Pointing out the existence of violence in the Bible does not justify or excuse modern-day Islamic terrorism. Yet you people bring it up in every fucking thread on the subject.
Whose side are you on???
Look, I get it. The idea is that every atrocity committed by Christians in the name of religion was done despite their religion. Whereas many, if not most, of the atrocities committed by Muslims are done in accordance with their religion. And so the idea is, Islam is therefore The Problem. And if you were to root out the Islam, then the poison ideology driving all these people to do what they do would be gone, and they would go back–as if the body-snatcher was chased out of them–to being normal human beings like you and me.
But you are ignoring:
Other religious texts besides the Koran, namely those of Judaism and also Christianity insofar as it subsumes the OT, contain equally violent and illiberal themes yet they don’t seem to drive people to uncontrollable violence,
Most of the Muslim world is not rife with violent extremism, and as an empirical matter the vast majority of Muslims are no more violent than you or me,
Most of what we call radical Islamic violence seems to coincide either with situations of civil war or specific geopolitical or socio-economic grievances that have been allowed to get sufficiently out of control that people resort to extremism, over which Islam hardly has a monopoly when viewed from a historical perspective [see: The Troubles; King David Hotel bombing; etc.].
It appears as if you have done more research than I have. I’m willing to take your word for it that it is more common than we think and I agree it is a statistic that will be hard to document.
I think most of these say the same thing. I will return to my criticism that a religion practiced with no restraint is actually the true nature of that religion. Everyone else practicing it, even if it is 99.9% of the people who are practicing it, are practicing a modified version of that religion. I am actually, really, criticizing the idea that all religions are equally bad because some people from all religions do bad things. That is simply carrying the apologetics too far in the wrong direction.
If you were an Atheist, an Infidel, a homosexual or a woman, which theocracy would you rather live in, one run by Muslims or one run by Janists?
Whose side? Well I like to think think that we are all on the side of Truth, Love and Justice. But some people seem to have a very strange idea about what those means, which in my analysis stems from a lack of gnosis (or knowledge). Basically people do not know who they actually are, confusing themselves with their egos, and act from fear and hatred because of this.
But I suppose you meant something along the lines of are you in the christian camp or the muslim camp, the whitey or brownie camp, my tribe or your tribe. The answer is that I am not in your tribe nor theirs. I view you as confused children who have forgotten who you truly are, in order to play out your secret fantasies of separation, hatred, violence and chaos. You have divided yourself into teams depending on whatever it is your particular ego fancies, be it a belief system, culture or ethnic group. Then you make war on other teams (or tribes) because that is the only way you can support your fake identity. Basically you need enemies in order to be You, because you define yourself by creating something in your mind that is different from you.
Ultimately I don’t believe you are real or to be taken seriously. You’re just a figment of imagination, running amok in a human consciousness, pretending to be a “person”. You’re basically a program running on wet software, but you’ve got some bugs and double commands in you that make you act erratically. Jesus saw this, as did Buddha and many others. Unfortunately this is not a popular truth and as far as I can tell all societies are built on perpetuating the illusion that you are the ego, and that there is a you and them to begin with.
And I suspect that the reason people like to bring up to atrocious violence of the Bible is not to “defend muslim terrorists” but to point put the hypocrisy of one genocidal religion calling another genocidal religion violent. They’re not saying that muslim terrorists are better than any other terrorists, they’re saying that your book is just as bad as their book. And they have a point.
In that case your question makes very little sense, since as far as I can tell nobody in this thread has condoned any violence. Everyone seems to be firmly against violence, but you seem to be upset that the violent nature of one book/religion is brought up to compare with the violent nature of another book/religion.
So it seems that these particular “sides” only exist in your mind.
I’m not a Middle East expert, but I say a bit about Central Africa and environs, which is a huge region that has some Christian areas, some Muslim areas, and many thoroughly mixed areas.
First we have Sudan. Years ago, the narrative was that the bad old Muslim north was ruthlessly opressing the otherwise wonderful Christian south, and if the south was just liberated, they could serve as the model of development. Well, with a lot of help, South Sudan was formed and promptly showed us that that charismatic Christian minority was just as willing to destroy their people and land as anyone else.
Then we have Central Africa Republic, where a decades-long war took on a religious flavor, and soon Christian militias were vowing to kill or drive out every Muslim in the nation. International peace keeping forces have managed to stave off the planned genocide, but Muslims are fleeing the country in droves.
Do you think women’s rights are great in largely Christian Southern Cameroon (where people apply bhot irons to young women’s breasts to restrict their growth). Do you think they are great in DRC? Would you rather be a Christian woman in rural Liberia or a Muslim woman in modern Istanbul?
Regardless, wherever you are traveling in the region, try not to get accused of being a witch. You can find yourself on trial or even lynched— by nice, tolerant Christians who would never dream of killing someone for violating their religious norms. Except for that.
In Africa, at least, the pattern is clearly that poor, unstable, violent places are poor, unstable and vilent, regardless of religion.
I think your points may very well have merit, sufficient merit, enough quite possibly to invalidate my initial claim, ie, Palestinian Christians are not violent so why are Muslim Palestinians? Well, maybe the answer is they do not have sufficient numbers. Small minorities can rarely act with impunity the way a majority can.
Upon further reflection I think you - have - caused my to change my mind. Or, at least, to seriously modify my position! I can see now it really is largely, mainly, cultural impact. Religious dogma may influence it but it is really the overall mentality of the region that is important.
Some cites please for your claims that Christianity killed more than Islam. Christianity spread through the Roman Empire. It didnt need to spread by invasion. Both religions faught over the scraps of the Roman Empire.
If you wanna talk genocidal nothing beats athiesm. It murdered tens of millions of people in a small handful of decades. Unlike the religions, there was no way to convert to them.
Not a single one? All Palestinian Christians are entirely peaceful? That would be remarkable, and probably make them the most peaceful Christians on earth and in human history.
But to answer your question… I think if you find one or two cases of an action based on religious/political motivation you can not know the true cause. But, if you find a pattern then that is saying something different…
Since Christianity was already in existence and Islam invaded its lands I think we can understand that Christianity didnt have a favorable view of Islam.
Cite please for your claim that Islam has been less violent.
There isnt a consensus that the 30 Year War was a religious war
Its hyperbole that fits well into this thread. Communism was officially athiestic. It had many true believers. And, like Naziism, its victims could do nothing to save themselves.
I’ll agree there is a pattern – there is a strong (but not nearly universal) correlation today between terrorism and Islam. But I’ll agree with your modified position, in general – this correlation is much less about the text of religious books, and much more about culture and politics. Generally, desperate people will be much more likely to do desperate things – wealthy and healthy people don’t risk themselves or their families for politics or religion, in general. So I think the modern correlation will change when and if these countries become safer, more prosperous, and more open and free. I don’t think a happy, healthy, and well-fed Iranian or Afghani or Pakistani person is significantly more likely to want to kill people or themselves than a happy, healthy, and well-fed American or Canadian.