Bronze Age, Stone Age, Iron Age, Ice Age, Age of Aquarius, whatever. I don’t care. Bullshit is bullshit, regardless of when it was concocted. Immoral, divisive bullshit - which these religions are full of, Islam especially - doubly so.
What I feel is based upon facts.
Muslims committing the overwhelming majority of terrorism, based upon sharia law? Check.
Several Muslim countries backwards ass vs western democratic values and basic human rights? Check.
Poverty stricken and backwards ass cultures and areas being overwhelmingly Muslim? Check.
I consider apologists such as yourself part of the problem.
What a pack of rabid rampaging assholes.
Sharia law is what it is; it is the vigor at which it is followed that is variable, just like in all relligions. There is no multiple types of sharia law. Polls show overwhelming support for it in several countries. Muslims that do not practice it are in violation of it in its basic form, just as the majority of Christians for example do not follow the bible word for word. Thankfully, that progression has at least happened, but there are millions that have not progressed.
You want the basic facts here to be softened to fit in your little PC box. Like I say, hop on a plane and go spend some time in these countries and then report back. Until then, I will refrain from replying to you further on this subject.
Or nailed it to a sinagogue, yeah.
Are you American or allied with us? If so, join up. Put on your uniform & go off to fight ISIS or ISIL or whatever we’re calling them now.
Unless you’re just another chicken hawk.
Sorry, I pay taxes that in turn are used for the US military, which in turn is commanded by the POTUS that is democratically elected. See how that works? Fortunately the result of that complex method of government means I don’t have to go over there and fight, and I can debate with others about policy. Its really sad when debate about issues is dismissed by people who lack a defendable position, who turn to BS like you just wrote. But, I am sure you are dealing with alot of limitations so I don’t really blame you.
My suggestion to andy goes the same to you, and it would even be a funnier experiment since you are a woman. You and andy can share a hotel room in these countries to save $, but watch out when you do that. 
Take care.
There are multiple interpretations and sources of sharia, and multiple schools of Islamic jurisprudence in interpreting sharia. You can read more if you’re interested here and here. So no, there is not just one way sharia is followed and applied.
I’ve spent a lot of time in one majority Muslim country (Bahrain, while I was in the Navy). It was weird in many ways, and very interesting in some ways. Your assumptions about me are false so far.
It seems way, way too broad, as well as vague. So I don’t know, but I don’t think it’s a useful statement.
I’m not saying that it doesn’t affect anyone’s lives – I’m just saying that nothing about Muslim texts and tenets particularly stands out – most or all religions have stuff that is as objectionable as the worst stuff in the Koran. This is borne out by history – at various times, one could be a “good Christian” and be as violent or more so than modern extremist Muslims.
Broad statements like that are almost always, if not always, false. Some of these cultures are shitty. Not all of them.
I’m all for criticizing Islam, and any other religions. I’m not a fan of any of them. Some criticisms are valid, some aren’t; some are sweeping, vague, and useless except to make the critic feel superior; some are pointed and on target.
Many of your criticisms are on point. I’m challenging the ones that I think are not.
WTF is the communication break down here? Yes, I wrote many times there is more than one way that sharia is followed. That is not the point…its basic tenets are oppressive and consistent. If certain cultures and countries have progressed from that by either interpretation or they have not decided to act like animals, like Christian countries have, then that is great. That is what needs to happen everywhere. It is not, and that is what breeds this terrorism issue.
If you insist on this line of debate then ok I will play…I will just take the tact that a too large % of muslims do not practice the form of sharia law that makes flying planes into buildings and killing people over cartoons unacceptable.
Since we are measuring penises, dealing with this part of the world is my business. The last time I was in Bahrain I had spent the whole previous month in Dammam, and went down to the bar in the Sheraton for a drink after being dry for one month since alcohol is forbidden in SA. I just had one and left…the bar was filled up with Saudis getting trashed.
LOL your experience is Bahrain. Bahrain is very liberal vs other countries. Alcohol is legal, women don’t have to cover up, there are bars, etc. Bahrain has evolved, which is what I have been trying to tell you. Dubai is the same way. No wonder you feel the way you do, being subjected to Muslim light in Bahrain and extrapolating that to the rest of the world. :rolleyes: It all makes sense now.
Out of curiosity, what are your top 5 examples of heavily Islamic countries that aren’t shitty? Being somewhere near 25% of the world’s population, there should be some shining beacons somewhere, right?
As I previously said in this thread, I think the best example you can come up with is Turkey, and that actually works as a counterexample, because Turkey has a uniquely hard-line stance on keeping Islam out of politics, so if the best example country is one in which Islam is kept from power, that’s a pretty strong example that pervasiveness of Islam in a state is correlated with being a shitty state.
“Muslim light”… no, their form of Islam is just as valid and any other (and, I think, far more valid then the violent forms). If you mentioned that there are multiple ways to follow sharia, then I must have missed it.
But your main argument at this point seems to be “I’ve traveled more than you, so shut up and just accept what I tell you because your reading and experience are not valid” – that’s not going to do much to sway me.
had. It doesn’t anymore, and it is becoming shittier by the minute.
“The tragedy of the Arabs circa 2015 is that they no longer have institutions than can save them from the murderers, just as they no longer have a Beirut that will embrace them and give them intellectual sustenance and a fleeting chance to engage in introspection after an atrocity like the one in Paris—to ask themselves the hard questions that only they can pose and answer. Alas, the old Beirut is no more, just as the old Alexandria is no more. We are left with the faded memories and lamentations of a world that cannot be restored any time soon. It is indeed the time of the assassins, and they are, for now, unopposed by their own people.”
I don’t agree with the author in everything, but at least it is an Arab viewing the events and refusing to blame outsiders for the crap in which Arabs find themselves.
Turkey, Indonesia, Malaysia, Morocco, Brunei – these are off the top of my head, and these are not the best places in the world to live, but they’re not too bad.
I don’t think we’re getting anywhere – my main quibble is that you still are making sweeping statements rather than being more selective. “They’re all shitty” is wrong and foolish, IMO, while “many or most of them are shitty compared to the western world” is probably not. Maybe just a nitpick, but I tend to nitpick things that are related to bigotry and discrimination.
You thought that a link to the page for Caliphate was an argument showing how the content of religious beliefs played a role in Muslim societies falling behind Christian ones. It’s an odd choice, given that the Caliphate began a period when the Muslim world was much better off than the Christian world, and that this period was ended by Mongol invasion (which I presume you do not believe was caused by the content of Islamic theology). And you offered up this argument while simultaneously mischaracterizing my position as being that all religions are the same–something I had expressly disclaimed multiple times in this thread.
So sue me if I addressed you like you didn’t have any idea what you were talking about.
If you’re like me and you don’t think any religion is divinely inspired, then at the end of the day there’s nothing really valuable in distinguishing religion from culture. To say that local circumstances shaped Islam is to miss the point, since local circumstances created Islam. And Christianity. And Judaism. Etc. In other words, it is sort of nonsensical to try to put some effects in the “religion caused” box and some in the “culture/geography/economy caused” box, because one box is inside the other one.
My interest in these arguments is reminding people that Islam is what Muslims interpret it to be. You can choose to believe that the real Islam is the one espoused by ISIS and Boko Haram. But why the fuck would you do that? Why wouldn’t you say that the real Islam is the one espoused by my neighbors who spend Sundays at the homeless shelter?
Heh. Not a friggin’ clue. It’s probably impossible, as is separating religion from culture.
In the immortal words of Hannibal Lecter, Brunei sounds charming.
But when they’re children, they’re absolutely adorable.
There are liberal and progressive Muslim societies, which Bahrain is an example of.
I wrote that progression occurs when strict adherence to the basic tenets evolve over time. Just like all religions have done, except large portions of Islam. The most basic form of adherence to sharia law is in conflict with liberal democracy. The form of Islam Bahrain has progressed to is not. Like I just wrote but you apparently glossed over, OK I will play sharia law can be interpreted differently (instead of my contention it is normal progression away from the barbaric parts). Still, large parts of one major religion in the world produces almost all of the terrorism in the world. You cannot argue that away, it is a fact. You wish to spin the blame away from where it lies, which restricts acknowledgement and ultimately discussion that can promote the change required to stop this shit like in Paris.
You brought up your experience, as if to jam me in the same manner. If you would gone over the causeway into SA from Bahrain, you would be more enlightened than what you are showing here. My experience in these countries and cultures extends beyond wikipedia and bars while on shore leave in Bahrain. If you want to ignore that, then that is your choice.