Islam: Is it inherently Evil?

[Weatsop]

ok your argument hammered me. But Im still going to believe in god.
But you have to admit that we don't know all the answers to life. We don't even know how the universe came to exist. Where did the matter even come from.

I don't know what George Washington was thinking at 8:07am, on the day before his third birthday...

...doesn't mean god was doing his thinking for him.

Just because you don't know something, doesn't mean a magical spirit that lives in the sky and no-one has ever seen did that thing. Just as it doesn't mean fairies made the universe, or that unicorns did, or that Odin did, or that I, personally, went back in time and did it myself just so I could get to 100 posts on Aussie Stock Forums.

Even though that last one is true...

 

[darkhorse70]

Well my dads friend offered me to take me to church on sunday. He wants to re kindle the relationship between me and god.

Ill go with an open mind and if nuthing else hopefully thete will be some babes there haha

 

[Weatsop]

Well my dads friend offered me to take me to church on sunday. He wants to re kindle the relationship between me and god.

Ill go with an open mind and if nuthing else hopefully thete will be some babes there haha

That's the spirit!

 

[Calliope]

Pauline Hanson attracted a deluge of criticism by suggesting that up to a quarter of Islamists were radical. Obviously she just conjured up this figure out of her head. But I think she was more in line with public thinking with her statement that the war against terror was one that “we cannot win”.

Anyone who watched "Insight" on SBS last night would have come to the conclusion that what the Islamic State has achieved in Syria and Iraq is irreversible. A large proportion of their strength and leadership quality comes from the fruitful supply of well qualified recruits from middle class backgrounds from entrenched Islamic positions in Europe , Australia and elsewhere, anxious to do battle and qualify to enter paradise by killing infidels.

Air attacks can't stop them, and Obama's and Abbott's blather about bolstering the Iraqi army to beat them is just pie in the sky. Aad now Obama is asking a compliant Abbott to increase our "boots on the ground" contribution.

After America and others invested billions in building up an Iraqi army, as soon as America left most of these imitation soldiers all pissed off and went home. There is no way that any backbone to fight the IS can be engendered in the Iraqi army.

 

[herzy]

Well my dads friend offered me to take me to church on sunday. He wants to re kindle the relationship between me and god.

Ill go with an open mind and if nuthing else hopefully thete will be some babes there haha

Finally - the first coherent argument for taking part in a religious practice that I've seen on this thread.

 

[Weatsop]

A large proportion of their strength and leadership quality comes from the fruitful supply of well qualified recruits from middle class backgrounds from entrenched Islamic positions in Europe , Australia and elsewhere, anxious to do battle and qualify to enter paradise by killing infidels.

Air attacks can't stop them, and Obama's and Abbott's blather about bolstering the Iraqi army to beat them is just pie in the sky. Aad now Obama is asking a compliant Abbott to increase our "boots on the ground" contribution

Whoohoo! Wonk-hat, ON.

IS has about 30,000 men. They get about 100 from international sources each week.

They've lost at least 2-3000 in Kobane alone.

Most of their actual replenishment is coming from locals who want to join the winning team - when IS starts collapsing, it'll fall down to their tiny core along the Syria / Iraq fringe really fast. People with a grudge for their neighbours will sign up for easy wins, but when the going gets tough they'll go right back to defending their own little neighbourhoods, just like they've been doing for years.

Note well that one of their original "caliphates" was Jarabulus. That's 25km from Kobane. They set up shop in Jarabulus back in June of 2013.


Seriously, it's taken them nearly 18 months to go 25km.


What's made them far more effective in recent months is that they captured a pile of actual armour from the Iraqi army as it ran screaming into the night.

The ONLY reason IS can do squat against Kurds (who are badass) is that armour.

Armour against airstrikes, on the open plains of Iraq, or in a focussed fight like Kobane, without air support, are ****ed.

The Forces of Goodness (joking aside, IS really is as evil as they say - just not much of a threat) only need to pop those old ruskie tanks, and all the technicals they can eat. Do that, and the tough Kurds (who stood down Saddam's army, you may remember) can handle the rest.

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Here's my prediction: the news is about to turn to "IS collapsing" stories.

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PS: and if I'm right, please do take this as a lesson about the media wanting to scare you to sell papers...

 

[Tisme]

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PS: and if I'm right, please do take this as a lesson about the media wanting to scare you to sell papers...

I think we all know there's a wag the dog exercise going on, but that doesn't mean a nasty war isn't being waged.

The way I look at it is the substitution test:- pick your ancesteral allegiance and wonder how you would behave if it were under siege and at risk of cultural loss?

For instance if you had Scottish forebears and the English today decided to wipe away the hoots, toots and Och ayes with force! My guess is there would be a certain amount of satisfaction seeing the sassenachs getting a hiding.

 

[Calliope]

The way I look at it is the substitution test:- pick your ancesteral allegiance and wonder how you would behave if it were under siege and at risk of cultural loss?

Who is under siege and who is at risk of cultural loss? Surely you can't mean the IS. Or do you mean the Islamists who have become entrenched in Western countries?

 

[Tisme]

Who is under siege and who is at risk of cultural loss? Surely you can't mean the IS. Or do you mean the Islamists who have become entrenched in Western countries?

I think it would be an error to apply western ethics/morals/norms to a middle eastern culture. They are not the same and many do feel their faith and homelands are under attack by foreign aggression/influence. e.g. Saddam Hussein might have been a tyrant, but he was their tyrant, if you get my drift.

 

[Calliope]

I think it would be an error to apply western ethics/morals/norms to a middle eastern culture. They are not the same and many do feel their faith and homelands are under attack by foreign aggression/influence. e.g. Saddam Hussein might have been a tyrant, but he was their tyrant, if you get my drift.

The Iraqi Kurds, Christians and Shia are certainly "under attack by foreign agression/influence" emanating out of Syria. The only "western ethics/morals/norms" we are applying is that Islamic State cease their murder, rape, kidnapping and pillaging in Iraq. If this upsets you, so be it, if you get my drift.

 

[DB008]

It seems like wherever Islam goes, so do extremists and nutters.

Religion of peace? No, it is not!

Thirteen Arrested as 500 Police Storm Mosques and Homes in Austria Counter-Terror Raids

Thirteen people suspected of recruiting fighters for radical Islamic groups in the Middle East have been arrested by police in Austria, who stormed mosques and homes in a cross-country dawn raid on Friday.

Around 500 officers were involved in the arrests in Vienna, the southern city of Graz and Upper Austria province, which follows two years of surveillance of the suspects.

The arrested individuals were also being investigated for helping to finance the Islamic State, according to local media.

Austrian privacy laws prevent suspects from being named; however, media reports pointed to a Vienna-based Bosnian preacher as the main suspect.

He was among those taken into custody following the raids which began at 4am.

https://news.vice.com/article/thirteen-arrested-as-500-police-storm-mosques-and-homes-in-austria-counter-terror-raids

 

[Calliope]

Is this the tipping point?

MUHAMMAD has become the most popular name for newborn boys in the UK

http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/br...k-baby-name-list/story-fni0xqll-1227140739393

 

[FxTrader]

It seems like wherever Islam goes, so do extremists and nutters. Religion of peace? No, it is not!

Nah. The apologists for religion here will assure you that groups like ISIS are just using Islam as an excuse to become men in black, wave a black flag, blow themselves and others up , chop off some heads and gain fame on YouTube. You just can't believe what they say about their own motives and justifications (Islam and the Koran) because they are essentially lying about this and/or they should just be dismissed as extremists. This is really a faith position based on a clear denial of reality, there is no hard evidence provided for this viewpoint just the absurd notion that a religion like Islam in its various guises and with its various interpretations just can't be the prime causative or motivating factor behind the behavior of Muslims (not real Muslims anyway).

 

[SirRumpole]

for this viewpoint just the absurd notion that a religion like Islam in its various guises and with its various interpretations just can't the prime causative or motivating factor behind the behavior of Muslims.

It may well be a motive for some, but for others it's adventure, excitement, greed, lust and psychopathy.

We've been through all this before, if religion was the prime motivation for slaughter then every fricking Muslim would be in Syria fighting for the cause.

Why are so many of them NOT there , and why are other Muslim states fighting ISIL ?

 

[FxTrader]

It may well be a motive for some, but for others it's adventure, excitement, greed, lust and psychopathy.

Once again you make this assertion without evidence. If you chose to actually believe what they say over and over again about their motives (something you simply refuse to do because it debunks your unsubstantiated theory) then you might have some real insight as to what motivates the vast majority of these people - their religion.

We've been through all this before, if religion was the prime motivation for slaughter then every fricking Muslim would be in Syria fighting for the cause.

This conclusion is simply a non-sequitur, we are talking about groups like ISIS not every "fricking" Muslim.

Why are so many of them NOT there , and why are other Muslim states fighting ISIL ?

One must make one of two choices when confronted by ISIL, fight and possibly live or just be slaughtered. Negotiation about whose version of Islam is correct is not an option. Surely even you can appreciate this.

 

[SirRumpole]

then you might have some real insight as to what motivates the vast majority of these people - their religion.

So what do you intend doing about it ?

 

[Weatsop]

1. There is a war *within* Islam, with a minority trying to change it into a religion of war. Every time you agree with them, you are supporting the terrorists' aims. You are reinforcing their message, which most Muslims oppose.

2. The VAST majority of people killed by ISIS were Arab Muslims.

3. The vast majority of people fighting ISIS are Arab Muslims.

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For some reason we didn't give a **** until they started killing non-Arabs.

(And then we wonder why so many Arabs hate our guts...)

Our media doesn't report the Arabs fighting against ISIS because our media doesn't care about Arabs, or pretty much anyone who isn't white and preferably English speaking (but we'll take photogenic Yazidis and hot Kurdish girls at a pinch). Our media only cares about Muslims when they scare us, meaning that we only get negative stories. The positive stories are, by definition, not of interest.

That skew does not reflect the reality.

For YEARS, ISIS has been killing Arab Muslims in Syria. Where was our media (and air support) then? Busy looking for scary Muslims, because scary Muslims are the only ones that sell papers.

A good example: the Lord's Resistance Army make ISIS look like a bunch of kindergarten teachers. Apart from the weird Kony campaign, our media hasn't noticed. Why? Doesn't affect us, doesn't scare us, and doesn't involve white English-speaking people.

Their religion? Christian.

Is Christianity the religion of war? I mean, if you add up all the killing done by Christians over the past 100 years, you'd have a total VASTLY in excess of anything the Muslims ever did. So is Christianity the religion of war, or not? If we weren't Christian, if we only got stories about Christians when they did evil things that scared us, wouldn't we have the exact same negative view of Christianity as many of you have towards Islam?

I would have though most people over the age of 12 would realise that what we get in the media is - at best - a tiny and very subjective piece of the picture.

 

[SirRumpole]

I would have though most people over the age of 12 would realise that what we get in the media is - at best - a tiny and very subjective piece of the picture.

True enough, we don't hear much of what is going on in Somalia, Nigeria, Kenya until it affects us, but that's a pretty normal human trait. We don't hear much about the poor of Estonia or drug abuse in Amsterdam either.

If we had all the ills of the world rammed down our throats every day people would start complaining that the press is Lefty biased, and why don't we get more stories about how Christopher Pyne wants to create a bold new tertiary education system, full of opportunity for low income earners.

 

[Weatsop]

True enough, we don't hear much of what is going on in Somalia, Nigeria, Kenya until it affects us, but that's a pretty normal human trait. We don't hear much about the poor of Estonia or drug abuse in Amsterdam either.

If we had all the ills of the world rammed down our throats every day people would start complaining that the press is Lefty biased, and why don't we get more stories about how Christopher Pyne wants to create a bold new tertiary education system, full of opportunity for low income earners.

Exactly. There's only so much news we can digest, and the media (naturally) gives us what they think we want.

But that means people need to have some basic ability to form a worldview that doesn't assume the news tells us everything.

This thread is all about people thinking that Islam is especially evil because the reality of the news cycle means we only get the bad stuff. It's really baffling to me that people then go and act as if that bad stuff is the whole story.

It also comes from people not really understanding historical context. Middle-eastern Islam (and the US, for that matter) took a really sharp right turn in the 50's. I mean, have a look at this series, from Cairo university:

1959


1995


2004


You might need to squint a bit, but you'll see girls in floral dresses, and not a headscarf to be seen in '59, and plenty of girls wearing similar in '95 - with a fair few headscarves too. And then in 2004, it's headscarves wall-to-wall.

There's nothing inherently Islamic about headscarves. The Koran doesn't actually take a position - just says people need to dress modestly, and the only restriction is that women need to cover their breasts.

But the Cold War was pretty hard on lots of the world, and the middle-east especially. Compounding that was the messed-up psychos running Saudi Arabia getting spectacularly rich thanks to oil. Just as the US went right-wing, so did the middle-east, but with a hefty taint of crazy thanks to the House of Saud's influence.

The current "brand" of Islam is only a few decades old. All this "Islam is inherently X" stuff necessarily ignores what Islam has been for most of its history.

Fact is, countries with repressive delusional nutjobs in charge, who then export their bizarre views as hard as they can, along with young men, money, and ideas, can have an effect when backed by stupid amounts of wealth. It wouldn't matter what religion was there. The House of Saud pretty much

Again, look at the 1950's photo. Go look up what was happening in the Islamic world a hundred years ago. Tell me they were fundamentally different from Christian countries.

They weren't really. They were poorer, and they had been colonised by Europe, and there was a lot of resentment, no doubt. But what *changed* was that repressive dickheads got into power (in part thanks to that same colonisation process being idiotically unwound). Oh, Israel happened, too.

But it's not like everyone suddenly converted to Islam. Instead, the people of the middle-east got changed by some bat**** insane dictators, and some absolutely humiliating moves by their colonial masters.

Take a look at (largely Christian) central Africa and you can see the exact same process, with the exact same results - with the only exception being that the poor bloody Africans never got the insane amounts of money the middle-east did, and so didn't have the capability to export their violence elsewhere.

The Christian Hutus killed in 100 days a lot more people than all the Wahabi nutters in the world ever will.

 

[Julia]

We don't hear much about the poor of Estonia

Every country will have some poor people. Why have you picked out Estonia? It's one of the most forward thinking, flourishing European countries, particularly given its fraught history with Russian invasion etc.