The problem with Islam

[a500lbgorilla]

This is dangerously close to hate-speech, and you need to humanize your perspective.

You should get yourself into a Mosque and meet some Muslim people. For your own sake.

Take a vacation to a Muslim country and hang out there for a bit. See the normal life passing day to day. See the people spending their time trying to work hard and take care of their loved ones.


***
Your tone of cultural isolationism is practically the same as any fundamental BS spouted by Islamic extremists.

How can 1/4 of the people of the world be that fooled so deeply? They are doctors and lawyers and mathematicians and economists. They are teachers and policemen and construction workers. They are people. You need to meet a few of them.

This is dangerously close to censorship. You should be able to hear any array of opinions expressed, entertain them, criticize them, take away all they're worth and dismiss the rest.

To disallow any discussion because it somehow triggers a 6th sense hate-speech awareness is exactly how I do not want to be.

I'm not a fan of pretending there are unthinkable thoughts and if it truly is hate speech, then its another opportunity to understand a pernicious aspect of humanity.

[MadMojoMonkey]

This is dangerously close to censorship.

Perhaps it is close to censorship, but it is in no way censorship. I made conscious choice to immediately set a counter-tone that championed humanism and education. I did not censor his post or make any personal attacks (unless advising him to expose himself to new perspectives for his own sake is considered an attack).

You should be able to hear any array of opinions expressed, entertain them, criticize them, take away all they're worth and dismiss the rest.

I did this.

Wuf's criticisms are laughable and do not come from a place of understanding, nor do they purvey a tone of seeking understanding. Contrast with your own tone, graphs and adding information to inform perspectives.

To disallow any discussion because it somehow triggers a 6th sense hate-speech awareness is exactly how I do not want to be.

Me, too. All discussion allowed.

I'm not a fan of pretending there are unthinkable thoughts and if it truly is hate speech, then its another opportunity to understand a pernicious aspect of humanity.

It is dangerously close to hate speech, and could well incite some nutjob to go on a full hate rampage. I wanted to counter his tone with something less abrasive to deter any such tomfoolery.

[a500lbgorilla]

It is dangerously close to hate speech, and could well incite some nutjob to go on a full hate rampage. I wanted to counter his tone with something less abrasive to deter any such tomfoolery.

I remember someone asked me how I wanted to die and I said bleed to death because I remember someone describing it as slowly forgetting everything until you forget how to live - he had some hole pop open in his stomach and he almost bleed-out internally, but was saved through blood infusions, he talked about imagining a toothbrush but being fully unable to comprehend the purpose of the toothbrush.

Then someone berated me because any nutjob could come along and be inspired to suicide by my post.

I think he and you are wrong for the same reasons. I'm not here to keep nutjobs in line.

[Renton]

I remember someone asked me how I wanted to die and I said bleed to death because I remember someone describing it as slowly forgetting everything until you forget how to live - he had some hole pop open in his stomach and he almost bleed-out internally, but was saved through blood infusions, he talked about imagining a toothbrush but being fully unable to comprehend the purpose of the toothbrush.

Then someone berated me because any nutjob could come along and be inspired to suicide by my post.

I think he and you are wrong for the same reasons. I'm not here to keep nutjobs in line.

What are your thoughts on Bill O'Reilly's culpability in the murder of George Tiller? If you weren't aware, Tiller was an abortion doctor, and was mentioned specifically 28 episodes of The O'Reilly Factor. In many of the episodes, O'Reilly referred to him as "Tiller the Baby Killer."

I agree with you 100%, but I think one's position on O'Reilly is the true test of that belief.

[a500lbgorilla]

What are your thoughts on Bill O'Reilly's culpability in the murder of George Tiller? If you weren't aware, Tiller was an abortion doctor, and was mentioned specifically 28 episodes of The O'Reilly Factor. In many of the episodes, O'Reilly referred to him as "Tiller the Baby Killer."

I agree with you 100%, but I think one's position on O'Reilly is the true test of that belief.

I dunno enough about it. What happened?

[Renton]

I dunno enough about it. What happened?

Famous/infamous late-term abortion doctor in Kansas. He was the victim of violence several times, including being shot multiple times in 1993, but he survived that. Eventually he was murdered following tons of bad press on Fox news, much of which was the O'Reilly Factor. The question is do you see any issue with O'Reilly using inflammatory language on a show that has extremely good ratings and is sure to be viewed by religious extremists prone to commit violence against abortion clinics? The issue is the power that he has with his platform. It's a bit different than us nobodies criticizing Islam on a web forum.

[a500lbgorilla]

Famous/infamous late-term abortion doctor in Kansas. He was the victim of violence several times, including being shot multiple times in 1993, but he survived that. Eventually he was murdered following tons of bad press on Fox news, much of which was the O'Reilly Factor. The question is do you see any issue with O'Reilly using inflammatory language on a show that has extremely good ratings and is sure to be viewed by religious extremists prone to commit violence against abortion clinics? The issue is the power that he has with his platform. It's a bit different than us nobodies criticizing Islam on a web forum.

Yes, but mostly no.

I was working on a project for an authority that had really ballsed up how it issued out work to upgrade their system. Basically, they brought us on to upgrade their old system and someone else on to install the next-gen stuff and they were incompatible in a lot of ways. The intent was to have the tried-and-true old system as a back up when the new system broke-down, but there were philosophical differences.

Anyway, they eventually decided to drop us off and just go with the newer system as the sole-controller. I say this because toward the end of my work on that project, we got a new project management team who were pressing us to get packages out the door regardless of their completeness. Hindsight tells me it's because they could read the writing on the walls and knew the work would never be looked at but would be billed. I refused. I wouldn't send anything out until it was level 5 done.

Bill O'Reilly is responsible for what he did in that same vein. He spoke his words, he hammered his fists, he inflamed his rhetoric, and so the consequences are his. A man in his position should have some sense of the cause-and-effect nature of his work and his words, and he shouldn't commit to any work that he himself doesn't approve in some manner.

At the same time, the nature of a hierarchy is that blame is equal to authority and Bill O doesn't get to have a show on the quality of his character alone. He's allowed to have a show because it fits into the overall plan and direction of the organization he's a part of. Whoever saw his fire-brand narrative as a product they wanted to own and push holds the lion's share of blame. Whoever looked over Bill O's work and saw fit to afford it is more responsible than he is.*

The least blame goes to the bumpkins who fell for it. They can't even maintain the basic health of mind to see through his words and hatred and so what good does it do to burden those who can't even do the least with any blame?

*which is why conquerors like Muhammad are so interesting. How cool is it when you afford your own work?

[boost]

I remember someone asked me how I wanted to die and I said bleed to death because I remember someone describing it as slowly forgetting everything until you forget how to live - he had some hole pop open in his stomach and he almost bleed-out internally, but was saved through blood infusions, he talked about imagining a toothbrush but being fully unable to comprehend the purpose of the toothbrush.

Then someone berated me because any nutjob could come along and be inspired to suicide by my post.

I think he and you are wrong for the same reasons. I'm not here to keep nutjobs in line.

I love this anecdote.

[wufwugy]

Wuf's criticisms are laughable and do not come from a place of understanding, nor do they purvey a tone of seeking understanding. Contrast with your own tone, graphs and adding information to inform perspectives.

The irony is that you're doing what you've accused of me, while I never did what you accused of me.

It is dangerously close to hate speech

No it isn't. This extreme jump to defense of something that is otherwise unfathomable is part of my critique in the first place. I point out negatives that are otherwise widely understood as negatives yet somehow it makes me a bigot.

[boost]

Really don't understand what is so special about Islam that inspires the SJW outrage. They don't defend any other religion with this much fervor. I could post scathing criticism of evangelical Christians and there wouldn't be a peep from anyone, only nodding heads. I could talk about the reactionary pining-for-the-1950s worldviews of neocons and they would practically slip a disk nodding in agreement so hard. But as soon as wufwugy or Sam Harris criticizes a religion that openly wants to remake the world in the image of 600 AD, out come the pitchforks.

I agree with all of this, except when you lump Harris' critiques in with wufwugy's.

This is dangerously close to censorship. You should be able to hear any array of opinions expressed, entertain them, criticize them, take away all they're worth and dismiss the rest.

To disallow any discussion because it somehow triggers a 6th sense hate-speech awareness is exactly how I do not want to be.

I'm not a fan of pretending there are unthinkable thoughts and if it truly is hate speech, then its another opportunity to understand a pernicious aspect of humanity.

I get the knee-jerk to call out SJW censorship-- but be careful to not do exactly what your accusing MMM of. Let's take wuf's argument point by point.

1) Mainstream Islam preaches racism, e.g. all the hot Muslim womens are off limits to wuf.

2) Mainstraem Islam preaches sexism, e.g. the Imam that openly supports women's rights is an extreme rarity.

3) Mainstream Protestantism, the predominant religion of the USA, where most of us live, has values that approximate the values of the culture of the place where most of us live.

4) Smorgasbord of borderline incoherent jabs framed by an overarching comparison to the pinnacle of tolerance, peace, and all that is good in the world: Protestantism.

5) Muslims don't condemn the abhorrent acts of fellow Muslims.

All of these claims are unsubstantiated, and while probably in the ballpark of truth are contaminated with hyperbolic rhetoric. Further, most of the claims beg dissenters to respond with anecdotes, since they themselves are anecdotal observations of the entirety of Islam-- how is this productive?

I think that's the gripe with wuf's post that had MMM sum it up as hate speech-- the rant lacks substance, is full of rhetoric, and does nothing to address a solution to the problem or even offer common ground on which a fruitful dialogue can be had. This is the difference between what Harris says on the topic and what wuf has to say. Harris gets lambasted for being a bigot, but it's because he uses extremely nuanced arguments, which often get turned into out of context quotes and inflammatory soundbites. I'm not missing any nuance in wuf's post. If it is an attempt to move towards a solution, it's a miserable failure, and if it's a purposeful success at anything, I think my value system is as far from wufwugy's as he proposes Mainstream Islam's is from that of western culture.

[a500lbgorilla]

I get the knee-jerk to call out SJW censorship-- but be careful to not do exactly what your accusing MMM of. Let's take wuf's argument point by point.

1) Mainstream Islam preaches racism, e.g. all the hot Muslim womens are off limits to wuf.

2) Mainstraem Islam preaches sexism, e.g. the Imam that openly supports women's rights is an extreme rarity.

3) Mainstream Protestantism, the predominant religion of the USA, where most of us live, has values that approximate the values of the culture of the place where most of us live.

4) Smorgasbord of borderline incoherent jabs framed by an overarching comparison to the pinnacle of tolerance, peace, and all that is good in the world: Protestantism.

5) Muslims don't condemn the abhorrent acts of fellow Muslims.

All of these claims are unsubstantiated, and while probably in the ballpark of truth are contaminated with hyperbolic rhetoric. Further, most of the claims beg dissenters to respond with anecdotes, since they themselves are anecdotal observations of the entirety of Islam-- how is this productive?

I think that's the gripe with wuf's post that had MMM sum it up as hate speech-- the rant lacks substance, is full of rhetoric, and does nothing to address a solution to the problem or even offer common ground on which a fruitful dialogue can be had. This is the difference between what Harris says on the topic and what wuf has to say. Harris gets lambasted for being a bigot, but it's because he uses extremely nuanced arguments, which often get turned into out of context quotes and inflammatory soundbites. I'm not missing any nuance in wuf's post. If it is an attempt to move towards a solution, it's a miserable failure, and if it's a purposeful success at anything, I think my value system is as far from wufwugy's as he proposes Mainstream Islam's is from that of western culture.

I knew I was bringing more to the party than wuf laid out in his post, as I thought I built on point 4 a bit.

But point 5 is an important one. It's not that they don't condemn each other for chopping off hands and stoning quran burners, so much as the apostasy point. You're born into the religion and you're stuck in it because if you don't follow it, you'll be killed, and following it means killing anyone who doesn't follow it.



"All we want is all the non-followers of Muhammed off the land."