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Originally Posted by badlander
I have no problem with anyone being critical of Islam, I am an atheist and believe that there is both good and bad in all the holy books.
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I do not agree on this point. I suggest you research and do an in depth analysis of the point "bad in all the holy books."
There are no evil and violent elements in Jainism and perhaps a few lines [as a drop in the ocean within the Buddhist sutras]. It is the same for Taoism. However Hinduism is quite a mixed bag of religions so I cannot really claim for Hinduism in general as I claim for other Eastern religions. However the main strand of Hinduism, i.e. Vedanta is not focused nor have any heavy weighting on evils and violence.
One of the central core principle of the Abrahamic religions is invoking the primal "us versus them" impulse which immediately treat the 'them' as a threat with contempt. Thereafter all sort of negatives are pounded upon the non-believers. The Abrahamic religions are however centered heavily with evil laden elements with Islam-in-part as the worst culprit.
The NT overrides the OT and has an overriding pacifist limit to the degree and how far a Christian can exercise any violence on non-believers.
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No its with people who claim that Islam is a wicked religion and ignore the
evils done in the name of Christianity, I am against those who paint all
Muslims as either terrorists or supporters of terrorists and I am against
those who hate Muslims because they are Muslims. In the past the same has been
applied to Jews, Pakistanis and First Nations people. In many Muslim countries
people do not protest groups like ISIS because they do not know who around
them is ISIS.
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First, humanity must addressed all sorts of evils and violence committed by any human or groups of humans.
It is very natural for the average person to commit hasty generalization as those who 'hate' Muslims because other Muslims are committing evil and violence. This is a logical fallacy where there is room for the masses to be educated. Note how I spliced the components of the issue above and deal with the respective layers and the elements specifically and objectively in post 36# above,
This logical fallacy of hasty generalization is typical in most human issues, e.g. race, sex, social, politics and the solution is to educate the masses on critical and rational thinking. This is not a tough thing to do in the years to come especially when the internet is expanding in an exponential trend.
As for evils committed by believers [Buddhists, Christians, Taoist, Hindus, etc.] we should be differentiate as I have done above into,
1. Religious related violence
2. Religion-inspired violence.
We must identify the root cause of the above issue and deal with them effectively.
Since we are in an Islam forum, it is only by protocol that we discuss violence by Islamists and not other religions.
At present, Islam is the only religion that has prevalent issue that are related to both, 1. Religious related violence and 2. Religion-inspired violence and we need to deal with them individually. To resolve the above problems we have to take into consideration the human nature of Muslims and also the very large quantum of evil elements in the Quran. [btw, I am VERY familiar with the Quran].
A very serious problem we face with the evil laden elements in the Quran, i.e. the core of Islam is the Quran is the immutable words of Allah and thus cannot be changed. So humanity cannot edit out the 'evil laden' elements. Thus as long as Islam exists its potential for evil will always follows. The other factor is we have a the inevitable percentile of evil prone humans [say 20%] in any groups of people. This combination of immutable evil laden elements and inevitable percentile of evil prone believers is a ready made very volatile Molotov Cocktail waiting to explode [has been exploding all the time and will continue to do so]. Soon this Molotov will be a nuke.
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Two days before the Invasion of Iraq the Arab league meet and pleaded with the
USA not to invade because it will cause instability in the region. This
advise was of course ignored, Iraq was invaded and instability is widespread
in the entire region. The history of the past century is full of powerful
countries, USA, Britain, France and the Soviets interfering and keeping the
mostly Arabs down and from that perception of being held down many radical
groups have sprung up and supportEd by the local population as they were not
taught the truth and they are looking for a better life.
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Most agree the invasion of Iraq was a mistake because the US and most do not understand the inherent evil ethos of Islam.
As far as Islam [in part] is concern the general impulse is to dominate the 'them' and subdue them as stipulated in the Quran. This impulse is very active in the very zealous Muslims who want to please Allah in accordance to Allah ordinations the Quran. Note this is objective and not my imaginations.
Islam [in part] has malignant elements and wherever there is a weakness, those zealous Muslims will be trigger to act and do their bidding in accordance to the Quran.
One point to note is, no Muslim will ever dare to act without knowing it is the sanction of Allah as in the Quran or the secondary texts [supposedly sanction by Allah]. One wrong move and they will go to Hell as stipulated in the Quran.
Therefore whatever a Muslim does whether it is violent or not violent in the eyes of others, to that Muslim what he has done is according to Islam and by the Book. Since there is no central authority, who in the world is in a position to say who is right and wrong. The Muslims who commit evils and violence is confident he is doing right [will earn merit points] because he is supporting his violent act from the Quran and not on his own.
The catch-22 is a Muslims must commit evil and violence as what the book say otherwise he will go to hell as stipulated in the Quran, i.e. the verbatim words of Allah.
Such is the position of Islam with Muslims and thus Islam-in-part must acknowledge it is part of the problem with Islamic evil.
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It is easier to be critical when you live in a free and democratic country.
Not so easy if you are living in a country with a strong presence of radical
Muslims, lived in Rwanda during its genocide or in the former Yugoslavia and
certainly n9t in the former Soviet block or Nazi Germany. And when Muslims
do condemn these acts of terrorism too many of us just use this as an excuse
to be even more critical of them.
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We can understand there are restriction on the freedom of speech where there are political oppression.
But how can a religion [ which is by default] peaceful be given the power and authority to suppress the freedom of speech of non-believers.
If Islam do not claim itself as a religion [as Woodrow does] then it is a cult or an ideology and should be condemned as such where it can be done.
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We must condemn acts ot terrorism but we should also support those Muslims who also condemm those acts. We must also stand against acts of hatred and bigotry against Muslims. Attempting to burn down a mosque 8s not a sign of being critical of the religion of Islam aND we can not use acts of terrorism to justify our own acts of terrorism..
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We as human beings must do what good human beings are supposed to do. Thus all acts of violence [bigotry, hatred, violence, etc.] against another or other human beings should be condemned regardless of whether it is secular or religious. This should be a separate issue from this OP and can be dealt within the Philosophy of Morality and Ethics. [I am reasonably good at this philosophically].
However in this OP what is critical is the ignorance of the critical ultimate cause that contribute to religion-inspired violence and evils. Protocol wise, this is the critical area we must focus in this forum.
To bring other side issues to deflect, dilute and blunt the main point is very psychological and emotional and will not be effective to the discussion.
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