Sam Harris on "Islamophobia"

[metacristi]

nice link, its those kind of links that exposes the islamaphobes. its an extremely dishonest and biased comparison. and only used by people that actually know next to nothing about Islam and how muslims interpret their religion.

its like quoting thebloody parts of the tora nad say, see how dangerous judaism is......

for example they quote mine parts that show Allah (Wich is the father of Jesus btw lol) and mohammed saying violent stuff. then compare it to jesus quote of a peacefull passage, why did they not use this part?

"I came not to bring peace, but to bring a sword" Jesus

Because all people know, except probably Reza Aslan, that the so called violent message of Jesus you quote does not mean that Jesus is holding violence in high esteem but only that he opposed family values (as the full context of that passage establish easily, not surprising given the apocalyptic message of Jesus). Even the cardinals of Pope Urban did not use the passage to justify the First Crusade...

 

[metacristi]

you do understand that this God is the same god moslems pray to? you do realize that Jesus was also a very important prophet in Islam?
its like a trillogy, Judaism , part 2 is Christianity and the final part is Islam?

you do realize that stoning is not allowed in most "muslim countries" ?

ETA: also funny to note that the propaganda page "religionofpeace" points out that the bible said you shall not bare false witness.

yet alot of Christians actually believe Jesus was a liar lol.

I don't think you understand the magnitude of the problem, the strawmen you attack do not solve anything.

 

[DC]

Because all people know, except probably Reza Aslan, that the so called violent message of Jesus you quote does not mean that Jesus is holding violence in high esteem but only that he opposed family values (as the full context of that passage establish easily, not surprising given the apocalyptic message of Jesus). Even the cardinals of Pope Urban did not use the passage to justify the First Crusade...

LOL are you a Fox "news" watcher maybe?

oh dear.so context is important? why not when quoting hadits or the koran?
heck the propaganda page "religionofpeace" even thinks you do not need to actually quote the hadits, let alone the context.

why do you make such a big difference in comparing Christianity and Islam?

 

[DC]

I don't think you understand the magnitude of the problem, the strawmen you attack do not solve anything.

i think you don't know anything about Islam. and its actually you that is atacking a strawmen version of Islam.

 

[tsig]

How, I wonder, does one contest the assertion that Islam is worse than the other Abrahamic religions when one is not allowed to even mention those other Abrahamic religions?

OK we'll compare them. How many Muslim suicide bombers last year, how many for all other religions combined?

 

[raff55]

I think the problem largely exists in the definition of the word.

It is irrational to fear over a billion people because of their religion.

In other contexts it is rational to fear Islamic fundamentalism if you are an author, politician, artist or even a cartoonist when you want to exercise freedom of expression that might contradict Islamic claims.

 

[DC]

I think the problem largely exists in the definition of the word.

It is irrational to fear over a billion people because of their religion.

In other contexts it is rational to fear Islamic fundamentalism if you are an author, politician, artist or even a cartoonist when you want to exercise freedom of expression that might contradict Islamic claims.

not only for them, for everyone.

 

[A'isha]

oh dear.so context is important? why not when quoting hadits or the koran?
heck the propaganda page "religionofpeace" even thinks you do not need to actually quote the hadits, let alone the context.

And their recommended site for that, described by them as "[an e]xcellent resource for discovering what the Qur'an and Hadith have to say", is Craig Wynn's psychotic prophetofdoom.net, which flat-out forges ahadith.

 

[Ryokan]

OK we'll compare them. How many Muslim suicide bombers last year, how many for all other religions combined?

Why can you pick the year? Why can't I pick the year?

 

[metacristi]

He was motivated by people like Spencer and Geller and Fjordman and thereligionofpeace.com and their pants-wettingly terrified shrieking about Muslim Stranger Danger.

Read first what Fjordman and Spencer have to tell about Breivik, no one ever advocated such an extreme 'solution' (not that I agree with all these guys write, Fjordman especially). As you put it it's as if I put the death of Pim Fortuyn on behalf of the extremist doctrines of the so called western 'progressives' (extreme leftist or liberals gone mad) which I will not do it. We all know that the most important ingredient is missing, one need also an irrational 'quantum jump' to resort to such acts (unlike the radicals of islam, where many can wake up one morning with the desire to defend islam against the infidels after reading the different Islamic traditions, very explicit after all, the night before).

 

[raff55]

Yes there are many sites both pro and con that present arguments that would make Dr. Goebbels blush.

Personally I find (amongst other sites) in the cemb uk web site a reasonable critique of religions and Islam in particular. You will find Ex-Christians, Atheists and many members who know Islam first hand. The subject of Islamaphobia comes up frequently and the members are quick to differentiate between Muslim people and Islamic ideology.

 

[A'isha]

Read first what Fjordman and Spencer have to tell about Breivik,

I have.

no one ever advocated such an extreme 'solution' (not that I agree with all these guys write, Fjordman especially).

Yes they have. Geller even idolizes the people who carried out the Srebrenica massacre.

We all know that the most important ingredient is missing, one need also an irrational 'quantum jump' to resort to such acts (unlike the radicals of islam, where many can wake up one morning with the desire to defend islam against the infidels after reading the different Islamic traditions, very explicit after all, the night before).

Really? The "sudden jihad syndrome" ********?

 

[DC]

islam must have some super powerfull writings. writtings that can convince you in one night to blow yourself up and take as many innocents with you as you can.
and its not aproblem with the one that reads it, its the religion itself, its Islam itself.

but years of geller and fjordman propaganda cannot do any harm. ther its the individual that is the problem, not the texts....

double standard. and once again a Islamaphobe exposes himself lol.

 

[AlBell]

No, if that were the case, we might be arguing that Orthodox Christianity poses a threat to civil society and that such a view is not necessarily bigoted.

This is not an argument attacking Islam for the sake of attacking Islam. It's a pragmatic view that says, lets first attempt to liberlise and educate the most serious threat, before going after less serious threats. The evangelical right in America is also a threat, but it's not likely that Texas will suddenly decide to go rogue and nuke Iran.

Where and to whom? Bombing abortion clinics, maybe? Nor does Texas per se have nukes sfaik, although at one time that's where at least some were assembled. I do suspect Wash DC would be ahead of Iran on their Target list.

 

[metacristi]

LOL are you a Fox "news" watcher maybe?

oh dear.so context is important? why not when quoting hadits or the koran?
heck the propaganda page "religionofpeace" even thinks you do not need to actually quote the hadits, let alone the context.

why do you make such a big difference in comparing Christianity and Islam?

Because the context is often clear in islam, only a few of the examples of incitement to violence can be 'fixed' honestly via modern re-interpretation. Or as ibn Warraq put it well (paraphrased) 'the quran is not infinitely elastic in interpretation', some passages just cannot be made white. The liberal, secularist, egalitarian, feminist, non violent, rational islam you seem to have in mind is still to be born and all I can tell you is that it will have very few in common with the islam of today except the name (sadly the progressives of islam have very slim justification in both the texts and in how islam was practiced along history, no surprise that some Islamic reformers have to employ guards to defend them against pious muslims eager to kill them).

 

[A'isha]

The liberal, secularist, egalitarian, feminist, non violent, rational islam you seem to have in mind is still to be born

http://sistersinislam.org.my/

 

[DC]

Because the context is often clear in islam, quite a few of the examples of violence can be 'fixed' honestly via modern re-interpretation. Or as ibn Warraq put it well (paraphrased) 'the quran is not infinitely elastic in interpretation', some passages just cannot be made white. The liberal, secularist, egalitarian, feminist, non violent, rational islam you seem to have in mind is still to be born and all I can tell you is that it will have very few in common with the islam of today except the name (sadly the progressives of islam have very slim justification in both the texts and in how islam was practiced along history, no surprise that some Islamic reformers have to employ guards to defend them against pious muslims eager to kill them).

lol a rational Islam? a Feminist Islam? LOL no i sure have not that in mind at all. there are many many things one can (and i do often) critique Islam. but sadly you linked to a website that is not looking for proper critique, its trying to demonize a competing religion.

i actually read the koran, talk with imans and work in a company with mainly moslems. (im openly Atheist, and nobody has aproblem with me, ok they are kurdish alevites, the most modern moslems i know ) and in debates i say what i think, and that is very theism unfriendly, towards all religions, but i give my best to stay rational and actually try to know indetail what iam talking about. and i do not just google a bit and pick the next best thing that confirms my bias. i actually try to find out what Islam is.

and in my opinnion, there is no Islam, just like there is no Christianity. those words describe a religion only so vaguely that its very hard to know anything by that word.
there are many different Islam just like there are many different Christianity. it all depends on the interpretation of their religion. how they see it. like reading the Thora and reading the Bible actually tells you very little about what Jews and Christians really believe. many people have what i call a freestyle Christianity or freestyle Islam. they cherry pick the parts they like and ignore the parts they don't like.

like in Islam you would expect a self proclaimed devote muslim to go to a mosque and pray on friday. but most moslems i know don't, they rather have a beer (yes with alcohol) with their friends from work, heck even the Iman joined in several times.

but feminist and rational? lol no, they really believe some invisible being created the whole universe and revealed themself to very few people in the missle east.... and it will punish all those that do not believe those stories... rational? lol.

 

[metacristi]

I have.




Yes they have. Geller even idolizes the people who carried out the Srebrenica massacre.



Really? The "sudden jihad syndrome" ********?

I do not know about Geller. But both Fjordman and Spencer have written about this accusation and their defence is sound (even the justice in Norway could not prosecute Fjordman even if many wanted that). As one who read them way before the Breivik case I maintain that one needs an important dose of irrationality to act as he did. And for that matter the same is valid also for those who want to prosecute people just because Breivik mentioned them in his manifesto (Geller, Fjordman and others are not the main goal but ultimately all rational criticism of islam).

 

[metacristi]

lol a rational Islam? a Feminist Islam? LOL no i sure have not that in mind at all. there are many many things one can (and i do often) critique Islam. but sadly you linked to a website that is not looking for proper critique, its trying to demonize a competing religion.

i actually read the koran, talk with imans and work in a company with mainly moslems. (im openly Atheist, and nobody has aproblem with me, ok they are kurdish alevites, the most modern moslems i know ) and in debates i say what i think, and that is very theism unfriendly, towards all religions, but i give my best to stay rational and actually try to know indetail what iam talking about. and i do not just google a bit and pick the next best thing that confirms my bias. i actually try to find out what Islam is.

and in my opinnion, there is no Islam, just like there is no Christianity. those words describe a religion only so vaguely that its very hard to know anything by that word.
there are many different Islam just like there are many different Christianity. it all depends on the interpretation of their religion. how they see it. like reading the Thora and reading the Bible actually tells you very little about what Jews and Christians really believe. many people have what i call a freestyle Christianity or freestyle Islam. they cherry pick the parts they like and ignore the parts they don't like.

like in Islam you would expect a self proclaimed devote muslim to go to a mosque and pray on friday. but most moslems i know don't, they rather have a beer (yes with alcohol) with their friends from work, heck even the Iman joined in several times.

but feminist and rational? lol no, they really believe some invisible being created the whole universe and revealed themself to very few people in the missle east.... and it will punish all those that do not believe those stories... rational? lol.

Why don't you try to read also what some humanists ex-muslims say? Like ibn Warraq and others. You'll see that no one denies that there are real muslim moderates, albeit a minority living especially in the West, but islam itself is not moderate (and the so called Islamic scholars are still at the level of Middle Ages). I addressed quite many times here the 'there is no islam or Islamic worldview', unfortunately this postmodernist view is not tenable. We can actually make an accurate enough inference of how the islam taught and lived by Muhammad in Medina looked like and it is no rocket science to see that many of its dysfunctional parts are still largely with us making very probable that few things will change in the future if the staus-quo is preserved (only the fact that the infidels still impose the moral standards barely keep alive the so called progressives of islam). I'm sorry that you cannot stand the site I linked, most of what they say is true nonetheless.

 

[DC]

Why don't you try to read also what some humanists ex-muslims say? Like ibn Warraq and others. You'll see that no one denies that there are real muslim moderates, albeit a minority living especially in the West, but islam itself is not moderate (and the so called Islamic scholars are still at the level of Middle Ages). I addressed many times here the 'there is no islam or Islamic worldview', unfortunately this postmodernist view is not tenable. We can actually make an accurate enough inference of how the islam taught and lived by Muhammad in Medina looked like and it is no rocket science to see that many of its dysfunctional parts are still largely with us making very probable that few things will change in the future if the staus-quo is preserved (only the fact that the infidels impose the standards keep alive the so called progressives of islam). I'm sorry that you cannot stand the site I linked, most of what they say is true nonetheless.

Islam is as moderate as Moslems make them. like it is with all religions.
A religions is not what their gods are or what their texts say. a religion isultimatively what its member smake of it. and most moslems are pecefull humans caring for their kids and managing life just like most people on this planet.

the way the website you linked to interprets Islam is how maybe the taliban interpret it. but not how most moslems interpret it and surely not how most moselms are living it.


i asked you already, but what exactly are you critizising Islam for. what is the problem of Islam in your eyes?