Terrorist Attacks - WARNING: CONTAINS DISTRESSING IMAGES

[Batman]

Reckon there will be another mass-murder in western europe (probably in france again) by New years day

[DuncanRG]

When was the last time someone drove a truck along a crowd of people killing 84 in the name of atheism?

 

This obviously isn't the place to debate this, but its the people who continue to ignore the issue rather than those that point it out that are the problem.

 

Taking this out of the Puel thread so we can discuss it properly.

 

The thread which ties these incidents isn't Islam - it's fascism. It's the same old fascism which has been around for centuries and finds different hosts to inject its poison into. At the moment the most common vehicle is Salafi Islam, but it manifests in attacks by garden variety racists and homophobes like the Orlando shooter and archetypal fascists like Anders Breivik.

 

The divide, as always, is between those who want to live in harmony with others and those who don't. The problem with blaming Islam - rather than working with its people - is that it puts you on the wrong side of this divide.

Edited 15 July, 2016 by DuncanRG

[Badger]

Reckon there will be another mass-murder in western europe (probably in france again) by New years day

 

Probably. But aren't we overdue one in the UK ?

 

I'd be surprised if some of the communities in Luton for example are content to being upstaged by their brothers from Brussels, and in France.

[JackFrost]

His name is Mohammed. There's been a huge problem with Islamic terrorism. It's a reasonable assumption to make that the two are connected, look at what France has been through the last few years.

 

You've actually summed up my point extremely well. 'It's an Islamic terrorist attack purely because his first name is Mohammed'.

 

I just don't get how anyone can carry out an 'Islamic terrorist' attack when their "not known to have any jihadist links or shown any signs of radicalisation, and not even particularly religious"

 

Especially when we're talking about a "weird, depressed loner" with numerous convictions for assault/domestic assault/road rage/alcohol/drugs related offences.

 

Regardless of whether this is all linked to an Islamic terror group or not, Hollande comes across as a shambles regardless.

[Verbal]

Islam is intolerant, bigoted and medieval . It's values are incompatable with modern liberal countries . Of course millions of Muslims shouldn't take responsibility for a small % of nutters , but they should take responsibility for the way their religion treats women, gays and other religions.

 

The problem is mainstream Muslim behaviour

 

It's depressing to see the outpouring of ignorance after events like these. This is a prime if small example of profound, immoveable, dangerous stupidity.

 

'Islam' is and isn't many things.

 

It isn't a centralised religion with a theocratic hierarchy. There is no Muslim 'pope'. This means, sadly, that any number of people, usually for the worst, can leap up and claim to be acting on behalf of 'Islam'.

 

Islam is incredibly diverse, and with a history so rich that many basic Western ideas in science, politics and even the ethics of war derive directly from Muslim scholarship (For example, the Italian Renaissance - Michelangelo and all - wouldn't have been possible without Arab theories of mathematics and optics). We all stand on the shoulders of giants - some of the best of them were Muslim.

 

Islam is incredibly diverse in religious form. The Glasgow shopkeeper, Asad Shah, was an Ahmadi, a faith so liberal it would be tolerated by many C of E devotees.

 

'Islam' is in the grip of a particularly virulent form of reactionary theology, Wahhabism, which originated with an especially violent thug (called Wahhab) in the Arabian peninsula in the 18th century. The reason - and the only one - it now holds such sway over so much of the world is down to one thing: oil. Asad Shah's killer was an adherent of a version of this.

 

Whoever the idiot was who dismissed Muslims as 'collateral', should know that's utterly false. Despite yesterday's appalling attack, the overwhelming percentage of victims of Muslim extremist violence are other Muslims. They are not collateral. They are the targets. Asad Shah was not collateral. He was the target. The bombs you see going off with monotonous frequency in Baghdad are targeting Muslims. They are not dying as if by some unfortunate accident. The dozens of schoolchildren killed in their classrooms in Peshawar last year were targets. No one accidentally left the safety off. The attack on the Istanbul airport was aimed at anyone who happened to present themselves as an easy kill. No one asked what religion they were, and of course most were Muslims.

 

As targets, they deserve but don't get our support. Consequently, Sufism, a remarkably peaceful (and soft-drug-friendly, hence Kabul was the terminus of the hippy trail) variant of Islam that was dominate in Afghanistan until the 1970s, has been wiped out by Saudi-financed and 'educated' hordes of crazed Islamists. The same thing is currently happening in Pakistan, where Sufi shrines - great pieces of architecture in themselves - are being destroyed and their worshippers murdered and forced out by sheer terror.

 

What actually should happen - even in our own interests in the West - is that the diversity and richness of Islam should be protected from these lunatics. If we did that, when the Saudis run out of oil, their pernicious, violent, cretinous form of the religion would (I hope to heaven) fade away.

 

The very worst thing we can do now is to whip up an atmosphere of hate and suspicion directed at anyone with a name like 'Mohamed', etc. The worst not just for them but for us.

 

And despite all the bull**** on here about Muslims not 'condemning' or 'apologising for' outrages like Nice, just remember that it's hundreds of thousands of Iraqis, Syrians, Pakistanis, Afghans, Bangladeshis, Kurds, Turks, Lebanese, Indonesians and many others who are actually on the ground fighting the worst of this Wahhabi virus.

 

So the problem isn't 'mainstream Islam'. The problem is the extremes of Islam which have been promulgated and funded among others by a paranoid, fearful, corrupt Royal family in the Arabian peninsula. The victims add up to Islam itself, as a religion that had evolved into great empires and then into a diverse and diffuse faith. And if you take the body count as evidence on who the real targets are, you wouldn't doubt for a second that it's actually not us. We're the sideshow. The real goal is the elimination of any form of the religion that doesn't accord with the lunatic ideas of Wahhab or his natural descendants Bin Laden, Zawahiri, al-Zarqawi and Bagdhadi.

[Sour Mash]

'It's an Islamic terrorist attack purely because his first name is Mohammed'.

Who's said that? Who are you quoting there?

[Sour Mash]

Taking this out of the Puel thread so we can discuss it properly.

 

The thread which ties these incidents isn't Islam - it's fascism. It's the same old fascism which has been around for centuries and finds different hosts to inject its poison into. At the moment the most common vehicle is Salafi Islam, but it manifests in attacks by garden variety racists and homophobes like the Orlando shooter and archetypal fascists like Anders Breivik.

 

The divide, as always, is between those who want to live in harmony with others and those who don't. The problem with blaming Islam - rather than working with its people - is that it puts you on the wrong side of this divide.

There's a significant problem with Islam. Deny it all you want, pretend it isn't happening, its not going away anytime soon. The damage to Europe is already done anyway.

[DuncanRG]

There's a significant problem with Islam. Deny it all you want, pretend it isn't happening, its not going away anytime soon. The damage to Europe is already done anyway.

 

I don't deny it, I think taking such a reductionist approach is counterproductive. The problem is (aspects of) Islam plus political instability plus deprivation plus all sorts of other things, and separating them isn't helpful. Separating Islam in particular is a problem, because it drives a wedge between Islam and 'us'. That's the wedge which terrorists want to build until it's all-out war between two opposing sides.

[Sour Mash]

The thread which ties these incidents isn't Islam

 

I don't deny it,

You clearly did. There's a major problem with Islam, Western Europe would be a better place without it.

[DuncanRG]

Not worth arguing if you can't see the difference between those quotes!

 

If Islam were in itself the root cause - which you seem to be suggesting, though I hope you're not - this particular form of violence would be as many hundreds of years old as the religion. In reality, we have to look at how different moving factors (politics, economics, international relations, technology) interact with the religion and create the conditions for fascism to fester. As I say, it's fascism - or hatred, if you're prefer to use that word - which binds all terror. Fascism/hatred weren't inherent in Germany in the 1930s - Germany and the world at that time simply created the conditions for it to breed.

Edited 15 July, 2016 by DuncanRG

[Sour Mash]

Not worth arguing if you can't see the difference between those quotes!

 

If Islam were in itself the root cause - which you seem to be suggesting, though I hope you're not - this particular form of violence would be as many thousands of years old as the religion. In reality, we have to look at how different moving factors (politics, economics, international relations, technology) interact with the religion and create the conditions for fascism to fester.

Islam is the root cause. As I said, keep denying it, bury your head in the sand, pretend its not happening, whatever makes you feel better.

[Batman]

Islam is the root cause. As I said, keep denying it, bury your head in the sand, pretend its not happening, whatever makes you feel better.

 

some of the beliefs and traits of Islam are tolerated far too much in western europe.

This means communities are easily segregated which allows these nutjobs to hide all too easily.

 

As ISIS are losing ground in the Middle East, it is just ridiculously easy for them to get to Europe and do what they want.

History will look back on this time and think we were a bunch of weirdo's

[DuncanRG]

Islam is the root cause. As I said, keep denying it, bury your head in the sand, pretend its not happening, whatever makes you feel better.

 

It certainly doesn't make me feel better - recognising the complexity of it is a real headache. Anyway!

 

Can you explain why this is happening now, and not at other junctures in history, if Islam is the root cause? It's been around a while.

 

Or, if you'd prefer to answer a different point - do you recognise that casting Islam in opposition to the West is from the Isis playbook?

[Batman]

Can you explain why this is happening now, and not at other junctures in history, if Islam is the root cause? It's been around a while.

 

Or, if you'd prefer to answer a different point - do you recognise that casting Islam in opposition to the West is from the Isis playbook?

 

looking back on the History of Western Europe, you would be hard to find a more liberal, free era that puts up with such incompatible social rules Islam brings to the table

[DuncanRG]

looking back on the History of Western Europe, you would be hard to find a more liberal, free era that puts up with such incompatible social rules Islam brings to the table

 

That's a fair point in one sense, though very few jihadists actually practice Islam properly or live by its laws.

[Batman]

That's a fair point in one sense, though very few jihadists actually practice Islam properly or live by its laws.

 

that is your opinion.

what are the rules? who decides them? who the islamic leader like the pope, sending out the leading message for said mythical magic man from hundreds of years ago?

 

 

it is not just about the mass murder the few carry out.

what about being anti Gay? women's rights? Sharia Law?

Sadiq Khan still address segregated audiences (not that the press report on that too much). Labour have done also, as we know.

Segregated Islamic student union parties and such like.......but how come that is even remotely tolerated in this country?? why is that?

 

however, some old couple who own a B&B say they do not want to have Homosexual customers staying. Get hounded down in all parts of the media.

 

Just weird times we live in

Edited 15 July, 2016 by Batman

[shurlock]

that is your opinion.

what are the rules? who decides them? who the islamic leader like the pope, sending out the leading message for said mythical magic man from hundreds of years ago?

 

 

it is not just about the mass murder the few carry out.

what about being anti Gay? women's rights? Sharia Law?

Sadiq Khan still address segregated audiences (not that the press report on that too much). Labour have done also, as we know.

Segregated Islamic student union parties and such like.......but how come that is even remotely tolerated in this country?? why is that?

 

however, some old couple who own a B&B say they do not want to have Homosexual customers staying. Get hounded down in all parts of the media.

 

Just weird times we live in

 

And? Men and women are segregated seating in synagogues - it's a practice; it hardly offends anyone, not least women as segregation isn't justified in terms of gender inequality or the inferiority of women; rather it's seen as a mark of respect between the sexes.

 

You seem very animated by this issue, pal. Far more than those who are meant to be affected by it.

Edited 15 July, 2016 by shurlock

[whelk]

that is your opinion.

what are the rules? who decides them? who the islamic leader like the pope, sending out the leading message for said mythical magic man from hundreds of years ago?

 

 

it is not just about the mass murder the few carry out.

what about being anti Gay? women's rights? Sharia Law?

Sadiq Khan still address segregated audiences (not that the press report on that too much). Labour have done also, as we know.

Segregated Islamic student union parties and such like.......but how come that is even remotely tolerated in this country?? why is that?

 

however, some old couple who own a B&B say they do not want to have Homosexual customers staying. Get hounded down in all parts of the media.

 

Just weird times we live in

 

True though re. B & B. Many will feel quite at ease protesting there but sh it scared of offending Islam for the same prejudices.

[Lord Duckhunter]

It's depressing to see the outpouring of ignorance after events like these. This is a prime if small example of profound, immoveable, dangerous stupidity.

 

'Islam' is and isn't many things.

 

It isn't a centralised religion with a theocratic hierarchy. There is no Muslim 'pope'. This means, sadly, that any number of people, usually for the worst, can leap up and claim to be acting on behalf of 'Islam'.

 

Islam is incredibly diverse, and with a history so rich that many basic Western ideas in science, politics and even the ethics of war derive directly from Muslim scholarship (For example, the Italian Renaissance - Michelangelo and all - wouldn't have been possible without Arab theories of mathematics and optics). We all stand on the shoulders of giants - some of the best of them were Muslim.

 

Islam is incredibly diverse in religious form. The Glasgow shopkeeper, Asad Shah, was an Ahmadi, a faith so liberal it would be tolerated by many C of E devotees.

 

'Islam' is in the grip of a particularly virulent form of reactionary theology, Wahhabism, which originated with an especially violent thug (called Wahhab) in the Arabian peninsula in the 18th century. The reason - and the only one - it now holds such sway over so much of the world is down to one thing: oil. Asad Shah's killer was an adherent of a version of this.

 

Whoever the idiot was who dismissed Muslims as 'collateral', should know that's utterly false. Despite yesterday's appalling attack, the overwhelming percentage of victims of Muslim extremist violence are other Muslims. They are not collateral. They are the targets. Asad Shah was not collateral. He was the target. The bombs you see going off with monotonous frequency in Baghdad are targeting Muslims. They are not dying as if by some unfortunate accident. The dozens of schoolchildren killed in their classrooms in Peshawar last year were targets. No one accidentally left the safety off. The attack on the Istanbul airport was aimed at anyone who happened to present themselves as an easy kill. No one asked what religion they were, and of course most were Muslims.

 

As targets, they deserve but don't get our support. Consequently, Sufism, a remarkably peaceful (and soft-drug-friendly, hence Kabul was the terminus of the hippy trail) variant of Islam that was dominate in Afghanistan until the 1970s, has been wiped out by Saudi-financed and 'educated' hordes of crazed Islamists. The same thing is currently happening in Pakistan, where Sufi shrines - great pieces of architecture in themselves - are being destroyed and their worshippers murdered and forced out by sheer terror.

 

What actually should happen - even in our own interests in the West - is that the diversity and richness of Islam should be protected from these lunatics. If we did that, when the Saudis run out of oil, their pernicious, violent, cretinous form of the religion would (I hope to heaven) fade away.

 

The very worst thing we can do now is to whip up an atmosphere of hate and suspicion directed at anyone with a name like 'Mohamed', etc. The worst not just for them but for us.

 

And despite all the bull**** on here about Muslims not 'condemning' or 'apologising for' outrages like Nice, just remember that it's hundreds of thousands of Iraqis, Syrians, Pakistanis, Afghans, Bangladeshis, Kurds, Turks, Lebanese, Indonesians and many others who are actually on the ground fighting the worst of this Wahhabi virus.

 

So the problem isn't 'mainstream Islam'. The problem is the extremes of Islam which have been promulgated and funded among others by a paranoid, fearful, corrupt Royal family in the Arabian peninsula. The victims add up to Islam itself, as a religion that had evolved into great empires and then into a diverse and diffuse faith. And if you take the body count as evidence on who the real targets are, you wouldn't doubt for a second that it's actually not us. We're the sideshow. The real goal is the elimination of any form of the religion that doesn't accord with the lunatic ideas of Wahhab or his natural descendants Bin Laden, Zawahiri, al-Zarqawi and Bagdhadi.

 

What a load of pony .

[Griffo]

It's depressing to see the outpouring of ignorance after events like these. This is a prime if small example of profound, immoveable, dangerous stupidity.

 

'Islam' is and isn't many things.

 

It isn't a centralised religion with a theocratic hierarchy. There is no Muslim 'pope'. This means, sadly, that any number of people, usually for the worst, can leap up and claim to be acting on behalf of 'Islam'.

 

Islam is incredibly diverse, and with a history so rich that many basic Western ideas in science, politics and even the ethics of war derive directly from Muslim scholarship (For example, the Italian Renaissance - Michelangelo and all - wouldn't have been possible without Arab theories of mathematics and optics). We all stand on the shoulders of giants - some of the best of them were Muslim.

 

Islam is incredibly diverse in religious form. The Glasgow shopkeeper, Asad Shah, was an Ahmadi, a faith so liberal it would be tolerated by many C of E devotees.

 

'Islam' is in the grip of a particularly virulent form of reactionary theology, Wahhabism, which originated with an especially violent thug (called Wahhab) in the Arabian peninsula in the 18th century. The reason - and the only one - it now holds such sway over so much of the world is down to one thing: oil. Asad Shah's killer was an adherent of a version of this.

 

Whoever the idiot was who dismissed Muslims as 'collateral', should know that's utterly false. Despite yesterday's appalling attack, the overwhelming percentage of victims of Muslim extremist violence are other Muslims. They are not collateral. They are the targets. Asad Shah was not collateral. He was the target. The bombs you see going off with monotonous frequency in Baghdad are targeting Muslims. They are not dying as if by some unfortunate accident. The dozens of schoolchildren killed in their classrooms in Peshawar last year were targets. No one accidentally left the safety off. The attack on the Istanbul airport was aimed at anyone who happened to present themselves as an easy kill. No one asked what religion they were, and of course most were Muslims.

 

As targets, they deserve but don't get our support. Consequently, Sufism, a remarkably peaceful (and soft-drug-friendly, hence Kabul was the terminus of the hippy trail) variant of Islam that was dominate in Afghanistan until the 1970s, has been wiped out by Saudi-financed and 'educated' hordes of crazed Islamists. The same thing is currently happening in Pakistan, where Sufi shrines - great pieces of architecture in themselves - are being destroyed and their worshippers murdered and forced out by sheer terror.

 

What actually should happen - even in our own interests in the West - is that the diversity and richness of Islam should be protected from these lunatics. If we did that, when the Saudis run out of oil, their pernicious, violent, cretinous form of the religion would (I hope to heaven) fade away.

 

The very worst thing we can do now is to whip up an atmosphere of hate and suspicion directed at anyone with a name like 'Mohamed', etc. The worst not just for them but for us.

 

And despite all the bull**** on here about Muslims not 'condemning' or 'apologising for' outrages like Nice, just remember that it's hundreds of thousands of Iraqis, Syrians, Pakistanis, Afghans, Bangladeshis, Kurds, Turks, Lebanese, Indonesians and many others who are actually on the ground fighting the worst of this Wahhabi virus.

 

So the problem isn't 'mainstream Islam'. The problem is the extremes of Islam which have been promulgated and funded among others by a paranoid, fearful, corrupt Royal family in the Arabian peninsula. The victims add up to Islam itself, as a religion that had evolved into great empires and then into a diverse and diffuse faith. And if you take the body count as evidence on who the real targets are, you wouldn't doubt for a second that it's actually not us. We're the sideshow. The real goal is the elimination of any form of the religion that doesn't accord with the lunatic ideas of Wahhab or his natural descendants Bin Laden, Zawahiri, al-Zarqawi and Bagdhadi.

 

Try and sound as clever and knowledgeable on the subject as much as you like. It's not just a small section or interpretation of Islam.

 

Look at the polls after Charlie Hebdo. Huge percentages agreed with and sympathised with the attacks.

It is a widespread problem in the religion. It's backwards.

[Sour Mash]

It certainly doesn't make me feel better - recognising the complexity of it is a real headache. Anyway!

 

Can you explain why this is happening now, and not at other junctures in history, if Islam is the root cause? It's been around a while.

 

Or, if you'd prefer to answer a different point - do you recognise that casting Islam in opposition to the West is from the Isis playbook?

Large scale clashes of cultures. Huge number of muslims inhabiting western civilization, when have so many lived in Western Europe before?

[Patrick Bateman]

Islam is intolerant, bigoted and medieval . It's values are incompatable with modern liberal countries . Of course millions of Muslims shouldn't take responsibility for a small % of nutters , but they should take responsibility for the way their religion treats women, gays and other religions.

 

The problem is mainstream Muslim behaviour

 

As one example ... rest of the world (bar Muslim countries and Russia) - You can be gay, you can change sex, you can be who and what you like, it's your choice.

 

Saying it's bigoted is too light.

 

400 years ago, we were ducking people in the river for being witches, we (in the west) were burning people for not being 'normal'. Slightly longer ago we still believed the Earth was flat and revered the make believe thing in the sky who made it all (FFS), then, we grew up and realised it's a load of old codswallop. That section of the world are still several hundred years out of date and massively intolerant. Anyone who says that isn't a problem when presented side by side with modern, western culture is utterly, f**king deluded.

 

The two don't currently mix.

[Griffo]

Oh my f*cking God. Someone on BBC news has just said this is all caused by the housing benefit system, the prison set up and how society alienates Muslims in France. People falling over themselves to excuse and be apologists for this. Sickening.

[Patrick Bateman]

Oh my f*cking God. Someone on BBC news has just said this is all caused by the housing benefit system, the prison set up and how society alienates Muslims in France. People falling over themselves to excuse and be apologists for this. Sickening.

 

You couldn't make it up. I'm sick of the apologists, it's getting pretty ridiculous.

[whelk]

Oh my f*cking God. Someone on BBC news has just said this is all caused by the housing benefit system, the prison set up and how society alienates Muslims in France. People falling over themselves to excuse and be apologists for this. Sickening.

 

Got a point about the prisons though - that is where they are getting radicalised. Should give solitary and pipe through a bit of US TV evangelism to send the fckers mad

[Lord Duckhunter]

As one example ... rest of the world (bar Muslim countries and Russia) - You can be gay, you can change sex, you can be who and what you like, it's your choice.

 

Saying it's bigoted is too light.

 

400 years ago, we were ducking people in the river for being witches, we (in the west) were burning people for not being 'normal'. Slightly longer ago we still believed the Earth was flat and revered the make believe thing in the sky who made it all (FFS), then, we grew up and realised it's a load of old codswallop. That section of the world are still several hundred years out of date and massively intolerant. Anyone who says that isn't a problem when presented side by side with modern, western culture is utterly, f**king deluded.

 

The two don't currently mix.

 

Spot on , it's a medieval culture . Look at the film "Life of Brian " that offended plenty of Christians , Make " The Life of Mo " and Cleese , Palin , Ect would be dead . FFS chicks walking round in burkas . I would say they need to join the 21sr century , but joining the 19th would be an improvement .

[badgerx16]

when have so many lived in Western Europe before?

 

The Moors used to run Spain.

[Sour Mash]

The Moors used to run Spain.

 

And?

[badgerx16]

And?

 

Just answering your question.

 

"By 1000, according to Ronald Segal, some 5,000,000 of Iberia's 7,000,000 inhabitants, most of them descended from indigenous Iberian converts, were Muslim."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moors#Moors_of_Iberia

Edited 15 July, 2016 by badgerx16

[shurlock]

Spot on , it's a medieval culture . Look at the film "Life of Brian " that offended plenty of Christians , Make " The Life of Mo " and Cleese , Palin , Ect would be dead . FFS chicks walking round in burkas . I would say they need to join the 21sr century , but joining the 19th would be an improvement .

 

Lord Darkiehunter- have you ever considered that there is nothing particularly outdated about "chicks wearing the burka"? Rather it is about identity politics, the bastardised offshoot of 21st century liberal-postmodern values.

 

Bit too complicated for you, innit.

Edited 15 July, 2016 by shurlock

[Turkish]

It's depressing to see the outpouring of ignorance after events like these. This is a prime if small example of profound, immoveable, dangerous stupidity.

 

'Islam' is and isn't many things.

 

It isn't a centralised religion with a theocratic hierarchy. There is no Muslim 'pope'. This means, sadly, that any number of people, usually for the worst, can leap up and claim to be acting on behalf of 'Islam'.

 

Islam is incredibly diverse, and with a history so rich that many basic Western ideas in science, politics and even the ethics of war derive directly from Muslim scholarship (For example, the Italian Renaissance - Michelangelo and all - wouldn't have been possible without Arab theories of mathematics and optics). We all stand on the shoulders of giants - some of the best of them were Muslim.

 

Islam is incredibly diverse in religious form. The Glasgow shopkeeper, Asad Shah, was an Ahmadi, a faith so liberal it would be tolerated by many C of E devotees.

 

'Islam' is in the grip of a particularly virulent form of reactionary theology, Wahhabism, which originated with an especially violent thug (called Wahhab) in the Arabian peninsula in the 18th century. The reason - and the only one - it now holds such sway over so much of the world is down to one thing: oil. Asad Shah's killer was an adherent of a version of this.

 

Whoever the idiot was who dismissed Muslims as 'collateral', should know that's utterly false. Despite yesterday's appalling attack, the overwhelming percentage of victims of Muslim extremist violence are other Muslims. They are not collateral. They are the targets. Asad Shah was not collateral. He was the target. The bombs you see going off with monotonous frequency in Baghdad are targeting Muslims. They are not dying as if by some unfortunate accident. The dozens of schoolchildren killed in their classrooms in Peshawar last year were targets. No one accidentally left the safety off. The attack on the Istanbul airport was aimed at anyone who happened to present themselves as an easy kill. No one asked what religion they were, and of course most were Muslims.

 

As targets, they deserve but don't get our support. Consequently, Sufism, a remarkably peaceful (and soft-drug-friendly, hence Kabul was the terminus of the hippy trail) variant of Islam that was dominate in Afghanistan until the 1970s, has been wiped out by Saudi-financed and 'educated' hordes of crazed Islamists. The same thing is currently happening in Pakistan, where Sufi shrines - great pieces of architecture in themselves - are being destroyed and their worshippers murdered and forced out by sheer terror.

 

What actually should happen - even in our own interests in the West - is that the diversity and richness of Islam should be protected from these lunatics. If we did that, when the Saudis run out of oil, their pernicious, violent, cretinous form of the religion would (I hope to heaven) fade away.

 

The very worst thing we can do now is to whip up an atmosphere of hate and suspicion directed at anyone with a name like 'Mohamed', etc. The worst not just for them but for us.

 

And despite all the bull**** on here about Muslims not 'condemning' or 'apologising for' outrages like Nice, just remember that it's hundreds of thousands of Iraqis, Syrians, Pakistanis, Afghans, Bangladeshis, Kurds, Turks, Lebanese, Indonesians and many others who are actually on the ground fighting the worst of this Wahhabi virus.

 

So the problem isn't 'mainstream Islam'. The problem is the extremes of Islam which have been promulgated and funded among others by a paranoid, fearful, corrupt Royal family in the Arabian peninsula. The victims add up to Islam itself, as a religion that had evolved into great empires and then into a diverse and diffuse faith. And if you take the body count as evidence on who the real targets are, you wouldn't doubt for a second that it's actually not us. We're the sideshow. The real goal is the elimination of any form of the religion that doesn't accord with the lunatic ideas of Wahhab or his natural descendants Bin Laden, Zawahiri, al-Zarqawi and Bagdhadi.

 

I take it your wife has forgiven you for posting on here then?

[Sour Mash]

Just answering your question.

 

"By 1000, according to Ronald Segal, some 5,000,000 of Iberia's 7,000,000 inhabitants, most of them descended from indigenous Iberian converts, were Muslim."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moors#Moors_of_Iberia

 

Thanks, your link rubbishes Duncan's earlier point 'Differences in religion and culture led to a centuries-long conflict with the Christian kingdoms of Europe'.

[ScepticalStan]

It isn't a centralised religion with a theocratic hierarchy. There is no Muslim 'pope'. This means, sadly, that any number of people, usually for the worst, can leap up and claim to be acting on behalf of 'Islam'.

 

Cobblers. The entire belief system revolves around one single, unalterable book. It couldn't be more centralised even if it tried.

 

Islam is incredibly diverse, and with a history so rich that many basic Western ideas in science, politics and even the ethics of war derive directly from Muslim scholarship (For example, the Italian Renaissance - Michelangelo and all - wouldn't have been possible without Arab theories of mathematics and optics). We all stand on the shoulders of giants - some of the best of them were Muslim.

 

Can you name a few? Or is it the usual guff about algebra and geocentrism that the Greeks had already come up with millenia before?

 

Islam is incredibly diverse in religious form. The Glasgow shopkeeper, Asad Shah, was an Ahmadi, a faith so liberal it would be tolerated by many C of E devotees.

 

And was ruthelessly murdered by a Sunni Muslim. The sect that makes up the vast majority of the faith.

 

'Islam' is in the grip of a particularly virulent form of reactionary theology, Wahhabism, which originated with an especially violent thug (called Wahhab) in the Arabian peninsula in the 18th century. The reason - and the only one - it now holds such sway over so much of the world is down to one thing: oil. Asad Shah's killer was an adherent of a version of this.

 

Oil has given Sunni Islam and ISIS the money and thus, the means to carry out what they have done. The motivation nonetheless remains a sincere belief that the Qu'ran is the word-for-word account of the will of the creator of the universe.

 

Whoever the idiot was who dismissed Muslims as 'collateral', should know that's utterly false. Despite yesterday's appalling attack, the overwhelming percentage of victims of Muslim extremist violence are other Muslims. They are not collateral. They are the targets.

 

Because ISIS and those of their ideology view them as apostates who have left the faith - i.e. - no longer Muslims

 

Asad Shah was not collateral. He was the target.

 

Perfect example, he was an Ahmadi - which is viewed as an apostate sect of non-Muslims by the mainstream Sunni majority.

 

The bombs you see going off with monotonous frequency in Baghdad are targeting Muslims. They are not dying as if by some unfortunate accident. The dozens of schoolchildren killed in their classrooms in Peshawar last year were targets. No one accidentally left the safety off. The attack on the Istanbul airport was aimed at anyone who happened to present themselves as an easy kill. No one asked what religion they were, and of course most were Muslims.

 

As targets, they deserve but don't get our support. Consequently, Sufism, a remarkably peaceful (and soft-drug-friendly, hence Kabul was the terminus of the hippy trail) variant of Islam that was dominate in Afghanistan until the 1970s, has been wiped out by Saudi-financed and 'educated' hordes of crazed Islamists. The same thing is currently happening in Pakistan, where Sufi shrines - great pieces of architecture in themselves - are being destroyed and their worshippers murdered and forced out by sheer terror.

 

What actually should happen - even in our own interests in the West - is that the diversity and richness of Islam should be protected from these lunatics. If we did that, when the Saudis run out of oil, their pernicious, violent, cretinous form of the religion would (I hope to heaven) fade away.

 

Diversity and richness? Seriously? What do we in the West have to learn from Islam? What recent contributions has the Islamic world made in the fields of science, technology, philosophy, the rights of minorities, women and homosexuals? democracy? What aspect of our society would be better if it were more Islamic?

 

The very worst thing we can do now is to whip up an atmosphere of hate and suspicion directed at anyone with a name like 'Mohamed', etc. The worst not just for them but for us.

 

Happily enough this never happens. Although I'm sure that someone throwing some pork scratchings into the local mosque will be leaped upon by the Guardian as some kind of mass-racist backlash

 

And despite all the bull**** on here about Muslims not 'condemning' or 'apologising for' outrages like Nice, just remember that it's hundreds of thousands of Iraqis, Syrians, Pakistanis, Afghans, Bangladeshis, Kurds, Turks, Lebanese, Indonesians and many others who are actually on the ground fighting the worst of this Wahhabi virus.

 

So the problem isn't 'mainstream Islam'. The problem is the extremes of Islam which have been promulgated and funded among others by a paranoid, fearful, corrupt Royal family in the Arabian peninsula. The victims add up to Islam itself, as a religion that had evolved into great empires and then into a diverse and diffuse faith. And if you take the body count as evidence on who the real targets are, you wouldn't doubt for a second that it's actually not us. We're the sideshow. The real goal is the elimination of any form of the religion that doesn't accord with the lunatic ideas of Wahhab or his natural descendants Bin Laden, Zawahiri, al-Zarqawi and Bagdhadi.

 

Cobblers. Look up the mainstream views of mainstream Muslims across the world in Pew polls. Huge majorities are opposed to equal rights for women, *most* believe that homosexuality should be a crime and again, most believe that blasphemy laws should be reintroduced. Your average Muslim worldwide makes Marine Le Pen look like Jeremy Corbyn.

 

Oh, and btw - you used the words "diverse/diversity" four times in your post

[badgerx16]

Thanks, your link rubbishes Duncan's earlier point 'Differences in religion and culture led to a centuries-long conflict with the Christian kingdoms of Europe'.

 

Never heard of the Crusades?

[Sour Mash]

Never heard of the Crusades?

 

Of course I have. What relevance do they have?

[nta786]

My mate grew up in a Muslim household, felt so sorry for the bloke, wasn't allowed out on Fridays/Saturdays, forced to pray five times a day, beaten up when he didn't pray etc. Was very restricted in the household, couldn't drink in a Western society, and when he did drink, did so in fear of getting caught.. At 18 he left, his parents don't speak to him due to his lack of faith, and he says he isn't only one who has been disowned over his lack of faith- he knows many more in the so called Muslim community.

I think they made the film East v East based on the conflicts within family, and James Caan also had his own conflicts too.

 

Islam, just not compatible with UK society yet thousands want to flock to live here- brining conflict internally in families and also ISIS clearly forcing their own prooganda onto the people

 

 

Whilst on the whole Muslims are nice people, their views towards women and LGBTs are just outdated and the fact some are willing to disown their own kin over it brings down Islam for me.

[Turkish]

I think in people's desperation to appear as lovely, caring people who love everyone they've got confused about what they actually believe in. Take homosexuality for example, one minute they're telling is how great it is gays can get married the next minute they're defending a religion where homosexuality is forbidden.

[ScepticalStan]

I think in people's desperation to appear as lovely, caring people who love everyone they've got confused about what they actually believe in. Take homosexuality for example, one minute they're telling is how great it is gays can get married the next minute they're defending a religion where homosexuality is forbidden.

 

Yeah exactly.

 

Same thing with womens' rights as well. The Cologne mass sexual assaults weren't reported in the mainstream media until a week after the actual event, and even then it was only because it was all over Twitter and amateur footage was shared online

 

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/jan/08/cologne-attacks-hard-questions-new-years-eve

 

This article and the reaction to it in the comments section sums it up. People are starting to cotton on to the fact that modern 'liberalism' just doesn't know how to deal with it's various 'tolerances' conflicting with one another - and that all it can do is offer denial and obfuscation.

 

This will be particularly interesting: http://www.breitbart.com/milo/2016/06/26/milo-to-lead-gay-pride-march-through-muslim-ghetto-sweden/

[Wurzel]

My mate grew up in a Muslim household, felt so sorry for the bloke, wasn't allowed out on Fridays/Saturdays, forced to pray five times a day, beaten up when he didn't pray etc. Was very restricted in the household, couldn't drink in a Western society, and when he did drink, did so in fear of getting caught.. At 18 he left, his parents don't speak to him due to his lack of faith, and he says he isn't only one who has been disowned over his lack of faith- he knows many more in the so called Muslim community.

I think they made the film East v East based on the conflicts within family, and James Caan also had his own conflicts too.

Islam, just not compatible with UK society yet thousands want to flock to live here- brining conflict internally in families and also ISIS clearly forcing their own prooganda onto the people

 

 

Whilst on the whole Muslims are nice people, their views towards women and LGBTs are just outdated and the fact some are willing to disown their own kin over it brings down Islam for me.

 

 

BIB That sums up what I keep asking myself. Why would anyone want to up sticks and move to another country where the way of life is completely at odds with their existing religion/culture/laws with all the conflicts and disadvantages that that brings unless they hope that eventually they may convert that country and it's people to their ways.

 

Will no accept "They are refugees they have no choice" as an answer, a very small minority are but the vast majority have come here under their own free will.

 

Will not accept "that's what we done in the days of the Empire". That was, rightly or wrongly, done in the name of big business and generally consisted only of "those in charge" moving there . There was no mass migration of, for want of a better expression "everyday people".

[DuncanRG]

Large scale clashes of cultures. Huge number of muslims inhabiting western civilization, when have so many lived in Western Europe before?

 

I don't know - quite probably never. But that doesn't explain why the vast majority of this violence happens in Muslim countries and kills Muslims, as the poster above pointed out.

 

Try and sound as clever and knowledgeable on the subject as much as you like. It's not just a small section or interpretation of Islam.

 

I love this. You can prove anything with facts, can't you?

Edited 16 July, 2016 by DuncanRG

[CHAPEL END CHARLIE]

The idea that the European empires were ever somehow run by a western business or administrative elite only and excluded any significant mass emigration from the "everyday" people of the great imperial powers is utter nonsense. To openly express such a ridiculous thing betrays a deep level of ignorance about the world that is rather embarrassing frankly.

 

For example (and with the current situation in mind) Algeria was until the 1950's not deemed to be a French colony per se, but rather it was considered to be an integral part of Metropolitan France with substantial numbers of (often poor) French and other southern European settlers living there - some even entitled to elect deputies to the French Parliment by the way.

 

For that matter has not the current population mix of the United States, Canada, Australia and New Zealand not been heavily influenced by mass British immigration over time? In fact it is perfectly clear that where empires became established a mixing of populations between people from the imperial power, and those of its colony, almost inevitably follows - as night does day.

[Sour Mash]

Completely different culture http://www.thetimes.co.uk/edition/world/social-media-star-murdered-in-honour-killing-pmkgfp32s?CMP=Spklr-_-Editorial-_-TWITTER-_-thetimes-_-20160716-_-World-_-518513235&linkId=26633086

[Manuel]

Completely different culture http://www.thetimes.co.uk/edition/world/social-media-star-murdered-in-honour-killing-pmkgfp32s?CMP=Spklr-_-Editorial-_-TWITTER-_-thetimes-_-20160716-_-World-_-518513235&linkId=26633086

That's in Pakistan though. Here's a newsflash for you, the Muslim chap I sit next to at work is nice as pie, fits right in, even comes to the pub now and then, although always leaves early and doesn't touch booze. Never talks about his religion unless asked. Condemns the atrocities that you and I would. He's pretty devout too, takes regular time off work to pray, which he pays back at other times. A well integrated, moral, interesting guy who happens to take his religion seriously but gets on with everyone in the office as well as anyone else. I doubt he's an unusual case.

[ScepticalStan]

That's in Pakistan though. Here's a newsflash for you, the Muslim chap I sit next to at work is nice as pie, fits right in, even comes to the pub now and then, although always leaves early and doesn't touch booze. Never talks about his religion unless asked. Condemns the atrocities that you and I would. He's pretty devout too, takes regular time off work to pray, which he pays back at other times. A well integrated, moral, interesting guy who happens to take his religion seriously but gets on with everyone in the office as well as anyone else. I doubt he's an unusual case.

 

No-one, but no-one, denies that a majority of Muslims are perfectly decent, reasonable people.

 

The problem is that there is a significant, small minority willing to carry out reprehensible violence as part of their religion and a larger minority who, though they won't do it themselves, will defend them. Beyond those groups is an even larger minority who might not defend them, but would nevertheless support the establishment of Sharia law and beyond that, the majority of Muslims who though they might be perfectly secular people, still hold on to dated and bigoted views that run directly contrary to modern, liberal Western culture. https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2009/may/07/muslims-britain-france-germany-homosexuality

 

Basically Muslims are like Millwall fans. The majority of Millwall fans are peaceful people who enjoy football but that's a complete irrelevance to the clear fact that Millwall as a club & institution has an issue with hooliganism and needs as much stick as it does carrot. Obfuscating about 'there are peaceful Millwall fans (we know) and 'all clubs have hooligans too ya know!' completely misses the point of how the issue can be addressed. Same thing here.

[buctootim]

No-one, but no-one, denies that a majority of Muslims are perfectly decent, reasonable people..

 

Of course they do, there are a number on this thread.

[Jonnyboy]

And? Men and women are segregated seating in synagogues - it's a practice; it hardly offends anyone, not least women as segregation isn't justified in terms of gender inequality or the inferiority of women; rather it's seen as a mark of respect between the sexes.

 

You seem very animated by this issue, pal. Far more than those who are meant to be affected by it.

 

My local swimming pool won't let me get changed in the ladies changing rooms. Must be that damn Sharia Law taking over Britain.

[Jonnyboy]

What a load of pony .

 

I know, Britain has had enough of Experts that's for sure.

[Lord Duckhunter]

Of course they do, there are a number on this thread.

 

Where?

Edited 17 July, 2016 by Lord Duckhunter

[Lord Duckhunter]

That's in Pakistan though. Here's a newsflash for you, the Muslim chap I sit next to at work is nice as pie, fits right in, even comes to the pub now and then, although always leaves early and doesn't touch booze. Never talks about his religion unless asked. Condemns the atrocities that you and I would. He's pretty devout too, takes regular time off work to pray, which he pays back at other times. A well integrated, moral, interesting guy who happens to take his religion seriously but gets on with everyone in the office as well as anyone else. I doubt he's an unusual case.

 

Would this tolerant and decent chap go for a pint in a gay bar ?

[van Hanegem]

This will be particularly interesting: http://www.breitbart.com/milo/2016/06/26/milo-to-lead-gay-pride-march-through-muslim-ghetto-sweden/

 

That will be very interesting indeed, if the Swedish authorities allow it...

 

I've got mixed feelings though. I believe it's necessary to confront the muslim communities in Europe with their backward ideas which do not belong in our societies (same goes for some old christian communities of course...) in order to get some progress in their integration process. On the other hand it's worrying to see so many right extremists in Europe who believe it's time to "stand up against those who don't belong in their country" and like a French security official said earlier this year: "a couple of muslim attacks will set things on fire" and who knows what will happen then... Sweden is just like France becoming a boiling pot, muslims attacking a gay parade might unleash a backlash everyone is going to regret. There should be a better way to deal with the problems with muslims...