistaking it with a coherent book to be taken to the letter. The tone of the Old Testament is very different from the New Testament, and people often forget that they were written at very different epochs, for very different audiences.

Re: VLC contributor living in Aleppo writing about the Paris attacks

#722

Post by the_af »

acqq wrote: post #720
the_af wrote: post #717

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm sure they attempt to represent the majority, just like ISIS claims to represent all of "true" Islam. But the fact remains that they don't . Statistics show that most Muslims don't support ISIS: http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2015/11/17/in-nations-w... Even in Saudi Arabia, support for ISIS isn't universal. According to this ( http://www.washingtoninstitute.org/policy-analysis/view/isis... ) there is only 5%…

I speak about Wahhabism, the official religious view in the whole Saudi Arabia, promoted abroad with their immense capital, so instead limiting the arguments to just "ISIS" is a major misdirection. Like that ISIS are the only one dangerous. They aren't.

Agreed, ISIS is not the only Muslim terrorist group.

But not all Muslims identify with Wahhabism (which percentage of the total Muslim population is Wahhabi?), nor live in Saudi Arabia. It's also not automatically true that all Wahhabis, even if more intolerant, want to murder the infidel.

Again, your conclusion about Muslims being fundamentally blood-thirsty is unsupported. The fact remains that most Muslims don't want to kill you.

Re: VLC contributor living in Aleppo writing about the Paris attacks

#723

Post by fineman »

webXL wrote: post #713
fineman wrote: post #712

Earlier quoted context omitted.

An unjust attack on whose way of life? The girls being sold into slavery? The boys forced to fight or die? Those simply murdered? I'm pretty sure the other 99.9% are hostages, and not half as committed to the bullshit as you think, except in stockholm-syndrome ways. Soon after they weren't being killed for not being fervent, they'd be as non-religious as we are.

You think our occupation would prevent those things? I supported the Iraq invasion initially, and had some hope for the surge, but these wars are literally controlled by the news media, because every time a bomb goes off in the wrong place or a soldier shoots a kid for whatever reason, we get more tentative, and our troops lose support for their mission, then a new president comes a long to capitalize. I was wrong. 9…

Sorry, but "just cut our losses" isn't acceptable to me when people are being murdered. This is the Nazi murder of Jews/etc of our time and it's everyone's obligation to handle it better.

Bush caused most of this current ISIS problem by lying about WMDs. At that point, we're the bad guys invading on a lie. It made us afraid of and hostile towards the Iraqis which caused the Abu Ghraib treatment, etc. He didn't make the terrorists but he provided them with their recruiting propaganda, made an ideal nest, and let them crawl in. It sucks, but we've got an uphill slog because we elected someone who was fine with murdering people on a lie.

Re: VLC contributor living in Aleppo writing about the Paris attacks

#724

Post by acqq »

the_af wrote: post #722
acqq wrote: post #720

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I speak about Wahhabism, the official religious view in the whole Saudi Arabia, promoted abroad with their immense capital, so instead limiting the arguments to just "ISIS" is a major misdirection. Like that ISIS are the only one dangerous. They aren't.

Agreed, ISIS is not the only Muslim terrorist group. But not all Muslims identify with Wahhabism (which percentage of the total Muslim population is Wahhabi?), nor live in Saudi Arabia. It's also not automatically true that all Wahhabis, even if more intolerant, want to murder the infidel. Again, your conclusion about Muslims being fundamentally blood-thirsty is unsupported. The fact remains that most Muslims don't w…

> Again, your conclusion about Muslims being fundamentally blood-thirsty is unsupported.

I've certainly never concluded that, you can verify all what I wrote. What I wanted to point out is that there is real danger that once Muslims attempt to read the "primary sources" themselves discover inspiration for immense intolerance, really not comparable to such present in Old or New Testament (and I've met some very radical and unpleasant Christians too). Not to mention that most "converts" are sucked in over their acquaintances, independently of the will of their families.

> most Muslims don't want to kill you

One of my best friends from childhood from basically secular Muslim family later converted to more fundamental Islam and he specifically isn't fighting except intellectually, at least as far as I know about him now, so you don't need to explain me that. Still I personally saw the fundamentalism rising and was actually close enough to atrocities of different kinds and directions. A member of my family had the luck just by accident to avoid one Islamic bomb attack. A few generations ago more neighboring (Christian) villages of my relative were wiped out by Muslims, women and children included. The world isn't for everybody as nice as is maybe for you so that you can just turn the head away and pretend that dangerous and disgraceful things don't exist and in some periods don't ugly grow.

Ask Armenians (Christians killed by the Ottoman Turks): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Armenian_Genocide

A Hindu from India also gave his voice in this discussion and somebody downvoted him, even though he wanted to point to something meaningful:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Persecution_of_Hindus

"The Indian historian Professor K.S. Lal estimates that the Hindu population in India decreased by 80 million between 1000 AD and 1525 AD, an extermination unparalleled in World history" [3]" (at the time of Muslim invasions and rule)

The Christians in the areas controlled by the Islamic law had the periods of "relatively quiet times" (with always much worse treatment than Muslims) and another periods of extreme suffering performed by the Muslim ruling minority. Note: just the minority of the population in their area were Muslims, and that was enough for extreme suffering. The biggest proof: Hindus.

So what the "most" of Muslim population does isn't even important. Even small number of determined oppressors (claiming to do just what their religion gives them right to do) is enough to make huge damage. And this can't be downplayed.

Re: VLC contributor living in Aleppo writing about the Paris attacks

#725

Post by acqq »

the_af wrote: post #718
acqq wrote: post #714

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The claims you make aren't based on even attempting to read Quran. So it's "no, you haven't read anything from the sources" you just try to make the case based on some bad articles, bad because they also haven't read from the sources or distort the facts enough to give a false impression. How do I know? I've read not only the line with the quote that is claimed to be peaceful but the whole chapter. You can do that to…

But I didn't attempt to read the Quran, so that cannot be the basis for your disagreement. I claimed that, since most Muslims aren't raving fanatics attempting to slay the infidel, there must be something more to Islam. I've also shown that people who have read the Quran (like a professor of religious studies who specializes in Islam) think it's open to interpetation. I also think that understanding a religious book…

Go away. If you aren't willing to read it yourself, your arguments are just the arguments of "intentional unwillingness" to even consider the original material I try all the time to discuss with you. You ignore the primary holy books of Islam and ignore the history of Islam conquest, some 1400 years. What's left? Your vain "argument" that not every Muslim blew himself up with the bomb belt already should prove that the religion isn't violent? Not everybody has to blow himself up, just a percentage of young men willing to fight (and die) or just oppress is more than enough to make the permanent damage to this civilization (as proven through the history). They do the dirty work, the clerics will just rule. That just a few are enough, ask Malala

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malala_Yousafzai

ask the victims of Boko Haram:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boko_Haram

It's not something exclusive for this period in history, the motives, principles and methods can be traced through all the 1400 years of the existence of Muslim faith.

Re: VLC contributor living in Aleppo writing about the Paris attacks

#726

Post by the_af »

acqq wrote: post #724
the_af wrote: post #722

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Agreed, ISIS is not the only Muslim terrorist group. But not all Muslims identify with Wahhabism (which percentage of the total Muslim population is Wahhabi?), nor live in Saudi Arabia. It's also not automatically true that all Wahhabis, even if more intolerant, want to murder the infidel. Again, your conclusion about Muslims being fundamentally blood-thirsty is unsupported. The fact remains that most Muslims don't w…

> Again, your conclusion about Muslims being fundamentally blood-thirsty is unsupported. I've certainly never concluded that, you can verify all what I wrote. What I wanted to point out is that there is real danger that once Muslims attempt to read the "primary sources" themselves discover inspiration for immense intolerance, really not comparable to such present in Old or New Testament (and I've met some very radica…

Ok, so this is a personal issue for you. My apologies if I offended you. I won't push this any further. I disagree with your position, but we're running in circles now.

PS: I know about the Armenian Genocide, and it's terrible. But as I'm sure you're aware, at other times Christians killed plenty of Muslims (and other Christians, while we're at it) and were decidedly intolerant of Jewish people. Ahem, I don't even want to go there. So I'm not sure what we can conclude from this about the current world-wide Muslim population.

Re: VLC contributor living in Aleppo writing about the Paris attacks

#727

Post by acqq »

the_af wrote: post #726
acqq wrote: post #724

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Again, your conclusion about Muslims being fundamentally blood-thirsty is unsupported. I've certainly never concluded that, you can verify all what I wrote. What I wanted to point out is that there is real danger that once Muslims attempt to read the "primary sources" themselves discover inspiration for immense intolerance, really not comparable to such present in Old or New Testament (and I've met some very radica…

Ok, so this is a personal issue for you. My apologies if I offended you. I won't push this any further. I disagree with your position, but we're running in circles now. PS: I know about the Armenian Genocide, and it's terrible. But as I'm sure you're aware, at other times Christians killed plenty of Muslims (and other Christians, while we're at it) and were decidedly intolerant of Jewish people. Ahem, I don't even wa…

I don't conclude anything "about the current world-wide Muslim population." Do quote when I ever wrote anything about the "world-wide Muslim population." I wrote about Islam as religious doctrine (which has more elements of a fight manual than of a spiritual text) about Islam's primary holy texts and about the violence and intolerance that they provably contain and can nurse and inspire. If they inspire it in minority, but minority with a lot of means of producing enough fighters and fanatic believers, that's more than enough to produce huge problems to this world. The another minority necessary are the ideological leaders. Only these two minorities are enough. The fanatics know that already: their prophet and his army are their role model for that (together with always-available case studies in Hadith). Even the Muslim women who didn't have to cover their hair until recently in a lot of Muslim countries know what it means the rule of "more religious" Muslims (as the smallest thing that changed to them in the last decades -- we had more secular societies in different now already again more and more "dark-age" Muslim countries). Only the people from the parts of the world where Muslims weren't effectively present aren't aware of the danger. It's not some ancient history, it never stopped. There was just a more quiet period.

Re: VLC contributor living in Aleppo writing about the Paris attacks

#728

Post by the_af »

acqq wrote: post #727
the_af wrote: post #726

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ok, so this is a personal issue for you. My apologies if I offended you. I won't push this any further. I disagree with your position, but we're running in circles now. PS: I know about the Armenian Genocide, and it's terrible. But as I'm sure you're aware, at other times Christians killed plenty of Muslims (and other Christians, while we're at it) and were decidedly intolerant of Jewish people. Ahem, I don't even wa…

I don't conclude anything "about the current world-wide Muslim population." Do quote when I ever wrote anything about the "world-wide Muslim population." I wrote about Islam as religious doctrine (which has more elements of a fight manual than of a spiritual text) about Islam's primary holy texts and about the violence and intolerance that they provably contain and can nurse and inspire. If they inspire it in minorit…

I heard you. I contend that Islam is not the problem at heart. Every holy text can inspire hatred and violence. It's very likely the Quran was a fight manual like you said -- for understandable historical reasons -- but what matters is what it is now for most of the world's Muslims. And it's not a fight manual. The slide to religious fundamentalism is a threat in all religions; I wouldn't welcome any theocracy.

Sorry, you can quote the Quran all you want, and I can quote it back with verses promoting peace (or verses from other holy texts promoting violence; or even violence from other religions which are not frequently linked to terrorism).

There is no inherent danger from Islam. There is real danger in the world, but I think you're mistaken in placing the source. And Western countries are oblivious to their own historical contributions to violence in the Middle East. All too easy to blame it all on weird raving fundamentalists.

In the end, you think I'm mistaken. I think you're mistaken. Let it rest.

Re: VLC contributor living in Aleppo writing about the Paris attacks

#729

Post by acqq »

the_af wrote: post #728
acqq wrote: post #727

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't conclude anything "about the current world-wide Muslim population." Do quote when I ever wrote anything about the "world-wide Muslim population." I wrote about Islam as religious doctrine (which has more elements of a fight manual than of a spiritual text) about Islam's primary holy texts and about the violence and intolerance that they provably contain and can nurse and inspire. If they inspire it in minorit…

I heard you. I contend that Islam is not the problem at heart. Every holy text can inspire hatred and violence. It's very likely the Quran was a fight manual like you said -- for understandable historical reasons -- but what matters is what it is now for most of the world's Muslims. And it's not a fight manual. The slide to religious fundamentalism is a threat in all religions; I wouldn't welcome any theocracy. Sorry…

> And it's not a fight manual.

Oh, yes, it is, absolutely is, especially combined with Hadith. Both together are the primary holy texts of Islam. Read it, read the historical materials, compare the texts and the history (what is written as the "words of god to Muslims" and what was done in the name of Islam in the last 1400 years -- the instructions and the actions match, and why wouldn't, if the "believers" performed them following the "manual") then you can try to give arguments how it is not. Right now you have no real arguments. And you know you won't have, since I'll recognize if you try to give something out of the context, that's why you don't even try.

What is your background in claiming what you claim? What do you actually know about Islam and Muslims, personally? Who tortured your ancestors? Or whom your ancestors tortured? You must have ancestors and they must have been involved in something. I've given you my background. Do you know anybody who's not Muslim but who's parents and grandparents lived in the Muslim country? Try to talk to such people.

> There is no inherent danger from Islam.

Yes there is, whoever isn't a Muslim and reads Quran immediately understands. It's totally not comparable to the texts of any other religion, that's why we see what we see now every day. Muslims "behaving normal" (never having read Quran themselves before and being more in the secular environment) and then in short time becoming suicidal bombers or mass shooters or even "just" "mad" car drivers after somebody (a friend or a relative) just shows them what's really there:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3325180/Two-fingers-...

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-30583390

So everybody should read himself what's in Quran. Especially non-Muslims.

"The Koran teaches fear, hatred, contempt for others, murder as a legitimate means for the dissemination and preservation of this satanic doctrine, it talks ill of women, classifies people into classes, calls for blood and ever more blood. Yet, that a camel trader sparks uproar in his tribe, that he wants to make his fellow citizens believe that he talked to the archangel Gabriel; that he boasted about being taken up into heaven and receiving a part of that indigestible book there, which can shake common sense on every page, that to gain respect for this work, he covers his country with fire and iron, that he strangles fathers, drags away daughters, that he leaves the beaten a free choice between death and his faith: now this is certainly something that no-one can excuse, unless he came as a Turk into the world, unless superstition has stifled any natural light of reason in him."

Voltaire (1694-1788)

Re: VLC contributor living in Aleppo writing about the Paris attacks

#730

Post by the_af »

acqq wrote: post #729
the_af wrote: post #728

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I heard you. I contend that Islam is not the problem at heart. Every holy text can inspire hatred and violence. It's very likely the Quran was a fight manual like you said -- for understandable historical reasons -- but what matters is what it is now for most of the world's Muslims. And it's not a fight manual. The slide to religious fundamentalism is a threat in all religions; I wouldn't welcome any theocracy. Sorry…

> And it's not a fight manual. Oh, yes, it is, absolutely is, especially combined with Hadith. Both together are the primary holy texts of Islam. Read it, read the historical materials, compare the texts and the history (what is written as the "words of god to Muslims" and what was done in the name of Islam in the last 1400 years -- the instructions and the actions match, and why wouldn't, if the "believers" performe…

Sorry, you're being unreasonable. I agreed the Quran was likely born as a fight manual (you chose to ignore that part and instead quoted out of context the next part). The fact is that it's not a fight manual now. Very similarly to how the Old Testament was born, out of desperate times, and which is not to be interpreted literally now.

You can quote the Quran all you want. I can quote back verses preaching tolerance and understanding, even of unbelievers. The fact remains that, like all holy texts, it's contradictory and open to interpretation. Islam is what modern-day Muslims choose it to be. And the vast majority of Muslims choose it not to mean a perpetual war against the unbeliever.

The notion that as soon as a reasonable Muslims picks up the Quran and "really reads it" (as I assume you imply you've done, and that all Muslims who disagree with you haven't... how condescending can you be?) he/she will turn into a murderous jihadist is so patently absurd it merits no further discussion.

Sorry, quote Voltaire all you want, but the real world contradicts you. Yes, some vocal fanatics are intent on murdering the infidel, but the vast majority of Muslims just want to live their lives. Repeat after me: "no, my Muslim neighbors are not biding their time for the moment they can kill me."

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