"...while the whole wide world is fast asleeeeeep..."
Yikes! C-Span has put its archive online, including all eight of my appearances going back to 2002. You can watch any or all of them here.
The two highlights, if you ask me (and I know you didn't), are my two-against-one debate with non-Muslim Islamic apologist Dinesh D'Souza and "moderator" Suhail Khan at the Conservative Political Action Conference in 2007, and the Heritage Foundation speech about Muhammad in 2006.
But you may prefer my bravura renditions of "In the Wee Small Hours of the Morning" or "Won't Get Fooled Again." Oh, those aren't online yet?
I am not going to comment on the diversity of your music selections.
Who has the toughest job in the world?
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Spencer does. Moving from D'Souza to Hoop to Charles Johnson to all the rest of such ilk (and that's a very large crowd of ilk) must be a disgusting journey that would try the patience of Job.
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Dunno how he does it.
Robert,
After getting into your site many moons ago, the "asleep" metaphor has, for me anyway, gotten alarmingly prophetic.
Other comparisons that loom large are the frog in the starting-out-tepid-water-in-the-pot-but-the-burner-is-on scenario, as well as the we-are-being-slowly-strangeled-by-the-Islamic Boa.
I always thought enough of the world was going to wake up from its coma.
I pray to God every day that it does.
Stop me, if you don't agree with this ...
In the Boa scenario, the "dumb" animal still "gets" that it is in mortal danger, doesn't it?
If the Boa tries that on a grizzly bear (hypothetical), doesn't the Boa come to a startling conclusion, just before the grizzly bites or rips it into tasty bite size pieces, that it "bit off a little more than it can chew"?
Thank God Bibi got elected.
Pssssssssssssssssssssst:
All you clowns that keep yelling, "Where's the WMD?" ...
I say, "Look no further than Syria, you idiots."
D'Souza's ignorance is there for all to witness...
He actually touts the Muslim conquest of India as a shining example of Islamic tolerance. Historian Will Durant - otherwise extremely generous to Islam - called that same conquest "perhaps the bloodiest chapter in human history." Some demographers estimate 70 million Hindus were killed over the 700 years of Islamic control of India...and D'Souza apparently feels that because the bulk of the Hindus survived, this is proof of Islamic tolerance.
Furthermore, D'Souza offers Indonesia and Turkey as modern examples of the harmony between Islam and democracy. The actual reality in both countries is that the security and rights of non-Muslims are increasingly imperiled.
In the end, D'Souza misses the confluence of ends if not means between so-called traditional Muslims and extremists; both groups want Sharia, their disagreement is on how to get it. His calls for accommodating the traditional Muslims will in the end be little different than the appeasement he castigates the Left for.
"Oh, those aren't online yet?" -- Robert
Some of us out here actually remember when these songs were new...Presumably Frank and Roger would never have guessed the context in which these classics are suddenly relevant again. Who'da thunk they'd ever take on the associations you've given them? Nice.
Here they are...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2XdN4SDYwyc
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LabxxEgMTjo
Will keep an eye out for your debut on YouTube.
Robert,
I started with the first video (the one at Quail Ridge Books) and I wonder if you still believe that we must apply the tenets of Christianity in order to oppose Islam, and if so where does that leave those of us who do not believe in gods or agree with every tenet of the Christian religion? Opposition to "secularism" and the separation of church and state appears to be growing amongst anti-Islamists lately. Is there a feeling that atheist anti-Islamists (several prominent names come to mind) are or will be less effective as opponents of Islamist aggression?
lilredbird:
Anyone whose thought doesn't evolve in 8 years isn't breathing.
That said, however, I haven't watched the Quail Ridge talk and don't intend to, but I am certain that I did not mean that only Christianity could oppose the threat of Islamic jihad. From the beginning of my public work (i.e., before the Quail Ridge talk) I have stressed the need for all the victims of jihad -- Jews, Christians, Hindus, Buddhists, atheists, etc. -- to join in a coalition to defend human rights against Islamization and Sharia supremacism. This is something that runs consistently through my work.
Thanks for asking. I appreciate the opportunity to clarify any misapprehensions.
Cordially
Robert Spencer
My fav was always your duet with David Lindley of Bye Bye Love!
It should surprise no one that pretend moderates in the Islamist camp find it easy to infiltrate conservative groups. The "ideal society" for many right wigners pretending to be conservative is not all that different from what the conservative Muslims fantisizes about; other than costuming that is.
What we need to do is find the real moderate Muslims by their actions (judge them by their fruit) and PROMOTE THEM against the "traditional" views.
That is after all how the Judeao-Christians reformed, by the actions of reformers.
The PROBLEM is that too many people support and listen to fake "moderates" who are nothing more than Taqqiya masters.
Nice one ! Commendable effort to group all these excellent videos together. I have watched quite a lot of those on youtube before, but it seems there are enough left I haven't watched before.
Robert,
D'Souza somewhere in those videos says that your criticism results in saying, somehow, that 'a good Muslim is someone who ceases to be a Muslim'. Indeed, everything you say leaves such an impression. But in a recent video of a recent speech of yours you say that something has to be done so that the Muslims leave their violent approaches, as has been done succesfuly in the case of Mormons in USA with the issue of polygamy.
As you know better than most of us here if you detach the violent, polygamic, supremacist, legitimate cheating aspects of Islam, you do leave nothing as a cause for it to exist. Really what new has to say Islam as a soteriological worldview? And, after all, as far as I know the issue with the Mormons was not an issue having to do with violence consecration but only with polygamy, an easy to deal with thing.
I am aware that sounds too much saying openly 'the best a Muslim has to do is leaving Islam'. But do we not have to be honest? How is it possible for a Muslim to choose from a teaching, that he/she sees it as direct divine revelation from God himself, some parts of it and leave some others?
I see in Sina's site that he is declaring openly that Islam can not be reformed, because reforming it means eliminating its very essence. It seems that it is a very clear put declaration... you agree with it or not.
Really, this is a very delicate point that has to be considered in the most straight way. Don't you think so?
I would like to see a book on the time from the death of the Big M to the closing of the gates of ijtihad.
IT seems to me the decades upon decades when Islam was an oral tradition holds the key to reforming it today.
After all, due to the huge gap in time from M to a written Koran the M we know has less historical foundation than Jesus.
Thanks, Robert!
Watching the Quail Ridge video I was struck by how back on '02 even the most astute observers didn't really know how serious this problem really was, how intransigent and relentless and manipulative the Jihad would turn out to be. To say nothing of the fact that none of us would have believed that 7 years after 9/11 Americans would elect a friend of Islam to the presidency.
This may be a shallow perspective, but the Mormons did have some issues of violence (e.g., Mountain Meadows massacre) to resolve, and the post-WWII Japanese were compelled to give up the political aspects of the Shinto religion. The question appears to be whether Muslims are capable of undergoing a similar evolution. And what it will take to motivate them to do so.
Mr. Spencer:
I have already watched nearly all of these videos tonight, and they are excellent.
I suggest that you link some of your best videos such as these permanently near the top of your page, in the same manner that you have "Islam 101" permanently at the top of your page. There are a number of people who are much more likely to watch a video than read a scholarly paper introducing them to Islam. Even a person not averse to reading who watches your videos might not only gain an introductory understanding to some of the problems in dealing with Islam and jihad, but might also become much more interested in purchasing and reading your books.
Friends often ask where they can go to look at materials which I am not eloquent enough, or authoritative enough to explain. Your website is very good, but to be honest the news articles are always changing so you never know what you are sending them to go and look at. Having some good introductory material near the top of you website would be good. Those familiar with your site would still find their way to the news articles. But it is the neophyte that you need to play to in the opening screen of your website, because without expanding the base, there is no hope.
Dendrite, I see your point. And yes, I suppose under the circumstances, we indeed must go for conversion, in the sense that Muslims become in effect apostates.
There may be a pleasant surprise along the way in the future, when Muslims do find a way to reform Islam, but we cannot count on that.
What is comforting to me, is that we can focus primarily on the preservation and expansion of Democracy, in the absence of a better governing system.
And that it is the Muslims that as a group are hopelessly confused, contradictive on many issues. Yes, real Muslims will want Islam to dominate, but so many Muslims are really dormant, ignorant, even defiant in their belief, that Democracy can win even perhaps in a slow peaceful way. But yes, to be honest, we aim to end Islam's sway over many, many future people.