When was the last time Salon criticized Muslims for promoting holy war, subjugating women, and oppressing gays in the name of their religion? That’s right, never. They routinely ignore, or downplay and diminish, the ways in which Islamic jihadists use the texts and teachings of Islam to justify violence and the oppression of women and gays. For the Left, the only religion whose adherents ever commit any evil in its name is Christianity.
Note also the stretch to create the impression that Christianity promotes holy war. No Christian text does any such thing, and no Christian sect teaches that Christians have any obligation to wage war against and subjugate unbelievers. No, but one remark by George W. Bush, in connection with the Iraqi misadventure, which — whatever else it did and did not do — had nothing whatsoever to do with spreading Christianity, and it’s a holy war. Meanwhile, the Qur’an’s teachings on jihad, and the teachings on jihad warfare affirmed by all the schools of Islamic jurisprudence, have never had any airing in Salon, and probably never will.
Pictured: a jihadi from the Islamic State passing out…Qur’ans.
“9 sinister things the Christian right does in the name of God,” by Valerie Tarico, Salon, July 18, 2014 (thanks to Jerk Chicken) — typographical irregularities as in the original:
…3. Demeaning and subjugating women is evil.When it comes to dignity and equality for women, instead of acting as moral torchbearers, Bible believers have been at the back of the pack for generations, along with conservative factions from other Abrahamic traditions ranging from Islam to Mormonism. The American Quiverfull movement, “complementarianism,” theexpulsion of Southern Baptist women who were making inroads into the clergy, the Mormon Patriarchy’s threats to excommunicate women who seek equality, the Vatican’s decision to crush nuns who thought poverty was a bigger problem than abortion . . . Need I say more?…
6. Promoting holy war is evil.What first flipped my bit, what transformed me from an agnostic into an outspoken full-time antagonist of Bible worship was a conversation with my Evangelical relatives about the Iraq war. From the vantage of my relatives and my childhood church “family,” George Bush needed no diplomatic or cultural expertise; he was Born Again. He didn’t need to seek input from his earthly father about the invasion, because he asked his Heavenly Father. Besides, Jesus is coming soon and war in the Middle East is predicted in the Bible. That makes it not only inevitable, but—in a manner of speaking—desirable.
Evangelical Christians have spent tens of millions of dollars funding the “return” of Jews to Israeland settlements in the West Bank “as it is written in the scripture”—with the perverse expectation that their presence will one day cause blood to flow in the streets as high as a horse’s bridle.
7. Abusing and killing queers is evil.The Bible’s clobber verses may be open to interpretation, but the fact that those verses have caused centuries of suffering is not. For much of American history, the common term for queer was the biblical “sodomite,” implying that gays are so offensive to God that they pose a threat to society as a whole. Thanks to Christian missionaries, African and Latin American queers also have now lived for centuries now under the threat of violent death. As progressive Anglican Gay Clark Jennings observes, “There is no getting around the Bible when searching for the origins of the homophobia that is rampant in many African cultures. What’s more, Europeans and North Americans bear much of the historical responsibility for this sad state of affairs.”
It would be bad enough if we were simply talking about history. But homophobic American Christians, thwarted at home, have turned to inciting oppression in Uganda and Nigeria where their hatred still finds fertile ground.
Jay Boo says
Tom Petty on his new song
“Religion seems to me to be at the base of all wars… I’ve nothing against defending yourself, but I don’t think, spiritually speaking, that there’s any conception of God that should be telling you to be violent. It seems to me that no one’s got Christ more wrong than the Christians.”
How can he be against religions and forget about Islam?
https://music.yahoo.com/blogs/music-news/tom-petty-decries-catholic-church-playing-dumb-about-203906946.html
Wellington says
Not only does Petty engage in serious omission by not mentioning Isalm, Jay Boo, but he didn’t even get what is the base of the vast majority of wars——-real estate. And this would definitely include totalitarian ideologies like Islam, Nazism and Marxism which wage war, in the final analysis, for land—-huge chunks of it or all of it.
Jay Boo says
Very true Wellington, It seems that those celebrities are living in a semi-permeable PC cocoon which filters out certain ideas through a mesh.
harbidoll says
whiner without a clue!
Shane says
libs hate christians so much they side with muslims who hate them.
CogitoErgoSum says
Tom’s pretty good at playing stoopid himself. See the video at the link below:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P1SSy1urjsc
I still loves you anyway, Tom. I’m stupid too….cause I’m not seeing the religious motivation behind….oh, let’s say the Punic Wars, or even more recent wars such as the Korean War or the Viet Nam War. I’m also having trouble with the American Revolution and the American Civil War (now which religion was the North and which religion was the South?) I’ll bet religion had something to do with all them wars though…..cause I’ll believe anything…..even in Christ (and that makes me really stupid, eh?).
Guy Macher says
Surely the violence in Nigeria has not been fomented by Christians but by Muslims. Christian doctrine and scripture contains no references to fighting non-Chrstians. The Koran is full of such verses.
Here’s a sampling:
Hated- 40:35 They who dispute the signs of Allah [kafirs] without authority having reached them are greatly hated by Allah and the believers. So Allah seals up every arrogant, disdainful heart. and despised by Allah.
Mocked- 83:34 On that day the faithful will mock the kafirs, while they sit on bridal couches and watch them. Should not the kafirs be paid back for what they did?
Punished- 25:77 Say to the kafirs: My Lord does not care for you or your prayers. You have rejected the truth, so sooner or later, a punishment will come.
Beheaded- 47:4 When you encounter the kafirs on the battlefield, cut off their heads until you have thor-oughly defeated them and then take the prisoners and tie them up firmly.
Confused- 6:25 Some among them listen to you [Mohammed], but We have cast veils over their [kafirs] hearts and a heaviness to their ears so that they cannot understand our signs [the Koran].
Plotted against- 86:15 They plot and scheme against you [Mohammed], and I plot and scheme against them. Therefore, deal calmly with the kafirs and leave them alone for a while.
Terrorized- 8:12 Then your Lord spoke to His angels and said, “I will be with you. Give strength to the believers. I will send terror into the kafirs’ hearts, cut off their heads and even the tips of their fin-gers!”
Annihilated- 6:45 So the kafirs were annihilated. All praise be to Allah, the Lord of the worlds.
Killed- 4:91 If they do not keep away from you or offer you peace or withdraw their hostilities, then seize them and kill them wherever they are. We give you complete authority over them.
CatsRus says
Well said Mr. GuyMacher! I read the koran last year and kept notes – basically I was appalled as I read nothing about a ‘religion of peace’ – unless one were muslim. Hatred for all others abounds in the koran, and how we got from Sept 11th 2001 to kissing moha’s ass I’m wondering!
dumbledoresarmy says
Nice description of the all-too-typical curious infidel’s “Oh Sh*t!” moment that follows when said curious Infidel decides to have a look at the Quran:
“I read the koran last year and kept notes – basically I was appalled as I read nothing about a ‘religion of peace’ – unless one were muslim. Hatred for all others abounds in the koran.”
Yep.
I have to ask: why, precisely, did you decide that it was time to pick up a translation of the Quran and have a look inside? (The next thing to read is the “Sira” of Ibn Ishaq, the canonical “Life” of mohammmed – there are two scholarly English translations, one by A Guillaume and one by Muir).
Just asking. I read the Quran in N Dawood’s Penguin translation years and years ago – some time in the 90s, certainly well before 9/11 – and I cannot now recall exactly what prompted me to do so. Funnily enough I think it was the “oddness” or creepiness of it, more even than the violence, that struck me , the first time around; the weird “twisting-out-of-shape” of certain familiar biblical figures and stories. Still, I noted the violence, the constant hostility toward Christians and Jews as such, and when 9/11 happened, I wasn’t the least bit surprised to discover that Muslims had done it.
jewdog says
As Goebbels once said, the best lie is one with 25% truth.
There is some element of truth in these allegations, but they are lies because they take the small failings or quirks and turn them into the equivalent sins of Islamic supremacist atrocities. It’s similar to how leftists demonize Israel: they cherry pick the failings, however minor, to justify genocidal war. Very clever, really, but lacking perspective.
Mo says
How vile these people are. I couldn’t even read the whole thing because it enrages me.
But you know what? I actually appreciate them being honest about this.
Leftists pretend to be oh-so-tolerant. Let them be honest and public about their hatred for Christianity and Christians. I prefer that, rather than their constant bleating about being “tolerant”.
Let the world see their hypocrisy.
Kepha says
Mo, I’m with you on this one. I’m also glad that they’re showing their fangs.
I also suspect that for someone like Valerie Terico, the fact that someone claims to be “progressive” is sufficient justification for any venomous act in which he engages; especially harassment of people who disagree.
Richie says
Leftists are the most racist people you will ever meet. They see EVERYTHING in terms of race, and judge people in terms of race.
Leftists in America are the ones who have destroyed the black community and perpetuate government funded poverty, the Democrats are the party of the KKK and the Jim Crow laws and race based Affirmative Action laws
Leftists coined the idiotic ‘hate crime’ legislation’, meaning they think a crime against gays or minorities is somehow worse than crimes against anyone else
The atheists tend to dominate the left, so delight in openly mocking people of faith. Oddly enough they give a free pass to muslims, but i suspect because they think they are aliies, as they share their hatred for Jews and Christians
duh_swami says
Weird…3,6, and 7 add up to 9? What happened to 1-2-4-5-8-9? Act6ually, 3, 6, 7, contained enough psychobabble for one article.
G179 says
These are excerpts. To see the full article, you should click on the link.
duh_swami says
Well, Christians are bad, aren’t they? I know for a fact that some of the Christians who post here are behind the problems in Nigeria and Uganda. They post coded messages disguised as scripture.
To spot them, just study the scripture they post. Read it several times, don’t rush, let it sink in , and the hidden messages will start to appear.
pumbar says
Not through this tinfoil hat they won’t.
Jan Fourowls says
Busted!
(Kidding, of course.)
Aion says
Its the liberal narrative: Christians and whites are bad, everyone else is good.
Mo says
@ Michael
“Actually, there are texts in the Bible for holy war and applicable today. They are Exodus 17:13-16, Deuteronomy 25:17-19; and 1 Samuel 15.”
No, there are not – not holy war as such. You can’t just grab isolated verses and narrations of specific events and take them as a commands or directives for today! Good grief.
Are countries allowed to defend themselves? Of course. Are there times when nations can and should defend other nations? Of course. but that’s different than what you’re claiming here.
Jay Boo says
Does Salon also offer an advice column about appeasing Muslims and what to wear at a public beheading so as not to offend Islam.
Dt says
What a moron! Tell me…where is there a female Imam? Oh yeah, there are none! Why is that?
I am a Christian and obviously the writer of the article is not. Yes, even Christianity has rules . And yes, there are Christians that have killed in the name of their religion. But, they are arrested and put in prison where they belong! It is never ok to subjugate others. It is never ok to kill someone because they believe differently than you. It is never ok to abuse a woman, a child or a man.
The difference in Christianity is Jesus. He taught us to love our enemy and pray for those that spitefully use us. So, for Christians, our spiritual leader teaches us to be tolerant and loving to even our enemy. To love one another as Christ loves his Church.
Richie says
Bashing Christianity, bashing Israel and pushing the absurd fiction of ‘white privilege’ are favorite activities of leftists
Mirren10 says
Well, why should we be surprised ?
This Valerie Tarico is a typical example of leftard non-thinking. The left despises facts, and truth. Whatever fits the leftard agenda must be swallowed whole, and to hell with inconvenient facts.
I note this ghastly bint is also a “chil psychologist”. God help her hapless patients !
Mirren10 says
Bother. I meant, of course, **child ** psychiatrist. The fiddly keyboard one gets on a tablet is a pain in the arse.