# BREAKING NEWS: The Netherlands to Abandon Multiculturalism! **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [June 23, 2011, 8:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-news-the-netherlands-to-abandon-multiculturalism/586606 "2011-06-23T20:07:17Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 9
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2011, 3:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-news-the-netherlands-to-abandon-multiculturalism/586606/161 "2011-06-27T15:19:09Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > Would have thought Buddhism would fall under the “Mostly Harmless” category, together with Wicca and Satanism, despite its superior historical success. Buddhism can and has been exploitative in places and times where it is powerful. Religious benevolence tends to wax and wane inversely with how much power it has. It does have the advantage of having little interest in conversion by force, as far as I know. But I wouldn’t want to live in a Buddhist theocracy. ---
**Author:** ![Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/f04885/32.png) [@Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Qin_Shi_Huangdi)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2011, 3:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-news-the-netherlands-to-abandon-multiculturalism/586606/162 "2011-06-27T15:35:51Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > Would have thought Buddhism would fall under the “Mostly Harmless” category, together with Wicca and Satanism, despite its superior historical success. How much has it done for civilization compared to Christianity? :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2011, 4:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-news-the-netherlands-to-abandon-multiculturalism/586606/163 "2011-06-27T16:14:02Z")
What has Christianity done for civilization? ---
**Author:** ![Siam\_Sam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d78d45/32.png) [@Siam\_Sam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Siam_Sam)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2011, 4:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-news-the-netherlands-to-abandon-multiculturalism/586606/164 "2011-06-27T16:31:05Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > Would have thought Buddhism would fall under the “Mostly Harmless” category, together with Wicca and Satanism, despite its superior historical success. > [@Der\_Trihs](#): > > Buddhism can and has been exploitative in places and times where it is powerful. Religious benevolence tends to wax and wane inversely with how much power it has. It does have the advantage of having little interest in conversion by force, as far as I know. But I wouldn’t want to live in a Buddhist theocracy. I’m with **Der Trihs** on Buddhism. I do live in a Buddhist society, and while it’s a vast improvement over Christianity, it’s still shameful the way it’s used to manipulate. Part of it is the way it’s blended with the old superstitions. Most Westerners don’t think of fortune telling and necromancy and such as part of Buddhism, but it certainly is in this region. There are really some very shiftless monks out there too, some real dregs. I’m never sure which is odder: The views on Buddhism by Westerrners who have never been to a Buddhist society, or the views of on Christianity by Thai Christians who have never been to a Christian country. ---
**Author:** ![Kyomara](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/8edcca/32.png) [@Kyomara](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kyomara)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2011, 6:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-news-the-netherlands-to-abandon-multiculturalism/586606/165 "2011-06-27T18:22:11Z")
> [@Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](#): > > How much has it done for civilization compared to Christianity? :rolleyes: I would ridicule you for this question, except for your user name. Are you being facetious? ---
**Author:** ![robert\_columbia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e79b87/32.png) [@robert\_columbia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/robert_columbia)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2011, 11:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-news-the-netherlands-to-abandon-multiculturalism/586606/166 "2011-06-27T23:36:06Z")
> [@Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](#): > > As a Western Cultural supremacist I rejoice at this news. Our civilization should aim for complete westernization of the world. Your ideas fascinate me and I would like to subscribe to your mailing list. ---
**Author:** ![robert\_columbia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e79b87/32.png) [@robert\_columbia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/robert_columbia)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2011, 11:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-news-the-netherlands-to-abandon-multiculturalism/586606/167 "2011-06-27T23:37:40Z")
> [@Der\_Trihs](#): > > And Christians have a justification to covert others by the sword. … The Amish would disagree with you on that. ---
**Author:** ![Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/f04885/32.png) [@Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Qin_Shi_Huangdi)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2011, 12:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-news-the-netherlands-to-abandon-multiculturalism/586606/168 "2011-06-28T00:09:39Z")
> [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#): > > What has Christianity done for civilization? The West (in large part derived from Christianity) helped establish such things as the value of human life, equality before the law, and so on. Of course Buddhism does ascribe value to human life but to a large extent it was theoretical and not in practice. And I find it amusing (although he certainly won’t respond) that Thailand is better say than the US despite the rampancy of drugs and sex slavery in that country. Certainly there are better examples of Buddhist societies such as Japan or Taiwan (although that’d be also quite Confucian) > [@Kyomara](#): > > I would ridicule you for this question, except for your user name. Are you being facetious? Qin Shi Huangdi had nothing to do with either religion (Buddhism would not reach China until the Han Dynasty). ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2011, 12:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-news-the-netherlands-to-abandon-multiculturalism/586606/169 "2011-06-28T00:19:27Z")
> [@Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](#): > > How much has it done for civilization compared to Christianity? :rolleyes: [shrug] India and China and Japan and Korea have done a lot for civilization. Whether they could have done as much with no Buddhist influence, who knows? Whether Western Civilization could have done as much without Christian influence, who knows? ---
**Author:** ![woodstockbirdybird](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/woodstockbirdybird/32/7905_2.png) [@woodstockbirdybird](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/woodstockbirdybird)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2011, 12:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-news-the-netherlands-to-abandon-multiculturalism/586606/170 "2011-06-28T00:30:19Z")
> [@Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](#): > > The West (in large part derived from Christianity) helped establish such things as the value of human life, equality before the law, and so on. Of course Buddhism does ascribe value to human life but to a large extent it was theoretical and not in practice. Yeah, I love that value of human life the Christians established with the slaves. And the non-theoretical value it placed on human life during the Crusades and the Inquisition. You do realize how ridiculous this is, right? ---
**Author:** ![Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/f04885/32.png) [@Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Qin_Shi_Huangdi)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2011, 12:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-news-the-netherlands-to-abandon-multiculturalism/586606/171 "2011-06-28T00:32:55Z")
> [@woodstockbirdybird](#): > > Yeah, I love that value of human life the Christians established with the slaves. And the non-theoretical value it placed on human life during the Crusades and the Inquisition. You do realize how ridiculous this is, right? It wasn’t an immediate process. But it was ulimately due to the domination of the West that the world is civilized as it is right now-everybody practiced slavery until quite recently and it was evangelicals in Britain who helped form the first anti-slavery societies. ---
**Author:** ![Chen019](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f19dbf/32.png) [@Chen019](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chen019)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2011, 12:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-news-the-netherlands-to-abandon-multiculturalism/586606/172 "2011-06-28T00:35:36Z")
> [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#): > > What has Christianity done for civilization? Some stuff [apparently](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Role_of_the_Catholic_Church_in_Western_civilization). > [@](#): > > Joseph Schumpeter, an economist of the twentieth century, referring to the Scholastics, wrote, “it is they who come nearer than does any other group to having been the ‘founders’ of scientific economics.”[61] Other economists and historians, such as Raymond de Roover, Marjorie Grice-Hutchinson, and Alejandro Chafuen, have also made similar statements. Historian Paul Legutko of Stanford University said the Catholic Church is “at the center of the development of the values, ideas, science, laws, and institutions which constitute what we call Western civilization.”[62]… > > Several historians credit the Catholic Church for what they consider to be the brilliance and magnificence of Western art.[citation needed] They refer to the Church’s consistent opposition to Byzantine iconoclasm, a movement against visual representations of the divine, and its insistence on building structures befitting worship. Important contributions include its cultivation and patronage of individual artists, as well as development of the Romanesque, Gothic and Renaissance styles of art and architecture.[54] Renaissance artists such as Raphael, Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci, Bernini, Botticelli, Fra Angelico, Tintoretto, Caravaggio, and Titian, were among a multitude of innovative virtuosos sponsored by the Church.[55] > > In music, Catholic monks developed the first forms of modern Western musical notation in order to standardize liturgy throughout the worldwide Church,[58] and an enormous body of religious music has been composed for it through the ages. This led directly to the emergence and development of European classical music, and its many derivatives. The Baroque style, which encompassed music, art, and architecture, was particularly encouraged by the post-Reformation Catholic Church as such forms offered a means of religious expression that was stirring and emotional, intended to stimulate religious fervor.[59] > … > The Catholic Church established a hospital system in Medieval Europe that was different from the merely reciprocal hospitality of the Greeks and family-based obligations of the Romans. These hospitals were established to cater to “particular social groups marginalized by poverty, sickness, and age,” according to historian of hospitals, Guenter Risse.[ ---
**Author:** ![Uzi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/91b2a8/32.png) [@Uzi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Uzi)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2011, 12:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-news-the-netherlands-to-abandon-multiculturalism/586606/173 "2011-06-28T00:52:57Z")
> [@Ibn\_Warraq](#): > > Please don’t tell me you’re thinking of the fasting that goes on during Ramadan because if so then you really don’t understand it. If you think it is about proving your devotion to god, or getting to know the poor, etc., then you truly don’t understand it. Lack of food, water and sleep plus extra prayers to ram the message home = brainwashing. Add to this threatening followers who might want to leave with death (and essentially everyone around them who isn’t a Muslim) = dangerous cult. > [@](#): > > I’m also amused by the “dangerous cult” claim. I glad you’re amused. ---
**Author:** ![Ibn\_Warraq](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/e19b73/32.png) [@Ibn\_Warraq](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ibn_Warraq)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2011, 1:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-news-the-netherlands-to-abandon-multiculturalism/586606/174 "2011-06-28T01:54:22Z")
> [@Uzi](#): > > If you think it is about proving your devotion to god, or getting to know the poor, etc., then you truly don’t understand it. > > Lack of food, water and sleep plus extra prayers to ram the message home = brainwashing. Add to this threatening followers who might want to leave with death (and essentially everyone around them who isn’t a Muslim) = dangerous cult. Except Muslims don’t starve themselves nor forbid themselves from sleeping. Also, Catholics who attend Mass every dan and Orthodox Jews pray more often than most Muslims. You really should learn more about Islam before making stupid comments about it, such as claiming that they suffer from sleep deprivation. ---
**Author:** ![Farmer\_Jane](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/bbe5ce/32.png) [@Farmer\_Jane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Farmer_Jane)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2011, 2:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-news-the-netherlands-to-abandon-multiculturalism/586606/175 "2011-06-28T02:07:23Z")
> [@Uzi](#): > > If you think it is about proving your devotion to god, or getting to know the poor, etc., then you truly don’t understand it. Both Islam and Judaism (and some sects of Christianity, I believe) have traditions of fasting, extra prayers, and acknowledgments of the haves and have nots. That’s a mark of a collective social consciousness, not brainwashing. There are **seven** fast days in the Jewish year, and they go for about 24 hours each (sundown to sundown) and not the half day fasts of Ramadan. For some, those are harder to deal with, so maybe you should direct your spite elsewhere if you think it is so deserved. :o ---
**Author:** ![Uzi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/91b2a8/32.png) [@Uzi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Uzi)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2011, 2:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-news-the-netherlands-to-abandon-multiculturalism/586606/176 "2011-06-28T02:19:29Z")
> [@Ibn\_Warraq](#): > > Except Muslims don’t starve themselves nor forbid themselves from sleeping. Do you deny that during Ramadan Muslims aren’t allowed to drink and eat during the day? Do you also deny that in practice they then spend most of the night making up for it resulting in a lack of sleep? Do you also deny that rather than the _ **FIVE** _ times a day prayers there are even more where the entire Koran is read over the course of a month? What percentage of the day do you think this adds up to where religion is the only focus? > [@](#): > > Also, Catholics who attend Mass every dan 5 times a day? > [@](#): > > and Orthodox Jews pray more often than most Muslims. Hey, maybe it’s a cult, too. Muslims don’t have exclusivity. > [@](#): > > You really should learn more about Islam before making stupid comments about it, such as claiming that they suffer from sleep deprivation. I’m just reporting the facts. You’re the one wanting to reinterpret them into something harmless. ---
**Author:** ![Ibn\_Warraq](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/e19b73/32.png) [@Ibn\_Warraq](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ibn_Warraq)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2011, 2:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-news-the-netherlands-to-abandon-multiculturalism/586606/177 "2011-06-28T02:22:20Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > Is it not true that all Muslims have a duty – or at least a justification – to kill any Muslim who apostasizes? In the same sense that Christians and Jews have “a duty-- or at least a justification” to anyone who goes to another religion. Deuteronomy 13:7-12 > [@](#): > > 1. If your own full brother, or your son or daughter, or your beloved wife, or you intimate friend, entices you secretly to serve other gods, whom you and your fathers have not known, gods of any other nations, near at hand or far away, from one end of the earth to the other: do not yield to him or listen to him, nor look with pity upon him, to spare or shield him, but kill him. Your hand shall be the first raised to slay him; the rest of the people shall join in with you. You shall stone him to death, because he sought to lead you astray from the Lord, your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, that place of slavery. also in the same sense that Christians and Jewish husbands have “a duty-- or at least as justification” for murdering their wives on their wedding night if they discover they aren’t virgins. Deuteronomy 22:20-21 > [@](#): > > But if this charge is true (that she wasn’t a virgin on her wedding night), and evidence of the girls virginity is not found, they shall bring the girl to the entrance of her fathers house and there her townsman shall stone her to death, because she committed a crime against Israel by her unchasteness in her father’s house. Thus shall you purge the evil from your midst Yes, there are parts of the Quran that are quite horrible but no matter how you measure it, the scriptures of the Jews and the Christians are at least as horrible. However, Most Muslims, Christians and Jews tend to ignore the uglier commands of the God of Abraham. ---
**Author:** ![Ibn\_Warraq](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/e19b73/32.png) [@Ibn\_Warraq](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ibn_Warraq)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2011, 2:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-news-the-netherlands-to-abandon-multiculturalism/586606/178 "2011-06-28T02:32:20Z")
> [@Uzi](#): > > Do you deny that during Ramadan Muslims aren’t allowed to drink and eat during the day? Do you also deny that in practice they then spend most of the night making up for it resulting in a lack of sleep? Do you also deny that rather than the _ **FIVE** _ times a day prayers there are even more where the entire Koran is read over the course of a month? What percentage of the day do you think this adds up to where religion is the only focus? Uh, Ramadan is one month and it’s based(though Muslims don’t like to admit this) on Jewish practices. Furthermore, no my father wasn’t a fan of Ramadan, but he never had problems with sleep deprivation and the half-day fasts didn’t have remotely the effect needed for brain washing. Also, if they were going to use it for brain-washing children would have to observe the fasts, but they don’t. Sorry dude, but you need to find better propaganda. > [@](#): > > I’m just reporting the facts. You’re the one wanting to reinterpret them into something harmless. No, you’re reporting myths as facts. Anyway, if you don’t mind my asking, since you have such an extreme hatred for Sharia law, why have you chosen “Uzi” for your username since Israel allows for the practice of Sharia law and bases many of it’s own laws on Sharia law. ---
**Author:** ![Uzi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/91b2a8/32.png) [@Uzi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Uzi)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2011, 2:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-news-the-netherlands-to-abandon-multiculturalism/586606/179 "2011-06-28T02:59:44Z")
> [@Ibn\_Warraq](#): > > Uh, Ramadan is one month and it’s based(though Muslims don’t like to admit this) on Jewish practices. Furthermore, no my father wasn’t a fan of Ramadan, but he never had problems with sleep deprivation and the half-day fasts didn’t have remotely the effect needed for brain washing. I’m basing my statements on direct observation on how Ramada was practiced in Yemen. > [@](#): > > Also, if they were going to use it for brain-washing children would have to observe the fasts, but they don’t. Children are allowed to observe the fast. > [@](#): > > No, you’re reporting myths as facts. And you’ve lived a sheltered life. > [@](#): > > Anyway, if you don’t mind my asking, since you have such an extreme hatred for Sharia law, You mean law that sentences a woman to death by stoning because of adultery, or to the lash because she was raped? That law? Should my hatred for it be less extreme? Or should I accept it as being part of a different culture to my own? Tell where I should put it on my ‘hate’ meter? Tell me why I should even want to allow a small foothold of such barbarity in my country? > [@](#): > > why have you chosen “Uzi” for your username since Israel allows for the practice of Sharia law and bases many of it’s own laws on Sharia law. I was in the army long ago and was speaking about it a few years later when a co-worker applied that nickname to me because that was the extent of their knowledge of military weapons. It’s a username. I’m not promoting Israel or the brand of weapon which would be one of my last choices if I needed a gun. ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2011, 3:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-news-the-netherlands-to-abandon-multiculturalism/586606/180 "2011-06-28T03:03:43Z")
> [@Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](#): > > The West (in large part derived from Christianity) helped establish such things as the value of human life, equality before the law, and so on. Please. The more civilized aspects of “western society” were mostly put in place against the tooth-and-nail opposition of Christianity. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-news-the-netherlands-to-abandon-multiculturalism/586606.md?page=8) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-news-the-netherlands-to-abandon-multiculturalism/586606.md?page=10)