I seriously doubt whether we’ll be safer altho’ I will concede that it is a possibility should our troops vacate Iraq.
The removal of these troops is welcomed by me, the whole frigging business is a stain on the character of the UK and USA, a stain that will take many years to erase
Misinterpretation? On what are you basing this?
On the fact that there’s a whole bunch of muslims who do not share this view?
It’s like sayng Ann Coulter’s interpretation of Christianity means every single Christian in the world is intent on converting heathens at the point of a sword.
My office is perhaps 30% muslim, and so far not one of 'em has tried to convert me to The Faith.*
*unless the yummy samosas that were shared to celebrate Eid last week counts as an attempt to establish The Caliphate in rural Warwickshire. MMmm… spicey!
Whether anyone shares that belief or not you were talking about interpretations. It may be that the ones not trying to convert you are the ones misinterpreting, or not following, their religion properly.
It’s quite simple. Any Muslim who believes in violent Jihad or establishing a Caliphate is No True Muslim… or is it only if they put sugar on their porridge? I can never keep that straight.
There is no problem accepting that they are true Muslims. Ian Paisley and Pat Robertson and Fred Phelps really are Christians (despite their abuse of the terachings of Jesus of Nazareth). However, while they are Christians and the Wahabbists are Muslims, they do not represent “Christianity” or “Islam.” To say that some religious nuts give their belief a bad reputation is accurate (since there will always be ignorant lumpers who simply throw tags at people and then irrationally accept that the same tag assigned to separate groups lumps them together ijn spite of the evidence), but it is wrong to join such lumpers in promoting such ignorance.
Ratchet back the language. Let’s not start an emotional brawl.
[ /Moderating ]
In as much as nobody does or possibly can, I have no problem agreeing with that. The problem I have is with defining out any schools of thought within Islam which are hostile to modernity as not being True Islam, or what have you. Which, I believe, is essentially what stating that a sect, say, Wahabism, is a “misinterpretation”. It’s a No True Scotsman fallacy.
They do not represent “Islam” (that’d be a fallacy of division in any case), but they certainly do represent a part of Islam. Saying that their beliefs are a ‘misinterpretation’ certainly seems, from where I sit, to be saying that they’re not true Muslim beliefs, or rather True Muslim Beliefs.
I’m not, and I would never say that all Muslims are bad, or hostile to the west, or what have you. But there are millions who would qualify, perhaps even hundreds of millions, and entire sects that do qualify. I have no problem with saying “Wahabism is a virulent and dangerous ideology that is not shared by the majority of Muslims”. That’s fine. Trouble arises, however, when one says “Wahabism is a misinterpretation of Islam and is No True Islamic School of Thought.”
Wahabists honestly believe that they are speaking from an Islamic point of view, and believe that they are representing Islam. I believe we should take them at their word. It is not a misinterpretation of Islam, it is simply a violent and dangerous interpretation of Islam.
It’s the difference between acknowledging that there are some seriously dangerous schools of thought within Islam, and trying to divest all of them with a No True Scotsman fallacy.
But the fallacy cuts both ways… there are posters upthread (e.g. Uzi) claiming that muslims who do NOT share violent Islamist tendencies are Not True Muslims.
Agreed without reservation. The fallacies of composition and division are both real bitches.
Well, a bit of reservation. I didn’t read Uzi as saying that those who aren’t violent are No True Muslims, merely that if we’re going to talk about true interpretations, maybe one we don’t like is the “true one”. I think he put it a bit badly but was trying to make a point about defining away various schools of thought within Islam. I am, however, open to being proven wrong on that count.
Sorry 'bout that… but really the mind truly boggles if somebody thinks that by removing our (UK) troops then by some miracle the war on terror stops
There is no ‘war on terror’. It is a cheap rhetorical trick of a term and it is quite right this government should be dropping its use.
Bingo. How did I phrase it badly? It looks to me as if someone interpreted what I said in an incorrect manner. Which is partly my point.
There are many passages in the Koran and the Hadiths that are not very nice for those who are not Muslims. Some use those passages to justify their actions. By doing so they are no less Muslims than those who ignore those passages.
For a Brit you don’t do irony/sarcasm very well.
The comment that ‘The War is Over’ has several levels.
1/ The UK Government are going to stop using it.
2/ Now only the US will use it.
3/ It never started so it cannot finish.
4/ It made a good title.
5/ It was a chance to poke ‘War on Terror’ believers with a big stick.
And one that is spread far and wide on the moneyed wings of our bestest buddies - the Saudi Royal Family.
You left room for misinterpretation instead of tacking on the standard boilerplate disclaimers 
I’d agree. If you notice, I’ve also been packing in caveats and qualifiers to avoid that sort of thing. Perhaps I shouldn’t have said you put it badly, merely that you didn’t put a fine enough point on it. My apologies.
There’s no “true” interpretation - that’s almost implied by the need to “interpret”?
It matters not what the “true” version of Islam is, what counts is whether the average “muslim on the street” is a genuine believer in the need for violent jihad.
And the experience of UK posters suggests that this is not the case.
That’s not to say there aren’t such people in the UK, but they exist in the same way that Ann Coulter exists in the USA… on the fringes of acceptable opinion, and well outside mainstream thought.
And it’s surely in that context that discussion on what exactly we’re “fighting” needs to be framed?
Words fail me with regard to your #5
Has anyone sent a memo to the terrorists to let them know the war is over?
-XT
Oh don’t worry about that, I’m sure Pjen has it all under control