Christians riot in Holland! Sixteen killed! Oh...wait...

Good Morning, Robert.

My apologies for the times I have added fuel to the fire on this topic, but I wish to clear something up about the argument:

Giaour, kj, I have no clue how far 'right' I am, and if you knew a few more things about me you'd at least (I would Hope) wonder why that is the side I support, but I do know this: I am Never going to just stand by and let my faith be depicted in such fashion. I am well aware of its History. History overall but especially religious history has fascinated me since I was in grade school.

If there is a Tiny Minority of Extremists, it is far, Far on the fringe of Christianity, and there it will stay. (Not to mention the fact that it is Aging and some of its adherents made jokes out of themselves years ago). Even the Southern Poverty Law Center can't find more than 5 articles' worth of material to offer on it in a decade. Mr. Spencer puts up that many and more about jihad every single day here, just browsing the world's electronic newspapers.

At the very least we can count on the media and watchdogs like yourselves (and Hey! Me too!) to keep it there.

A very Hot day today, and I am outside in most of it, have a good day everyone.

Maybe the scientists should trample a few Bible's? That will get those pesky Christian Fundamentalists going.

Pity that not many can/will see that the perpetrators on this show are secular extremists. That they cannot be because they 'don't believe in god'. So extremism doesn't apply to them!

Mr Spencer comment..

"And the one question I received from each of these groups most often was: Well, what you're saying is true, but all religions have their extremists, don't they? Every religion has inspired violence, hasn't it?"

The implication is that Islam is somehow entitled to be violent because other religions have done so in their past. We the infidels, just have to be patient and let it run its course.

This question or some form of it, is one that many of us jihadwatchers hear over and over again when we talk to others about the dangers of Islam. It's an absurd argument.

If was wrong in then, it is wrong now

'The implication is that Islam is somehow entitled to be violent because other religions have done so in their past. We the infidels, just have to be patient and let it run its course.'~ Infidella

That is Exactly the point, and thanks for making it son concisely. That is kt's argument and when made by some others it plays into the hands of the jihadists.

Definitely gone now, take care all!

son? Sheesh. More coffee.

*pop*

Now, surely Giaour and KJ are sure to come out and contest this view! Surely they must defend their attitudes and their warped notion of history! Surely they do not have... well... something better to do....

Incidentally, the cowardice of attacking Christianity in the Netherlands, a country where the Churches have long since been neutralized, speaks by itself. I have no doubt that these morons would not consider opening their mouths against their Muslim neighbours. Perhaps they could be convinced to run a TV special attacking Theo Van Gogh and stating that Hirsi Ali is a sell-out to Western cultural imperialism. After all Van Gogh is dead and Hirsi Ali does not use knives.

Christianity can survive outrageously offensive and churlish attacks like this due to the strength of the overall message.

On the other hand, Islam cannot withstand the mere reading of its texts, leaders, accepted beliefs (Bedouin), or daily news stories. There is no there there. What is there makes Clive Barker jealous he didn't think of it first.

Christianity has a long philosophical tradition including all the medieval Scholastics up to the priest who originally theorized the Big Bang.

In the marketplace of ideas, Islam is New Coke.

“…all religions have their extremists, don't they? Every religion has inspired violence, hasn't it?…. But the idea that all religions are equal in their capacity to inspire violence is not only false but misleading….this is a principal obstacle to our resistance to the genuine jihad threat: it diverts attention, it diverts energy, and it clouds the issue at hand. For ultimately the point of dredging up the Crusades and Falwell is to suggest that Osama and the jihad are phenomena that are just going to crop up in religions…
--- from the article above

One form of denial is that of pseudo-symmetries and moral equivalences. One that will enter the books is the recent remark by Senator Durbin making a clear comparison between the American kid-glove treatment (well, the gloves which Infidel soldiers are instructed to wear when handling the Qur’an so as not to offend Muslims by touching it with their “unclean” (najis) hands may not quite be made of kid) and the Nazis, or the Soviet secret police (whose idea of fun would be to insert a glass rod in a male prisoner’s urethra, and then to smash it in ways you can imagine – so very like the Americans in Guantanamo, no?).

But another is the telling pluralization in such Karen-Armstrongesque titles as “Religions Fundamentalisms” or “The Fundamentalism Project” or anything which implies that Jerry Falwell or Jerry Vines (whose accurate description of Islam, one that no brave defector from Islam would quibble with, is actually one of the “exhibits” of so-called “intolerance” at one of those Museums of Intolerance that the Wiesenthal Center supports – how stupid can some people be?), or those West Bank “settlers” who keep using those Biblical toponyms “Judea” and “Samaria” (my, my – why then do we keep using the Bibilical toponym “Gaza” if not because the Arabs forget to rename that in 1948 as well?).

There is a difference between those whose religion instructs its adherents that Islam is “to dominate and not to be dominated,” that insists that everyone in the world was actually born a Muslim but fell away, that attempts to acquire converts (“reverts”) by withholding complete information (all one has to do is recite the Shehada in the presence of a Believer), that treats all Muslims, whether born into it or converts to it, as akin to soldiers in an army, the Army of Islam, and treats those who wish to openly declare their apostasy as deserters from the Army of Islam who deserve to be killed, that puts all of its emphasis not on individual salvation but on the collective, the communal, the umma, the Community of Believers to whom all loyalty is owed, and no loyalty can conceivably be offered to an Infidel nation-state (which raises a delicate but important question: can any true Muslim conceivably, logically, be a loyal member of an Infidel nation-state? How?). Above all, Islam -- which we have called a “religion” because most of us cannot be bothered to call it a “belief-system” so as to deny it the immediate respect that so often is accorded a “religion,” and because it is called one of the world’s “great” religions when we are too lazy to see what is wrong with that designation and are not careful to describe it, more accurately, as one of the world’s “major” religions or, better, “a belief-system with a great many adherents.”

The business of “all religions do it” is comforting. It makes Infidels feel better. We don’t have to really worry. It is just the hotheads, the extremists. Oh, maybe there are a few more of those in Islam than in other religions, but if they can only get rid of their poverty – we all know how “poverty” explains so very much – and can just get that “democracy” running in Light-Unto-the-Muslim-Nations Iraq, well Iraq will show the way. And with everyone taking time to run the country, get the sanitation system going, and a new subway system, and running for Town Alderman, and having little New England Town Meetings in the Sunni Isosceles Triangle, they will be just like those Atlanta businessmen who had that slogan in the 1960s (“The city that is too busy to hate.”). Yes, the Muslims in Iraq, and then elsewhere, as they build their countries on the wonderful model of the nation-state of Iraq that we Americans will, this year, and next year, and the year after that, with the $595 million embassy we are building to show we are there for the long and expensive haul, and all those secret military bases that the Iraqis are allowing us to build (you don’t really think they just plan to take them away from us soon after we finish building them, do you? Why would they do that?), we know that there will be no problem, because once poverty in the Muslim world is licked (sorry, we don’t have time to dole out hundreds of billions or even billions, or much of anything, to the non-Muslim poor – since their poverty, for some reason, doesn’t cause them to be hostile, they’ll just have to fend for themselves. And we can’t ask the rich Arabs to support the poor Arabs, because that would annoy them, and we have annoyed them quite enough already – don’t you agree?).

All religions are not the same. The word “fundamentalism” should never be employed in the plural, and when you find someone doing so, immediately swoop down on that usage, and dissect it for what it is – an ill-concealed attempt to pretend that Islam is not a peculiarly virulent, hostile, malevolent, and totalitarian belief-system, some of whose adherents (that is, those calling themselves Muslims) are, on a personal level, friendly, affable, and so on – but their friendliness and affability on the superficial level mean nothing, and if it is to be any deeper than that, it will depend on the superficiality of their belief in Islam. The less they truly believe in Islam, the more lax they are in observance, the more indifferent they are, or ignorant of, the texts, the less of a threat they may be, for now, to Infidels. But one cannot base policy on the continued ignorance, or continued indifference, of people who consider themselves Muslims to the tenets of Islam. And that very affability, of the local Pak-Indian grocery where you just bought that large jar of Ginger Pickle (the one with the big new sign, in cardboard, that has been taped to the lamppost outside the store, on the city street, that reads “Halal Meat”), deceives. Deceives about the nature of Islam.

One may mock the occasional Elmer Gantry among preachers. One may not always share a taste for the most extreme of the holy-roller programs with lots of shout-outs and so on. But none of it represents a mortal threat. And no atheist is threatened, really, by so-called “fundamentalist” Christians or “fundamentalist” Jews or “fundamentalist” Hindus or “fundamentalist” Buddhists, all of whom have views that hardly threaten. Christians seek the salvation of individual souls, not recruits to an Army with a totalitarian system of Total Explanaton and Total Regulation. Those “fundamentalist” Jews want, at most, to be able to retain at least part of the land that they may claim on religious grounds, but which they might equally claim on historical and moral grounds, and they are not claiming, as Muslims are, the world, but a sliver of territory so small, so devoid of resources, that it can scarcely have its name discerned on maps of the world, or even of the area. “Fundamentalist” Hindus, too, have no world-conquering schemes, and mostly they would like some recognition of the terrible results, to Indian civilization, that the Muslim invasion and conquest caused, and some attempt to recover that Hindu past and Hindu identity. Even if there are the odd ducks (Mr. Thackeray, for example) whose views and words are unacceptable, the very idea of Hindutva should not be mocked, has its points, and is certainly not a threat to people living in Thailand, or in Russia, or in France, or in Bolivia, or in the United States. But people in Thailand, or Russia, or France, or in Bolivia, or in the United States, are threatened by Islam. Not “fundamentalist” Islam. Just Islam. When that is better understood, there will be far less waste, financial and human, in such dismal efforts as the current wrong-headed campaign – because naively based on a misapprehension of what this “war” really is all about (not “terror” but the Jihad, and not the Jihad promoted only through combat, but through money, propagadanda, Da’wa, and demographic conquest from within).

Little by little, this will come to be understood. The steady stillicide of news about Muslim attacks, Muslim attempts to shut down criticism (see the Hate Speech law in operation in Australia, and now being pushed in the United Kingdom; see the informal ways – murder and threats of murder – that are employed wherever and whenever deemed to be an effective instrument, as in Holland today), Muslim outrages – will, despite the best efforts of governments and The New Duranty Times and Le Monde and The Guardian – sink into the consciousnesses of many. Even one article, such as that about Oriana Fallaci in The Wall Street Journal yesterday, can open many eyes. All it takes is for someone to say what so many are thinking, and have been afraid, or unable, to articulate.

There are no “fundamentalist” Muslims among those who really believe.. All Muslims, if they believe in Islam, are fundamentalists. The Qur’an is the Word of God. It cannot be changed. The Hadith, as collected and winnowed by the greatest muhaddithin, al-Bukhari and Muslim, are fixed in amber. And of course, the life of Muhammad, the details of that life, cannot be tampered with. To believe in Islam is to believe all of that.

There are some who do not really believe, but continue to call themselves Muslims. Does Fareed Zakaria, does Fouad Ajami, does Ms. Nafisi believe in Islam? Probably not. But they will not follow the articulate, humorous, altogether delightful Ibn Warraq, or others like him. It would be, for them, a bad career move. So much better for them to remain silent. Or not to incquire too deeply into the theory and practice of Islam, for fear of what they might find out (calling oneself a Muslim does not make one an instant expert, for example, on the history of Muslim conquest and subjugation of non-Muslims).

To call yourself a Muslim, but not to believe, and yet to defend Islam, to misrepresent the teachings of Islam to Infidels, to deny any connection between, say, the treatment of women in Iran or Pakistan and the tenets of Islam, and the attitudes of Islam (as such plausible “soft” apologists as Shirin Ebadi, and Hussain Haqqani, are wont to do), is to further the world-wide Jihad. Not through violence, but through disinformation. And whether that disinformation is the result of ignorance, or embarrassment, or filial piety, or a combination of all three, is irrelevant to Infidels. We cannot permit ourselves not to see through such misinformation, even if it is offered for humanly understandable reasons.

Our sympathies must be limited – limited to those of us who are not Muslims, who were not born in to Islam, and whose ways of life, whose safety, whose wellbeing, whose art and science, are threatened by the presence of large numbers of Muslims within our societies, and Muslim power – entirely the result of an accident of geology – from without.

And that is why whatever rhetorical devices are used to confuse and deny, and there is none so insididous as that appeal to “three fundamentalisms” and the insistence that “everyone does it” (if you can make yourself, despite all the evidence, believe it – the way editors at The New Duranty Times have managed to convince themselves – you will rest easier, and we all want to do that, don’t we?

Hugh, good post. I also refuse to use the term "fundamentalist" for any save those Christians who claim it--and I notice that the Christian fundamentals are a set of doctrines about the person and work of Jesus Christ and the nature of the Bible. Before the late 1970's, Christian "fundamentalism" was politically varied, covering both the segregationist Bob Jones and Carl Henry, who wrote _The Uneasy Conscience of Modern Fundamentalism_. It was immensely susceptible to having its ethical blind spots (racism, for instance) challenged by having Scripture quoted right back at it (one of the things Martin Luther King excelled at) and rethinking its position. And, as soon as any credible Democrat makes the right kind of noises (Bill Clinton did; Joe Liberman probably could; Hillary Clinton probably can't because she just isn't credible), its fearsome monolithic "Evangelical rightist" bloc cracks due to a desperate desire to believe that Grandpappy's party might still have a place for it (despite being the party of abortion, alternative lifestyles, and bureaucratic interference in private education).

When "fundamentalism" is used to suggest a commonality between some very different approaches and beliefs concerning political life (this covers the whole issue of limited government versus dictatorship; not just feminism and gay rights), it becomes the mark of the bigot rather than of the analyst.

Hence, I insist on speaking of Islamicist radicalism, ferment, or Islamofascism.

To return to Mr. Spencer's post, though, I have a sneaky suspicion that there may be a slow re-gathering of Christian strength in the Netherlands which people like Muntz and van de Wint (of the wind? Flatulence?) wamt to stop.

We should also remember that this is WESTERN CIVILIZAION that is fighting against Islam. Let us not forget that without the Enlightenment, the freedoms that we cherish might not exist.

Yes, the history of the West has many examples of violence, hatred, intolerance. The bloody religious wars of the 16th Century, African slavery, and imperialism. (Although when will public school textbooks give equal time to Islamic Slavery - that still exists today - and Islamic Imperialism.

But we can't let these Islamic apologist use these examples as a way for them to shout down people like Robert Spencer and others. Many on the Left are still unable to criticize Islam and Islamic theology, mainly because they glom Fundementalist Christianity with Fundementalist Islam. (I've heard it so many times that "If we get rid of Wahhabism then everything will be alright." When I explain to them that it's not Wahhabism, but Islam itself, I get branded as a right-wing wacko.)

The difference between Islam and the West is in the West's ability to change, grow, become better. Not just technologically, but also ethically. Yes, the Judeo-Christian tradition has much to do with that. But many of the West's advancements came when it challenged the Dogma of the THEOCRATS.

In Islam, you can't challege the theocrats. Just as Salman Rusdie, Irshad Manji, Theo Van Gogh.
And just ask the thousands of SILENT so-called moderate Muslims living in America. Where are their voices? Why haven't they come out of the woodwork?

Because they secretly harbor the idea that America will one day become an Islamic country.

I hope the West will use its ability to change once again and fight to eradicate this harmful ideology.

"And just ask the thousands of SILENT so-called moderate Muslims living in America. Where are their voices? Why haven't they come out of the woodwork?

Because they secretly harbor the idea that America will one day become an Islamic country."
--- from a posting above

Or because they are embarrassed about what Islam teaches. Or they try not to investigate too closely for themselves what Islam teaches, because then they would have to make a mental choice: to stay or to go. And the hold of Islam on many of its adherents is extraordinarily powerful, for after all it is also comfortinig to have this Total Explanation and Total Regulation, and to turn one's back on Islam seems to many to mean -- and indeed may mean -- to turn one's back on one's family, one's pious grandmother or grandfather (who practiced a kind of semi-literate village Islam, and knew nothing or almost nothing about the Hadith, or Sira, and very little about the outside Infidel world, or about the real history of Islamic "civilization").

Filial piety is a very strong bond.

And then, of course, there is fear.

But of course the number of "moderate" Muslims has, in any case, been grotesquely inflated. They are a very small group - that is, if the word "moderate" is to mean something more than "does not participate or take pleasure in Muslim acts of terror against Infidels." That just won't do as a definition of "moderate."

"people like Muntz and van de Wint (of the wind? Flatulence?)" -- you bring a smile, Kepha

A cult with a billion "believers", most of whom are so because their forbearers were forcibly "converted", is still a cult.

Obviously the T.V. show is out to offend people. It offends me and I'm not a Christian. It's one of those tricky censorship issues I avoid by exercising my freedom of choice. Which thank goodness, counter to the wishes of many people of varying philosophical ilks, I still have.

the idea that Jerry Falwell is as much or more of a threat to Western notions of freedom and human rights as is bin Laden or Zarqawi.

In both an immediate and practical sense the idea of Falwell being more of a threat is of course silly and an obvious exaggeration to say the least.

If history and experience is any indication I would imagine most Christians will address this in a civilized manner.

I personally believe belief in the supernatural is unfounded and well silly but I really don't care what people believe as long as they act in a civilized manner. Some religions teach a more civilized approach to social differences than others. I believe Christianity is certainly one of the more civilized in that respect.

I agree with you Robert, the discussion of the merits of religion in a general sense distract from the more immediate need to address one religion's war on the world. I apologize if my anti-religious views and comments have been construed as aiding that.

f.g.

I explained the Islamic Imperialism to my classmates in a presentation in my final course. Needless to say they were all stunned.

Anyway, a Total Explanation or Regulation is easy because it means that you don't have to think or wonder about anything, just do. Reminds one of the Borg, or that episode of the Simpsons when Homer went to the Duff Beer, "if the plant ye wish to flee, go to sector 7-B".

And some of the moderate Muslims are so named by the media because they come from India, or Pakistan, while in actual fact they may be atheists, Zoroastrians or Hindus. I've also heard of a rise in Buddhist followers in Afganistan and Pakistan, and Malaysia.

Regarding "all religions are equal and bad". If that's true, then the Buddha should be regarded as the bringer of evil and a true terrorist. Now that'll make you think. :-/

Religious imperialism in any form is odious and unacceptable. Islam is the only ideology that has religious imperialism as a goal. Period.

How many people do Christians have to kill before they're afraid of offending us too?

Don't worry. Jesus was a Muslim prophet too. Those whack-jobs should be out in force when they see this.

In 2000, they were fired by another broadcasting company after Muntz walked around a Jewish Orthodox neighborhood in Vienna, Austria, dressed up as Adolf Hitler.

Reading the New York topic yesterday, I was somewhat caught in-between, on one side the Moslems are angry at American Christians because Jerry Springer is on TV, the non-Christians in America are angry with the Christians because Jerry Springer isn’t on 24 hours a day. Is this a great Country or what?

“Selfishness is not living as one wishes to live, it is asking others to live as one wishes to live.”
Oscar Wilde

“What can you say about a society that says that God is dead and Elvis is alive?”
Irv Kupcinet

Not to beat a dead horse, but here are some Giaour quotes I found particularly laughable.

I know the history of the mid east and Islam probably better than Mr. Spencer

you see long before I read the Qur'an ..... I studied the bible, in fact I'm a biblical scholar of sorts,

don't question my Biblical Scholarship, I'll eat you alive`

You see Christians can be, and many are, as fanatically theocratic and antiliberty as Muslims. It's called.... Evangelicalism

don't question my Biblical Scholarship, I'll eat you alive`

I know the history of the mid east and Islam probably better than Mr. Spencer

"To be stupid, selfish, and have good health are three requirements for happiness, though if stupidity is lacking, all is lost." Gustave Flaubert

RS: I spoke, as it happens, to two Christian and two Jewish groups. And the one question I received from each of these groups most often was: Well, what you're saying is true, but all religions have their extremists, don't they? Every religion has inspired violence, hasn't it?

...so Mr. Spencer, if Christians and Jews even do this, why do expect less from apostates, agnostics, humanists, liberals, and atheists?

******************************************

Gary: Giaour, kj, I have no clue how far 'right' I am, and if you knew a few more things about me you'd at least (I would Hope) wonder why that is the side I support, but I do know this: I am Never going to just stand by and let my faith be depicted in such fashion. I am well aware of its History. History overall but especially religious history has fascinated me since I was in grade school.

I base my "how far right you are" on what you say. The history of your faith, assuming that you are a Christian, is not much to be proud of. At least Catholics can point to Mother Theresa and Father Damien (Mel "What Holocaust?" Gibson notwithstanding.) But who are the great protestants? Jerry Falwell? Pat Robertson? The Crystal Cathedral huckster?

I have never, ever criticized the Crusaders because Islam crusaded even more, and is still doing it. History shows that had the Crusades not occured, India and Hinduism would have disappeared. Thank God (ha-ha) for the Crusades.

But there were many other "campaigns" by Christians at the orders of their Christian leaders. Even against other Christians! Like the sack of Constantinople, and the slaughter of the Albigensians. And they weren't too kind to the Druids, Pagans, and other heathens.

It seems to me that the greatest westerners are the ones that questioned their "state religion" the most: DeCartes, Hume, Mill, Bentham, Washington, Voltaire, Franklin, Paine, Lincoln, Jefferson, et al.

Gary, I think that you should know that I am not a dyed-in-the-wool liberal. All my conservative friends think I am a namby-pamby liberal and all my liberal friends think that I am a closet conservative who, (ahem!) "Hates Brown-skinned Ay-Rabs!")

....I just do what science says is the best. I don't have the superstitions, "heritage", religion, and traditions of my family/nation/race/whatever. I believe in science, and history is a science.

I support "this" side, i.e. the "Jihad Awareness and Resistance" side because it is the one I consider best. The opposite "stance" would be to stand idly by while Islam destroys the world.

I resist Islam because I am a feminists and have a keen interest in women's equality. Islam abuses women.

I resist Islam because I have a desire to see homosexuals treated like human beings, and Islam abuses homosexuals.

I resist Islam because I am "mostly" liberal and appreciate tolerance, freedom, and diversity, all of which Islam strenuously opposes.

I also support the "Limit Role of Women In The Military" side because I think that side is the best. The opposite side supports letting women fight alongside men in combat, and that troubles me. Especially if we are fighting Jihadis.

And I support the "Equal Rights For Homosexuals Including Adoption And Marriage/Civil Union" side because I think THAT side is the best. The contrary view keeps one-tenth of the population in second-class citizens, and I don't like that.

Etc.

If there is a Tiny Minority of Extremists, it is far, Far on the fringe of Christianity, and there it will stay. (Not to mention the fact that it is Aging and some of its adherents made jokes out of themselves years ago). Even the Southern Poverty Law Center can't find more than 5 articles' worth of material to offer on it in a decade. Mr. Spencer puts up that many and more about jihad every single day here, just browsing the world's electronic newspapers.

"...IF?" There certainly IS an minority of extremists in Christianity, and the farther back we go in history, the more there were.

But another way to say this is that all the time, the extremists are fading away. Would that we could say the same about Islam.

I believe what you say about the SPLC... it just goes to show that extremism for Christianity is fading... the hate SPEECH is on the rise, to be sure. But actual incidents of lynchings, assassinations, etc. are decreasing. The case of James Byrd's murder in Texas stands out because it is rare... the murder of an apostate, convert, "uppity woman", etc. in any Muslim hellhole doesn't get any press because it happens every day.

Gary, you have never seen me try to equivocate the atrocities of Christianity's PAST with Islam's PRESENT. Gaiour can quote all the Biblical scripture he or she wants about punishments and threats, but the fact is that there are practically no Christians doing that now. The Inquisition is over. The extremists lost. As long as the ACLU and the US Constitution are around, there isn't going to BE a Christian "Reconstruction", or another series of witch/heretics massacres, or another Inquisition.

I know that there are Christian extremists that would LIKE to bring back the "good old days" of Church-State theocracy, but it's not going to happen.

Gary, we can accomplish so much more if we work together. Let's focus on what we agree on, like Islam is a threat; instead of what we disagree on, like the need for Kerry to sign his release-of-information form (while Dub STILL hasn't.)

**************************************

Monkey: Now, surely Giaour and KJ are sure to come out and contest this view! Surely they must defend their attitudes and their warped notion of history! Surely they do not have... well... something better to do....

You wish. I don't have a "notion" of history. I know about history.

Monkey: Incidentally, the cowardice of attacking Christianity in the Netherlands, a country where the Churches have long since been neutralized, speaks by itself. I have no doubt that these morons would not consider opening their mouths against their Muslim neighbors.

Here, here. (Or should I say "dittos"?) I'd like to see the two fools make a money about "Allah Doesn't Exist" and walk through a Muslim neighborhood dressed up like Godfrey de Bouillon. (Use your search engine, insect.)

*********************************

One form of denial is that of pseudo-symmetries and moral equivalences. One that will enter the books is the recent remark by Senator Durbin making a clear comparison between the American kid-glove treatment ... and the Nazis, or the Soviet secret police

..."a clear comparison"? Excuse me, sir, but it seems to me that he read a report by and FBI eye witness, and then said that the incidents cited in that report "reminded" him of the treatment of prisoners in Gulags, etc. He DID NOT compare Nazis and Soviet Secret Police to American Soldiers. Nice try though. Now tell me about those psuedo-symmetries agian.

Our sympathies must be limited – limited to those of us who are not Muslims, who were not born in to Islam, and whose ways of life, whose safety, whose wellbeing, whose art and science, are threatened by the presence of large numbers of Muslims within our societies, and Muslim power – entirely the result of an accident of geology – from without.

Exactly. Like the poor non-Muslims everywhere in the midst of Muslim majorities. Glance at Darfur and behold what the Utilitarians called the "Tryanny of The Majority." We should all be thankful Americans--and Westerners in general, like all infidels--respect the rights of minorities.

************************************

"people like Muntz and van de Wint (of the wind? Flatulence?)"

LOL....good one Keph.

There is no moral equivalence, nor any equivalence whatsoever between spiritual religions, Christianity, Buddism, Hinduism, Judaism and a cult built around a single evil megalomaniac. If you want comparisons to islam, try the branch davidians, or the aum shinricko, or the rashnishees, or the aryan nations.

Kepha The difference between Islam and the West is in the West's ability to change, grow, become better. Not just technologically, but also ethically. Yes, the Judeo-Christian tradition has much to do with that. But many of the West's advancements came when it challenged the Dogma of the THEOCRATS.

This comes close. What's wrong with being identically opposed to right wing Christian AND Jihadist views?

If you oppose the Falwell-Robertson-Dallas Theological Seminary axis, you are seemingly automatically pegged as a left wing tree-hugging Muslim-lover. Presumably, then, this means all those who do so equally enjoy automatically being pegged as Christian Reconstructionist/Dominionists dedicated enshrining the Falwell-Robertson view into the Constitution.

Moral equivalence between Islam and Christianity is ludicrous; and the meanings in Islam and Christianity and how those meanings influence history are quite literally night and day.

There is a tendency in Islam to resurrect practices in Sharia and those endorsed by 'the perfect man Muhammad' that are antithetical to contemporary Western conceptions of human rights: inequality for women, oppression of non-believers, slavery or quasi-slavery, in addition to things like jizya and the archaic interest free banking, which now has even taken a foothold in the United States. But consider the Gospels. What meanings have carried special historical power? Do texts like the Sermon On the Mount have anything to do with the evolution of European moral and political categories, even if some of these categories are developed and promoted by groups that considered themselves 'anti-religion'? Despite religious institutions, like the Catholic Church, that has suppressed in a variety of ways the principle of political equality, the principle emerges in European history with irresistible power (but we should not demonize the Church. Look at the influence of the foundational principles and texts on this institution. Could one ever imagine the Pope commanding armies again? The Church is utterly in the embrace of a pacifism that is richly expressed in the stories about Jesus. And there are many other stories to tell as well.). There are complex causes, of course, but surely the idea that all persons are equal before God, that the meek are blessed, that riches and social status are irrelevant moral status (and in fact perhaps a detriment), that all human beings, even non-believers, are deserving of not only respect but sacrifice and care, don't these notions, which define the ethos of the Gospels play crucial roles in the evolution of social and political forces that purged injustices such as slavery, political and social inequality for women, unjust taxation, from European history?

What is said in these foundational religious texts is important. The meanings of these words, the tone and texture of the stories, the examples set by the main actors in the stories, all these and more have influenced the evolution of our social and political institutions, as well as the ways we view ourselves within those societies. And the stark contrast between those cultures under the influence of the Qur'an and those under the influence of other forces, like the Gospels and the Hebrew bible, cannot be overemphasized.

Gary, you have never seen me try to equivocate the atrocities of Christianity's PAST with Islam's PRESENT ~ kj

Dear KJ
Don’t you think your preposterous harangues about Hitler being a “Christian” fall into that category? Well, technically maybe Gray hasn’t seen them, but this insect has.

“Science without religion is lame, religion without science is blind.”
Albert Einstein, "Science, Philosophy and Religion: a Symposium", 1941

I think Hugh and Robert underestimate the depth and complexity of the Western Leftist pathology.

A poster named hun above wrote: "Many on the Left are still unable to criticize Islam and Islamic theology."

No, not "many". The vast majority -- probably over 95% -- of Western Leftists are unable to criticize Islam.

Tautalos:

The Kalash survived this long probably because they could afford to segregate themselves etnically and economically from the surrounding sea of moslems. Given that Afghan is hard territory and sparsely populated, it was possible for small tribves to survive with their unique identities intact. (Think tribal communities in the Amazon, in Australia etc that have successfully done this).

Also, a related question then would be: how about the Ahmediyas? and the Hindus in Pakistan? or the Buddhists in Bangladesh? How do they survive so long as a community?

I would like to see Muntz and van de Wint portray Allah in the same way and then see how long they live!

Everytime in history science has tried to disprove God or creationism, it can't do it. The more the facts of history and the facts of science are studied, the more proof there is to a device creator, be it God or alien.

Guys, guys, guys...I've seen the program and it's really quite tame. It's just two people talking about scientific facts. In the first episode that got the fundamentalist christians (because the ones that are protesting are fundamentalists, the SGP was on trial just recently for not letting women into their party) riled up they even talked about Mohammed suffering from epilepsy. The 1-minute skits where they make 'fun' of all the various religions out there or either too obscure to make any sense at all or they're just damn funny. They're quite bizarre but always tie into what they were talking about in the interview. There are three Dutch public channels and especially on channel 1 almost all the programs are made by religious broadcasting companies. It's only fair there's a program once a week that says God doesn't exist and lays down a couple of scientific facts to prove that religion is very much a human invention. It goes into all kinds of aspects of the human psyche and is really interesting. Those 1-minute skits are nowhere near as insulting as some of the things these christians that now complain have said about gays. If you think burning a Qu'ran is free speech then why complain about a program that questions the existence of God? And yes, they do discuss Allah but they are brutally honest when they say that it's virtually impossible to say anything about Islam because Muslims want to kill you and non-Muslims will call you a racist bully. But they do talk about Islam.

Everytime in history science has tried to disprove God or creationism, it can't do it. The more the facts of history and the facts of science are studied, the more proof there is to a device creator, be it God or alien.

Gosh, who can argue with a statement like that? Sure it does Tautalos, sure it does.

f.g.

Leveller,

The 1-minute skits where they make 'fun' of all the various religions out there or either too obscure to make any sense at all or they're just damn funny.

So how did they make fun of Islam? Or did they just say they couldn't make fun of it because Muslims would kill them?

I don't remember all the skits, they were quite bizarre, very short and most of the time it was impossible to make out exactly what it was about. When the scientist was talking about epilepsy he mentioned Mohammed and after that they had a skit of Robbie Muntz faking a seizure with a christian, a jew, a muslim, an American Indian and some other character around him, all praying and bowing their heads and then running after him like a scene from Life of Brain. I believe it was in an interview they did after the first show aired and people started to complain that they said how the whole atmosphere had been polluted and it was near impossible to say anything about islam and muslims. Their point was that yes, they were afraid to criticize islam because of what happened to Van Gogh and all the other people that are threatened by muslims. Our Prime Minister said the program was disgusting but admitted he had not actually seen it. I agree it was extremely bad taste when they went after orthodox Jews dressed like Hitler a few years ago (I still don't know what point they were trying to make, allegedly it was meant to ridicule nazi's but that kinda backfired) but this is something completely different. They have a crazy sense of humour that not a lot of people appreciate but this new program is, like I said, pretty tame.

"the idea that Jerry Falwell is as much or more of a threat to Western notions of freedom and human rights as is bin Laden or Zarqawi."

King: For those of you who are not American, this statement may not resonate as it does with me and millions of other Americans.

While Jerry Falwell does not subscribe to militant behavior like Bin Laden or Zaqawi, he has helped instigate and mobilize thousands of right-wing Christian zealots who are gaining traction with things like:

1. gays (gay rights have slipped 20+ years)
2. abortion rights (sometimes violently)
3. censorship of music, pornography, books
4. constantly try to mix church and state
5. support a war-mongering president

All of these have been on the rise and all of these are, in fact, real threat to some of the freedoms we have grown to enjoy as Americans. I see little difference in Fallwell's/Bin Laden's pseudo-religious zealotry. They're both assholes.

On their website one of the pictures shows a Muslim wearing explosives and going into a schoolbus.They have a picture of a guy with a crown of thorns and a Muslim, both on a leash. It looks like Muhammed, but they told a journalist it was 'just a Muslim and in no way is that Muhammed'. It's one of those things that shows they are afraid of what Muslims might do to them if they said that yes, that is Muhammed on a leash. Obviously, the guy with the crown of thorns is supposed to be Jesus. Christians may take you to court but they won't try to kill you. Muslims will take you to court as well but some will try to kill you if you show Muhammed on a leash. Of course, we can all agree that it's bad taste to show Jesus or Muhammed of Buddha on a leash but it's really just a bizarre visualisation of what these scientists are talking about.

OT:
Don't read it, but if you feel like crying:

http://us.lrd.yahoo.com/_ylt=AktzxL27LRmfWh_ls01PdJdg.3QA;_ylu=X3oDMTA2ZGZwam4yBHNlYwNmYw--/SIG=156sjshrq/**http%3a//us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/fc/World/mideast_conflict/feature_articles/SIG=1260s0k1o/*http%3a//www.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,3604,1512272,00.html

Kingkong:

Fartwell and his 'thousands of militant, rightwing zealots' really seem to trouble you!

Strange: All I know about Fartwell is from the Movie about the Hustler magazine editor Larry Flynn.

That was funny! Other than that, not that I ever noticed that he existed...

But you have a real crush on him! Why?

( If UHU doesn't work, try counseling...)

Prancing Popinjay

I see little difference in Fallwell's/Bin Laden's pseudo-religious zealotry. They're both assholes.

Except Falwell does not instigate his followers to hijack planes full of children women and men, slit the throats of air stewardess's, and fly the planes into skyscrapers.

Nor does he scheme to slaughter every Jew on Earth or explode bombs on rush hour trains in Madrid.

Indeed there is no difference between them.

What a demented idiotic half wit you are. You are beyond parody. You are hilarious when you squeal your flatulence out in your prancing popinjay bufoonish way, but when you come with idiot-savant moral relativism like this, you are just a towering idiot, or, to use your parlance, an asshole, in fact, the Mother of all Assholes, no, you are the Bin Laden-Fellating Mother of All Assholes.

Mel "What Holocaust?" Gibson notwithstanding.~

It wasn't Mel, kj, it was his father and you well know it.

http://attaboy.tommydoc.net/?p=549

As for me:
Catholic, degree in Geology. Yes I believe the Earth is 4.5 billion years old. Yes I believe in God. I see NO conflict there. I can't help it if God's Creation is far grander than the few short words about it in the Bible. Evolution? I think it is factual, but I see reasons why it is also part of His Design.
And I'll stake the blemished history of the Catholic Church against the best days of islam, any day.

Anyway. It has been a Long week and I only get Saturday to myself this time, so... have a good one, one and all.

See what I told you guys?

KT said: "For those of you who are not American, this statement may not resonate as it does with me and millions of other Americans."

I think he's right -- there are millions of pathological American (and European) Leftists (KT among them) whose sense of reason is so diseased they seriously entertain such screaming nonsense as comparing Falwell with twisted crowds of Muslims who publically STONE FEMALES TO DEATH FOR HAVE SEX.

Here is a link from the BBC characteristic of a certain, subtle ploy in the Eurabian press to engender attitudes of moral equivalence.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/4618465.stm

On the face of it, we have a simple little gay rights story of interest: Jerusalem 'authorities', presumably Jews, ban a gay pride parade. So what?

The BBC is very diligent in reporting any human rights story critical of religions other than Islam: little puff pieces like this one that, prima facie, indicts Jews in a gay rights issue, always make the press (we find in the story that 'Christians and Muslims are behind the ban. Just religious people speaking out. That's all.), or a story on an underage Hindu girl getting a divorce, or a story on American 'evangelicals' that demand teaching creationism, or end-days eschatology, or Sikh violence: all such stories get open, critical, visible press.

But what of Islam? I challenge anyone to find an in-depth story on BBC online that researches honor killings in Islam, or the practice of slavery in Islam, or female genital mutilation, or denying women education, or the concept of dhimmitude, or any in-depth open reporting on the views of Ayaan Hirsi Ali, or Oriana Fallaci, that is not muddied with provisos and equivocations, or open, critical reporting on Islamic history, the destruction of non-Islamic art and culture, jihad conquest, anything in that vein.

You will find nothing. Absolutely nothing. But, you will find many puff pieces featuring attractive Arab women, smiling, talking about their opportunities in Saudi Arabia, damning America in Iraq, or smiling Persian women wearing the hijab striking a natural pose, stories on the culture of Shia Islam, wrestling, prayer, but nothing about the doctrines of Ayatollah Khomeini and how those doctrines relate to Islam itself, like changing the marriagable age for girls in Iran to nine.

Islam is just a religion like any other, with 'extremists', with 'problems', and the Eurabian BBC will not hesitate to broadcast that message to its viewers and listeners.

But the equivalence is a sham and a lie. There are differences between banning a gay pride parade and executing homosexual men on well established Islamic grounds, or discriminting against women in the workplace and throwing acid in a woman's face or stoning her to death, or advocating a ban on publishing pornography and lashing those who possess pornography, or claiming that the natural role of women is motherhood and sanctioning polygamy and spousal abuse, or blaming homosexuals and the immorality of society for 9/11 and indiscriminately murdering worthless Infidels in the name of Allah, or pleading with nonbelievers to convert and accept Jesus, and executing those who leave your religion while working to subjugate those who do not believe.

Islam is a religion unto itself in brutality, aggression, and violence. May we all learn this lesson before forces like the Eurabian BBC lead us down a path to irrevocable destruction.

Also, a related question then would be: how about the Ahmediyas? and the Hindus in Pakistan? or the Buddhists in Bangladesh? How do they survive so long as a community?

Like the recent story of Kafiristan (my apologies if the Kalash are/is the same topic) this is indeed intriguing. Also of interest are the Yezidi of northern Iraq. Some consider them to be Kurds, but the Kurds are about as multicultural and tolerant as the Taliban and persecute the Yezidis like the Sunnis persecute the Kurds.

Their religion is thought to be about 4000 years old... read up on them using your search engine; it's very interesting. The Tampa Times (or maybe St. Pete Times?) had a big, above-the-fold, frontpage story about them last year. They don’t wear blue garments, don’t eat lettuce, and don’t accept converts.

[Sidebar (as if anything I say is on topic, ha-ha): I’m currently reading Bury Me Standing, about the Gypsies of Europe. It really is interesting to read about Jews, Gypsies, Yezidi, Parsis, Kurds, Tibetan Buddhists, etc. and other oppressed people. You Israel bashers out there should try it. Doing so would really help you put the “plight of the poor, mistreated palestinians”--with their limitless, ongoing multi-billion dollar welfare programs, mysterious, tenfold-in-two-generations population increase--in perspective..]

The Ahmedis are routinely punished in Pakistan without recourse to the law. One of the first things I critically read about Islam was at www.secularislam.org at (I think) the women’s rights page, about an Ahmedi lady beaten by the police, forced to watch them rape her two young female tenants, and then publicly sodomized with a police truncheon that had been dipped in ground cayenne pepper.

In most places Ahmedis may not refer to themselves as “Muslims” and have the same dhimmi prohibitions on building new churches, not seeking converts, etc. When I used to argue on campus with the Dawa Dummies, once I brought up the treatment of Ahmedis in Pakistan, and an Arab Mobot asked a Pakistani Mobot “What are the Ahmedis” and the Pakistani said “They aren’t really Muslims.”

As for the Hindus of Pakistan (and Bangladesh, formerly "East Pakistan") surviving so long as a community, they AREN'T. Many of them have fled to neighboring India, as have the Sikhs, the Buddhists, the Parsis, etc. etc.--in other words--all the non-Muslims. It seems to me I read that the Hindus were 15% of Pakistan at the time of Partition, down to 3% now. And in Bangladesh it was about 20%, down to 8%.

History has shown that Muslim hellholes do not grow more tolerant, open, and respectful; to the contrary they do just the opposite (Gaiour, King Tolerance: can you see the distinction NOW?) a la Malaysia, Iran, Saudi, Nigeria, Sudan, etc. etc. etc. etc. We're still waiting, hoping all the time for that dramatic "secular" revolution in Iran. If not for Hugh's "accidents of geography" I daresay Islam would have already gone the way of the Shakers long ago.

******************************************

For that loudmouth up there trying to drag Buddhism and Hinduism down to the despicable level of western "religions", Hindus, Buddhists, and Jains (the later two are pretty-much sects of Hinduism anyway) got along peacefully for thousands of years. There were some conversions to be sure, but no slaughtering of civilians, no "holy" wars, and no destruction of "rival" temples. We know when Islam, Christianity, Judaica, Sikhism, Buddhism, and Zoroastrianism started, because the dates are in history. Hinduism alone is the religion that predates recorded history. Hindu worship was well-established and codified before the advent of writing. It has stood the test of time and is marked by forgiveness, forbearance, and gentleness. Hindus are everything Christians wish they could be.

************************************

All of these have been on the rise and all of these are, in fact, real threat to some of the freedoms we have grown to enjoy as Americans. I see little difference in Falwell's/Bin Laden's pseudo-religious zealotry. They're both assholes.

Maybe they will serve in the same chaingang in hell, but Jerry Falwell hasn't blown up any skyscrapers lately. It may be worth noting here that Bin Laden's plan for the WTC was to TOPPLE them, destroying not only the towers themselves but everything within five (linear) blocks (i.e. the towers were about five "block" tall.) Also worth remembering is that the target of the plane downed in Pennsylvania was quite likely the Capital Building which could have been much more disastrous than it turned out. And I'm sure the jihadis thought that the Pentagon would be much more damaged than it was... and recall they found boxcutters on planes in LA... imagine what the Jihadis were hoping to achieve there, perhaps taking out some skyscrapers in San Fransisco or LA.

Remember, early on there was speculation that 20,000-30,0000 people had been killed at the WTC? If they had actually KNOCKED THEM OVER, that would have probably happened, along with another 50,000 dead in the crushed surrounding buildings.

I hate Jerry Falwell too; but speech doesn't kill people. Neither does ideas. People kill people, and Bin Laden has killed a lot of people. Comparing Bin Laden to Falwell, Roberston, et al. is like comparing a scratched finger to an amputated arm. Both hurt, but one is definitely preferable to the other.

*****************************************

...there are millions of pathological American (and European) Leftists (KT among them) whose sense of reason is so diseased they seriously entertain such screaming nonsense as comparing Falwell with twisted crowds of Muslims who publically STONE FEMALES TO DEATH FOR HAVE SEX.

And there are million of Rightists doing the same damn thing, Metaxy. And (as you can see for yourself in my posts) there are some leftists that AREN'T doing that.

As comparing Christianity and Islam in more general terms, you need to look toward your president and his staff before you try to correct any lesser folk that don't have any real influence anyway.

MOST leftists that I talk to can understand this... why don't you rationally and reasonably try convincing a few on your own? It really is possible, if you can refrain from the insults and accusations.

**********************************************

Bar: Don’t you think your preposterous harangues about Hitler being a “Christian” fall into that category?

No. Hitler was a Christian, and he was active only a short time ago. If he'd died of old age, he likely would have lied to see the death of John Kennedy.

I know Bar; I know. He wasn't a "real" Christian, just like Bin Laden and Mo Atta aren't "real" Muslims. And Timothy McVeigh wasn't a "real" Catholic either; but he asked for (and--of course!--received) Last Rites. (That means he went to Heaven... if you don't believe me, ask Gary.)

Yeah, those "God Is With Us" Storm Trooper uniform beltbuckles meant Allah, or maybe Krishna; not the Christian God. After all, "everybody knows" that there are no Christian churches in Germany and certainly there were none there in the 1930s and 1940s. In fact, there was no history of Christianity or Jew hatred in Germany until after and just before the Holocaust, respectively (which never even happened according to many Christians today.)

Yeah, those Nazis (who hated immigrants, abortions, cripples, homosexuals, Jews, negroes, "black" music, profanity, political dissenters, "un-patriotic people", [sound familiar yet, Bar?] uppity women, communists, labor unions, and pornography were reeeeeeal liberal. Oh yeah.

*****************************************

Gary attempts to dissemble:

KJ: Mel "What Holocaust?" Gibson notwithstanding.~ Gary: It wasn't Mel, kj, it was his father and you well know it.

Yes, Hutton Gibson is ON RECORD as denying the Holocaust, and Mel Gibson is ON RECORD as saying his dear old dad never told a lie in his life... can you see the conclusion Gary, or need I spell it out for you?

So your a Catholic, eh? I guess you are all for Bob Jones (R-Nut), who says that you (Mother Theresa, Pope John Paul, Father Damien, Jeb Bush, Sean Hannity, Pat Buchanon, Bill O'Reilly, St. Francis, etc. etc.) are going to hell? You know, Bob Jones of Bob Jones UNIVERISTY in South Carolina?

AND you think the earth is BILLIONS of years old? Now you really are going to hell.*

KJ

rollinsfan021361@yahoo.com

* Don't let it ruin your weekend with worry Gary; it's just a myth.

metaxy:

KT is not American. Even if he is born and raised in the US his Mohammedan stench is overbearing...

His arguments, his arrogance, his stupidity and the ad nauseum mantra about 'interpretation' of Koran and Islam: That's what happens when you screw a coffee-filter to the skull...

I tried to help him many times by suggesting to take the screws out, but he won't have any of it. UHU may not be a cure, but at least it doesn't hurt so bad...

...beaten by the police, forced to watch them rape her two young female tenants, and then publicly sodomized with a police truncheon that had been dipped in ground cayenne pepper.

This may just a be warm-up for a great weekend for the likes of GOPers Ken Melhman, Andrew Sullivan, and Jeff Gannon, but it seriously traumatized the poor lady.

Please address flame mail to:

rollinsfan021361@yahoo.com

Gaiour, King Tolerance, please take note:

But the equivalence is a sham and a lie. There are differences between:

1) banning a gay pride parade, and executing homosexual men on well established Islamic grounds

2) discriminting against women in the workplace, and throwing acid in a woman's face or stoning her to death

3)advocating a ban on publishing pornography, and lashing those who possess pornography

4)claiming that the natural role of women is motherhood, and sanctioning polygamy and spousal abuse

5)blaming homosexuals and the immorality of society for 9/11, and indiscriminately murdering worthless Infidels in the name of Allah

6)pleading with nonbelievers to convert and accept Jesus, and executing those who leave your religion while working to subjugate those who do not believe.

Hot-damn, JTF! You'd make a great liberal (that's a compliment BTW.)

I can just see the phony leftists at Democracynow.org whining about the parade being banned in Jerusalem. The most noteworthy aspect of the story SHOULD be that Israel is the only place in the region where a Gay Pride movement even EXISTS, much less has the right to even request a parade and still live past sunset, LESS STILL gives homosexuals recourse to the law and so many other basic rights.

Homosexuals are even allowed to serve, out-of-the-closet no less, in the IDF. That's even more liberal than America.

kj~ as I expected, you took the bit of info I gave you and twisted it. No wonder I rarely even Think of giving such info. At least now I know how badly you would distort other details about myself that shall remain unknown. Just another reason to make sure of another Democratic defeat in 2006, and then again in 2008. I won't vote for intolerance like that which Dean, Kerry, Hillary et al spew on a daily basis.

Hitler was a Christian in name only, an unfortunate (for Christianity) circumstance of his birth.

God Bless You, kj. Have a good weekend on Him!

Jerry Falwell preaching war and mass murder? Was there a major news story in the last few months which I missed? What the hell are these people talking about? As for the Crusades (yawn), the vast majority of Crusading soldiers would have been totally unaware of the Theological contradictions of putting cities to the sword for Christ, because: A. The Bible was in Latin, B. Bibles were scarce as printing had yet to be discovered* C. Most of them could not read anyway, and D. the version of Christianity being orally propagated by the Catholic Church was severely skewed. So, how on earth can they compare the well educated perpetrators of 9/11 (who lived in our age of information) with a Norman cavalryman of 1099? Their argument has so many holes in it, that you could use it as a colander.

The narrow-mindedness and bigotry of Islam is unique. How come Christians in Holland will NOT riot over this openly offensive TV programme and yet Muslims there killed Theo Van Gough for a similar (or perhaps lesser) insult? How come a Hindu, in England, says nothing about adverts for beef and McDonalds, and yet the Muslims there seek to ban alcohol advertising and have even attacked pubs? - Beer has been brewed in the British Isles for at least 2,500 years, it was the national drink of the Celts and later the Romans built their “tabernǽ diversoriǽ” –pubs- on their fine roads, some of which still form the basis of English thoroughfares, which still have pubs! But of course these newly arrived arrogant alien troublemakers perceive it as their natural right that 2,500 years of culture should be changed at their whim. How can they possibly think this is reasonable behaviour?

Ahhh, but here I am again trying to measure the points of view of Islamists (and their apologists) on scales of common sense. I suppose I should try doing something more productive, like try and push water up hill or try to fit a square peg into a round hole. (-;

----------------

*Yeah, yeah - OK, the Chinese had screen printing by then, I mean moveable type printing -as invented in England! (-;

King Tolerance is proof you can lead a literate person to knowledge, but you can't make them think.

That list of five is the weakest moral equivalence argument - unsupported by facts - I've ever seen.

KT knows our president is a "war-monger".

But an entire belief system (not a religion) designed around world conquest by the sword, promising its adherents a giant orgy with children of both sexes, is just peachy. Forget the stonings, acid baths, beheadings, bigotry, luddite regression through the centuries, theocracy, expansionism, dhimmi rules, and hatred for all unbelievers.

Dammit, KT has a point to make and inconvenient facts are not going to stop him!

King Tolerance - Islam is the King of intolerance.

You say that America is a war monger, yes, of course it is. Every four or five years your highly polished superb army sallies forth to some tiny country that 90% of Americans had never previously heard of with the same old disastrous results every time, and between these pointless military excursions over 50,000 Americans are shot, killed and wounded in the streets by a well armed, highly excitable and apparently unhappy populace. Yes you're right, the USA has its probelems... but my question is, what has that got to do with opposing Islam? What is your point? America has to be some kind of Socialist Utopia before any American can express concern over a vicious foreign Fascistic ideology on the rampage? Do you think two wrongs make a right? If it were so, your country would have never fought against Hitler.

Everything you say is probably true. But your perspective is all wrong.

(Small analogy :) A few years ago I stood on a mountain in the Himalayas Everest was a distant peak and looked quite insignificant in the general landscape, whereas nearer comparatively insignificant peaks looked huge and daunting. Where you are in America, the religious right probably seems like a big deal because it is so near and close to you, yet compared to the vicious reactionary and expansionist ideals of Islam it is but a trifling affair.

Have you ever been to a Muslim country?

I wish we lived in a world where all cultures and religions were as good as, or as bad as, each other, but the ugly and complicated world we live in does not conform to this convenient and cosy standard. Example: Falwell preaches against the sins of your nation's unmarried mothers and promises them hellfire and perhaps whispers in a senator's ear about how single mothers get too much welfare - but then, in perhaps three dozen Muslim countries, single mothers are regularly stoned to death by angry mobs with the full backing of the state and clerics. How can you compare your imperfect land and the rantings of a few confused local Fascists with such obscene barbarity? They are not one and the same.

Tolerance is good in moderation, but those that tolerate almost anything must (by definition) believe in almost nothing.

KT, Tolerating intolerance isn't tolerance. I don't tolerate Fascists; I don't tolerate Muslims, BECAUSE I BELIEVE IN MAINTAINING A TOLERANT SOCIETY WHICH THESE PEOPLE WOULD GLADLY DESTROY.

You're not stupid. Study Islam with an open mind. Once you perceive its genuinely fascistic nature I hope you will join us in our reasonable, progressive, humanitarian and logical critique of this global abomination.

"Comparing Bin Laden to Falwell, Roberston, et al. is like comparing a scratched finger to an amputated arm."

Yes indeed. But why do millions of Western Leftists continue to do this, over and over and over and over again?

I must conclude there is some rampant mental disease that has seeped into Western culture over the past 50-100 years (with roots further back: it is a complex phenomenon that deserves further study).

KJ: “Hindus are everything Christians wish they could be.”

PLEASE!!

Have you read anything about India?
Have you ever been there?

Hindus are twenty times better than Muslims, but I think you are getting carried away.

The following are some practices outlawed by “less enlightened” British Christians. I include original sources lest you accuse me of making it all up. These are just from the Calcutta area:

If an infant refuse the mother’s breast, and decline in health, it is said to be under the influence of some malignant spirit. Such a child is sometimes put into a basket, and hung up in a tree where the evil spirit is supposed to reside. It is generally destroyed by ants, or birds of prey, but sometimes perishes by neglect, though fed and clothed daily. If it should not be dead at the expiration of three days, the mother receives it home again, and nurses it, but this seldom happens. The late Mr. Thomas, a missionary, once saved and restored to its mother, an infant which had fallen out of a basket, near Malda [West Bengal] at the moment a Jackal was running away with it. As this gentleman and Mr. Carey were afterwards passing under the same tree, they found a basket hanging in the branches containing the skeleton of another infant, which had been devoured by ants.

--

The widows of yogees, a description of weavers, are sometimes buried alive with their deceased husbands. If a person has died near the Ganges, the grave is dug by the side of the river; at the bottom of which they spread a new cloth, and on it lay the dead body. The widow then bathes, puts on new clothes and paints her feet, and after various ceremonies, descends into the pit that is to swallow her up: in this living tomb she sits down, and places the head of her deceased husband on her knee, having a lamp near her. The priest (not a Brahmin) sits by the side of the grave, and repeats certain ceremonies, while the friends of the deceased walk round the grave several times repeating ‘Hûree bûl! Hûree bûl!’ that is, literally, ‘Repeat the name of Hûree;’ but in its common use it is equivalent to Huzza! Huzza! The friends (if rich) cast into the grave garments, sweetmeats, sandal wood, Rupees, milk, curds, clarified butter, or something of this kind; and the widow directs a few trifles to be given to her children. The son also casts a new garment into the grave, with flowers, sandal wood, &c. after which earth is carefully thrown all round the widow, till it has arisen as high as her shoulders, when the relations throw earth in as fast as possible, till they have raised the mound of earth on the grave, when they tread it down with their feet, and thus bury the miserable wretch alive. They place on the grave, sandal wood, rice, curds, a lamp, &c. and then, walking around the grave three times, return home. – On enquiring among the Brahmins and other Hindoos employed in the Serampore printing-office, I found that these murders were much more frequently practised than I had supposed: almost every one had seen widows buried alive, or had heard of them from undoubted authority.

W. Ward, 1815.

I should not forget here an evil custom which is practised among the idolaters of the same Kingdom of Bengal. When a woman is delivered, and the infant, as often happens, is unwilling to take its mother's breast it is carried outside the village and placed in a cloth, which is tied by the four corners to the branches of a tree, and is thus left from morning to evening. In this way the poor infant is exposed to the crows, which torment it, and some have been found whose eyes have been torn out of their heads, which is the reason why many idolaters are seen in Bengal who have but one eye, and others who have both injured or altogether gone. In the evening the infant is taken to try whether it is willing to suckle during the following night, and should it happen that it still refuses the breast, it is taken back on the following day to the same place; this is done for three days in succession, after which, if the infant is unwilling to take the breast, in the belief that it is a demon, they cast it into the Ganges, or some other river or tank which is nearer at hand. In places where there are many monkeys these poor children are not so exposed to the attacks of crows, for this reason, that as soon as a monkey discovers a nest of these birds he climbs the tree, and throws the nest on one side and the eggs on the other. On the other hand, there are among the English, Dutch, and Portuguese charitable persons who, moved to compassion for the misfortune of these infants, remove them when they are thus exposed and hung in a tree and take care to have them brought up as I have once seen an example of at Hugly; this is done in the places near their factories.

Jean-Baptiste Tavernier, c. 1650.

--§--

When a man becomes infirm, or has any dangerous illness, if his relations have the slightest interest in his death, they take him to the banks of the river, set his feet in the water, and, stuffing his ears and mouth with mud, leave him to perish, which he seldom does without a hard struggle; and should the strength of his constitution enable him to survive, he becomes a pariah; he is no longer considered as belonging to his family or children and can have no interest in his own fortune or goods. About thirty miles from Calcutta, there is a village under the protection of government, entirely peopled by these poor outcasts, the number of whom is incredible.

Maria Graham, 1810.

--§--

They take invalids down to the edge of the water, and, after stuffing their mouths and ears with mud, place them so far in, that they are almost sure of being carried away in a very few hours by the alligators. If the poor invalid happens to escape all the perils by which he is surrounded, he can never return to his family or society more; his heirs take possession of his property, he loses his caste, and is to all intents and purposes dead to his family and friends. There is, I am told, a village (Sooksaugor) on the banks of the Ganges inhabited by these wretched outcasts. Poor people! I should like much to show them some kindness, and will make further inquiry about them.

Lady Nugent, 1812.

--§--

Two gentlemen proceeding up the river Hooghly, observing a concourse of people assembled at Corder [ten miles from Calcutta] and learning the cause, put on shore in the vain hope that their presence would prevent the immolation of a human being. This however, they had reason to believe expedited the ceremony, for on getting on shore the woman had been placed in the hole dug for the purpose, with the dead body of her husband. The hole was about 8 or 9 feet deep, and about three in diameter, like a well (with the bodies placed upright) into which the relations were throwing the earth, and the eldest son of the woman, about nineteen years old, dancing over the bodies in the hole, and treading it down until it came above the heads, when a general shout closed the monstrous and horrid ceremony.

Government Gazette, 9th July, 1818.

--§--

The following article from the Columbian Press Gazette of August 1825, serves as a fair example:

On my way down from the Upper Provinces, my budgerow stopped at a ghat on the Hooghly River, in the vicinity of Moorshedabad [Murshidabad]. The crowd which was collected on the spot excited my curiosity to know what occasioned it. I went to the place, and witnessed one of the most terrible scenes that can be imagined. A poor helpless creature was stretched on a cot, the lower part of his body being immersed in water. In this posture he was imploring his murderers in the most pitiful manner to let him go, declaring that he was as yet far from death. But those cruel wretches that were about him, unmindful of his entreaties, kept crying Hurri Bol! Bol! and continued filling his mouth with water, till at length the poor creature became exhausted: his voice, which at first loud, gradually sank, and he fell a victim to superstition.

Also, an excerpt from The World paper of July 1829:

I witnessed an instance where a diseased mother was exposed, with one infant at the breast, and another about two years of age with no visible disease. We had landed to dig a grave and bury an officer, who had died in the night. Going next day to examine if the jackals had torn up the officer's grave, I observed the elder babe dead, the younger crawling about it, and the mother had been devoured! Being anxious to know the fate of the surviving infant, I went next day, and found it had crawled under the bottom of a boat, and the dead child had disappeared: next morning the other had been devoured also. This was at Diamond Harbour, where the population not being great, we might have saved one of the children, but feared to try; as I had been in great danger from the natives at Calcutta, a short time previously, by attempting to carry off one in a boat, who was laid on the beach with a number of other human sacrifices. This was an interesting young woman, who happened to lie near the boat I was getting in; she seemed to be overjoyed when I raised her up; and looked equally dejected when I was obliged to drop her and hasten into the boat to avoid the stones which were thrown at me.

God exists!

God doesn't exist!

God exists!!!

God doesn't exist!!!!

Meanwhile, as the endless arguing over an Ultimately unprovable point, one way or the other, goes merrily into its perpetual semantic spiral of "My God is Bigger", "Your God is Bloodier", etc.,etc.,etc.- and bogs down in the familiar rhetorical cul de sacs, the Islamic threat grows, spreads, deepens, gains adherents, and smiles at this febrile flapdoodling.

Save the perpetual bickering over the unsolvable for AFTER the war is won.

Kicking in the foxhole only alerts the enemy to your position.

There is only one Proof of the Existence of God (or not), and it isn't St. Anselm's Ontological Fudge: "There can be no greater concept than God, and, for it to be truly great, it must include the quality of existence, therefore God exists.".

No.

It is this (try it): TO BECOME GOD

Omniscient, Omnipotent, Eternal.

Anything less can be:

Delusion, dream, demonic, or dementia.

And, as far as we have ever seen on Earth, no one has achieved this Absolute Apotheosis.

Maybe after death we are all absorbed into the Pantheistic Deity and become utterly enlightened, but, until then, let's concentrate on battling those in Imperialistic Islam who want to prevent all argument. Here, and now.

King Tut Tut-

Gay rights have eroded over the past 20 years in the U.S.?

Now I know you're not living in America.

The exact opposite has occurred.

There has never been a better, freer, more open, and more 'normalized' time in the history of the world- since the misogynistic and pedophilic Greeks- for the expression and expansion of homosexual rights and public freedoms.

As Freud assumed, most women are naturally bi-sexual (since they breastfeed both genders), while males are apparently about 5-10%, by population, biologically gay.

And the majority of the people in the U.S. are amazingly accepting of homosexuals, (or benignly indifferent) especially considering that, as recently as the 1960's, it was something completely taboo'd and hidden from the press, forbidden on television, and rare in the movies ("The Killing of Sister George" was a shocker... while the same theme is now a commonplace sitcom minor chuckle).

Get your facts straight (sic).

Nattering about Jerry Falwell and Christian Reconstructionism only diverts us from these and other salient facts.

Perhaps, but the point really is that Jerry Falwell and Osama bin Laden & Co. occupy the same demonic space for many Americans -- myself included. And until the NeoCon right understands this, we anti-jihadist lefties are gonna keep kicking them in the teeth over their self-defeating coalition with the Christian right.

Loxas:

Wake me up when Fartwell hijacks an airplane and lands it on the white hourse!

Bye, folks. Loxias, KJ, KT, Giaour, and a few others got their ideas about what religion should and should not be from 1960's/70's-vintage pop mysticism and think they're Thomas Jefferson when they do their moral equivalence thingie. Having spent some years in the US Dept. of State, I can tell you that the same mindset was one of the things that got us into the mess we're in.

Loxias, KJ, KT, Giaour, and a few others got their ideas about what religion should and should not be from 1960's/70's-vintage pop mysticism and think they're Thomas Jefferson when they do their moral equivalence thingie.

Be careful, Kepha. I have always been a social liberal and a fiscal conservative. The Democrats used to be socially and fiscally liberal, and the Republicans opposite, but now the Republicans are the fiscal liberals and social conservatives.

My theology was developed in a Calvinist theological seminary (I got educated out of Christianity). I'm also probably older than you: I remember the wall-to-wall TV coverage of the PLO terror attack on the Munich Olympics, which turned me into an anti-Jihadist. I've also been to Israel three times and kissed the Western Wall on multiple occasions (sundown is the best time).

Let us consider good NeoCons. There are Robert Spencer and David Horowitz. There also are Karl Rove and Grover Norquist. But I don't think Robert or David or you want to keep company with Grover; Karl Rove, I think, will distance himself from Norquist, if pushed.

So, as a good Democrat I distance myself from the loony left. So I also expect you to distance yourself from the rabid right.

Or shall I descend into my Crusader theology?

For NeoCon anti-Jihadists, that good NeoCon Grover Norquist occupies approximately the same demonic space as does Osama bin Laden. For leftist anti-Jihadists, Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson also occupy that same demonic space reserved for Osama bin Laden & Co.

Why are we fighting?

kj

"And there are million of Rightists doing the same damn thing, Metaxy"

kj, you quoted me distinguishing Muslims from Right-wing Christians where I SPECIFICALLY and CLEARLY cited Muslim crowds supportively stoning women to death in public for having sex.

kj, cite me one example where Right-wing Christians have stoned a woman to death for having sex or even one example where Right-wing Christians have advocated stoning a woman to death for having sex. You won't be able to cite even ONE, and yet you recklessly claim there are "millions"...

ARE YOU FUCKING INSANE!!!!!?????

kj

"And there are million of Rightists doing the same damn thing, Metaxy"

kj, you quoted me distinguishing Muslims from Right-wing Christians where I SPECIFICALLY and CLEARLY cited Muslim crowds supportively stoning women to death in public for having sex.

kj, cite me one example where Right-wing Christians have stoned a woman to death for having sex or even one example where Right-wing Christians have advocated stoning a woman to death for having sex. You won't be able to cite even ONE, and yet you recklessly claim there are "millions"...

ARE YOU FUCKING INSANE!!!!!?????

Terminator, I wouldn't conclude from KT's posts that he is not American. Sadly, there are millions of Americans who hate America, hate the West, and will not criticize Islam.

Tambo,

Good info on Hindu pathology -- which I agree with you is still at least 20 times better and more sane and less dangerous than Islamic pathology.

Alright, Loxias, I'll back off a little. We have two things in common--although you'll probably walk away from this thinking I'm 百分之百洗腦的次等小人(totally brainwashed nobody). One is that I, too, remember the Munich Olympics (although you may still be older than I), and I was also educated in a Calvinist seminary--although, unlike you, mine stuck even though I backed away from fultime ministry, and I consider it one of the best parts of my education (ancient languages, enough foundation in how to read texts and Western intellectual history to keep me afloat later when I did my Ph.D. in political science, and enough sense of the Bible and how it was read through the ages to take a very deep offense at being seen as the moral equivalent of a Talib).

And, since you presumably had a bit of Calvinist history from your seminary, I suppose you call a whole nexus of political thinkers who used Scripture to challenge the 16th and 17th century doctrine of royal absolutism, declare for the political supremacy of law, and call for some form of popular consent in government the moral equivalent of seeking a "rightly-guided" Khalif--or re-establishing such an institution?

I mean, what kind of useable past do we have here? How does it compare to Islam's?

And, surely you know enough Calvinist history to know that had Pat "The-Lord-Told- Me-no-book-chapter-and-verse" Robertson lived in Covenanting Scotland or 17th century New England, he'd have been flogged out of town at the cart's tail, pilloried, or possibly even hanged for a Quaker.

There, folks. We did too hang folks. And, how does that differ from some of you secular folks wanting to expel a couple million people (don't think you can do it without a bit of violence)?

If you want to talk more, contact me at horpeide@yahoo.com

Even if we accept that Jerry Falwell is similar in temperament to Bin Laden, the point remains that the influence of Falwell can be contained by other Christians who can argue against theocracy and intolerance on Christian grounds. To my knowledge no Muslims have refuted the theological justification that Al-Qaeda put forward for their actions. That's the important point. It's not enough to assert that Bin Laden is against Islam, you have to show how Islam is against Bin Laden. If a Christian group used the Bible as a justification for terror, and no Biblical rebuttal (emotional reaction is insufficient) was made from other Christians, then we would soon have a Christian terror problem.

Even if we accept that Jerry Falwell is similar in temperament to Bin Laden, the point remains that the influence of Falwell can be contained by other Christians who can argue against theocracy and intolerance on Christian grounds. ~ Viking5

Bang on target, Viking. Defense of one's faith is NOT support, unconscious or otherwise, for extremism, nor is it a refusal to acknowledge the problems of the past, as some would have us believe with defense of Christianity.

There's nothing wrong with this program. It’s just an atheistic and scientific program with a few provocative sketches about religion. In the Netherlands we have the whole day Christian programs on public television where they worship their imaginary God. And now there is a program where they tell the true scientific side of the story, some fundamentalist religious people yell they are discriminated. But those people are still free not to watch this program! If I don’t like a program, I turn off my television-set! And moreover, the program is also a critic of Mohammedanism and many other religions, with for instance explaining Mohammad’s epilepsy and also making fun of Mohammedanism with some provocative sketches.

Long live science and the freedom of speech!

http://www.muntzvandewint.com/site/m2_tvprogrammas_2005.html

Oh, Yeah Nordthiad,

Jesus on a leash like a dog - oh how very scientific you Dutch are! What was that supposed to instruct your audience in -- string theory?

The minds of you Dutch have been so addled with legalized marijuana and vice, your country so overrun and dominated by Europe-hating Muslims, that logic and decorum now totally escape you.

Geeez, what a country! No wonder you were the #1 collaborating occupied nation under the Nazis. You embraced Hitler with the same passion that you embrace Islam.

SS Nord Division says: "If I don’t like a program, I turn off my television-set!"

Oh fantastic argument! Take a deep breath everybody; we have a child prodigy amongst us!
You can justify anything with this argument. You can imagine it can't you: "Let's have a show about Jews eating babies and how Belsen was really a holiday camp. Hey, if people don't like it, they can just switch it off!"

Northiad - try to wrap your limited intellect around this:

The Netherlands is on Death Row. By 2095 it's going to be majority Muslim and all your precious freedoms will be mocked and destroyed. Holland will exist in name only. You will have a Muslim Prime Minister and there will be Mosques in every village. If you show these Muslims that you have zero respect for your own cultural identity (i.e.: showing Jesus as a dog) how the hell do you expect them to even think about integrating? How are they going to respect Holland like this?

Perhaps Christ being treated like a dog is a goods metaphor for early 21st Century Holland - who knows.

You will hang yourselves with your overzealous and reckless liberalism.