• Why Jihad Watch?
  • About Robert Spencer and Staff Writers
  • FAQ
  • Books
  • Muhammad
  • Islam 101
  • Privacy

Jihad Watch

Exposing the role that Islamic jihad theology and ideology play in the modern global conflicts

Jeffrey Tayler in Salon: “The left has Islam all wrong”

May 13, 2015 9:28 am By Robert Spencer

taylerIt’s an ongoing puzzle: Salon, which routinely excoriates Pamela Geller and me as “bigoted” “Islamophobes,” even more frequently allows Atlantic writer Jeffrey Tayler to tell the unpopular and unwelcome truths that Salon otherwise lambastes us for telling; see, for example, here and here. One can only speculate as to the provenance of this editorial inconsistency. Do Salon’s publishers owe Tayler some huge sum of money? Did he catch them with their fingers in the till? Has Tayler tied their daughters to the railroad tracks?

I am not seriously suggesting that either Tayler or Salon is engaged in blackmail or any other illegal activities. But it is a head-scratcher: why — for several years now — does Salon allow this single writer to go against the editorial stance it manifests in every other article it publishes on these issues?

In any case, this is another thoughtful and well-reasoned piece from Tayler. One wonders if any of the Salon-reading lemmings will take heed.

“The left has Islam all wrong: Bill Maher, Pamela Geller and the reality progressives must face,” by Jeffrey Tayler, Salon, May 10, 2015:

Whatever her views on other matters are, Pamela Geller is right about one thing: last week’s Islamist assault on the “Draw Muhammad” cartoon contest she hosted in Texas proves the jihad against freedom of expression has opened a front in the United States. “There is,” she said, “a war on free speech and this violent attack is a harbinger of things to come.” Apparently undaunted, Geller promises to continue with such “freedom of speech” events. ISIS is now threatening to assassinate her. She and her cohorts came close to becoming victims, yet some in the media on the right and the center-right have essentially blamed her for the gunmen’s attack, just as far too many, last January, surreptitiously pardoned the Kouachi brothers and, with consummate perfidy to human decency, inculpated the satirical cartoonists they slaughtered, saying “Charlie Hebdo asked for it.”

No…. The meme “Islam – the religion of peace” might evoke snickering now, but it was wildly inaccurate long before 9/11 and the plague of Islamist terrorism. For starters, the Prophet Muhammad was a triumphant warlord leading military campaigns that spread Islam throughout Arabia and initiated the creation of one of the largest empires the world has known. His was a messianic undertaking. He preceded his invasions by demands that populations either convert or face the sword. Verses sanctifying violence against “infidels” abound in the Quran. Even the favorite verse of Islam’s apologists, Surat al-Baqarah 2:256 (“There is no compulsion in religion”), prefaces a warning that Hellfire awaits those worshipping anything besides God. The real meaning of the word “Islam” is, in fact, surrender — to God and the inerrant, unchallengeable path He lays out for us. Surrendering denotes war, groveling, and humiliation – not exactly the kind of behavior liberals tend to value.Many know that “jihad” means both spiritual and non-spiritual striving in the name of Islam, with the latter connoting holy war. As we speak, the violent are bearing it away, rendering the peaceful definition irrelevant. The Charlie Hebdo massacre and the shooting at Geller’s “Draw Muhammad” contest attest to how extremists are determining our discourse about Islam, and compelling us to deal with the religion at its worst. Even though the majority of Muslims in the West are hardly on the warpath, the overarching aim of jihad, of the messianic mission launched by the Prophet Muhammad, remains Islam’s conquest of the planet — the most illiberal goal imaginable, threatening to every aspect of Western civilization.

The canonical glorification of death for the sake Islam, or martyrdom, similarly belies those who would argue that the religion’s nature is pacific. If you, as a progressive, do not believe in the veracity of the Quran, then you have to accept Arthur C. Clarke’s diagnosis of those who “would rather fight to the death than abandon their illusions” as complying with the criteria of “the operational definition of insanity.” Insanity hardly engenders peace.

All those who, à la Reza Aslan, maintain that Muslims today do not necessarily read the Quran literally have lost the argument before it begins. What counts is that there are those (ISIS, say, and al-Qaida) who do, and they are taking action based on their beliefs. To the contention, “ISIS and al-Qaida don’t represent Islam!” the proper response is, “that’s what you say. They disagree.” No single recognized Muslim clerical body exists to refute them….

The above are the stark doctrinal and practical realities of which no honest progressive could approve, and which form the bases of the religion. Regardless of what the peaceful majority of Muslims are doing, as ISIS’s beguiling ideology spreads, we are likely to face an ever more relentless, determined Islamist assault. We can delude ourselves no longer: violence is an emergent property deriving from Islam’s inherently intolerant precepts and dogma. The rising number of ethnic Europeans mesmerized by Islam who set off to enroll in the ranks of ISIS attests to this; and may prefigure serious disruptions, especially in France, the homeland of a good number of them, once they start returning. There is nothing “phobic” about recognizing this. Recognize it we must, and steel ourselves for what’s to come.

This is no call to disrespect Muslims as people, but we should not hesitate to speak frankly about the aspects of their faith we find problematic. But it’s not up to progressives to suggest how an ideology based on belief without evidence might be reformed. Rather, we should cease relativizing and proudly espouse, as alternatives to blind obedience to ancient texts, reason, progress, consensus-based solutions, and the wonderful panoply of other Enlightenment ideals underpinning our Constitution and the liberties characterizing Western countries.

The only path to victory in this war in defense of free speech lies through courage. We cannot wimp out and blame the victims for drawing cartoons, writing novels, or making movies. We need to heed Gérard Biard, Charlie Hebdo’s editor-in-chief, who declared, as he received the PEN award, that “They don’t want us to write and draw. We must write and draw. They don’t want us to think and laugh. We must think and laugh. They don’t want us to debate. We must debate.”

In doing as he urges, we will give the terrorists too many targets to attack and convince them that we will not surrender, not cede an inch. That means the media needs to begin showing Charlie Hedbo’s [sic] Muhammad cartoons. We must stop traducing reason by branding people “Islamophobes,” and start celebrating our secularism, remembering that only it offers true freedom for the religious and non-religious alike. And we should reaffirm our humanistic values, in our conviction that we have, as Carlyle wrote, “One life – a little gleam of time between two eternities,” and need to make the most of it for ourselves and others while we can. There is nothing else.

This is not a battle we have chosen; the battle has chosen us.

It’s time to fight back, and hard.

Share this:

  • Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Twitter (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on WhatsApp (Opens in new window)
  • Click to print (Opens in new window)
  • Click to email this to a friend (Opens in new window)
  • More
  • Click to share on Skype (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on LinkedIn (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Telegram (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Tumblr (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Pocket (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Pinterest (Opens in new window)

Follow me on Facebook

Filed Under: "Islamophobia", Featured, free speech, journalistic bias Tagged With: Jeffrey Tayler


Learn more about RevenueStripe...

Comments

  1. Martin Vink says

    May 13, 2015 at 10:00 am

    In WW2 the critics (fifth column) could no longer make money supporting Hitler and Winston Churchill was invited to take their place. Winston did not persecute the media for treason (although he could have).

    Islam has been killing Christians and Jews for 1400 years. You would think that Christians would support each other by now. However, we are comatose. We have argued among ourselves and watched each other die.

    There is no coordinated effort to eradicate Somali pirates. There is no effort to make Muslims read their Quran. If they did, half may be shocked (judging by the optimism about “moderates”). In short, each of us, in turn, feels that we are safe . . . until it is too late!

    • Alarmed Pig Farmer says

      May 13, 2015 at 10:24 am

      Don’t forget the Hindus and Zoroastrians.

      • miriamrove says

        May 13, 2015 at 11:38 am

        And don’t forget muslims on mulims!! M

        • Alarmed Pig Farmer says

          May 13, 2015 at 12:40 pm

          Every cloud has a silver lining, m. I look back to the halcyon days of the 1980s with regret that the Iraq-Iran War had to end. Persia is your homeland, I know that, but the place was ruined when the Moslems knocked over the Sasanians in the 7th century. If it were still a Zoroastrian country today, something tells me it’d be a much happier place. The Ulema running Iran are lucky that the country is blessed with a stupendous amount of oil and is hard to invade because it’s mountainous.

          But Iran is an ally now, so we must make ourselves into big admirers of the Supreme Leader, he’s done such a fine job.

        • Susan says

          May 13, 2015 at 7:59 pm

          Muslim on muslim is the only one that I like.

      • Mary says

        May 14, 2015 at 4:16 am

        Ah. Okay. The point is Islam is against mostly Christians and Jews. They are going against us first. Don’t see why you keep naming other religions when we are the most targeted.

        The other religions come after the massacre of us. That is to say they convert easier seemingly so. Look at the atheists. Heaps have converted.

        So. Look at the main issue. That have overtaken Israel and iron and Iraq and Egypt and Syria all for the basis of over throwing the Christian and Jewish population.

        The jihad starts there.

    • The vilest of creatures says

      May 13, 2015 at 1:00 pm

      Islam has been killing Christians and Jews for 1400 years

      and Hindus, and Buddhists, and Baha’is, and Zoroastrians (pretty much about 98% of them) and Confucians, and atheists.

      • Alarmed Pig Farmer says

        May 13, 2015 at 1:17 pm

        What about the Sikhs, are they fair game too?

        • Know Thy Enemy says

          May 14, 2015 at 5:21 am

          Anyone who does not call Muhammad a “messenger of God” is fair game, and it does not matter if the non-Muslim is a monotheist believer who believes in a formless God (Sikhs, for example).

          Even if the person believes in Muhammad to be a prophet, s/he must believe him to be the last messenger sent by God. Those who believe in newer ‘prophets’ are fair game (e.g. Ahmadiyyas)

          Muslims can’t see it, but it is obvious to everyone else that it is Muhammad who is most important in Islam, not God, nor monotheism, and neither the formlessness of God!

          What a fraud!

    • gravenimage says

      May 15, 2015 at 9:02 pm

      Martin Vink wrote;

      There is no effort to make Muslims read their Quran. If they did, half may be shocked (judging by the optimism about “moderates”).
      ………………………………….

      With all respect, I’m not sure why so many Infidels assume that Muslims will be horrified if the read the Qur’an. All too many Muslims *do* read the Qur’an, and most of them are inspired by it to become more savage.

      I’ve only heard of a handful of lax Muslims who finally got around to reading the Qur’an who were actually appalled when they did.

      Kudos to them, but I’m not at all sure this is something we can count on.

      More:

      There is no coordinated effort to eradicate Somali pirates.
      ………………………………….

      The international coalition to suppress the Somali pirates has been, in fact, one of the few unsullied *successes* in the fight against Jihad terror:

      “Fight against Somali pirates so successful that there’s been no hijacking in nearly a year”

      http://www.foxnews.com/world/2013/05/02/fight-against-somali-pirates-so-successful-that-there-been-no-hijacking-in/

      I’m not saying we should get cocky—Somali pirates are sill making attempts, and there is no saying that they won’t change their tactics at some point and become more deadly. But right now, this one small aspect of the Jihad threat has been largely neutralized.

      We should, in fact, take heart from this success. All this took was some real will on our part, as well s cooperation between Infidels.

      • Oliver says

        May 16, 2015 at 2:47 pm

        Around 200+ years ago, the (then infant and weak-somethings never change-Obama has made us weak-my view)–the US took out the Somali pirates- for almost 200 years.

        Them the US showed guts. Now it shows appeasement

        • gravenimage says

          May 17, 2015 at 11:36 pm

          Yes—the US took on the Barbary Pirates—in fact, we crated a navy for that express purpose, though we could ill afford it at the time. We inspired Britain and France to stand up as well. They had been paying “tribute” to these thugs to leave their ships and crews unmolested, but Muslims often seized their ships and enslaved their crews anyway.

          Once we were done, the Mediterranean Sea was free for international navigation for the first time in a thousand years. Something to be proud of.

  2. Lesley says

    May 13, 2015 at 10:05 am

    I’m so glad to read this sound reasoning coming from a more mainstream media source! Huzzah!!!

    • jihad3tracker says

      May 13, 2015 at 11:02 am

      As an extremely cynical, ancient 66 year old Democrat — who now despises the cowards and fools in that once great party. And I have the utmost contempt for lying mainstream press & smug Leftist media egotists.

      Jeffrey Tayler shows a willingness to be honest that probably puts his life at risk. My guess is that the Garland jihadi attack was an epiphany for him — along with Pam’s astonishing courage. Recall, too, that Time Magazine (a highly respected anchor of traditional journalism) published a page by Pam.

      AS I HAVE SAID BEFORE : there must be an IQ ceiling in the brains of “full menu” Muslims who are now showing what Islam is like. We are currently at — or soon will reach — an “AHA !” moment for the millions of Americans who have steadfastly hung on to their cluelessness privilege guilt.

      • jihad3tracker says

        May 13, 2015 at 11:08 am

        BTW, I am going to send a thank-you to him if there is a reasonably direct path for contact, and perhaps other JW readers here would consider doing the same thing.

        Gifts of truth, like his Salon piece deserve letting the give know how grateful we are . . .

        • laura r says

          May 16, 2015 at 6:00 pm

          would like to follow this writter on twitter, but i was suspended last night, maybe for ever. i hope he mr. taylor has a blog. it is perplexing that “salon” would let him write for them. i cant comment on “salon” w/out being attacked. (or banned). now after reading this piece, their readers can think about the phobia scam. after all this in a far left wing publication. i wonder what the comments are? prehaps mr. spencer can publish some?

      • gravenimage says

        May 15, 2015 at 9:17 pm

        jihad3tracker wrote:

        My guess is that the Garland jihadi attack was an epiphany for him…
        ………………………………..

        jihad3tracker, Jeffrey Tayler has been criticizing aspects of Islam for quite some time. This, from thirteen years ago:

        http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2002/03/islam-versus-the-pleasure-principle/302454/

    • Keith says

      May 13, 2015 at 3:06 pm

      It needs publishing in EVERY newspaper throughout the western world, at a minimum of once a week for a year, until people, well the liberal left and governments, actually get the message.

  3. Anthony says

    May 13, 2015 at 10:12 am

    An incisive article. Should be made compulsory reading for all those timid and cowardly apologists of Islamic extremism.

  4. RonaldB says

    May 13, 2015 at 10:17 am

    The question is, why does Salon allow Taylor to sully its otherwise pure-white pages with “Islamophobic” articles pointing out the base problems with Islam?

    I have two observations, maybe three.

    One is that it’s not productive to get too far into the head of the enemy. You can pretty much predict their actions, however illogical they appear, so why try to find a logic for them?

    Two, is that Salon wants to demonstrate that its firm head-in-the-sand stance is not a result of being oblivious to the wolf at its back. To the contrary, Salon has read and even published reasoned, factual arguments against its left-at-all-costs stance, and still chooses its stance. It is not marching blindly into the machine gun fire. It is marching into the machine gun fire with all eyes open, and wants to make sure we know that.

    Three, is that Salon is beginning to hedge its bets. This is the most optimistic point of view. An enemy as vicious, unprincipled, and violent as Islam is as likely to blow up its fellow travelers as its enemies, for insane reasons. Salon may be anticipating the very real possibility its own offices will be attacked for some imagined slight or another, and doesn’t want to have to have total egg on its face.

    • Georg says

      May 13, 2015 at 5:19 pm

      I’m going with hypothesis three. It makes sense that they’re cynically planting some seeds which can help them hedge later and if they must. Perhaps they see the writing on the wall and wish to continue onward when the time comes as a lucrative magazine sans principle. We’ve already seen political shockwaves roiling across Europe, and it looks like the start of society’s retort to Islam, not its conclusion. Salon’s accountants have probably told the tale of reality to the editors.

      • Beagle says

        May 13, 2015 at 5:46 pm

        I don’t know. The kids on a railroad track theory seems fairly likely after reading that and realizing it is attached to Salon.

  5. Alarmed Pig Farmer says

    May 13, 2015 at 10:23 am

    The meme “Islam – the religion of peace” might evoke snickering now, but it was wildly inaccurate long before 9/11 and the plague of Islamist terrorism. For starters, the Prophet Muhammad was a triumphant warlord leading military campaigns that spread Islam throughout Arabia…

    Warlord is being too kind. The Prophet Mohammed was the leader of an organized crime gang that mass murdered 800 in an afternoon not to protect the land of Banu Qurazay or even to steal it, he did it out of pure hatred for Infidels. And worse, they were Jew Infidels.

    Oh, and now that you’ve self-corrected on Moslems, Mr. Tayler, why do you call him the Prophet Mohammed when he didn’t prophesy anything? Skeert?

    • Raja says

      May 14, 2015 at 7:43 am

      APF,

      I don’t understand why you are so keen on having the word prophet prefixed to the name Mohd.

      To make it more queer you prefer the capital “P” for prophet instead of small “p” for the same.

      Acknowledging him as a prophet is half the battle lost…

  6. mortimer says

    May 13, 2015 at 11:01 am

    Jeffrey Tayler just called the Obama’s JIHAD ENABLERS ‘INSANE’ !!!

    Quote: “If you, as a PROGRESSIVE, do not believe in the veracity of the Quran, then you have to accept Arthur C. Clarke’s diagnosis of those who “would rather fight to the death than abandon their ILLUSIONS” as complying with the criteria of “THE OPERATIONAL DEFINITION OF INSANITY.”

  7. Thomas Hulting says

    May 13, 2015 at 11:03 am

    Sadly, I think, the Left DOES NOT “have Islam all wrong,” given their objectives of bringing the “evil empire, the United States of America, to her knees! With the Liberal Left, Radical Egalitarian, Godless Relativists who embrace the Democrat/Socialist/Progressive/Marxist agenda, the ends ALWAYS justify the means! If one of the objectives of Muslims worldwide is to replace the “City on a Hill” as we once knew her, with an Islamic Caliphate, ANYTHING the Left does and embraces, Including Islamic Jihadi tactics and objectives, is arguably “right” if it contributes to the demise of America!

    • Alarmed Pig Farmer says

      May 13, 2015 at 3:13 pm

      Hear hear.

  8. Angemon says

    May 13, 2015 at 11:35 am

    But it is a head-scratcher: why — for several years now — does Salon allow this single writer to go against the editorial stance it manifests in every other article it publishes on these issues?

    It could be due to “diversity” policies. “What do you mean, we’re biased and only allow for one chain of thought? We have that one guy writing every once in a while”

  9. David Hayden says

    May 13, 2015 at 11:49 am

    thanks, Jeffrey Tayler. The hole in the dike is ever widening.

  10. mortimer says

    May 13, 2015 at 11:53 am

    This is clarion call to the Left to join the fight against totalitarian Islam!

    “We must stop traducing reason by branding people “Islamophobes,” and start celebrating our secularism, remembering that only it offers true freedom for the religious and non-religious alike…This is not a battle we have chosen; the battle has chosen us. It’s time to fight back, and hard.”

    Jeffrey Tayler has joined the counterjihad.

  11. Ricky Black says

    May 13, 2015 at 12:42 pm

    Chrisiamanity ? or Chrislam ?

  12. agent of Liberty says

    May 13, 2015 at 12:55 pm

    Bookmark this one. Pass this one on to your naive family members and friends.

  13. Don McKellar says

    May 13, 2015 at 1:42 pm

    Jeffrey Tayler is clearly a Liberal, expressing Liberal values in this piece. Jeffrey Tayler is clearly not a Leftist. Leftists blindly, and with fascist zeal, attack anything and anybody they imagine to be non-Liberal. And, in the irony of that wilfully blind lashing out, become anti-Liberal. Which is what has happened with the Left and Islam.

    • Alarmed Pig Farmer says

      May 13, 2015 at 3:26 pm

      I’m hard put to understand the difference between a liberal and a leftist. To me they’re all socialists nowadays, globo-socialists. My guess is that by liberal you mean RINO.

      Notable here is the ratchet effect first described by M.P. Keith Joseph back in the day of Margaret Thatcher. The liberals became socialists, the conservatives became liberals, and anybody left is now a Tea Partier who is an extremist, a racist, and probably insane. The march is always inch by inch, election cycle by election cycle, graduating class by graduating class, and always directly to the left. Thatcher and Reagan were only episodes that were quickly discarded upon their respective retirements.

      • Don McKellar says

        May 13, 2015 at 6:20 pm

        A Liberal is quickly identified and seperated from a Leftist based on their response to Islam. The Liberal recognizes that it is against all of the values of freedom and liberty and equality that modern civilizations hold dear. Liberals hold jihadi killers to account. You would never have a Liberal calling you a racist or other names because you don’t agree with their opinion. Their opinions are generally reasoned. You will never find a Liberal who is racist. They are also not concerned particularly with being politically correct. An example of a Liberal is Bill Maher.

        A Leftist is somebody who thinks they have Liberal values but they hold them only on a superficial level. They don’t believe in equality and fair laws and treatment for all — they believe in better treatment for those who they deem “minorities” over those who they deem “majorities” or those who they believe hold an “unfair” balance of power. And when it comes to Islam, they remain wilfully ignorant about it, and shout down any who speak ill of it, because they believe it is the religion of a “minority” and those who oppose minorities are evil. There is a racist undertone to their view of the world. And being politically correct is critical no matter how surreal and absurd it may become. Especially when it comes to Islam.

        We can throw around terms like Socialist and all the rest, but it’s pretty meaningless. The most Socialist of countries could very likely be the United States under a president such as Reagan. After all how many other countries spent so many public tax dollars to create government programs with the military, subsidies for Big Oil, Big Pharma, you name it, and massive space programs and all the rest. That’s what Socialism is. Socialism can be Left or Right — it just depends on what the money is being spent on.

  14. Papa Whiskey says

    May 13, 2015 at 2:12 pm

    Right at the end of this cogent essay comes an exhortation that is slightly incomplete:

    We need to heed Gérard Biard, Charlie Hebdo’s editor-in-chief, who declared, as he received the PEN award, that “They don’t want us to write and draw. We must write and draw. They don’t want us to think and laugh. We must think and laugh. They don’t want us to debate. We must debate.”

    In doing as he urges, we will give the terrorists too many targets to attack and convince them that we will not surrender, not cede an inch. That means the media needs to begin showing Charlie Hedbo’s Muhammad cartoons.

    AND Jyllands-Posten’s, AND Bosch Fawstin’s, and those of Pamela Geller’s other entrants — to include my own:

    http://s1167.photobucket.com/user/AFDIMotoons/media/motoon.paul.green%201_zpsx6p
    jooow.jpg.html?sort=6&o=35

    and

    http://s1167.photobucket.com/user/AFDIMotoons/media/mo%20entry_zpsnvmpil8t.jpg.h
    tml?sort=6&o=85

    • Alarmed Pig Farmer says

      May 13, 2015 at 3:32 pm

      In doing as he urges, we will give the terrorists too many targets to attack…

      This theory, was espoused independently a few years apart by two brave women, Hirsi Ali then of Amsterdam, and Molly Norris of Seattle.

      Both are in hiding now, presumably with armed security on the lookout for any Moslems who might appear in their vicinity.

      It’s a sound strategy, this “they can’t kill us all” theory, it’s perfect in fact. Even I thought of it a couple of years before Hirsi Ali introduced it in an essay she published after surfacing in the United States. Indeed, Geller invoked this theory just the other day on the Fox RINO TV channel, on Hannity I think.

    • Westman says

      May 13, 2015 at 4:54 pm

      Papa,

      The PC Police have already removed the cartoons.

      • Papa Whiskey says

        May 13, 2015 at 6:36 pm

        I might have known. Here’s a link to one of them — the lead art in this Breitbart story:

        http://www.breitbart.com/texas/2015/05/01/pamela-gellers-inaugural-10000-muhammad-art-exhibit-and-contest-in-dallas-may-3/

  15. cs says

    May 13, 2015 at 3:20 pm

    You guys made history with the cartoon contest.

    • gravenimage says

      May 17, 2015 at 11:56 pm

      Hear, hear!

  16. wildjew says

    May 13, 2015 at 4:32 pm

    “There is,” (Pamela Geller) said, “a war on free speech and this violent attack is a harbinger of things to come.”

    Salon editors are covering their far-left derrieres, so that when this prophecy comes to pass they can can protest, “But we allowed Jeffrey Tayler space in our publication!”.

  17. wildjew says

    May 13, 2015 at 4:58 pm

    I thought I recognized this piece. I read it a day or two back.

    All in all Tayler wrote a good piece for fellow atheists and agnostics. I’ve got a couple of quibbles:

    Tayler wrote: Islam is a hallowed monotheistic ideology, as are Judaism and Christianity, the other two Abrahamic “anti-human religions” (to quote Gore Vidal), that preceded it. From a rationalist’s perspective, any ideology that mandates belief without evidence is a priori dangerous and liable to abuse….”

    Judaism, or I should say Moses did not mandate belief without evidence. “So keep and do them (the commandments), for that is your wisdom and your understanding in the sight of the peoples who will hear all these statutes and say, ‘Surely this great nation is a wise and understanding people.’ ”

    If there we are to believe without evidence why would the peoples say surely this great nation is a wise and understanding people?

    Tayler: “Enter the God of the Israelites. Jealous and vengeful, capricious and megalomaniacal, He issued His Decalogue….”

    Capricious? Megalomaniacal? Where does that come from?

    Tayler: “Recognizing no Holy Spirit or mediating, moderating heavenly offspring, the Prophet Muhammad transformed the Judeo-Christian Despot on High into an even more menacing, wrathful ogre, whose gory punishments meted out to hapless souls after death fill many a Koranic verse….”

    On this we agree.

  18. duh_swami says

    May 13, 2015 at 6:16 pm

    Whatever her views on other matters are, Pamela Geller is right about one thing…

    What does that mean? Otherwise an OK article…

  19. voegelinian says

    May 13, 2015 at 6:24 pm

    Jeffrey Tayler’s article is certainly a refreshing change from the party line of the Mainstream, and Spencer is correct that its publication in Salon is baffling, given their solid PC MC record. Well, baffling for the most part; clues may exist subtly between the lines here and there explaining why it received the blessing of their Imprimatur.

    For, Tayler’s article is not perfect (and the standard for perfection is not some unattainable rocket science dispensed from Experts: there does exist a certain number of ordinary, garden-variety civilians who can be bluntly “perfect” with regard to the problem of Islam — viz., that the problem is all of Islam and all Muslims — without having to go through elaborate exercises in erudition or convolutions of logic).

    Tayler’s imperfection seems to revolve mostly around his retention of the TMOE meme (the Tiny MInority of Extremists). Even if his analysis rhetorically implies a more robust adjustment of the T part of that meme (adjusting the “Tiny” to something vaguely broader in numbers), it’s still functioning to reinforce that meme and its fundamental flaw & fallacy.

    And the logical connector making sense of this meme in Tayler’s argument is the fact that he limits his focus exclusively on Islam and ignores the problem of Muslims enabling Islam (except, of course, for the TMOE).

    One part caught my eye:

    “We can delude ourselves no longer: violence is an emergent property deriving from Islam’s inherently intolerant precepts and dogma. The rising number of ethnic Europeans mesmerized by Islam who set off to enroll in the ranks of ISIS attests to this…”

    Tayler is making it sound like non-Muslims are being hypnotized by some ineffable quality of Islam that moves them to go join the grotesquely evil and ultra-violent ISIS; when as a matter of fact the ones joining ISIS are already Muslim (and even if they are converts they converted before the latest “extremist” Islamic group ISIS came to world attention). What Taylor is adroitly (or ineptly) avoiding is the reasonably inferred conclusion we must draw that there is something in normative ordinary Islam that makes Muslims like ISIS. I.e., it is their Muslimness that is leading them to join ISIS, not some magical power of ISIS transforming them into zombies – for it’s their Muslimness that, formed by Islam, already contains the evil ideology ISIS is energetically purveying.

    Like all asymptotics, Tayler is struggling with simultaneously conceding this point, while also resisting it.

    The asymptotic tendency is indicated by a formulation of the problem fixating on Islam, and avoiding Muslims – their agency, responsibility, motivation. The asymptotic focuses on the abstraction “Islam”. One symptom of this is Tayler’s various spasms of glibly sweeping generalities concerning vast swaths of harmless Muslims he cannot possibly know (but axiomatically assumes) are harmless – e.g.:
    “Even though the majority of Muslims in the West are hardly on the warpath…”

    And his sentence is completed by invoking an abstraction, Islam, that can do things like conquer:

    “…the overarching aim of jihad, of the messianic mission launched by the Prophet Muhammad, remains Islam’s conquest of the planet.”

    As though “Islam” can conquer by itself, without the agency of Muslims enacting that imperative and putting it into practice – by hook (violence) or by crook (stealth, taqiyya, immigration, false moderation – i.e., pretending to be the very same harmless Muslims Tayler assumes abound throughout the West).

    Similary:

    “Regardless of what the peaceful majority of Muslims are doing…”

    (Which should read: Regardless of what the ostensibly peaceful majority of Muslims are doing…)

    “This is no call to disrespect Muslims as people…”

    Bullshit. It is a call to disrespect Muslims as Muslims – for as such – supporting, enabling, promoting the vile and deadly ideology of Islam — they deserve no respect.

    And so forth.

    • voegelinian says

      May 13, 2015 at 6:30 pm

      And lest the seemingly sophisticated but really simple-minded Angemon nitpick about one complaint I had about Tayler’s glibly sweeping phrase —

      “Even though the majority of Muslims in the West are hardly on the warpath…”

      — no one in the Counter-Jihad should need reminding that in Islam there are two types of war — violent jihad and stealth jihad. We can, and must, reasonably assume that all Muslims in the West are, when not doing the former, doing the latter, in one of its myriad forms or other — and thus a Muslim doing stealth jihad is a stealth jihadist, and is “on the warpath”. (The myriad forms of stealth jihad the Jihad Watch regulars should know by now, but about which become strangely amnesiac whenever their spastic reflexes see “Hesperado” pushing the envelope beyond their incoherent comfort zone…)

      • Angemon says

        May 13, 2015 at 7:35 pm

        voegelinian posted:

        “And lest the seemingly sophisticated but really simple-minded Angemon”

        Hi voeg. There’s no going around it – seems like one way or another I’m always on your mind, aren’t I? Sorry, but for the time being I don’t require any more evidence to prove your grudge against me. If you really want to get my attention, you’ll have to treat me to a nice dinner and a movie or reply to my actual posts instead of, you know, the strawman ones you create on your mind during what I assume to be your incredible amount of free time. Also, the former is no longer an option, so… Yeah.

        Although, to be honest, I can’t really blame you for having to resort to making up posts in your mind – you did say you weren’t bothering to read my posts anymore, and you wouldn’t want to come out looking like a pompous ass who makes wild claims publicly and ends up going back on them with hilarious results, right? Now, I know that some regulars – myself included – may be reading that and thinking to themselves “that ship has sailed several times and voeg went out of his way not to be on board on every single one of them”.

        xoxo

        <3

        Angemon

        P.S.: Have you found any evidence to back that false claim you made about me recently? Do you need a refresher? Here it is: I'm talking about the last time you went out of your way to lie about what I said and did. The last time, not any of all those other times before. Hope that helps 🙂

      • voegelinian says

        May 14, 2015 at 1:00 am

        LOL, for the 1000th time, I push the envelope, and Phillip Jihadski and Angemon nip at my heels, and all the other Jihad Watchers pretend not to notice.

        • Davegreybeard says

          May 14, 2015 at 1:56 am

          @voegelinian
          “LOL, for the 1000th time, I push the envelope, and Phillip Jihadski and Angemon nip at my heels, and all the other Jihad Watchers pretend not to notice.”

          You presume too much, Hesp. I noticed.

          My first thought was to call out Philip and Angemon as bullies, which, on this occasion, is an appellation they both richly deserve. Philip perhaps more so, as he was not the recipient of any taunt – such as the “simple-minded” insult you directed at Angemon.

          Absent the spurious insult, your post was very thought provoking.

          There is a strong tendency to focus on “Islam” as the enemy, while excusing the “Muslim.” You very eloquently pointed this out. It is an aspect of the counter-Jihad that is very easily “washed away” in the desire to be “fair” to our fellow human beings. We rush to declare that yes, we vigorously oppose the evil ideology of Islam, but we, being “good people” are reluctant to fault Muslims. If we did so, that might make us bigots – and of course we can’t have that, can we?

          But it is Muslims, all of them, that enable Islam. This is a fact that must be repeated in numerous, creative and eloquent ways, lest we lose sight of it.

          Philip and Angemon, I greatly respect both of you, but it seems you have developed a conditioned response to bash the donkey every time he appears. Is it possible for you to back off just a bit? Every now and then his braying makes sense.

        • Angemon says

          May 14, 2015 at 5:41 am

          Davegreybeard posted:

          “Philip and Angemon, I greatly respect both of you, but it seems you have developed a conditioned response to bash the donkey every time he appears.”

          Nope. I could search topics and point out many times where he posts and neither myself or PJ reply to him. I will keep calling him out on specific subjects, I’ve always been available for discussion on those subjects, and if his default response is “help, help, I’m being attacked” then that speaks more about him than it does about me. As for the “bullies” part, show me where I go to a topic and pick on him by saying, for example “And lest the seemingly sophisticated but really simple-minded voegelinian nitpick about”. You’ll find no such example because it simply doesn’t exist. I, on the other hand, can give examples of voeg doing so. And I don’t consider taking out that kind of trash as bullying, I consider it setting the record straight. If someone goes to say something like “Angemon said such and such” then I’ll ask “show me where I said that”.

          Can you explain to me why you consider replying to a coward, underhanded attack, “bullying”? And can I get your opinion of what lying about other users, ascribing them thing they never said or outright insulting them is if not bullying?

        • RonaldB says

          May 14, 2015 at 3:18 am

          Let me share a dilemma I have.

          I agree that Muslims are a threat to the culture and freedoms of the United States. Given Islamic doctrine, there’s no way around it. The attempts by Muslims to inject Islam and sharia into US law and politics are pretty much described in
          http://www.centerforsecuritypolicy.org/the-muslim-brotherhood-in-america/
          http://www.centerforsecuritypolicy.org/2010/09/13/shariah-the-threat-to-america-2/

          But, most Muslims in the US have not committed a violent act, and have not done anything illegal. That’s a fact. They may support Muslim Brotherhood fronts politically, and provide a steady public opinion pressure on US freedom of speech, but are still only exercising their legal rights.

          The question is, even speaking hypothetically, what actions do we wish to take concerning Muslims in the US. If we take actions against a US citizen who has committed no crime, we are setting a precedent which will destroy our culture and liberties as certainly as importing more Muslims. Whatever the danger, when we give the government arbitrary power of death, imprisonment and deportation over US citizens without constitutional due process of law, we have given up the ship. It can, and most certainly will, be used against people the sitting President finds dangerous, possibly including anti-jihadists.

          So, there is value in trying to find a constitutional means of nullifying the Islamic and Muslim danger.

          The sine qua non of acting to save ourselves is to totally cut off Muslim immigration. No marriage, no family reunions, no relatives, no refugees from persecution…nothing. There’s no provision in the constitution saying the US has to provide a refuge. Honestly speaking, there’s some problem with the first amendment. It may be claimed that excluding Muslims as Muslims may be related to the establishment of religion. I think that could be gotten around as such a law would affect only non-citizens.

          I think that going back towards the original constitution could do a lot to reverse Muslim influence and infiltration. The concepts of balance of power and true property rights will serve as a brake to an out-of-control presidency such as the one we have now, which is openly acting to import tens of thousands of Muslim refugees.

          https://refugeeresettlementwatch.wordpress.com/

        • Angemon says

          May 14, 2015 at 5:27 am

          voegelinian posted:

          “Waaah! Waaaah! I came in, picked on a regular, got a reply I have no cogent, adequate answer to, and people aren’t tripping over themselves to defend me! Oh, why is life so unfair? Why are people so cruel? Why is everyone always picking on me?”

          Well, those were not the exact words, but the spirit behind them.

          Oh, all right, I’ll reply to his exact words. We wouldn’t want to see him around moping on other topics, pointing here and saying something like “See? Angemon is a very nasty individual who has been acting upon bad faith for days, months, years, maybe even decades!!!”, would we? Best keep his dreck contained in a single place.

          “LOL, for the 1000th time, I push the envelope, and Phillip Jihadski and Angemon nip at my heels”

          By which you mean it’s the 1000th time (your numbers) you sneak attack and deride staunch counter-jihadis for no good reason.

          “and all the other Jihad Watchers pretend not to notice.”

          Huh, exactly which Jihad Watchers did that? There’s plenty of regulars and lurkers, you’ll have to be more specific. Are you saying that ALL of the people that have been on JW don’t chide in on the subject? Because, IIRC, you used to complain that other JW regulars noticed what was going on and spoke out… against you. Remember that?

    • gravenimage says

      May 15, 2015 at 9:53 pm

      Voegelinian, your first post above is very perceptive, and I was all set to comment on it when I noticed you were gratuitously and unfairly bashing your fellow Anti-Jihadists again—Angemon, in this case. And in this instance, this was not directly responding to any of his specific comments at all—this was just rudeness for its own sake. What is the point of this?

      And so—predictably—the important points you made get lost in the shuffle as other posters get defensive, angry, or come to each others’ defense.

      If you are actually intending to get your points across, then you are doing nothing but shooting yourself in the foot. If you just intend to stir things up, then you have succeeded—but it seems a pointless waste of your talents, as well as any remaining good will you might have here.

      • Angemon says

        May 16, 2015 at 6:03 am

        gravenimage posted:

        “Voegelinian, your first post above is very perceptive”

        Huh, GI? Voeg considers that saying

        “violence is an emergent property deriving from Islam’s inherently intolerant precepts and dogma. The rising number of ethnic Europeans mesmerized by Islam who set off to enroll in the ranks of ISIS attests to this”

        means saying the exact opposite:

        “Taylor is adroitly (or ineptly) avoiding is the reasonably inferred conclusion we must draw that there is something in normative ordinary Islam that makes Muslims like ISIS”

        Not sure why you would consider that to be “very perceptive”.

        • gravenimage says

          May 16, 2015 at 1:45 pm

          Hi Angemon. You wrote:

          “Voegelinian, your first post above is very perceptive”

          Huh, GI? Voeg considers that saying

          “violence is an emergent property deriving from Islam’s inherently intolerant precepts and dogma. The rising number of ethnic Europeans mesmerized by Islam who set off to enroll in the ranks of ISIS attests to this”

          means saying the exact opposite:

          “Taylor is adroitly (or ineptly) avoiding is the reasonably inferred conclusion we must draw that there is something in normative ordinary Islam that makes Muslims like ISIS”

          Not sure why you would consider that to be “very perceptive”
          ………………………………………….

          I believe that Voeg was making the point that most of those ethnic Europeans are already Muslim—in other words, that ISIS is attractive to *Muslims*. Also, many of these “ethnic Europeans” may have been born in Europe—hence, they are “French” or “British”, but go back a generation or two and they hail from Dar-al-Islam, and are not truly “European” at all. Of course, there *are* a handful of “reverts”, but these are rarer.

          He also points out that we should not assume that Muslims who are not necessarily running off to join ISIS are hence opposed to such Jihadists. In other words—an important point—that they may not be as “moderate” as they superficially appear.

          I believe his points re Jeffrey Tayler’s take on things are of interest, but—as is not uncommon—that they are rather too harsh. Obviously, if everyone had Tayler’s understanding of Islam, or even anything close to it, that we would be *immeasurably* better off than we are now.

          And, of course, I did not mean to imply that Voegelinian’s bashing of yourself was something I considered perceptive.

          Even if we disagree as to the validity of Voeg’s points, at least this is something substantive, rather than ad hominem attacks or name-calling, which I believe does no one any good.

        • Angemon says

          May 16, 2015 at 2:36 pm

          Hi gravenimage. Hope everything is doing great with you and your loved ones 😉

          You posted:

          “I believe that Voeg was making the point that most of those ethnic Europeans are already Muslim—in other words, that ISIS is attractive to *Muslims*.”

          I believe that’s exactly the point Tayler is making when he mentions the “rising number of ethnic Europeans mesmerized by Islam who set off to enroll in the ranks of ISIS“. And what voeg does is to say that Tayler tried to avoid linking islam with violence. I don’t consider that to be perceptive, I consider it to be deceptive. This is far from being the first time voeg does something like that, and I doubt it’ll be the last.

          You also posted:

          “Also, many of these “ethnic Europeans” may have been born in Europe—hence, they are “French” or “British”, but go back a generation or two and they hail from Dar-al-Islam, and are not truly “European” at all. Of course, there *are* a handful of “reverts”, but these are rarer.”

          I believe that by “ethnic Europeans” Tayler is referring to physical features, like the colour of the skin. If he wasn’t talking about that then “European citizens” would have sufficed, and I’m sure Mr. Spencer would have asked the obligatory question: “Do they consider themselves to be European citizens or were they brought up in an environment obeying the islamic imperative to be loyal to the ummah alone?”. But Tayler went out of his way to specify ethnicity. White (or “ethnic”) Europeans would have no reasons to join the islamic state, or any other islamic terrorist group, because they grew up in a land mostly populated with other white Europeans and therefore they weren’t subject to the alleged “discrimination” or “disenfranchisement” descendants of non-European migrants suffer, nor do they have any sort of ties to non-European lands. But they go and join islamic terrorist groups. Why? Well, because of islam.

          “I believe his points re Jeffrey Tayler’s take on things are of interest, but—as is not uncommon—that they are rather too harsh.”

          You’re being too kind. He shouldn’t be able to get away with bolstering his ego by misrepresenting and vilifying someone, especially someone bringing what I believe to be overall JW’s stance to people who, by definition, are completely opposed to it.

          “And, of course, I did not mean to imply that Voegelinian’s bashing of yourself was something I considered perceptive.”

          Don’t worry, that idea never crossed my mind. It wouldn’t, even if he had his take on Tayler and the insult in the same post 😉

          Take care 🙂

        • gravenimage says

          May 18, 2015 at 12:08 am

          Thanks for laying out your take on things, Angemon. I’ll mull them over.

          Hope you are well, also.

        • Angemon says

          May 18, 2015 at 6:26 am

          Thank you, GI. That’s all I ask. Things are fine in this side of the pond. Apparently, summer decided to come early and it’s beach time already 🙂

  20. Max Publius says

    May 13, 2015 at 7:15 pm

    Robert, the answer can be found in the same rationale of the left for those who were anti-communist before it became stylish (moments after the Berlin Wall fell), i.e., the American conservative movement was “prematurely anti-communist”.

    You and Pamela were prematurely anti-jihadist. You decided way too quick after 9/11 (and the other stuff before which we all know was about poverty and “respect”). You and Pamela needed to witness a few thousand more beheadings, massacres, genocides, kidnappings, rapes, and all around supremacist behavior by jihadists and Islamic governments before you put your toe into the waters of being critical of Islam.

    • gravenimage says

      May 18, 2015 at 12:20 am

      Max Publius wrote:

      You and Pamela were prematurely anti-jihadist.
      …………………………..

      Interesting, Max—I’ve referred to those of us in the Counter Jihad tongue-in-cheek as “premature Anti-Jihadist”, just as those who saw the ugliness of Nazism as early as the 1930s were ludicrously referred to as “premature Anti-Fascists”.

      Until now, I’ve never heard anyone else use the term. Great minds and all that…

  21. abad says

    May 13, 2015 at 7:41 pm

    The only ones responsible for killing non-Muslims while screeching “Allah Akhbar” are Muslims themselves. It is called personal accountability. Muslims need to stop blaming non-Muslims – that’s all there is to it.

  22. Lia Wissing says

    May 14, 2015 at 4:40 am

    Thank you & congratulations Mr Tayler!

  23. Davegreybeard says

    May 14, 2015 at 1:58 pm

    @Angemon
    “Can you explain to me why you consider replying to a coward, underhanded attack, “bullying”?”

    Basically It has to do with the length and depth of your reply(s) to the insult directed at you.

    In my opinion, the first paragraph of your reply to voeg was sufficient. Going on to bring up numerous past insults, arguments and incidents while launching new insults yourself, is kind of excessive – hence my “bullying” comment. It’s just my opinion.

    And I didn’t say not to respond, I just asked if it was possible for you to dial it back a bit. It would be nice if voeg could make a comment sans the personal insults. He almost managed it, but then, in his follow up post, just had to squeeze one in – exasperating.

    @Angemon
    “And can I get your opinion of what lying about other users, ascribing them thing they never said or outright insulting them is if not bullying?”

    What you describe sounds like bullying. My first thought is “But mommy he did it too!”

    I am on JW almost every day. But I do not read every article and I certainly do not follow all the bantering back and forth of all the people who post here. You claim that in the past, voeg lied about you, insulted you, etc. etc. I am not familiar with all the incidents you are referring to, but I’ll take your word for it. I need no “proof” of what you say and frankly, I’m not interested.

    What I am interested in is any comments you may have on voeg’s detailed analysis of the article above.

    • Angemon says

      May 14, 2015 at 3:58 pm

      Davegreybeard posted:

      “Basically It has to do with the length and depth of your reply(s) to the insult directed at you.

      In my opinion, the first paragraph of your reply to voeg was sufficient. Going on to bring up numerous past insults, arguments and incidents while launching new insults yourself, is kind of excessive – hence my “bullying” comment. It’s just my opinion.”

      We’ll have to agree to disagree on that. Voeg didn’t pick a random user to insult that just happened to be me. There’s a history behind it and I believe it’s worthwhile to note that he has done this in the past – avoiding open discussion when inquired/criticized about something eh said only to go into another topic and throw that kind of mud against whoever questioned/criticized him. And I’m not just talking about me. He has done that to several users, always playing the victim and demanding that other regulars step in to silence whoever happened to disagree with him. One can overlook what happens once or twice, but after a certain point one can see it’s a pattern of behaviour, and a disturbing one at that. Frankly, I consider that his harassment of some users, trying to guilt trip them into coming to “defend” him (even users who have stepped up to defend him), borders sociopathy.

      “And I didn’t say not to respond, I just asked if it was possible for you to dial it back a bit. It would be nice if voeg could make a comment sans the personal insults.”

      I didn’t say anything about the other comment where he didn’t just had to throw the insult in.

      “He almost managed it, but then, in his follow up post, just had to squeeze one in – exasperating.”

      Not the first time he does that, and I doubt it will be the last. And yet, that never stopped him to play the victim, as if I’m the one going around randomly insulting and deriding him.

      “My first thought is “But mommy he did it too!””

      I prefer the analogy “if you don’t want to get punched in the face then don’t spit in my eye, And if you then cry and go tell people I’m a big bully because I punched you in the face then I’m going to point out you spat in my eye”.

      “What I am interested in is any comments you may have on voeg’s detailed analysis of the article above.”

      Well, there’s nothing particularly different from voeg’s standard posts – take out the fluff and thesaurus and there’s not much actual substance, in the sense that he has a certain amount of ideas and speech patterns he recycles over and over but there’s nothing new or refreshing, nothing that hasn’t been said previously, and often more eloquently, by other people. His analysis is certainly not detailed, at least on my definition of “detailed analysis”. By my definition, a detailed analysis would scrutinize most, if not all, of the article. Voeg opens with an assertion (that Tayler is somehow PC MC enough to be allowed to write for Salon), picks a paragraph, makes a wrong assertion (more on that later) and writes a lot of nothing based on that.

      This bit stood out. Voeg goes to say “that the problem is all of Islam and all Muslims“. But I’ve seen him before saying that the problem wasn’t islam but muslims. So, which way is it? Is the problem islam? Is the problem all the muslims? Is the problem islam and all the muslims?

      A common occorence in voeg’s posts is him misrepresenting a point then “skilfully” defeating the misrepresentation. There’s a name for that: strawman fallacy. For example, take this statement by Tayler:

      ““We can delude ourselves no longer: violence is an emergent property deriving from Islam’s inherently intolerant precepts and dogma. The rising number of ethnic Europeans mesmerized by Islam who set off to enroll in the ranks of ISIS attests to this; and may prefigure serious disruptions, especially in France, the homeland of a good number of them, once they start returning. There is nothing “phobic” about recognizing this. Recognize it we must, and steel ourselves for what’s to come.””

      voeg’s take is this:

      “Tayler’s imperfection seems to revolve mostly around his retention of the TMOE meme (the Tiny MInority of Extremists).Tayler is making it sound like non-Muslims are being hypnotized by some ineffable quality of Islam that moves them to go join the grotesquely evil and ultra-violent ISIS; when as a matter of fact the ones joining ISIS are already Muslim (…) What Taylor is adroitly (or ineptly) avoiding is the reasonably inferred conclusion we must draw that there is something in normative ordinary Islam that makes Muslims like ISIS.”

      I submit to you the following alternative: what Tayler means when he says that “violence is an emergent property deriving from Islam’s inherently intolerant precepts and dogma… There is nothing “phobic” about recognizing this” is that violence is derived from islam’s precepts and dogma and that there is nothing phobic about recognizing this. Tayler doesn’t avoid it, he says it out clear. And he backs his claim by saying “The rising number of ethnic Europeans mesmerized by Islam who set off to enroll in the ranks of ISIS attests to this“, meaning that those ethnic Europeans who joined the islamic state did so because of islam, not because of their cultural upbringing and the traditions of the region they were raised in, like it could be argued by those trying to distance ISIS from islam by claims ISIS is, for example, tribal and/or ethnic disputes masked as religion, or the result of poverty.

      And I think my take on that paragraph is not unique. Since the creation of Jihad Watch, Mr. Spencer has deconstructed many articles who, purposely or not, end up separating groups like al-Qaeda or the islamic state from islamic orthodoxy. I risk saying that it’s become second nature to him, and yet he saw nothing of the kind on Tayler’s article – Mr. Spencer describes it as being ” thoughtful and well-reasoned”. In fact, Mr. Spencer bolds the part voeg considers “offensive” as to make it stand out.

      Also,notice that voeg saw fit to leave out the part I bolded for emphasis. He created a strawman (the notion that Tayler was avoid saying that normative islam is responsible for the like of the islamic state) and “skilfully” defeated it… by saying what Tayler said in the first place. Why, yes, normative islam is responsible for, for example, the islamic state. I don’t think anyone here disagrees with it. I don’t. Jeffrey Tayler doesn’t seem to disagree with it, and certainly neither does Mr. Spencer, who emphasized the part reviewed by voeg.

      So the question is: how come voeg got the exact opposite idea? Why is he portraying Tayler as someone buying hook, line and sinker the idea of “the TMOE meme (the Tiny MInority of Extremists)“? Who stands to win from it? The answer is: voeg. According to voeg’s narrative, Tayler is parroting PC speak and unwilling to link islam with violence and that’s why he’s allowed to write in Salon, while voeg is the knight in shining armour waving his sword of righteousness around and dissipating the poison fog of “politically correctness”, coming to our rescue by… telling us what we already know and what Tayler said.

      Now, I don’t think I need to cheer anyone for telling me something that not only I know but also take for granted, especially when he tried to denigrate someone who was saying it to a wider audience.

      The rest of his post is just his standard railing against “asymptotics” (and there’s a funny story regarding the coinage of the term) and further denigrating Mr. Tayler based on the (all things considered, we can reasonably infer, purposely) erroneous assumption that Tayler is somehow adding to the confusion and trying to excuse islam rather than pointing out that the violence of groups like the islamic state comes from islam, that there’s nothing phobic about point it out and that we need to brace ourselves for what’s coming.

      tl;dr: there’s nothing new or original on voeg’s analysis, and he goes out of his way to misrepresent Tayler’s position while trying to profit from it.

  24. Bindon Blood says

    May 14, 2015 at 3:33 pm

    The left always get it wrong and they always side with the group that they think offers the best hope for the destruction of the Western way of life as we know it and the imposition of their Lefty Marxist fairy land.In the 1920s and the 1930s the left thought Mussolini was wonderful ,until he bombed Abyssinia. The left only really fell out with Hitler after he attacked their sacrosanct spiritual homeland,the blood soaked Soviet Union. Now it’s Islam.The same ambitions ,same or similar methods,and the left love them. When it’s too late the left will denounce Islam and demand praise for doing so.We must all remember when they were hot for Islam,never let the left forget.

  25. gravenimage says

    May 15, 2015 at 8:42 pm

    Jeffrey Tayler in Salon: “The left has Islam all wrong”
    ……………………….

    Wow—this piece appeared in *Salon*? Given that magazine’s constant excoriation of heroes Robert Spencer and Pamela Geller, this is astonishing.

    But whatever this says about Salon’s editorial schizophrenia, it’s good to see the truth is getting out there at least some of the time. Kudos to Jeffrey Tayler.

  26. Frosty says

    May 16, 2015 at 2:23 pm

    Nothing puzzling about it, Salon doesn’t like you. It’s the messenger, not the message. Just as this site never covers Aaayan Hirsi Ali

    • gravenimage says

      May 18, 2015 at 12:49 am

      Frosty wrote:

      Nothing puzzling about it, Salon doesn’t like you. It’s the messenger, not the message. Just as this site never covers Aaayan Hirsi Ali
      ……………………………

      Um…what?

      “Video: Robert Spencer on Sun TV: Ayaan Hirsi Ali and the Islamic war on free speech”

      http://www.jihadwatch.org/2014/04/video-robert-spencer-on-sun-tv-ayaan-hirsi-ali-and-the-islamic-war-on-free-speech

      “Ayaan Hirsi Ali: Here’s What I Would Have Said at Brandeis”

      http://www.jihadwatch.org/2014/04/ayaan-hirsi-ali-heres-what-i-would-have-said-at-brandeis

      “Biden tried to lecture Hirsi Ali about Islam”

      http://www.jihadwatch.org/2014/12/biden-tried-to-lecture-hirsi-ali-about-islam

      There are dozens of more stories about Ayaan Hirsi Ali on Jihad Watch, dating back years.

  27. Oliver says

    May 16, 2015 at 3:24 pm

    On a few posts, both in this post and others (on JW and elsewhere) use RINO (Republican In name Only).

    I guess that means NOT AGREEING 110% WITH EVERYTHING THAT SOMEONE SAYS ALL REPUBLICANS SHOULD AGREE WITH.

    With that, Barry Goldwater (pro-choice- his family helped start Planned Parenthood in Arizona; for gay rights and gays in the military–HE WAS A GENERAL WHO SAW COMBAT- (U.S.A.F.), and other “non republican ” views. (he also said, paraphrasing- in response to THE MORAL MAJORITY)–did not start a revolution to get the government out of our pocketbooks to get them into our bedrooms. But, that is what (it seems) the ‘social conservatives’ want to do.

    as, in another 9conservative blog) a RINO wrote, I want fiscal conservatism; limited government; strong defense.

    I WILL TAKE CARE OF MY SOUL, AND MY MORALITY. I DON’T NEED THE GOVERNMENT -OR ANYONE ELSE- TO TELL ME WHAT TO DO.

    I agree.

    if a Republican dares to disagree- regardless of his/her reasons- immediately, immediate crucifixion. (not physical, of course).

    Tea baggers seem to be the worst ( my view).

    They (look at recent elections) disagreed with rep. candidates 9for Senate) in Indiana- so instead of a competent, foreign affairs expert, got a liberal; in Nevada -so instead of someone competent, stuck with Reid for a few more years (to end soon); Delaware- the same; -as Indiana, etc.

    in the last Pres. election-Romney was not ‘conservative’ enough, so did not vote, etc.

    Seems, like the bully -my bat, my ball, my rules or i take and go home, and you all go screw yourselves.

    but, the country ( and they0 get screwed.

    My views.

FacebookYoutubeTwitterLog in

Subscribe to the Jihad Watch Daily Digest

You will receive a daily mailing containing links to the stories posted at Jihad Watch in the last 24 hours.
Enter your email address to subscribe.

Please wait...

Thank you for signing up!
If you are forwarding to a friend, please remove the unsubscribe buttons first, as they my accidentally click it.

Subscribe to all Jihad Watch posts

You will receive immediate notification.
Enter your email address to subscribe.
Note: This may be up to 15 emails a day.

Donate to JihadWatch
FrontPage Mag

Search Site

Translate

The Team

Robert Spencer in FrontPageMag
Robert Spencer in PJ Media

Articles at Jihad Watch by
Robert Spencer
Hugh Fitzgerald
Christine Douglass-Williams
Andrew Harrod
Jamie Glazov
Daniel Greenfield

Contact Us

Terror Attacks Since 9/11

Archives

  • 2020
    • December
    • November
    • October
    • September
    • August
    • July
    • June
    • May
    • April
    • March
    • February
    • January
  • 2019
    • December
    • November
    • October
    • September
    • August
    • July
    • June
    • May
    • April
    • March
    • February
    • January
  • 2018
    • December
    • November
    • October
    • September
    • August
    • July
    • June
    • May
    • April
    • March
    • February
    • January
  • 2017
    • December
    • November
    • October
    • September
    • August
    • July
    • June
    • May
    • April
    • March
    • February
    • January
  • 2016
    • December
    • November
    • October
    • September
    • August
    • July
    • June
    • May
    • April
    • March
    • February
    • January
  • 2015
    • December
    • November
    • October
    • September
    • August
    • July
    • June
    • May
    • April
    • March
    • February
    • January
  • 2014
    • December
    • November
    • October
    • September
    • August
    • July
    • June
    • May
    • April
    • March
    • February
    • January
  • 2013
    • December
    • November
    • October
    • September
    • August
    • July
    • June
    • May
    • April
    • March
    • February
    • January
  • 2012
    • December
    • November
    • October
    • September
    • August
    • July
    • June
    • May
    • April
    • March
    • February
    • January
  • 2011
    • December
    • November
    • October
    • September
    • August
    • July
    • June
    • May
    • April
    • March
    • February
    • January
  • 2010
    • December
    • November
    • October
    • September
    • August
    • July
    • June
    • May
    • April
    • March
    • February
    • January
  • 2009
    • December
    • November
    • October
    • September
    • August
    • July
    • June
    • May
    • April
    • March
    • February
    • January
  • 2008
    • December
    • November
    • October
    • September
    • August
    • July
    • June
    • May
    • April
    • March
    • February
    • January
  • 2007
    • December
    • November
    • October
    • September
    • August
    • July
    • June
    • May
    • April
    • March
    • February
    • January
  • 2006
    • December
    • November
    • October
    • September
    • August
    • July
    • June
    • May
    • April
    • March
    • February
    • January
  • 2005
    • December
    • November
    • October
    • September
    • August
    • July
    • June
    • May
    • April
    • March
    • February
    • January
  • 2004
    • December
    • November
    • October
    • September
    • August
    • July
    • June
    • May
    • April
    • March
    • February
    • January
  • 2003
    • December
    • November
    • October
    • March

All Categories

You Might Like

Learn more about RevenueStripe...

Recent Comments

  • gravenimage on Erdogan: ‘Turks must defend the rights of Jerusalem, even with their lives’ for ‘the honor of the Islamic nation’
  • gravenimage on Erdogan: ‘Turks must defend the rights of Jerusalem, even with their lives’ for ‘the honor of the Islamic nation’
  • Walter Sieruk on Iranian Kurdistan: Muslim brothers behead their sister in honor killing over her romantic relationship
  • gravenimage on Uighur leader: ‘We’re actually quite worried’ about what Biden might let China get away with
  • James Lincoln on Iranian Kurdistan: Muslim brothers behead their sister in honor killing over her romantic relationship

Popular Categories

dhimmitude Sharia Jihad in the U.S ISIS / Islamic State / ISIL Iran Free Speech

Robert Spencer FaceBook Page

Robert Spencer Twitter

Robert Spencer twitter

Robert Spencer YouTube Channel

Books by Robert Spencer

Jihad Watch® is a registered trademark of Robert Spencer in the United States and/or other countries - Site Developed and Managed by Free Speech Defense

Content copyright Jihad Watch, Jihad Watch claims no credit for any images posted on this site unless otherwise noted. Images on this blog are copyright to their respective owners. If there is an image appearing on this blog that belongs to you and you do not wish for it appear on this site, please E-mail with a link to said image and it will be promptly removed.

Our mailing address is: David Horowitz Freedom Center, P.O. Box 55089, Sherman Oaks, CA 91499-1964

loading Cancel
Post was not sent - check your email addresses!
Email check failed, please try again
Sorry, your blog cannot share posts by email.