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The "Islam Is Peace" campaign...
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Originally Posted by Baal:
Oman & Yemen have the worst track records for failing to pass down the oil money to the rest of their populations.
This is not about religion. This was in reply to someone suggesting that Oman is as enlightened as Jordan.
But you bring a good point: is this just capitalism gone bad or religion gone bad? I do not see people in Oman being taught in Capitalism, they are taught in islam. A Religion that takes pride in being more then just a religion, that prides itself in being a complete lifestyle. And followers who take pride that their religion is a complete lifestyle as well.
To me, Blaming Capitalism for failing the muslim Omanis is the same as Blaming Capitalism for the failing of Communist Ciacesco's Romania. They both have built-in measures that make it hard for a progressive and beneficial form of capitalism or even benign socialism to take effect.
Originally Posted by Baal:
Your claim that only the "ruling elite" are engaging in honor murder. That is of course bogus since the king and his wife are opposed to this travesty. Sorry, I remember you talking about how Jordan is not a democracy and that it is only the will of the rulers is getting implemented.
Logical Fallacy: Non Sequitur.
Logical Fallacy: Tu Coque.
I have my own beef with Christianity and I am a secular Catholic. What does Bible Thumpers following some mass murdering prophets from god have anything to do with this?
Hello Aladdin,
If you consider a third of caught but unpunished murders in a country a drop in the ocean then that is a problem with your humanity.
If you consider semi-sanctioned state murder committed against the victims of sexual abuse to be a drop in the Ocean then that is a problem with your humanity.
If you do not consider the total state of fear of EVERY SINGLE woman who lives under such laws then there is a problem with your humanity.
If you do not consider the condition that since murder is so lightly punished then the crime of violence that does not lead to murder is probably not even a crime. (And it rarely is a crime in muslim countries unless the woman is lying in a hospital bed).
(Refer to verse : 4:34 and no remember that no state law can be above the koran)
I know you do not really believe what you said, and are just probably trying to win some virtual brownie debate points (aren't we all) but you are really scrapping the barrel of your humanity on this one.
This is not just about Jordan. This is about the Islamic Umma. This is about the religious authority patting down the secular authority because the population fundamentally wants to the Koran supremacy even though I admit, they know very little about that book and the vast majority (over 90%) can not read it.
As you are stating the population had bugger all to say on the matter. You are mistaken: What is the islamic population, including the jordanian population doing to combat this travesties of justice? They are campaigning to the West that "Islam is Peace".
Really? After all Saudi oil money gets spread around the Saudi royal family and under Saddam oil money was divided between corrupt UN officials and the Baathist party.
I don't know Yemen, but I do know Oman and it was a relatively prosperous, liberal country.
That's true, but my point was the comparison wasn't necessarily valid - i.e. Jim was saying if the practice isn't the same as the scripture it's relevent, the question then was what about Nazi's. My argument was - although both systems of ideology / belief - they are not similar enough to compare and draw any good (relevant) comparisons, because the circumstances are so different. One is a monolithic major religion dating back hundreds of years, the others was an ideology thought up to justify religious and racial persecution. The first one therefore, has 'god' at it's heart - and trying to reach him or something like that - and the other has a disturbing objective of genocide.
I'm trying to think of another example... but it's hard to think of one similar. I mean, I can use brain size
Mice - small brains, simple intelligence
Cat - bigger brain, more intelligence
Monkey - bigger brain still, yet more intelligence
Human - massive brain mass, highly intelligent
Whale? - humongous brain mass, but not as intelligent as humans, but they're from such a different environment and are so different (even though they're still an animal) you can't compare them properly.
It's a really bad example, but I hope you see my point. In order to compare anything, (and everything is relative), you need markers that are similar, you can't measure them against something random just to justify your point, it's about objectivity I feel.
Why are you under the impression that the majority of practicing muslims do not hide behind their religion to perform muder or other hateful acts? If a muslim commits a murder that can be justified through his religion then he is hiding behind his religion.
You also state that "Islam itself was not constructed as Nazism was". The who wrote the koran? god? of course islam is constructed. And the first Disciple of Muhammad became the first ruler (Caliph) and committed ethnic cleansing and so did the Second ruler and the Third and the Fourth. The Next Ten rulers were all related to the Third ruler (Amawids), and the (Abbassids) who were also cousins to Muhammad from his tribe Quraysh.
Islam stayed in the family for Centuries. How do you assume it was not constructed? Even the Ottomen claimed descendansy from Quraysh but no one believe them.
Why so? you seem to think that the Koran has equal amounts of hate and fear and goodness as other books. You seem to assume that just because this is a "Religion", then obviously it passed through checks & balances that garanteed there is a balance of good and evil.
Sorry but you are wrong, the checks and balances are not automatically built-in all religions. The Aztec had this festival for the Corn god where they would take a 15yr old kid, cut the tendons attaching his jaw to his face, rip his jaw. As he is agonizing, they skin him and take his skin off and 'wear' it. They do their best to make sure the victim stays alive as long as possible so he can die screaming as he is thrown down the pyramid stairs screaming with no jaw or skin.
The Aztec had many other similar festivities attended by the masses. So if you want to compare islam to other religions you might as well compare islam to the Aztec religions. And do not think that the Checks & Balances killed the Aztec overnight. The Aztec lasted for Thousands of years. We uncovered a city for them that is as big as New York.
The Aztec gods referred to themselves as the "Trickster Gods", the "Deceiving Gods". Of course the Aztec, interpreted "Trickster" in the nicest way possible. Guess what Allah calls himself in the Koran: "Khayr Al Makerin": the "Best of Deceivers", "The Best of Tricksters". And of course we have the muslim interpreting this sentence in the nicest way possible.
The scripture of the Islam permits hate & fear and murder at the "exclusion" of peace and goodness. A muslim can only accept peace and never offers it. And can only accept peace if they follow the true religion, establish regular prayer and pay the Zakat (islamic tax). Of the 6666 verses in the book, less then 1% is about doing good to humanity and the good is repetitive and not that good or enlightening.
Of the 70 or so instances of goodness, Five times the muslim is instructed to take care of orphans. Like every good warrior society, taking care of orphans is paramount. But, considering there is only 70 instances of good in the Koran, did we really need to waste 5 instances to take care of orphans?
Whenever I see those orphan verses, I feel like I am staring at Bush or a politician or Ossama Bin Laden taking a picture with a Baby. "The Orphans, The Orphans, save the Orphans.." Yet the book does not take any measure to reduce the number of orphans by not killing their infidel & apostating parents in the first place.
You mention Criticism. Criticism (or the lack of it) is the problem. I said it earlier and will restate it now: Islam lacks Criticism. Never had their been such a wide written body of material that completely and utterly lacked self-criticism.
The islamic scripture is designed to protect itself from criticism. The Koran is very very good to its soldiers. A Christian shooting an abortionist has no religious ground to stand on. The muslim who stabbed Theo Van Gogh is going to Paradise as far as the islamic scripture is concerned. And you do not have to twist ANY islamic text. The islamic text can be used as is to justify the killing of Theo.
That is the problem ShyBoy. Since you directly assume it is "no worse" then you also assume they deserve to be protected to continue doing what they do. All I want them is to permit self-criticism and not go after apostates. After all an apostate is no longer a muslim and no longer should have any islamic verses applied on them.
There are aspects of islam that I believe are not compatible with today's humanity and those aspects will not be address unless muslims begin to self-criticize themselves. Until they do self-criticize themselves, I will have to do it for them.
Originally Posted by Baal
Oman & Yemen have the worst track records for failing to pass down the oil money to the rest of their populations.
Yemen and Oman having the Worst, does not mean the others are 'good'.
Because I don't believe that most muslims commit murder in the name of Allah. I believe most Muslims are good people who cherish all life, just like most people of the world.
My point is that not all Muslims do this.
The specific reason behind Nazism was to permit and justify genocide. Islam (as far as I'm aware) was founded due to people's beliefs about God / Allah / creation and the way one should live their life according to 'His' teachings. I'm not saying God wrote the Koran, but that it wasn't specifically written to endorse killing and hate (even if it does).
I think this is a reasonable assumption to make seeing as it's incredibly similar to the Bible and so on. Both have bits about vengeful gods and so forth. Isn't Islam a spin off of Christianity anyway?
Not at all, merely that the major monolithic religions all came from the same roots in essence, and all have bad and good bits - but the religion should be judged on the practice of it - and as I have said I don't believe at all, that most Muslims endorse killing or violence or hate.
That's quite horrid, but again, Aztec religion is very far removed from Islam wouldn't you agree?
Again, I don't think it would be fair to compare Islam to Aztec(ism?) as they're from very different environments where different social norms were prevalent at their conceptions. Otherwise we are just picking points of convenience. Surely I could pick the religion of Jedi (:D), again it is a religion, and shows how good people can be. It has a code of humanity that is based on basic human rights and wrongs that people intrinsically adhere to, which most systems of beliefs are based on anyway.
But I'm sure you'd agree in saying how can you compare Jedi to Islam? They come from different places, different cultures, they are not relevant to each other. Whereas Christianity, Hindu, Judaism, Islam all come from the same regions of the world where the cultures are fairly similar, so we can compare these fairly. Is Islam inheritly violent therefore? I believe, no more so than other religions, and inherit violence from Muslims is born from socioeconomic issues in Muslim regions, i.e. EXTREME poverty / poor welfare in the middle east due to wars and strife - the average age of a man in Palestine is 15.9 years! (https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/gz.html CIA World Factbook 2007) Compare this to the UK at 38.5 years and you can begin to see we live in a much better environment, and it's desperation that causes violence and hate more than any other single thing.
And the Loki in viking mythology was something like that too - I don't know if we can draw comparisons based on names or titles (seems slightly tenuous).
But the practice of Islam is by and large peaceful, that's my point. If you want to debate scripture (which is ok) then consider that again, it is no more violent than other religions that in their literal sense permit all manner of crimes and violence for crimes such as not resting on Sunday.
Not that people do this of course, because they don't take everything literally.
I dunno, looking after orphans seems worthwhile. I'm no expert on the Koran. But does this mean or imply that Islam is a hateful religion?
It's fine to criticise Islam, but here we're not Islamic scholars, in fact most of us I assume are not practicing of any religion - therefore why should we single out Islam when fundamentally it is the same as the other monolithic religions I have pointed out?
I wouldn't be so sure about a Christian being unable to justify abortion, abortion could = murder, and so on.
I agree with you here - why shouldn't you be able to criticise Islam. My point is that from my perspective, why should we pick fault with Islam when in normal everyday society we would not heckle a Christian for what it says in the bible, or a Jew for their beliefs and so on. Obviously if you're an apostate then you have a personal interest, but from an objective point of view I can only compare Islam to the other major religions. I think that common sense will and does prevail in normal circumstances but where people are desperate they will and do use it as an excuse.
But doesn't that make you a preacher in itself? You are actively preaching to Muslims about the wrongs of Islam, whilst ignoring that these are problems found in all religions and are overcome by humanity. I am not convinced they are entirely incompatible since many people do live good lives and still practice Islam. When a conflict occurs they must use their better judgement and sometimes it is not clear what is the right choice. But those who follow the more extreme parts of the Qu'ran are those who simply wish to use it as an excuse.
edit:
I find it funny in the time it took me to write that I wrote 852 words when instead I could have been doing an essay on Implicit Social Contracts
Try to read my posts properly.
I'm just questioning if you have the same contempt for Christians who don't follow the Bible literarlly as you appear to have for Muslims who don't follow the Koran literally.
Yawn. And again you fail (deliberately or otherwise) to misread what I said. You seemed to be suggesting earlier that honour killing are a common occurrence. They aren't. Murders tend to be quite an uncommon occurance for most folks. We were not discussing how terrible they are. All crimes are terrible. But they are not a common occurrence.
See above.
Do try to keep up.
You are extremely naive if you think people can change what they not like about a country as easily as they can change into their pyjamas in the evening. It's difficult enough in democracies. Let alone non-democracies.
I suppose the people of Spain, Chile or Burma were really happy with the regimes they had/have to endure for decades, seeing as they did nothing about it...
A lot has been said in this thread so I think this is an appropriate time to take a little breather and reflect on our previous comments and the topic as a whole.
I would like you to give a quick summery of where you stand in this debate.
Which of my opinions do you agree with, which of my opinions do you disagree with, whether you support this IslamIsPeace campaign, etc...
... and any other concerns you have (which mainly seem to revolve around the tu-quoque argument involving Christianity)
Look forward to your reply.
So the reason why islamispeace is lying is because of the political situation around the world? :rolleyes:
So you agree with the opening thread then? Why didn't you say so in the first place!!
1) Hasty generalisation.
2) Deflective
3) Irrelevent to OP.
or one of us gets hit by a bus, or if you get abducted by aliens or ....
Irrelevant to opening thread.
You have contributed to the length of this thread by dragging it out with your apologetics. This comment:
should have been made much earlier. I wonder why it has took you so long to ADMIT it? :banghead:
But as a very brief resume:
No Abrahamic religion is peaceful.
Islam is probably slightly less peaceful than Christianity or Judaism- though not much.
But then a religion is made by its faithful and their actions as much as by what is said in their user manuals. And thefore quoting verses from the Koran giving instructions to kill and hate is not much proof of anything.
That the authors of the campaign have lied by saying Islam is peaceful is secondary and to be honest rather inconsequential next to what is happening in the world today and the current climate of persecution towards all muslims in many Western countries.
Singleing out Islam and demonising it because of the contents of the Koran is unfair since the other religions contain their fair share of atrocities. All, or none.
Some people are getting their knickers in a twist about an advertising campaign and should try to acquire a sense of perspective and to look at the bigger picture.
I think that about covers it.
Feel free to dissect and comment on the above so we can all start again and carry this thread's post count into four figures before the weekend
I never say I didn't. But there is a lot more to the story, and the venom and rage the advertising campaign has provoked on a few posters is disproporitionate and simplistic to breathtaking levels. Apparently several hundred posts later we're none the wiser.
Oh many things are irrelevant to the OP. That's how debate in internet forums usually works.
But relevant to the forum itself.
Oh I "admitted" it a long time ago. But as said before there is more to the story than that. For instance why the campaign was created or the double standards displayed in the West.
But frankly, I can't honestly comprehend people can get so worked out about an advertising campaign. If someone had created a thread a couple of months ago titled 'Why Islam is violent and should be challenged/fought'' I would have understood the seriousness of the issue and how passionate people could get about it. But getting worked out about a campaign? Perhaps even shouting "But that's not true. That's not truuuuuuuuue" in despair every time a bus passes you by on the street with the slogan on its side. So fucking what? Far more serious things to worry about in the workd than spin and PR campaigns. Report it to the Advertising Standards Authority if it bothers you so much
The Islam is Peace campaign is cynical propaganda imo, because the people behind it are well aware of the following 3 facts-
a)Muhammad's "Best example for all time" status - no bloody picking and choosing! Only things not to follow are those SPECIFICALLY abrogated or for "Muhammad only" (ie. more than 4 wives)
(b)The Quran is allegedly the word of Allah; unchanged, and 'protected from change.' Who gives a flying you-know-what WHAT some christians believe about the bible...it doesn't SAY its the "literal word of your God" or anything like the Quran does.
(c) As long as the Arabic texts (*especially the Quran*) are in existence, the "Islam is peace!" muslims don't have a leg to stand on. They can present all the "flowery translations" and omission/denial of evidence that they like; but the arabic texts (heck even the truer translations!) prove them completely wrong.
If they want to improve the view outsiders have of Islam they should be standing up to the people who commit human rights abuses in the name of Islam, terrorism in the name of Islam, and stage protests against the freedom of speech of cartoonists and writers in the name of Islam. That would be more honourable, and constructive, I think than a silly campaign to fox the kaffirs.
Islamispeace are lying. FACT.
And lastly, this gem:
Question
Answer
WTF?? :chin: :rolleyes:
Kindest Regards,
BB
To my knowledge, you have to twist the bible quite far in order to justify this sort of thing, as well as showing an unparalleled ignorance of simple biology. You'd have to twist Jainism to the degree that it genuinely isn't jainism any more. However, when someone commits a horrific act by following their holy book to the letter, is it not time to admit that the source material is rotten, and no measure of shoeing these verses under the carpet and inventing other interpretations for it is going to solve it? Incidentally, the unchangable dogma is the unique problem of religion, with political belief systems being constantly and quickly able to adapt. And it's precisely why you get so many educated people still subscribing to bronze-age moral standards that would be the realm of the psychopath otherwise.
I don't know anyone who starts arguing with muslims in the street out of the blue, just argues against other people's irrationality and superstition when it begins to effect our lives. I wouldn't walk up to someone wearing a hijab or a cross and tell them the error of their ways and get them to "defend such and such a verse." But I will argue strongly against Catholic doctrine in the abortion debate, Islamic doctrine in the women's rights debate and Jewish doctrine in the debate about teaching creationism in school, if and when they intrude upon the debate (as they so often do).
Why are they? If faith is a virtue, and this really is the word of God, then surely following it to the letter wherever possible (bear in mind, following it to the letter in its entirety, not just selecting the bad bits) is as holy as you can get?
Not really. I don't want to get into it too much, because my only comparison between the two is that they are both belief systems and should be equally cross-examined as such when they affect the lives of others. But as for nazism, the ultimate objective wasn't genocide, it was to improve the human gene pool by only allowing the best (in this case, white, non-Jewish) people to have children. Genocide was merely the tool used to attempt to achieve this goal, not the goal itself. A goal incidentally, slightly more rational than killing to get into heaven - only slightly mind.
Absolutely. The reason that the statistic that 78% of muslims wanted the Danish cartoonists charged is precisely for this reason. They need to realise that extremists in their own religion will be the first to hide behind any religious hate laws when people attempt to criticise what they are saying or doing (while simultaneously shouting from the rooftops about the flaws about how every other group lives). The idea that religion should be protected comes from supposed moderate members of religions, not extremists, but it's extremists that will benefit most from any legislation in this direction, because it will create a taboo around criticising religion (as if there isn't one already).
I'm sorry I missed this up till now.
The implication of this statement seems to be that the majority of Muslims are committing murder and violent acts. That's simply an untrue statement and clearly breaches the rule about hateful postings on this board.
Baal, make a similar statement to that again and you'll be banned. If people want to debate Islam and discuss if it's a violent religion that's one thing - but such a blanket untrue statement is appalling and isn't going to be allowed.
With an Islam population of in excess of 1.3 billion people in the world the idea that over half are committing murder and hateful acts is just horrible and hateful propaganda without foundation - there's simply not that much crime in the world.
Let's see if we can put it very plain and simple.
Do you think murders (of any type) are a common occurrence? Do you see three or four murders every day on your way to work every morning? Do you have to wipe blood from your clothes due to the inevitable killing that alwaystakes place next to you on the bus journey home in the evening?
Murders are an uncommon occurrence. Here, in Jordan or pretty much every country that is not called Iraq or Sudan. Honour killings are an uncommon occurrence in Jordan. The average Muslim does not commit one in his life time- though of course in a country of millions murders will occur and honour killings will occur.
If someone made that thread then they would STILL be confronted with your tu-quoque logical fallacy about “Christianity also being violent”.
You have bombarded this entire thread with your tu-quoque logical fallacy about “christianity also being violent”.
Even a murderer would be let off the hook with that argument because “Harold Shipman was also a murderer, and a much bigger one at that” :rolleyes:
Let me make it clear for you once and for all...
Your tu-quoque logical fallacy argument about “christianity also being violent” would hold some water if the people criticising Islam were Christians...
.. but I am not a Christian and I do not believe in Christianity and I would level the SAME criticism to any intolerant teachings of Christianity or any Christian who carries out violent/intolerant acts in the name of Christianity.
If only I was as well informed about Christianity as I am about Islam.
Has it crossed your mind that the biggest critics of Islam are NOT Christians... but are infact secular ex-Muslims?
I am an ex-Muslim of Pakistani origin
Ayaan Hirsi Ali is a Somali ex-Muslim
Salman Rushdie is a British ex-Muslim of Indian origin
Taslima Nasrin is an ex-Muslim of Indian/Bangladesh origin
Ali Sina is an ex-Muslim of Iranian origin
Ehsan Jami is an ex-Muslim of Iranian Origin
Maryam Namazie is an ex-Muslim of Iranian origin
Irshad Manji is of Pakistani origin
NONE of us believe in or support Christianity... yet why are we STILL confronted with the tu-quoque logical fallacy of “christianity also being violent” from useful idiots such as yourself when we try to objectively discuss Islam?
Reminds me of a joke I recently read about erstwhile apologists for the USSR: A listener calls in to Radio Armenia and asks, 'What is the average wage of an American manual worker?' There is a long pause. (The answer would be embarassing to the self-proclaimed workers' paradise, which was proving to be lots of work and no paradise). After a while he receives the answer: 'u nich linchuyut negrov' [over there they lynch Negroes].
Well yes, because it is true and very much relevant. But the point wasn't that. The point was how indescribably bizarre it has been to see this thread created and a number of new posters posting passionately about an advertising campaign.
People use advertisements on billboards to try to spin the truth shock! Stop the press!
You might be an ex-muslim. It remains to be seen whether the other newcomers are- one of them has already confirmed they aren't. And in the 'real' world, outside this internet forum, of course the biggest critics of Islam are Christians in their majority and of other religions and none. Certainly in Great Britain. That is why is important to remind everyone that quoting certain rules and instructions from the holy book of Islam is NOT a valid argument for demonising and singling out Islam, since it is no different to the other two Abrahamic religions.
However I wish I could turn back the clock and tell those behind the campaign to change the slogan to "Muslims are in their majority peaceful", seeing what waves of apoplectic rage their technically incorrect slogan has caused amongst a few people.
The campaign is a propaganda exercise; presenting a balanced view isn't what it's about.
It's just another polarised source of misinformation which does nothing to aid reasonable debate. In one camp people are portraying all Muslims as frothy mouthed fundamentalists avec bomb; the other camp has them painted as all sweetness and light; the truth is lost somewhere in between and the real issues go unaddressed.
Well that's not really the issue, is it? There are plenty of examples where someone might use something trivial as a starting point to discuss something serious. Remember that Eeny meeny miney mo advert prompting a debate about race relations, for example?
I didn't intend to come back to this thread, but then I saw this. I have to say this is a real personal bugbear of mine - english speakers making making smart, patronising comments to foreigners who speak english far better than you speak their language. I should have included it in my post in the Room 101 thread, because I find it every bit as annoying as people who make disgusting noises when they eat.
Aladdin, do you want to try debating with Baal in his first language? Because presumably your arabic is better than his english, otherwise you would hardly be immature enough to make such a comment? It reminds me of Jade Goody and friends taunting Shilpa Shetty in the BB house.